230 - The Tide Pools of Your Life | My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark

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My favorite murder Hello and welcome to My Favorite Murder. The professional version of our podcast.

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It's the one you've been waiting for. The good one. You know, it's the NPR version where we're journalists, professionals.

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Oh, did you say depressional? Oh, my God. No. That's amazing. Hi, spinoff. What's up?

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We're professionals. Depressionals. Time for the depressionals. Do you have to go into the office and you're super chemically bummed about it?

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We understand. Are you wearing the same sweatpants for the past two weeks? We get it.

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We're depressionals. Hopeless. But typing? The depressionals. Our new sitcom. On Quibi.

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Next month. Poor Quibi. No one will let Quibi. I know. Everyone's bullying Quibi on the playground.

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I know. I mean, really, Chrissy Teigen as a judge, I'm like kind of totally down for it.

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There's no problem with it. It's just it doesn't. I think it's reductive to pretend that people want to be staring at their phones all the time.

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I don't think it's what any of us want. It's just a full on addiction. It's like if they came out with designer syringes.

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we as the addicts don't want that. We're now doing this because we can't go anywhere else.

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We're not trying to up our heroin game. No. And like make it a luxury heroin game.

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No, I want something to look away from the phone for. That's my dream. These days, watching TV is an escape from your phone.

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It's like not anymore a negative thing. This is a little hell machine that we have to stare at in case someone's a coming.

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But we don't want to. No, I'm having a hard time just with a little bit. I a lot of it.

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I am lately on my phone. Yeah, yeah, I agree. There's a lot of input and not a lot of positive.

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I mean, you have to look for it. Every day is negative. Every day is a new negative.

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here's a pause that I'll give you because my sister texted this to me yesterday and I thought you'd enjoy it

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it's an interview with Bill Gates and the person asks what are the skills today's students need to know

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to thrive in the world of 2030 and 2040 and Bill Gates said for the curious learner

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these are the best of times because your ability to constantly refresh your knowledge

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with either podcasts or lectures that are online is better than ever do you think bill gates is a murderino

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basically i'm saying he's a murderino oh this is my favorite murder the podcast did we already

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say oh that's karen kilgarra that's georgia hardstark hi definitely didn't say that part

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hi hi what's how are you what's going on um let me think it's been a stressful week

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But lots of Lots of kind of conversations With my therapist that are like You know, I'm on a boat

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And the boat is on high seas But that doesn't mean They're going to be It's going to be wavy forever

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It's just how it is now These are the tide pools of your life And right now you're in the tide pool

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With like really angry fish these really really angry small fish what were they called? Parrot fish?

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Those parrot fish with the teeth? Yeah. That are dicks? But someday it's going to all be starfish

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and fucking those dick slugs there's going to be there's going to be whales winking at you out of the corner of their eye because that the only way they can look at you because they so giant It going to be helping at all

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My therapist gave me homework last week, which I usually am like goodbye. You're like, I can't fucking do this.

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What are you talking? We've talked about my, I feel like I have a learning disability undiagnosed, and yet

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you give me algebra? She's like, you know what you need to do? You need to find X. You need to find the value of X.

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You're the value of X, Georgia, all along. But it actually did end up being good.

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So, yeah, thank God for therapy during this horrible, horrible time. Would you have to give us a general idea?

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Do you have to write something in a notebook? Did you have to like... I had to make a list of shoulds that I feel like I have, you know, like I should be this place in my life.

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And I should be this happy all the time. And I should be like cool, but also like feminine.

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and like all my shoulds you know what I mean I should know if I want a baby or not

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like those things all bullshit it was like what was the what was the dog from the Simpsons

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oh yeah the skate dog of course you know Poochie the rapping Poochie that's right

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but also feminine but feminine like Poochie but feminine but then she said then the next week after I read it to her

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she was like okay now look at this list would you tell any of your friends that they should have all these things done already too and i'm like no yeah yeah that's

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very effective when you're like it sounds fine to say that to me but i of course i would never

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say that to anybody else i like my friends messy yeah well and also it's like no i bet you people

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have three babies and don't know if they should be having babies like i don't think the baby thing

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ever feels like and you know there's i'm sure there's some people are like i knew it since i

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So it's dangerously young. But I don't know. I think it's all scary. How could anyone feel like 100% about anything, especially these days?

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These days. Fuck, man. Did you just slap someone? I threw my pen down. What if I slapped me?

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It sounds like a good face slap right there. Remember all the Zoom mess-ups in the beginning of these times

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when people just kept fucking up on Zoom and one guy like threw a cat, his cat. It was not just that cat, it was his cat.

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His own cat. It wasn't just a stray cat. It was a cat he was supposed to love. Did you see the one where the little girl was arranging the bookshelf

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behind her mom while she was on the BBC News? No, that's adorable. It was almost like that family was like,

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how can we try to be this super cute little girl that walks in while her dad's talking?

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And this little girl came in and started moving books on this top shelf kind of like in the back of the room while the mom was like clearly talking about

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I didn't actually I can't listen to news clips anymore like I can't risk hearing the things that

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then will like rattle in my brain so I can't why I don't listen to the audio of anything so that

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woman could have been talking about any number of things yeah yeah she could have been like how to

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train your children to reorganize your bookshelves you got to assume whatever it is it's not that

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I think that would be a good assumption. She's like, I got this one trained in three weeks.

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Watch her go. You just need some pirate's booty and a little bit of focus. Let's see here.

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Oh, I wanted to. So a couple of weeks ago when we had our episode called The Seasons in the Abyss or whatever.

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right after we posted that fucking Slayer someone from Slayer a lovely person named Emma reached out

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to us and was like do you guys want Slayer swag I listen to the podcast I think she's with the management team

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of Slayer is that right? so Emma thank you for sending us fucking Slayer and even Vince

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got some it was like our birthday so Jay on the Friday staff Zoom meeting was like

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oh someone named Emma from Slayer's management company reached out and asked if we wanted swag

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and everyone's like, yay! It was company-wise. Even Jay, who's like a fucking deadhead, I was like,

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are you sure Slayer's gonna fit in with your, like, because he's got a lot of Grateful Dead

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stuff. And he's like, nope, I fucking love it. It's great. Slayer is, Slayer crosses all divides for the

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depressionals. Slayer is the band, the boy who drove the van who wouldn't make eye contact

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and laid to your real license because he was baked out of his mind. That's the shirt he was wearing.

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Who doesn't love that? Let's see. Oh, I also want to... We have a new Phoebe friend of the podcast.

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You know how we collect Phoebes? Phoebe Judge, Phoebe Waller-Bridge. Oh, oh. There's another Phoebe.

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Would those two women declare themselves friends of the podcast or reclaiming them?

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We're claiming them. We're demanding them. They might have mentioned us or been mentioned near us in an article once somewhere, someday.

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I know. I think we make Phoebe Judge our friend. Phoebe Judge, I made up. She doesn't know.

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You just wanted the Phoebe to be in there. All right. Who's our third Phoebe? Phoebe Bridgers.

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Real talented gal. She's like on the charts. She said she listened to us when she was making her last album, Punisher.

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Yes. I fucking read this to you. This is every conversation I have with my sister.

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I told you this two weeks ago. She is a real person. I've been in the not paying attention, forgetting things tide pool of my life.

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Hey, that's a tough one. That a real that can be a real there a real undercurrent in that tide pool Yeah because it went it was an article that was in Pitchfork I believe And our logo was in the image of all the things

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Yeah, yeah. You're like, yeah. I've met her before. She was on a podcast that I used to record with Moon Zappa, and she was a guest on it.

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And she was so good and played a song. And I saw her open for Conor Oberst, and it was amazing.

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Yeah, she opened for someone else huge recently. It was the 1975. Oh, wow. That's awesome.

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She's a big deal. Well, I'm the last to know everything. No, she's great. She's a real talented gal.

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One more Phoebe to the pile. I bet you there's more out there than we can get. Keep your eye peeled.

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Did you see that thing? You know how we said, like, enough with the McKenzie's and the Brooklyns,

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and there was one other name, McKenzie, Brooklyn, and Madison. yeah and then some gal um tagged us in her twitter and it was herself and her two sisters

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and their names were mckenzie madison and brooklyn swear to god and it was an i feel attacked yeah

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and they're like we don't listen to you anymore fuck off how dare you hi mckenzie madison and

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brooklyn sorry okay let's do merch corner real quick let's do it yeah um there's some good stuff

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Yeah, we have like we're finally updating the our merch page. It's at my favorite murder dot com, the store.

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And we have a puzzle, which I have a puzzle. Are you so happy? Honestly, it looks way too hard for me.

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It's what I love is people are already sending because we haven't. I don't think we've talked actually on the current podcast about the puzzle.

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Have we plugged it yet? I think we like mentioned it. So people are now sending pictures of them starting it or doing it.

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Right. Which is my favorite. And somebody sent a picture saying this thing's going to be hard. And I was so excited because it is not easy.

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It's not a bait. It's not for babies. No, this is an advanced professional puzzle. And I'm proud. And all my dreams are coming true. Thank you, Georgia. Thank you, Stephen.

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It's like you, America. It's all about America and Phoebe's and the Depressionals have made it real and happen.

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Yeah. It looks hard. I don't want to do it. No, you don't have to. You don't have to.

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But let others do it for you. No, it's exciting. It's so exciting, though. But I guess for me, we have koozies of that really cool thumbprint design that I love, too.

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So that's, I'll take the koozies. You take the puzzles. Yes. Well, also, I like the puzzle because it shows a map of the United States that then has icons that show every city where we've done.

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It's like a bunch of the murders that we've covered. Right. So a little bit of drawings and stuff that have to like, you know, this and that.

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It's a little yearbook. It's a little three, four yearbook of all the things we've done so far.

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It's very kind of fun. And, you know, of course, about us. So that's exciting. The puzzle, of course, was made by Jade Young, who did our merch, like the really cool poster for our UK tour.

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Super talented and like obviously a puzzle freak because it's it's super hard. I mean, she didn't hand cut the pieces or anything, but yes, she designed this puzzle.

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She designed the heck out of it and she did it really fast. So she did great. Awesome. Thank you, Jade, for enabling us to have our own puzzle.

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You're our enabler. Go to MyFavoriteMurder.com to the store. yeah. And get our puzzle for your lake house.

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You know it needs it. Also now we have murdering of sweat pants and like sweat, what do they call them?

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They want to call them a lounging or a jogging set. But that's fucking sweat outfit.

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It's sweat. It's a sweatsuit for those who aren't that into sweating. Yeah. Should we do exactly right news

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highlight corner while we're here? Do it all. Read off that. Do you want me to do it?

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Okay. Sure. I'll be here with you. What do you mean what paper? This is off the cup.

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You know how. I memorized this monologue last night. So Murder Squad, this week they're doing the recent case of Specialist Vanessa Gann,

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which is a really, I mean, we've been following this on our own horrifying case out of Fort Hood, the U.S. Army base.

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It's so sad. Yeah. Condolences to her family and friends. So Billy and Paul are looking into that.

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And other unknown causes of death cases there, which is very interesting. And like, yeah, I can't wait to hear.

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I can't wait to hear that. That's right. Bananas has Arden Mirren on, who's a really funny comedian.

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This podcast will kill you. They, Aaron and Aaron are covering radiation. I mean, the best.

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Who doesn't fucking love radiation? It's so good. Also, the Perk House, this is so beautiful, Stephen.

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Stephen. You guys, they're covering the story of Elijah McClain, who was a young black man who used to volunteer his free time playing the violin for local shelter cats.

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And he was murdered by police in 2019. You've seen his face and the calls for his case to be solved.

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And so Stephen and Sarah are raising money to help that cause. Yeah, we're essentially just wanting to shed a little bit more light on the case because there's so many cases.

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And so we just wanted to take an opportunity to step back, talk about it, and encourage people to donate to the Family's GoFundMe.

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And yeah that simple but I think it was important to tell his story because he was such a sweet person That so beautiful He was a cat lover like you guys And I love that you I love that direction you going

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And that's so beautiful. Because you're right. It's like all of these unsolved or, you know, these these cases of violence or whatever are coming to the fore.

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And it's just lovely that people are taking the time to kind of focus on them and help people focus in specific ways.

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it's really good are you guys still doing the fundraising yeah the fundraising just started

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basically today so essentially if you go listen to the episode there's more details but if you

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donate to the families go fund me and you know show that you donated you basically get entered

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into a um into a random drawing where you can win a copy of stay sexy no get murdered uh signed

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and just some other per cast stuff and everything and you know it's it's not it's not an incentive

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to donate, but it's more of like a thank you, you know, for our listeners to, you know,

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just give back a little bit, which... That's beautiful, Stephen. Thank you so much.

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Thank you to you and Sarah for doing that. And yeah, I love keeping the attention on this and that the police who murdered him

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need to be brought to justice. It's really important. And then The Fall Line, always doing incredible work.

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Their new series starts this week. It's about the Atlanta Ripper. Really important.

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and then I said no gifts with Bridger Weineger as our friend Karen, friend of the podcast, Karen Kilgareff.

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Well, I think my gift might be the best one he's been given so far. Check it out. You tell me what you think.

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I think I won the gift competition. It's not a competition. It wasn't until you showed up.

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Now it's on. That's right. Yeah, we've got a nice, there's a nice lineup on Exactly Right this week.

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lots of entertainment all different kinds what do you need lots more to come we're working on it

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oh so much to come yeah gonna be so exciting um are you watching anything right now well we both

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talked about so we're obviously watching i'll be gone in the dark right with our with friend of the

00:20:04

podcast karen kilgariff making an experience making a karen phoebe kilgariff yes she's such a phoebe

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can we make phoebe be the like positive you know how everyone's saying karen's the negative

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How about Phoebe is like the friend. For a second, I honestly thought you meant Phoebe from friends.

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And I was just like, OK, yes, I'm liking this because Phoebe. Remember when we met her at that?

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Yes, I was going to say that we saw and met her at a party. She was so nice. So nice.

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So, you know, like just standing by the where people were getting drinks and somebody.

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I can't. We were talking to another person and then she just basically said, what are you guys talking about?

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Yeah, Lisa Kudrow. Lisa Kudrow comes up to our stupid conversation. It was you and me in a corner.

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Just us talking about each other to ourselves. And fucking Lisa Kudrow walks up to our other Phoebe.

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So we have so many Phoebes. That's what I'm saying. That's the first thing I went to because she was kind of bent over.

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What are you guys talking about? I'll always love her for that. And then we just, she and I chatted for like three minutes kind of about just,

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it's just like that thing where everyone you have to remember this for people who hate going to

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parties and we will go again someday and if you're going now truly go fuck yourself for real you're

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killing people don't go to parties i mean parties are you are you a fucking child like please no

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please anyway um well you have to remember when no one wants to go to a party everyone feels like

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they're the one that doesn't belong no matter who you are what you are whatever but if you're

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the kind of person that can just be like hey what are you talking about people will always

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be like i'll tell you anything i'm talking about because that's such a brave fun vulnerable thing

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that you just did yes of course on top of that you're phoebe from friends and everyone loves you

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yeah but still it's such a great move to make i mean you're opening yourself up right you have

00:22:07

to keep in mind that there's someone at that party who's more uncomfortable than you are

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So chances of you going up to someone and being like, hi, I'm being open and like vulnerable.

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You're going to make someone have a better time. Yes. Then they do some weird snobby thing where like they make a face at you.

00:22:26

Then you can you're allowed to slowly touch their face. Not yet. Not right now. Not in this climate.

00:22:33

But I'm just saying in the future. Because it's not assault. if you just weirdly rub your palm,

00:22:40

your kind of salty palm right down their face. Or the back of your fingers, like slowly down the side of their face.

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Like you're a strange Lothario walking through the party trying to seduce people.

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And that's on them that their face just got touched. If you're bored during quarantine,

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there's no reason you can't make up fights to have when we're all out of quarantine.

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Make them up, practice them, go over them a time or two. These are the tide pools of your life.

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And sometimes you're in the imaginary future fight tide pool. I'm going to stick with the stupid tide pool metaphor.

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Well, it's very visual. I'm seeing. Oh, you don't want to? I like it. Can I keep going?

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Okay. I just didn't know. Violent starfish and really scratchy rocks. Starfish is our band.

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The backup band for Phoebe Bridgers. Us is now violent starfish. The violent starfish.

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One, two, three, four. The titles of your life. The titles of your life. I just want to say this, and I actually, I'm almost positive I've told the story on this very podcast before.

00:23:42

When I spotted, I was with Bananas Boy, Scotty Landis, actually, when this happened.

00:23:48

I spotted Colin Farrell, I'm not kidding, from probably 80 yards away. I could feel him coming toward me.

00:23:56

It was magical, but one-sided. And then I was like, oh, my God. had the full wave of like,

00:24:02

oh my fucking God, it's Colin Farrell. And I turned to Scotty and I'm like, it's good. And he was already nodding very

00:24:08

tiny at me. Scotty is the most incognito person I've ever met. So he'll not give away your

00:24:17

bullshit. No. Keep it like a secret. He didn't even turn his head. He was just like,

00:24:25

mm-hmm. Did I tell you I saw Keanu Reeves? at the what's the mall on the corner of

00:24:36

La Cienega? The Bev Center? The Bev Center in like 98 at the height of my cuteness.

00:24:43

You know what I mean? It's all been downhill since then. We passed each other on the

00:24:48

escalator going up and down. And I swear to God he gave me sexy eyes. Yes, he did.

00:24:55

A little 18-year-old? Sure, with your little choker and your bangs and your barrettes.

00:25:01

God, he was so... It was like... It was a dream. How long was his hair? It was like early Matrix.

00:25:09

It was like long, short. You know, like flowy. Floppy on top, but then short. Yes!

00:25:16

He was so gory. I'm sure he was like, I'm going to ruin the next five years of this girl's life by giving me sexy eyes.

00:25:24

It's just like, oh, why don't... Okay. Okay, see, later I'm going to be, I'll be up at Sephora.

00:25:32

No, there was no Sephora, it was 98. No, pre-Sephora. It was a wet seal. I'm going to be at wet seal.

00:25:39

You'll be like, I'm going to be in the Macy's Estee Lauder section. That's how backwards this society is.

00:25:45

Timeline. That I have to buy makeup that doesn't match my skin. Where is MAC? Okay, here's something just to, while we're here.

00:25:54

Okay. Because I just had this thought. when Mac makeup came out, I remember this,

00:25:59

this came to me. It was 1990 or 1991. I lived in San Francisco. My roommate, Christy Ward,

00:26:07

who was also my roommate in Sacramento. She was there for me, the good times, but mostly for the bad times.

00:26:13

And Christy, she was very hip and she was very into knowing all the new stuff. Thank God for her.

00:26:20

She fucking was like, I was at Stonestown today and we're, I signed us up for this thing and it was a Mac tutorial that weekend.

00:26:29

And it wasn't like out on the floor. We were in a separate like conference room and the person,

00:26:35

I think either who started Mac or was like one of the main early people was there and like,

00:26:41

this is studio fix and like showed us this makeup that was not liquid makeup that covered all of my zits and all of my ruddy skin,

00:26:49

but like in five pats and all the, it was, I will never forget that day. I was like, and the Spice lip liner, it was like the 90s kicked off.

00:26:58

They were like the first people that were like, oh, you live in Sacramento? Doesn't matter.

00:27:01

You can look like a fucking candy raver from my club kid from New York, even though you

00:27:07

live in Sacramento. And like, here's how it goes. And you're like, shit, I live in Sacramento, but I can look like a fucking candy raver.

00:27:13

Here I am with my super powdery face, very brown lipstick for no reason. Yes. And a very dark brow.

00:27:22

And here we go. Let's get into it. It was I just think that was such a it was a it was a pivotal moment.

00:27:29

Mac makeup was the reason Christy Ward made it happen. Now, do we have a photo we can put on the Instagram of this episode?

00:27:38

I think I have one of a Raver Day candy, candy, Georgia. I can post you have a candy, Karen.

00:27:45

Yes. But see, my look was never anything like that because I'm older. But you had the skin of a girl who had on a lot like the skin.

00:27:53

Oh, hell yes. Okay. Yeah, yeah. Let's get that to Stephen. And lots of lipstick.

00:27:56

Okay. Even though it's Wednesday night right now, and Stephen has been working all fucking day,

00:28:03

and he's exhausted. Stephen, will you make sure that we get these fucking photos that are probably in our basements

00:28:10

and give them to you? Stephen, if you could come over and look through my basement, and I'm going to stay upstairs

00:28:16

wearing a mask. Please wear a mask. Please wear two masks. You'll be responsible.

00:28:21

Well, you shared the Sacramento photo with your, I think it was your friend and your roommate.

00:28:26

That's right. During those live shows, which was really great. That's true. People love that stuff.

00:28:31

Patty Riley, that was a Patty Riley special. She listens to every episode. Patty.

00:28:36

Patty. Oh, and also she's the one that had the Nick Terry shirt and got stopped on the street in San Francisco by another murderer who freaked out.

00:28:44

Was like, how did you get that shirt? And she was like, they're online. I keep seeing on TV things happening and then just going, ah, the old days.

00:28:51

I know. It was fucking four months ago. Or like, what do you see on TV? People like sitting near each other and being like, be careful.

00:28:57

Don't touch each other. And you're like, no, that's not real. It's not real. It's not real.

00:29:01

Yeah. Yeah. So crazy. Stay home, everyone. If you can wear masks, no matter what.

00:29:07

It's not political. It's so we're at this such a strange time. This is such a historically significant time.

00:29:14

There's so many things kind of coming to a head all at the same time. We're probably yelling.

00:29:21

We're preaching to the choir right now. I like to think. Yeah. We're yelling at people that actually are wearing masks in their own homes alone.

00:29:28

All their pets have masks on. They're like, please stop yelling at us. We couldn't be more worried.

00:29:33

But, you know, just in case there's some people on the edge or they're like, well, look, I just need to go to this party or whatever.

00:29:39

It's like there's much more to it than just you. God for fucking bid you consider that every once in a while.

00:29:47

We know we're the depressionists. We're the depressionists who are also narcissists.

00:29:51

We're original partiers. Like all we want to do is go to a Target and a party Fucking we do our best work at parties We met at parties we just we destroy parties we left so many parties early oh that so right all right member there there some

00:30:08

party it's like a birthday party and you and i were like literally texting the whole time like

00:30:12

are you going seriously because i'm gonna go but i'm gonna be mad if you're not there but

00:30:16

and we got there stood in the living room and i was like i gotta leave was it was it your party

00:30:21

it could have been your party like at a bar was it one of those bar parties maybe where it's just like you know what I'm just

00:30:27

too old to be doing this I can't stand around with the kids anymore I just love that about you have your close friends

00:30:33

who are like yeah okay goodbye they don't judge you for it I didn't see you at the party

00:30:39

yeah it's like no I know I know but now man I'd kill for a party oh to be in a fucking dank sticky bar

00:30:50

with a bunch of fucking arrogant comedians who just like want to talk shit on other more successful comedians

00:30:59

and like mother's milk. What a dream. I'd love nothing more. Is this podcast about murder?

00:31:11

Baby said this podcast was about murder. Here's what I think we should start looking forward to

00:31:16

is how this podcast is going to begin to meld and merge out of a true crime podcast and into us tracking our own mental decline.

00:31:28

Okay. Right? All right. Yeah. What if I just stopped taking all of my meds today?

00:31:34

What if I start taking all of your meds? Oh, my God. Med switch. We don't recommend it.

00:31:41

But we're going to do it. We switched Karen Kilgariff's non-medication for Georgia R. Stark's medication.

00:31:47

And then you're like, is this Folgers? And you're like, what are you talking about?

00:31:50

That's not coffee. You're drinking fucking pond water. It's not coffee. No, it's not pond water.

00:31:57

It's my tide pool water of insanity. I have to. These are the tide pools of your life.

00:32:04

God help me. Who's first? It's me, right, Stephen? Shit, I didn't look it up. Why don't you care?

00:32:12

I'm off this week, too. What, are you on my meds? Yeah. Oh, because it was a live episode.

00:32:17

Yeah. Karen is first yeah she's on it guys also I wanted to mention that I saw Scotty Landis at a Shania Twain concert

00:32:26

we ran into each other this was like two years ago not nerd not you it's fine it's so perfect

00:32:35

was he wearing a cowboy hat no he wasn't was he wearing a Shania Twain shirt I think so yeah

00:32:43

like a Shania Twain belly shirt I swear to God, if you haven't listened to Bananas, those are two friends you're going to be excited to have met.

00:32:50

Kurt and Scotty. Good people. Love them. Bro, from the show last night to this drive, why is it never chill?

00:32:58

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00:34:32

Code FLOW15. Hey everyone. It's Cal Penn, host of Earsay, the Audible and iHeart Audiobook Club.

00:34:41

This week on the podcast, I'm sitting down with Lily Chu, the author of the Audible original romantic comedy Just Kiss Already.

00:34:49

It's a story about a forensic anthropologist who secretly writes mystery novels, an actress who adapts his book into a film,

00:34:56

and what happens when a meme and a media tour collide with a slow burn romance. It's performed by Simu Liu and Philippa Su, and it is an absolute blast.

00:35:08

When you actually hear the performance, you realize that other people are taking your words and what you thought was kind of a straightforward sentence like, the cat in the corner is black.

00:35:19

In my head, it's the cat in the corner is black, not the dog, not the gerbil. But someone else might say it. The cat in the corner is black.

00:35:27

that's always fascinating to me how they just bring in all these different nuances and really

00:35:32

make it fun and interesting and distinctive listen to earsay the audible and iheart audiobook club

00:35:39

on the iheart radio app or wherever you get your podcasts georgia this week i going to do the grim sleeper no you not yes i am damn karen it been so long fucking heavy hitter why not right But the thing I will say again which is what I said before if you haven seen Nick Broomfield documentary Tales of the Grim Sleeper it absolutely for any true crime fan

00:36:13

it's such required viewing because it tells the story of this serial killer that was in basically

00:36:23

South Central Los Angeles for 30 years it's told by the people who live there it's told by his neighbors

00:36:30

it's told by the local activists that were the first ones to get out there and say what the fuck is going on

00:36:37

it's told by the people who lived it every day and it's such a direct Like it's such a beautiful way of doing that, basically letting the people who it happened to and it happened around tell the story.

00:36:49

Right. And there's no filter. It's really cool. And it's and you meet these amazing characters that literally Nick Broomfield just walks around like different neighborhoods in South Central and meets introduces himself to people and lets them tell him the story.

00:37:05

Yeah, it's amazing. And it's how it should be done. I love that. But for now, I'll tell it this way.

00:37:12

And the sources, so of course, it's Tales of the Grim Sleeper, which is an amazing documentary by Nick Broomfield.

00:37:19

Also articles from the LA Times and the LA Sentinel. There's a couple articles from BuzzFeed that were written by a writer named Claudia Corner.

00:37:28

and then there's information that I got from this 2008 LA Weekly article by a writer named

00:37:38

Christine Pelasek. That's amazing and I'll talk about it later. Very cool LA Weekly moment. You

00:37:44

know from growing up here, the LA Weekly used to be this kind of stalwart local free paper that

00:37:50

did amazing coverage on really big important things. They were in the book, in our book,

00:37:56

I talk about how the LA Weekly are the ones that did the kind of like the cover story on Scientology and the Scientology.

00:38:04

Maybe I took this part out, but the Scientologists came around and took all the free papers and threw them away so no one could read their expose on the church.

00:38:12

And this was in like the 90s when the church was kind of growing in popularity. And it's it used to be the LA Weekly used to be this amazing independent newspaper.

00:38:22

It's it got bought. I feel like every town had this great alternative newspaper in the 90s where you could find out really find out about cool artists and cool things happening and bad things happening and shows.

00:38:35

And it just doesn't exist anymore, which is such a huge. Escorts in the back and the green pages.

00:38:40

Right. Party in the front. It's a real bummer. Really good stories in the front.

00:38:45

And then you could get if you wanted a little company that night. OK, so let's let's start.

00:38:51

It starts November 19th, 1988. It doesn't start here, but this is where we're going to get in.

00:38:56

Okay. Because that's the night that 30-year-old Initra Washington is walking down the street in South Central LA on her way to her friend's house.

00:39:05

They're going to meet up, get ready, and go to a party together. Again, don't you miss it.

00:39:12

So as she's walking, this orange Ford Pinto with racing stripes, fancy rims, and high-end tires pulls up alongside her.

00:39:21

So Anitra later will remember that the car looked like she told someone it looked like a Hot Wheels toy.

00:39:28

The driver is talking to her through the roll down passenger window. He asks her where she's going, what she's doing.

00:39:33

He tells her he can give her a ride. She just says back to him, you can't just, quote, holler at me through car windows.

00:39:40

You have to get out and talk to me. So he does. He parks the car and hops out and again offers her a ride.

00:39:47

she remembers she said he is a short black man probably in his 40s and that he looked very clean

00:39:55

cut almost geeky and so again he offers her a ride and he's being very insistent and when she

00:40:01

says no he fires back and says that's what's wrong with you black women people can't be nice to you

00:40:06

and when she hears this she it makes her feel really bad so that manipulation works on her

00:40:13

and she gets into the car. Oh, man. Because she's like, I'm being too, you know, he gets her, he knows how to manipulate.

00:40:19

So he gets her kind of where she lives. So she's in the car. But once he starts driving, she realizes he's not going in the direction where she said her

00:40:27

friend lived. He explains he has to stop at his uncle's house to pick up money. He makes that stop.

00:40:33

He goes into a house for a little bit, comes back out, gets back into the car. They get back on the road and they're driving again.

00:40:39

And then she hears him say something to her, but she isn't quite sure what it is.

00:40:45

So she turns toward him to hear it better. And suddenly everything goes quiet. And then that's when she notices that somehow she's bleeding from the chest.

00:40:56

So she panics. She reaches for the car door. He stops her saying, don't touch that door or I'll shoot you again.

00:41:03

And that's when she realizes that she has been shot in the chest. Oh, fuck. Yeah. So she's obviously in shock and like the whole thing processed in the weirdest way. So she then asks, why did you shoot me? He said, because she was disrespecting him. When she tries to say, I don't even know you. He talks over her and is just blathering, rambling incoherently. At one point, he calls her a different woman's name. Then she blacks out. And when she comes to, he's on top of her. And he's as she drifts in and out of consciousness, he's raping her.

00:41:39

and at one point when she comes to she sees the flash of a camera and she realizes he's taking

00:41:45

her picture oh god yeah she has no idea how much time passes but at some point he starts driving

00:41:53

again so she is she like kind of comes back to consciousness a little bit and she reaches for the door handle again And this time he lets her open the door And when the door opens he pushes her out of the moving car

00:42:06

And so she's on the street. He basically leaves her for dead on the street. So she's laying there in the street.

00:42:13

And then this voice in her head says, you have to get up. You have to get up. So she basically manages to crawl over to the curb and slowly push herself up using the parked cars around her.

00:42:28

And when she finally gets to like a slightly standing position, she realizes she is on the street where her friend lives.

00:42:37

So she looks around. Well, I think he dropped her off where she said she needed to go.

00:42:43

Oh, God. So but then she's like, oh, so she walks to her friend's house. She makes it all the way there with having been shot in the chest.

00:42:53

She gets there, gets up onto the porch, knocks on the front door. No one's home.

00:43:01

So she's like, she turns around and realizes, okay, now the street is empty. I'm going to have to walk down to the main street and flag down help down on the main street, like, you know, half a block away.

00:43:16

so she starts down she's like i'm gonna make it i'm getting you know she starts walking down off

00:43:23

this porch and a car pulls up it's her friend and her friend's husband they finally came home

00:43:29

so because she hadn't shown up so her friend gets out of the car is like we were waiting for you

00:43:35

what's going on and she's kind of like almost yelling at her for being late yeah and she comes

00:43:39

up on anitra and realizes her all of her clothes are covered in blood her friend starts screaming

00:43:45

She's like hysterical. And they call 911. An ambulance comes, takes Anitra to the hospital.

00:43:51

She's immediately taken into surgery. And she ends up in the hospital for the next three weeks.

00:43:57

But her life is saved. And after about a year of procedures and treatments and physical therapy, Anitra makes a miraculous recovery.

00:44:07

A year. A year after a year. I mean, she got shot point blank in a car. Yeah, it's so it's an amazing that she lived at all. And that after that happening to her clearly fully in shock, she got herself like to this front porch. It's insane. It's incredible.

00:44:24

so it's a year later it's 1989 and she's outside of her house in inglewood and a man walks up to

00:44:33

her and asks her if she knows him and she says am i supposed to and he doesn't say anything he just

00:44:39

turns around and walks away and as he's walking away it slowly dawns on her the night she was

00:44:45

shot her purse went missing and inside her purse was her driver's license with her current address

00:44:51

on it that was the man who was her attacker what the fuck yeah so now we have to go back to the

00:44:57

early 80s and south central and what is famously known as uh the crack cocaine epidemic um that

00:45:06

that hit that part of town um and that this whole thing is a story in and of itself and it's

00:45:14

mind-boggling and horrifying and many people believe and there's lots of proof to believe

00:45:20

that crack cocaine was introduced into these neighborhoods intentionally. It's really horrifying.

00:45:28

And that's a different show. And I'm sure there's plenty of podcasts out there. So we'll just keep it simple.

00:45:35

And basically, by 1985, crack cocaine is a full-blown epidemic in this part of town.

00:45:43

And addiction ravages South Central. And families are torn apart. The communities are, I mean, people, you know, as drug dealers are fighting over their turf, addicts are committing petty theft to be able to feed their addiction.

00:45:59

Right. Crime rates rise and especially murder. so when the bodies of black sex workers start being found around the south central area

00:46:09

in alleyways on roadsides in parks even in schoolyards these deaths are written off as

00:46:16

being either drug or gang related or you know basically they're written off as collateral damage

00:46:22

right um so basically the crack epidemic it becomes the perfect cover for one of los angeles's

00:46:31

what will end up being one of Los Angeles's worst serial killers ever, if not America's.

00:46:37

So through the mid 80s, more than 20 murdered women, the bodies of more than 20 murdered women

00:46:43

are found, but many, many more go missing. And there's and many more murders happen. These are

00:46:52

just the ones that basically are all connected to each other, and eventually connected to this

00:46:58

killer. But that doesn't mean that black women and especially black sex workers were showing up

00:47:05

dead constantly. So among these victims is 29-year-old Deborah Jackson. Her body is found

00:47:11

on August 10th, 1985 in an alley near West Gage Avenue in the Vermont Slauson area, South Central.

00:47:18

She has three bullet wounds in her chest and ballistics will later determine that they have

00:47:23

come from a 25 caliber handgun at close range. Almost a year to the day later, August 12th, 1986, the body of 34 year old Henrietta Wright

00:47:35

is found in Hyde Park. And then just two days after Henrietta's body is found on August 14th, Thomas Steele's body

00:47:43

is found in the middle of an intersection. And they believe his death is connected to Henrietta's murder.

00:47:50

but police never find solid evidence to actually back that up. That's just what people nearby believe and that,

00:47:58

that no essentially, All of this is kind of feeding that idea that these black communities are simply, quote unquote, prone to illegal or criminal activity.

00:48:08

Right. It's dismissed. Right. And and just all all kind of piled together. Like it's the same as it's the same kind of crime that's happening as gang, the gang shootings or or drug dealing instead of clearly a series, a series of murdered women with the exact same MO every time.

00:48:31

And that basically gives the LAPD a free pass to turn a blind eye to these horrific murder murders.

00:48:36

It's later discovered that the LAPD would classify these murders as being NHI, which is short for no humans involved because there are women of color because there were sex workers because or or and because they were addicts.

00:48:54

They're not even human to the to the officers of the law. We're supposed to serve and protect.

00:49:01

yeah it's i mean it's unimaginable and it's the kind of thing again in this documentary and you

00:49:08

have to watch it because it's there's people that speak on this where there's this woman who is a

00:49:14

local activist and she's talking about um that you know people were talking about why why didn't this

00:49:20

guy get caught and why wasn't anything reported and she's like you can't as a black person just

00:49:24

walk into your local police station and say i have something i'd like to talk to she's like 99

00:49:29

percent of the time that's going to end very unpleasantly for you people don't you know that's

00:49:36

years and years of that kind of hideous treatment that obviously they're not going to be running to

00:49:43

the police to say we need protection because they're not getting it i mean this is the epicenter

00:49:48

of rodney king and the riots this is yeah which actually gets covered and we've talked about this

00:49:57

in the O.J. Simpson 30 for 30. That's incredible. That kind of links all this up of what was

00:50:05

happening down here and the way this town has been segregated and the systemic racism that went into

00:50:14

all of that. Okay. So there are leads in these cases. There are pieces of evidence that when

00:50:21

these bodies are discovered that are running throughout each case. So, for example, there's reports of a 1984 dark-colored Buick Regal, reports of a late

00:50:33

model Plymouth station wagon, and reports of an orange-colored Ford Pinto. But if they're followed up at all, I mean, they're barely followed up.

00:50:42

Nothing is really ever chased down. And even though they question a number of suspects, they end up, like the theory becomes

00:50:50

that there's something called the Southside Slayer, which was more of like a, quote, evil

00:50:55

force than it was one specific killer. Wow. Which that doesn't even make sense. Like, and it's basically just kind of saying bad stuff is happening over there.

00:51:04

Yeah. You know, there's not a lot we can do about it, which is totally insane. Yeah.

00:51:09

So Margaret Prescott, who is a local radio host, she has a radio show called Sojourner

00:51:16

Truth, and she's outraged. She knows that these victims, because these victims are black women, most of whom are sex workers or struggle with addiction, that the LAPD is just blatantly neglecting their cases.

00:51:28

And she refuses to let them get away with it anymore. So in 1986, Margaret joins forces with other local activists and she forms the Black Coalition Fighting Back Serial Killers.

00:51:40

Like she knew it wasn't like it's a force. She's like, we're fighting a serial killer.

00:51:45

Everyone fucking knows. is she said and there's an amazing she's in the nick brunfield documentary she's she's incredible

00:51:51

and at one point she says in the 80s we at one point we had a count of 90 women but only 18 of

00:51:58

them made it onto the book so this wasn't the story that was actually when the story even got

00:52:04

told at all the numbers were reduced so much and she's but she was like yeah this is this is

00:52:10

outrageous. So they start printing up flyers and handing them out in front of grocery stores. And

00:52:17

you see there's footage from the 80s of this coalition, the Black Coalition, fighting back serial killers. They're just going around flyering and saying,

00:52:28

did you realize these women were found dead? Did you know there was a serial killer in this

00:52:33

neighborhood? They're just going and telling other women, you need to be aware. And they just had to

00:52:37

do it grassroots by themselves because of course it wasn't on the news. Nobody was talking about it and nobody was treating it seriously.

00:52:44

So together the coalition hands out flyers and they inform the community about the serial

00:52:50

killings. They demand that the police and city officials prioritize the investigations of these murders.

00:52:56

They fight for more resources in South Central and they fight to get the media to stop dehumanizing

00:53:02

the victims just because of the jobs that they hold or the addictions that they have.

00:53:06

Yeah. So despite the coalition's best efforts, the LAPD negligence enables this killer to continue murdering vulnerable black women for the next two years.

00:53:17

So on January 10th, 1987, the body of 23 year old Barbara Ware is found inside a trash bag in the central Alameda area.

00:53:27

And Barbara Ware was the third official victim that they knew. So at that point, because she also had gunshot wounds at that point, they knew it was a serial murderer, but they didn't.

00:53:41

And they talk about this in the documentary. They didn't tell anybody and they didn't treat it that way.

00:53:47

Therefore, that she could have been the one. And they talk about this like if this was some blonde girl that went to UCLA the media would have been all over it But nobody talked about it at all And so those murders continued But if it had gotten any press or any kind of traction as a story

00:54:05

maybe those other girls wouldn't be dead now. Right. But instead, it all just got swept under the rug.

00:54:11

Four months later, 26-year-old Bernita Sparks tells her mom she's going to go out to buy a pack of cigarettes.

00:54:16

She never comes back. Her body is found on April 16, 1987, and she'd been shot to death with a .25 caliber handgun.

00:54:25

On Halloween of that same year, 26-year-old Mary Lowe says goodbye to her mother as she heads out for a Halloween party.

00:54:33

Her body is discovered the next day, and she'd been shot to death. On January 30th, 1988, the body of 22-year-old Lucretia Jefferson is found in the Westmont area.

00:54:45

And seven months after that, the body of 18-year-old Alicia Monique Alexander is discovered on September 11th of 1988.

00:54:53

And both of these young women have been shot by a .25 caliber handgun. And it's the eighth murder in three years with the exact same MO.

00:55:04

So in the case of Monique Alexander's murder, eyewitnesses tell police they saw her get into an orange colored hatchback on Normandy Avenue.

00:55:14

And that's the same type and color of car that witnesses tell police Mary Lowe got into the year before.

00:55:20

The lead is never followed up on. Monique's father, Porter Alexander, told the LA Weekly that the investigation of his daughter's death was, quote, a big mess.

00:55:30

They didn't put forth any effort and they didn't show any aggressiveness about it, which obviously they they actually they started a task force to be to work on the cases that they called the task force actually calls this series of killings, the strawberry murders.

00:55:49

because strawberry is slang for somebody who sells, does sex work for drugs. Really?

00:55:55

Yeah. Yeah, that's like, that's what they call, I mean, the level of just a total lack of care or respect or anything is just monstrous.

00:56:07

So aside from determining that all eight murders were committed with the same .25 caliber gun, nothing comes of establishing this task force.

00:56:15

until 1988 when the killer meets anitra washington and like the eight victims before her the eight

00:56:22

known and on the book victims we should say she shot with a 25 caliber handgun after getting into

00:56:28

an orange hat hatchback but because anitra survives her attack she's able to provide police

00:56:34

the first eyewitness description of the killer she tells him he's a black man who looks to be in his

00:56:40

30s with short hair and a geeky, clean-cut appearance. And she also describes his car in detail.

00:56:47

It's an orange Ford Pinto with racing stripes, rims, and high-end tires. After Anitra's survival and her identification of her attacker, the murders of black women

00:56:58

in South Central committed with a .25 caliber handgun suddenly stop. But that's not because the serial killer has stopped killing.

00:57:06

He's just changing his MO. Shit. So for the next 14 years, L.A. undergoes some drastic changes. While drug addiction does remain a public health issue, the crack epidemic begins to subside and crime rates begin to go down.

00:57:23

And L.A. becomes the second safest city in the United States. But that has a lot to do with the intense police violence and police brutality and the tactics that they used, which, again, is a whole different show.

00:57:38

Yeah. But essentially, the crack epidemic is waning a little bit. So because the crime rates are coming down, it's more obvious when like strings of murders happen now.

00:57:51

Right. So in 2002, a 15 year old girl named Princess Berthamu is living in foster care and she often runs away and makes money for herself through sex work.

00:58:03

When her foster mom reports her missing on December 21st, 2001, she is not seen again until her body is found strangled in an Inglewood alley on March 19th, 2002.

00:58:17

A little over a year. It's so tragic. 2002. I think of all these crimes as like in the 80s and early 90s, but it's like that's so recent.

00:58:26

And she's 15. 15 years old. So for about 14 years between those crimes in the 80s of women just getting shot in the chest and having their bodies dumped.

00:58:39

Thrown away. Yeah. Things calm down. And then he comes back in 2002 with this horrifying.

00:58:47

And a 15-year-old, I mean, she's a baby. She's a baby. A little over a year later, a crossing guard finds the body of 35-year-old Valerie McCorvey in a Westmont alley on July 11, 2003.

00:59:00

And she's also been strangled. When the LAPD tests the DNA samples taken from both of these murders, they are found to match eight cold cases from the 80s.

00:59:13

The murders of Deborah Jackson, Henrietta Wright, Barbara Ware, Bernita Sparks, Mary Lowe,

00:59:19

Lucretia Jefferson, Monique Alexander, and the attempted murder of Nitra Washington.

00:59:24

So newly appointed police chief Bill Bratton considers making a task force in 2004 to investigate

00:59:32

these connections and these cold cases. But an unnamed colleague allegedly dissuades him from doing that.

00:59:40

The connections and the potential leads in these murders and the proof of the existence

00:59:44

of an active serial killer in South Central are basically ignored until 2007. It's New Year's Eve, September 31st, 2006.

00:59:54

Laverne Peters gets a call from her 25 daughter Janisha Laverne babysitting Janisha four son at the time and they visiting other family members and Janisha calls to tell her mom that she finally got a place to live

01:00:08

She's really excited. She really loves the place. She feels safe there. The next day, January 1, 2007,

01:00:15

a homeless man who's looking through a dumpster on Western Avenue finds Janisha's body wrapped in a garbage bag and sealed with a twist tie.

01:00:25

She had been shot with a .25 caliber handgun. So despite the obvious connection, Janisha's death goes almost unnoticed.

01:00:35

The few news stations that actually cover her death, they don't even report it correctly.

01:00:41

They say that she was stabbed. But while the media and the LAPD fail to inform the public of the return of the .25 caliber killer,

01:00:49

A detective named Dennis Kilcoyne finally convinces Chief Bratton to form a task force to investigate these murders.

01:00:56

And it's dubbed the 800 Task Force, named after the conference room that the force initially gathers in at the police station.

01:01:04

Finally, it's not a fucking derogatory name. Yeah, for real. Ridiculous. So the 800 task force is made up of six officers.

01:01:15

No outsiders are allowed. No press. No other police people that are working. Just the people that are on this task force.

01:01:22

And basically the existence of it is totally kept secret. So here's where the L.A. Weekly intrepid reporter comes in.

01:01:32

In 2008, a reporter for the LA Weekly named Christine Pelosek learns about the existence of the 800 task force and begins to investigate.

01:01:43

Christine. Christine publishes an article on August 27, 2008, and it's the first anyone in Los Angeles reads in the general sense in the mainstream media, which is a free, the LA Weekly, you know, the free local paper, about the fact that a serial killer has been on the loose in South Central since 1985.

01:02:06

I mean, it reminds me of Michelle McNamara so much. Completely. Well, listen, along with her thorough details on each murder, Christine also delivers a scathing critique of how poorly the LAPD and newly appointed mayor Antonio Villagorosa has handled the entire ordeal.

01:02:24

She writes the following. There has been no big press conference by Bratton who recently weighed in on Lindsay Lohan's love life.

01:02:32

The camera loving Villagorosa recently beseeched the public to eat nutritiously.

01:02:37

Unlike city leaders who decried the BTK killer near Kansas City and the Green River killer who terrorized Seattle, Los Angeles City Hall is either unaware or has kept news of California's longest operating killer under wraps.

01:02:52

Thanks to the extraordinarily poor diplomacy extended by Villagorosa and the Villagorosa administration and the LAPD brass to the victims, mostly working class black families.

01:03:05

The weekly also was able to first inform some families this month that the murders are known to be the work of one sick man.

01:03:13

Holy shit. So the families didn't even know because no one even informed them. And so no one knew to look out and be careful and don't take rides from neighbors and, you know, be on the lookout.

01:03:27

It was just not they weren't even warned. No, there was no word on it. And in fact, it's Christine herself, not the police who coined the killer's nickname, the Grim Sleeper, because of his very abnormal 14 year hiatus.

01:03:43

Damn. Okay. So now we have, we will go to an email sent to us by a murderino. Hi, Karen Georgia and your cult family of pets and Steven.

01:03:54

I'm a longtime listener, first time writer. Karen, you mentioned the Grim Sleeper in the last episode,

01:03:58

and I've been waiting for you to cover this murder. My aunt, not by blood, but by being my mom's best friend since I was a kid

01:04:04

and helping my mom raise my brother and I on her own, which was not easy as we were the brattiest kids in North America,

01:04:11

is a badass female journalist who's been covering crime in Los Angeles since the Rampart police

01:04:17

scandal of the 90s. Oh my God. Growing up, she was always my idol because she was funny,

01:04:22

pretty, bought me smoothies, and would talk to me about her stories. Now we bond over murder

01:04:27

stories because murderinos abound. In 2008, she ferociously began to hunt down stories of nine

01:04:34

murders of sex workers in South Central LA that had gone unsolved and cold since 1988.

01:04:39

She discovered two new murders in 2002 and 2003 that had been DNA connected to the murders of the 80s.

01:04:47

When this murderer resurfaced, LAPD wasn't paying attention or adding manpower to the case because it wasn't going to win them any political points.

01:04:56

And my aunt Christine Pelisek wrote a huge expose calling them out for the lack of attention paid to what appeared to be one of the worst serial killers in Los Angeles history.

01:05:07

Christine dubbed this murderer the grim sleeper because of the 14 years he had seemingly spent not actively killing in Los Angeles.

01:05:14

She pointed out that these cases had these cases been in Westwood or Brentwood, white, wealthy areas.

01:05:20

There's no way police would have ignored a serial killer striking again. She humanized the stories of the residents of the South Central community who had their family members murdered.

01:05:30

And she called the fuck out the mayor of the man. She called the fuck out of the mayor.

01:05:34

She also pointed out the need to use DNA testing on old cases Like Michelle McNamara with the Golden State Killer

01:05:41

Christine's articles brought attention to the case And put pressure on the city to do something

01:05:46

This led to a break in the case with DNA I'll get to that in a second She wrote a book about her experiences

01:05:53

Called The Grim Sleeper The Lost Women of South Central Which was published in 2017 And they even made a cheesy great Lifetime movie about it No I had no idea

01:06:05

I'm so proud of her and her work to shine a light on a community of people whose safety

01:06:08

wasn't valued. My dad passed away last September, and when he passed, Christine told me how he'd been

01:06:14

her editor and had seen her talent at the LA Weekly in the 1980s. I like to think about his legacy in me, so I want to brag to the world about her amazing

01:06:23

talents. love Kelly Murderino Cole. Did that get you? Yeah. Sorry. So suddenly now, because of this article, there's real pressure to solve this case. But when

01:06:42

the DNA samples are taken from the victims and run through the state offender and federal crime

01:06:47

databases, there's no matches. So they turn to familial DNA testing. I remember this is 2008,

01:06:56

2009. Early. It was still super early. Yeah. And familial testing is the kind where the sample has

01:07:05

at least 16 markers matched to another sample in the database. So it's enough to implicate a close

01:07:10

relative of a person in that database. So if there's someone with similar DNA who's already

01:07:16

been convicted of a crime, there's a good chance that that person's relative could be

01:07:20

a viable suspect. Now, this kind of familial DNA testing is controversial. And at the time, the attorney general was Jerry Brown for California, and he was up for

01:07:31

re-election. So he didn't want to attract any negative attention. So he didn't do the familial DNA testing until a little bit late, till after he was

01:07:41

elected. Okay. Or till, yeah, so till after he was re-elected. So eventually, he does rule that familial testing can be used if other avenues have been exhausted and if the criminal presents a clear and present danger.

01:07:56

So finally, in 2009, familial DNA testing is conducted on this cold case and they get a hit.

01:08:04

A close familial match is found in a man named Christopher Franklin, who had just been convicted of a felony weapons charge the year before.

01:08:13

And this leads police to a new suspect, Christopher's father, 57-year-old Lonnie Franklin Jr., a former garbage man for the city of Los Angeles.

01:08:25

Such a good cover because you can get rid of bodies so easily that way. And he was a garbage man in the 80s when it was still the system where it was the city dumps.

01:08:35

Yeah. And like there was no the technology was not there in any way. And he'd had access to a play, basically the hugest dumping ground that where no one.

01:08:46

So how many bodies find someone? How many bodies were just never found? Well, they start following Lonnie Franklin Jr.

01:08:54

And they realize he frequently drives along streets that are known where sex workers are known to walk.

01:09:02

and so they need to be certain that they it's him so an undercover cop poses as a bus boy at john's

01:09:09

incredible pizza in buena park fuck yeah it's the name that's not my opinion that's the name of the

01:09:14

pizza place um and they know lonnie franklin jr is going there for a birthday party the undercover

01:09:21

cop takes franklin's pizza crust utensils like all the stuff that he used to eat that night and

01:09:28

They put it in their little evidence bag and the investigators extract his DNA. And when Forensic runs their analysis, they find a perfect match.

01:09:39

And on July 7th, 2010, police finally arrest Lonnie Franklin Jr. When they search his home, they find the 25 caliber handgun that was used in many of those killings in the 80s.

01:09:53

It's just there in his house. Yes, he still has it. That's how cocky he is. He didn't even try to get rid of it.

01:10:00

Yeah, because no one had ever even... Never. It didn't come up. Even more chilling than that, though, they find over a thousand Polaroids of women, both conscious and unconscious, often nude, including the photo of Anitra Washington from the night of her attack.

01:10:18

Basically, they have 180 photos that remain of missing unidentified women from that stash of photos.

01:10:29

Oh, my God. That they're still trying to work through to identify who the women are because they're just missing and the bodies weren't found or they might be Jane Doe somewhere.

01:10:40

They just don't know. So after a series of delays, Lonnie Franklin Jr.'s trial finally begins in February of 2016.

01:10:48

he pleads not guilty. 2016, Jesus. Yeah. In her opening statement, Deputy District Attorney Beth Silverman explains that survivor Anitra

01:10:58

Washington will give testimony about her attack that will provide a blueprint to the fate

01:11:04

of the 10 other victims who have no voice. Then Anitra takes the stand and tells the story of her attack and survival in full detail

01:11:13

to the court. When she's asked to point out her attacker in the courtroom, she identifies Lonnie

01:11:18

Franklin Jr. And when Beth Silverman asks her, are you sure? And nature says 100%.

01:11:25

Oh, my God. The prosecutor also reveals that in the 70s, Lonnie Franklin Jr. was stationed at an army base in

01:11:35

Stuttgart, Germany, where he was dishonorably discharged for participating in the gang rape

01:11:40

of a 17 year old German girl. and then that girl now a grown woman takes the stand

01:11:47

and testifies against Lonnie Franklin Jr.'s character she flew in from Germany to testify

01:11:54

holy shit yeah yeah on May 5th 2016 the jury finds Franklin Jr. guilty on 10 counts of first degree murder and one count of attempted murder.

01:12:05

He's sentenced to death on August 10th, 2016, exactly 31 years after the body of Deborah Jackson was found.

01:12:14

He is on death row at San Quentin until March 28th of this year. No. When he is found unresponsive in his prison cell and Lonnie Franklin Jr., the grim sleeper, is found dead at 7.43 p.m., he was 67 years old.

01:12:33

So while investigators were able to confirm that Lonnie Franklin Jr. did indeed murder Deborah Jackson, Henrietta Wright, Barbara Ware, Bernita Sparks, Mary Lowe, Lucretia Jefferson, Monique Alexander, Princess Bartholomew, Valerie McCorvey, and Janisha Peters, and attempted to murder Nitra Washington, they unfortunately could never confirm beyond a reasonable doubt that he murdered Thomas Steele.

01:13:00

But it is widely believed that he did. Because of the gross negligence of the LAPD and their blatant disregard for black lives in South Central Los Angeles, we will never know for sure how many people were murdered by Lonnie Franklin Jr.

01:13:17

It's possible that he could have murdered as many as 100 women, if not more. In December of 2010, the LAPD released 180 Polaroids to the public in hopes that someone might be able to identify the women in them.

01:13:33

So far, there have been no additional confirmed identified victims. And that is the story of Los Angeles serial killer, the Grim Sleeper, Lonnie Franklin Jr.

01:13:44

Wow. Yeah. Great job. Great job. Thank you. So necessary. Thank you, Jay Elias, for helping me with that research.

01:13:54

He did an insanely great job. And he found that murder in a letter. That's so great.

01:14:00

It's so great. But please, please watch Nick Broomfield's documentary. Those are the people you need to hear the story from.

01:14:07

It's amazing. Pam, who is the woman he meets on the street that basically becomes his sidekick in the movie.

01:14:13

She is the best. She is the greatest person. And it's just such a way better way to tell the story of this,

01:14:22

the people that lived in that community that knew him, his neighbors. And also when they finally did, like, you see a map.

01:14:30

His house is in the center. It's like a clock where all those, the confirmed victims of him, it's like a clock.

01:14:38

It's just all around. Well, he had easy pickings. He didn't need to go into other parts of the fucking city.

01:14:43

Like he could just drive a block away and fucking get a victim and and take 30 fucking years to be caught.

01:14:52

Yeah. And exploit this situation that was already so tragic, you know, so unfair.

01:14:58

That's one of the first ones Vince and I watched together. And Vince is not into true crime like he gets really freaked out by it.

01:15:04

But he talks about it to this day because it's just such a good documentary. And so so good.

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01:17:35

So we just discussed the idea that maybe every other every week one of us tells a story.

01:17:43

Since we're already at the two hour mark on this episode. And like, but it'd be nice, right?

01:17:51

If like next week I tell the story and you can just sit back and listen and react and not, you know.

01:17:58

And also just, I think just because there, you know, are, whatever. We're going to do it.

01:18:05

We're going to see how we feel. Yeah, we can try it. Let's try next week. So next week I'll go.

01:18:09

And then, yeah, I like that. I do too. I think that's nice. Cool. Real quick, before we do the fucking hoorays, we want to take a minute.

01:18:17

It's really sad. You guys have told us there's very young murderinos died this week.

01:18:23

And so we just want to take a second to talk about them. And so Summer Taylor and Diaz Love from Seattle were at a Black Lives Matter protest on the freeway in Seattle and got struck by a car.

01:18:41

sweet Summer Taylor and both of them are they them by the way. Summer Taylor passed sadly

01:18:50

and Diaz Love is still fighting for their life and but I believe they're awake and getting through

01:19:00

it so sending them our love. Yeah Steven, will you mind finding there's gotta be a

01:19:08

GoFundMe? Yeah, yeah, I'll find those. For them. There is, yeah. Yeah, let's put that on the website so that people can support and help out because that's, you know, God, that's such an awful thing to happen.

01:19:21

And then on top of everything else, then you have to worry about medical bills. It's just so much for people to deal with.

01:19:28

And they're both big advocates for human rights. And I know Diaz is fighting, so send them your thoughts and love.

01:19:37

And then just completely this freak accident, this sweet baby angel, Allie Davis, 21 years old, a musical theater major at the Kentucky School of the Arts.

01:19:55

And she's from Banner, Kentucky, just a complete freak car accident and died. And it's just it breaks my heart.

01:20:03

It's so I looked at her Instagram and she's just this bright, shiny person who looks like the minute you meet her, she would wrap her arms around you and be friends with you.

01:20:14

And like, you know, all three of them just look like good, kind people. And I'm more, you know, when and there when someone in our community dies, it's just, you know, we can't help but think of that.

01:20:26

They're our friends, you know, like the shit that we share, the shit that you guys share with each other.

01:20:31

the openness, the friendship that we all have. It's our friends. And so we more than that It really means something You meet people and you understand that you all have that same interest or whatever any interest but it like yeah it is that you guys have built this into a real community

01:20:47

it's a real connected community it's really beautiful and hearing about stuff like this

01:20:53

really does it's heartbreaking and it's also a really good opportunity to try to feel gratitude

01:21:01

you're still here and what do you think that person would want you to do right in the fact

01:21:08

that you're still here and you're still living what can you do either to honor their memory if

01:21:13

you didn't know them at all then to then to you know live maybe a little bit better or a little

01:21:19

more consciously um yeah because like the the idea that people hit by a car because they were out

01:21:25

protesting against the brutality and violence against black people is really meaningful and

01:21:33

really it's it's really quite something. Yeah. You know, definitely. So Summer Taylor, Diaz Love,

01:21:40

Allie Davis, they're all in our hearts. Yeah. And we're thinking about every their friends

01:21:45

and family and and what a huge tragic loss. I have actually a really good one to kick off

01:21:53

our fucking hoorays. Yeah. Because it also is about some murderinos. Okay. But some very good news.

01:22:02

So this was sent by Eric Clemonson. It was to me and to my favorite murder. It said on Twitter, this couple bonded over MFM and as a protest got married in front

01:22:13

of the burnt third precinct in Minneapolis. Oh my God, I saw a picture of that. What is it?

01:22:18

Yes. Okay. So Alexis Hamblin and Selena Burnt got married and after being together for four months.

01:22:27

And so there's a long article on City Pages. You can look it up citypages.com. That's about this, but it's the cutest picture.

01:22:38

And it says here, Hamblin and Burnt met on Tinder, bonded over a shared love of my favorite murder,

01:22:44

and dated for about a year before they got engaged this Valentine's Day. It's so sweet.

01:22:50

Look at how cute. Yeah, right there. Sweethearts with the flower crown. They hung a flower heart.

01:23:00

It's the burnout police station. How many years is four months in quarantine? Together.

01:23:07

We've been going out for seven years. Congratulations, you guys. We're honored to be a part of your

01:23:15

City Pages wedding announcement. That's right. Please invite us to the wedding party when it happens.

01:23:22

In Cabo? We'll slip out early. Yeah. Okay. Mine is from someone named Livster. L-I-I-V-S-T-E-R-R.

01:23:34

And it says, I have a fucking hooray. And then all caps, my dad is the fucking judge on the GSK case.

01:23:43

Oh, no. Her dad is the Golden State Killer judge. Oh, shit. She better shut up. This is all privileged information, girl.

01:23:53

Do not ruin it. Growing up, my dad was a defense attorney in Sacramento. He says, sorry, Karen.

01:24:00

It's okay. And I watched. Too late. And I watched as he showed me what justice really was.

01:24:06

Everybody deserves to have someone on their side. And he has so many stories now.

01:24:10

He could probably fill a book. I definitely think this is where I get my dark and twisty passion for true crime.

01:24:17

Definitely. But a few years ago, he became a judge and began trying more and more criminal cases until today.

01:24:23

He took on one of the most prolific serial killers still alive today. Not only is he an A-plus dad to three amazing daughters.

01:24:33

I'm just adding this. Mackenzie, Brooklyn, and Madison and Bailey. But he is a kick-ass judge

01:24:42

And watching him lead the courtroom Through this motherfucker's plea hearing Was inspiring to say the least

01:24:48

Love you ladies and keep doing your thing P.S. I am a nurse in pediatric ICU So I can confirm that yes

01:24:57

You need to wear a fucking mask And yes you still need to distance Okay love you Bye Holy shit What their name Livester L That on Instagram

01:25:12

Congratulations, Livester. That's very cool. Amen. I feel like... That's amazing.

01:25:17

You're a celebrity. You brought that up earlier. We were like, we still, we didn't even take the time. We

01:25:21

bullshitted about MAC makeup. We didn't take the time to talk about the plea deal,

01:25:27

the golden state killer and i remember um i was talking to somebody about this because i read i

01:25:32

was reading about it oh no no sorry steven it was you probably telling me during do you need a ride

01:25:37

or whatever but paul holz sitting in the courtroom watching them watching this guy plea plead guilty

01:25:46

finally amazing 2020 um to these crimes that he committed in the 70s yeah and terrorized this

01:25:55

entire all of california um up until very recently the idea that that story is winding down and he is

01:26:04

going to be in prison for a long time for raping and murdering people for 40 years is incredible

01:26:13

it's unbelievable it's like surreal we have um we have to talk about i'll be gone in the dark

01:26:19

the tv show we need to talk about perry mason we need to talk about unsolved mysteries which we

01:26:24

next week when i next week when it's my turn to tell my story because that's the format we have

01:26:31

and probably always should have had also we just thought of dirty john is like it's almost it's

01:26:38

winding up and it is got it's gotten so good i am so into this season of dirty john okay i'm gonna

01:26:44

i'm gonna have time to watch it before then we'll talk about books listening to podcasts i'm i'm

01:26:49

listening to some new podcasts I'm loving. Guys, we didn't even get into anything.

01:26:55

We were busy talking about fucking tide pools, Mimi. It's a real problem. Thanks for listening to us still

01:27:03

after all this time and being here and being there for each other, support each other,

01:27:10

reach out to each other. We love you guys. We're so fucking lucky and appreciative

01:27:13

of you all. Yes, thank you. And stay sexy. And don't get murdered. Goodbye. Mimi, you want a cookie?

01:27:24

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My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgi

230 - The Tide Pools of Your Life

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