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[Music] [Music] % [Music] welcome to True Crime garage wherever you are whatever you're doing thanks for
00:01:45
listening I'm your host Nick and with me as always is a man that's not going to be scared just because somebody's mind
00:01:51
has jumped the tracks here is the captain but I'm deathly afraid of clowns it's good to be seen it's good to see
00:01:58
you thanks for listening thanks for on a [Music] friend today we are still sipping on
00:02:07
don't worry my mom said it's cool Bourbon Barrel aged Imperial birthday cake Stout and it doesn't have to be
00:02:14
anybody's birthday to celebrate and drink a few of these but it's 12% ABV so drink these at home in your garage we
00:02:23
put a 4 and a half bottle caps on this one let's give some thanks and praise where it is most certainly due right
00:02:30
here first up we have a big cheers to Beth and Cleveland Ohio and a big we like your JP goes to Melanie and
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Windfield West Virginia next up we have a double fisted cheers to Trish and Nicole and Cannonsburg Pennsylvania and
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a big shout out to Andrew from Oregon next to cheers to Abigail in Milan Tennessee we also have Daniela in atoria
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New York and last but certainly not least we have Sally end Dorset United Kingdom everyone we just mentioned they
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helped us out with this week's beer fund and for that we thank you yeah BW r n Beer Run get you some thanks for
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listening thanks for telling a friend make sure you're subscribed and make sure you tell your friends to subscribe
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and that is enough of the business all right everybody gather around grab a chair grab a beer let's talk some true
00:03:21
[Music] crime where we left off yesterday Captain is with The Accidental or what appears to
00:03:36
be an accidental death of Ron Gillespie driving his truck August 19th 1977 am I saying
00:03:45
100% that there was no foul play involved no I don't think anybody can say that for certain however the
00:03:53
evidence shows and stacks up that this does appear to be an accident and if there was anybody else
00:04:02
involved the police the sheriff's department and BCI could not find any evidence of such right and the police
00:04:10
have to rule this in accident based off the evidence and when people talk about a cover up again what would be their
00:04:19
motive what would be the whole police department and the sheriff and everybody else involved coroner everybody else
00:04:26
involved what would be their motive to cover up this accidental death for the superintendent or a bus driver doesn't
00:04:35
make a lot of sense to me that there would be a cover up and in regards to sheriff Dwight Radcliffe I want to point
00:04:42
something out here this name may sound familiar to our longtime listeners because we gave him a shout out in
00:04:49
episode 396 in May of 2020 when Dwight Radcliffe passed away we gave him a shout out because Dwight
00:04:59
Radcliffe was not only the sheriff of pickway County he was the sheriff from 1965 until
00:05:06
2013 he was the longest serving sheriff in the entire country in the United States and I understand that that does
00:05:14
not make him a perfect man nor a perfect Sheriff however what I see here Captain
00:05:19
when we reviewed the information is rather than looking for reasons that this was a cover up what I found were
00:05:28
reasons that the sheriff's Department was looking to prove that there was no foul play to themselves right by sending
00:05:35
the gun to BCI sending the ammunition to BCI had there been Foul Play or had they
00:05:42
suspected Foul Play they would have followed up on that yeah because I want to solve why these individuals are
00:05:49
getting harassed by this letter writer and again let's go back through a couple pieces of evidence his blood alcohol
00:05:58
level was point 16 family is surprised they go hey we're surprised by this cuz he's not a heavy
00:06:04
drinker well if he's not a heavy drinker then1 six he might not be able to operate a vehicle to the best of his
00:06:13
ability also not wearing a safety belt yes Bally thrown from his truck maybe if he's wearing the safety belt he makes it
00:06:22
through the accident and to be clear no one should be operating a vehicle with a
00:06:28
0.16 especially here in the state of Ohio where they've decided 08 half of that is past the legal limit MH now the
00:06:37
next stop in our timeline would be 1983 per the Unsolved Mysteries timeline that we reviewed earlier 1983 in
00:06:48
February is when the attempt is made on Mary Gillespie's life when she finds the
00:06:53
nasty sign that has words and statements so nasty and terrible on it that she has
00:06:58
to tear it down and if the booby trap would have worked it would have triggered the trigger on that gun and
00:07:05
fired a shot in the direction of her and her head as she removed that sign MH however that is six years later that's
00:07:16
it's 77 the time of Ron Gillespie's accident it's 83 with the attempt on Mary Gillespie's
00:07:23
life there is a lot that goes down during that span of time and we're going to go through that and this whole Time
00:07:29
Captain that whole time frame there are letters that are continuing there are suspicions that are going on in town
00:07:36
about who could have tried to kill Ron Gillespie or who was responsible for that truck accident who is responsible
00:07:44
for these letters and how long are they going to continue for Mary gispie that has claimed that there is no Affair
00:07:51
happening but now her husband has passed away and the superintendent he is now going to get a
00:07:58
divorce we could assume if he had a nice relationship before these letters that these letters made his relationship a
00:08:06
lot more complicated yes regardless of the Dynamics of that relationship I would guess so now it's the late 70s
00:08:14
when gour Massie and his wife split up and at some point Gordon Massie and Mary Gillespie say yes we did have a
00:08:24
relationship their statement has always been that the relationship started after
00:08:30
the letters a better date for when that relationship started I don't have for you it's never been provided as far as I
00:08:36
could find other than the simple statement of we didn't start up this relationship until after the letters
00:08:43
started so the other statement would be it would be after Ron Gillespie's passing mhm you can question that as
00:08:51
much as you want I'm fine with it I think that there's plenty of room for speculation there that can be a hard
00:08:57
thing to believe I have seen situations like that witness situations like that in in my own life so I can believe them
00:09:06
I don't 100% believe them however I don't look at this situation and see Mary Gillespie being responsible for
00:09:14
Ron's death and I don't see what others are looking for where they say well Mary
00:09:22
or even Gordon Massie could be sending these letters when the letter started well that doesn't make any sense
00:09:30
why would Gordon Massie threaten his own career his own job by sending these letters they were sent to his boss
00:09:37
before they even sent to Mary glaspie Mary would be threatening her marriage or threatening her job as well if she
00:09:44
were sending the earlier letters yeah and again it's a small town so you screw up it's not just as easy as get in a job
00:09:52
somewhere else you you become a stain on that Community the other person that we
00:09:58
mentioned in yesterday y's episode captain that was possibly tied or at least suspected to by the Gillespies
00:10:04
anyway to be involved in these letters is David longberry David longberry resigned from his position with the West
00:10:13
Fall School District as a bus driver he resigned in October of 1981 October 22nd
00:10:21
actually of 1981 this whole time again the letters continue now two of the people that have
00:10:27
been very Central to this story all along are Paul fresh hour and his wife who is also Ron Gillespie's sister Karen
00:10:37
fresh hour to this point their only involvement in the story because on our timeline we've not gotten to the
00:10:43
attempted murder yet is that they have been trying to help the Gillespies through their problem through this issue
00:10:50
of receiving these strange and threatening letters we did say yesterday that the letters what we do
00:10:59
know when they were being mailed were coming from Columbus Ohio from postal Hub 430 SE bus shout out to my favorite
00:11:09
postal carrier in Columbus Tim Williams Mr Speedy Delivery himself I'm pretty badass on the keyboards as well Paul
00:11:16
fresh hour and his wife Karen lived in Grove City Ohio they were super tight with the
00:11:23
gesp Paul worked for Budweiser at the anheiser bush in Columbus Ohio he worked there as a
00:11:31
quality control officer or agent whatever you want to call them in 1982 him and his wife Karen and Paul
00:11:43
they file for a divorce it was in early 1983 in February when the attempt is made on Mary Gillespie's life and I
00:11:53
think we should go through that because there's a lot of questions there and you
00:11:56
POS some of those questions yesterday first first off we need to paint the picture she's still
00:12:03
driving her bus route at this point Mar is correct the sign that she discovers is at the end of the day okay this is
00:12:12
not on her morning route this is in the afternoon a description of this sign should be as such it's a nasty sign that
00:12:21
she she sees spots and decides she's going to take it down however it's rigged to this booby trap
00:12:29
right it's a very crude booby trap she doesn't know that though at the time correct that's exactly right but what
00:12:37
what does it say anyways I don't know what the sign says see I don't believe there's a sign until people tell me what
00:12:43
what it says so until they tell me what it says nasty sign don't buy it what do you mean
00:12:51
don't buy that there was a sign or a booby trap no I believe there was a booby trap I don't believe there was
00:12:56
this horrible I mean there supposedly there was a bunch of signs and it was there were they were all on this uh
00:13:03
street but it wasn't a main street right no this was a Main Street this is actually not terribly far from the
00:13:10
accident site of where Ron Gillespie was killed well what street was it on I don't have that in my notes so but the
00:13:17
but but you're also getting that that there was more than one sign there was no the information I have states that
00:13:25
there was one sign see what I heard was that there was signs on both both sides of the street multiple you know a couple
00:13:33
here a couple there like definitely trying to get her attention or anybody's attention that would go down that road
00:13:40
that could be the case then the issue then becomes for me and I think other people will feel this way as well if the
00:13:47
booby trap was intended for Mary Gillespie the more signs that you put up makes it a little dicey that it's going
00:13:54
to hit its intended target mhm the information I have states that it was one sign in a very specific location
00:14:03
that she would have passed through and she would have seen this sign and anybody driving in the area
00:14:09
should have seen this sign as well the way that it's described is that she sees this sign and that the crude booby trap
00:14:16
was set up as such that if she pulled the sign out or I guess anyone for that matter pulled the sign MH to tear it
00:14:24
down it would pull on a string that would pull the trigger on this gun that is aimed at the person that would be
00:14:30
tearing off the sign however she doesn't tear off the sign it's attached to um you know like a
00:14:39
post she pulls the steak or post out of the ground and then sees the string that
00:14:45
is tied to this other steak or post right takes that down as well now on the second post we have what's described as
00:14:54
a box inside the box is where she finds the gun that has the booby trap now there's a couple different versions of
00:15:01
what happens after she takes this down in every version she takes both of these items and brings them back onto her bus
00:15:09
in some of the versions of the story she then discovers that the gun was rigged up to shoot whoever would tear off the
00:15:15
sign mhm in other versions and I think this is where it comes into question where you brought up her own personal
00:15:23
vehicle the majority of the versions of this story is it's not discovered the booby tra anyway until she gets home and
00:15:31
she's done with work and as soon as she discovers this booby trap she gets in her car and now she's driving off and
00:15:38
she's going to report this to the authorities well I also think that maybe that's the reason why people think there
00:15:45
was multiple signs was because like you said she had to take down two post well and there's some dramatizations of this
00:15:53
story that do show multiple signs MH I think the reason why they showed that is to increase the Threat Level some would
00:16:02
say till midnight Michael Scott the office the other situation too is this was not the first day nor first time in
00:16:10
fact in years this has been going on for years where people were posting these nasty signs mhm and we mentioned
00:16:17
yesterday Ron would drive around looking for them which see what I used to teach
00:16:22
guitar lessons we would send a guy out at night once it got dark and he put you know guitar lessons call this number all
00:16:32
around Circleville because normally if people you know if if we put them out during
00:16:38
the day they were going to be taken during the day but if we put them at night at least the morning traffic would
00:16:43
see them well a lot of these signs had to do with her whatever relationship with Gordon Massie which is not that big
00:16:50
of a deal at this point they're both not married uh the yeah but it's it's one of
00:16:56
those relationships oh well you're as you're together you can keep rubbing it in their face that the the the letter
00:17:04
writer can keep rubbing that that in their face see I told you I was right from the beginning yeah but that's not
00:17:10
the issue the issue is what people what has being posted is that there's some kind of relationship between Gordon
00:17:17
Massie and Gillespie's daughter who at this time would only be 13 years old so Mary Gillespie is tearing these
00:17:26
down not to save her own name nor Gordon massie's name she's doing it in defense
00:17:32
of her own child to me it seems like this individual if if the letter writer is connected to whoever's putting out
00:17:40
these signs then their their target all long has been the superintendent it's difficult to say I don't I don't know
00:17:48
how to answer that or or respond to that statement with words I I don't think you're wrong the problem becomes that
00:17:55
there are so many people that this thing let's just call it a thing cuz we don't
00:18:00
know what it is we don't know if it's multiple people we don't know if it's one individual fight and if it's
00:18:05
multiple people we don't know if they know who the others are that are doing this terrible stuff right it seems to be
00:18:12
targeting a lot of people from what I can see and yes it does seem to be that this started with Gordon Massie but I
00:18:21
have some strong opinions on who I think the writer is and I think we can address
00:18:26
that once we get through the events of 1983 because the way that The Story Goes per Unsolved Mysteries and the local
00:18:36
Legend and the story that's repeated over and over and over again for the most part to this day is that they trace
00:18:44
this gun back to Paul fresh hour Paul says yeah that's my gun but it was stolen from my residence the issue then
00:18:54
becomes well why didn't you report it stolen well I didn't know it was stolen until now
00:18:59
right okay well if that's a good defense I know that this is not a homicide that
00:19:03
it was an attempted murder but if a homicide was committed with my gun and a a a good defensible excuse is well it
00:19:11
was stolen but I never reported it stolen and everybody just went along with it then we all would use that
00:19:16
excuse all the time it's not believable and then Dwight Radcliffe the sheriff at the time sits Paul down Paul
00:19:24
says hey I agreed to do this and he shows me some of the letters in the envelope es that are coming from the
00:19:29
circle will Rider and says you know what try to mimic this try to write like this
00:19:34
copy it and then Sheriff radliff uses this as further evidence that he was not just the person that owned the gun that
00:19:44
belonged in the booby trap but the writer the letters and the envelopes coming from the Circleville writer
00:19:51
matched what was written on the sign of the set booby trap mhm and Paul could not be eliminated as that writer in fact
00:20:01
Radcliffe takes it a step further and says that this is proof that he was the writer so not only is he the attempted
00:20:07
murderer but he's also the circle Ville riter mhm they take him to trial and in October the trial last about one week
00:20:16
Paul does not testify on his own behalf and he is sentenced to 7 to 25 years in prison which is the maximum sentence at
00:20:24
that time then he gets jammed up even further because he can't get paroled because the letter writer continues to
00:20:31
write these letters and send them to businesses churches individuals Mary Gillespie she
00:20:38
gets more the school board keeps getting more letters in fact Paul fresh hour himself gets a letter and we know
00:20:45
Unsolved Mysteries gets a letter yeah it's like Oprah you get a letter you get a letter you get a letter look
00:20:51
underneath your chair and so Radcliffe tells the warden hey you can't let this guy out he click clearly has not learned
00:20:59
his lesson he's still writing these letters well they you know they did the investigation to see if there was a way
00:21:05
basically for him to get a letter out there's that's easy to do it's easy to do do you know do you know what prison
00:21:15
he went to well he was in Lima Ohio so this would be a Maximum Security Prison at the time and but but the letters were
00:21:22
still coming from Columbus yes which makes it difficult one but the other thing too doesn't make it impossible I
00:21:29
mean we have no but the the tricky thing Captain becomes they monitor in these prisons they monitor the ingoing and
00:21:37
outgoing mail no I understand that but what I'm saying is if the mail was still coming from Columbus you would all you'd
00:21:45
have to do is bribe one of the officers to take the mail for you and then that officer might think well I get to I get
00:21:54
to read the letter beforehand all he all he's doing doing is talking some [ __ ]
00:21:59
and I know he's harmless because we have him locked up I'm just saying it wouldn't be that farfetch to for to have
00:22:07
him bribe somebody to hey if I write a couple letters will you drop them off for me no and I'm glad you bring that up
00:22:14
for a couple of reasons because I'm on your side I want to say this though I believe the warden exactly as the warden
00:22:20
said in his statement in his letter that I did an investigation and it is my opinion as the warden of this prison
00:22:28
that Paul fresh hour is not mailing these letters through my Prison Walls I believe that statement 100% because they
00:22:36
are checking the incoming mail and the outgoing mail mhm and even when the letters continued the warden said cool
00:22:43
I'll play along Paul you want to keep playing your game I'll put you and lock you up in solitary confinement MH and he
00:22:50
kept him in solitary time and time again three different times and the letters continued during all those times but I
00:22:57
again I'm with you I've seen Shaw Shank Redemption I've read the book uh read in
00:23:01
there said you know what whatever you need I can get for you guys mhm and what did he do he got him and I know that's
00:23:07
fictional but let's throw this little Wrinkle in there Paul fresh hour at one point in his life worked as a
00:23:14
corrections officer in a prison in the state of Ohio not at the Lima prison he worked at the Ohio penitentiary which is
00:23:22
in Franklin County mhm he worked that job I don't know for how many years I believe it was less than this was after
00:23:28
he got out of the military after he went to college I always think it's funny when they they get flipped to the other
00:23:35
side like for so many years I was the the officer and now I am I am the prisoner so if anybody could figure out
00:23:43
how to do it it would be somebody in Paul's situation somebody who had worked as you said both sides both sides of the
00:23:50
bars mhm the other issue though also becomes it it doesn't have to be Paul fresh hour writing these actual letters
00:23:58
that continue during this time to be connected to Paul it could be somebody for him on the outside that doesn't need
00:24:05
nor require any information from Paul at all and just keeps sending them on his own or her own to try to make it look
00:24:14
like Paul is innocent because what did they tell us at trial what did they tell us in the
00:24:19
papers he was the writer Not only was he the attempted murderer but he was the writer that they're one and the same
00:24:28
so if the letters continue then maybe they got it wrong with the attempted murder right let's dig through this
00:24:35
attempted murder charge a bit more because there is some evidence that magically has lost its
00:24:42
way today when this retelling of the story [Music] [Applause] continues [Music] this show is sponsored by better help do
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[Music] [Applause] [Music] 2023 well we're back I didn't go anywhere well you should have tall cans
00:27:25
in the air cheers to everybody front and side to side oh by the way if you would
00:27:29
like to receive some mail from us make sure you sign up on our mailing list that's right that's right we will try
00:27:36
not to send any booby traps so here's some issues with Paul's guilt and with his innocent or innocence that we should
00:27:44
point out M first off we had several people at his trial that testified as to I Witnesses of what they saw that day
00:27:54
where the sign and the booby trap was set up yeah but we have issues we always seem to have issues the issue became a
00:28:02
couple of things one Paul did not go to work that day we know he worked in Columbus so that would have been a
00:28:10
really good day for Paul freshh hour if in fact he was innocent to go to work yeah and that you know it would have
00:28:16
been a 20 30 minute drive for him the anheiser bush plant is North Columbus it would have been an hour for him to get
00:28:24
to this location and he worked long days as a quality control officer he worked 50 hours a week up in North Columbus
00:28:33
yeah but if he didn't go to work he's coming from his home in Grove City that's correct I'm sorry I was I thought
00:28:40
you meant if he was at work but yeah so it would have been a great Alibi had he been at work now he did have an alibi
00:28:46
for portions of that day the question then became when in fact was the sign in the booby trap set up because there are
00:28:53
other people that say hey I saw a tall sandy-haired man in in a yellow El Camino parked right in that general area
00:29:02
and this was before the sign was visible to anyone else there were other eyewitnesses
00:29:08
however that put Paul in the general area of Circleville and Danville around the time that it is believed that the
00:29:16
sign and booby trap were set up so more for him being in the area rather than against and of course the damning
00:29:25
evidence is that he did not go to work that day there's also a lot of stuff going on in Paul's life leading up to
00:29:34
February of 1983 in 1982 he and his wife Karen divorce and it's not a good one it's not a clean break it's not nice and
00:29:47
neat for everybody well then why not shoot her one problem has always been for the case against Paul fresh hour as
00:29:56
setting the the booby trap attempting to kill his one-time sister-in-law is that he's this nice
00:30:04
quiet man he would never do anything like this however at the divorce proceedings it's presented at that trial
00:30:12
at that court case Paul beat up his wife when he suspected that she was running around on him and he beat her up pretty
00:30:22
bad and we know this because we have the police report she has a black eye she received SE several
00:30:31
stitches and this is not a he said she said situation because in the court proceedings his own attorney tells the
00:30:41
court it's okay Paul never meant to do that he lost control but he's gone to counseling since and he's gone because
00:30:49
he is sorry for what he did that's admitting that he was violent against his own wife yeah piece of [ __ ] they
00:30:58
divorce in 1982 and at some point Paul moves on he has a girlfriend which becomes his wife
00:31:07
before February of 1983 Paul somehow even with the violence is awarded the children and the house
00:31:16
during the divorce and Karen goes to live in a trailer at the back of Mary Gillespie's
00:31:24
property there are signs that are being po posted in darbyville and Circleville leading up to the booby trap sign that
00:31:33
are now making nasty statements about Karen fresh hour saying that she's a lesbian and naming the woman that she is
00:31:40
supposedly involved with even though she has a boyfriend mhm and she goes on you
00:31:45
can have a boyfriend and a girlfriend at the same time that's true I mean I mean
00:31:52
all of the stories we cover you can have a husband or a wife and a boyfriend or girlfriend of the same same time I'm
00:31:57
pointing part of this out though because there are a lot of people that believe that Karen fres hour could have been the
00:32:03
letter writer well I mean just because there's some nasty signs about her it's like you got to take a couple for the
00:32:08
team my look when I look at these letters I mean just going off I want to know your opinion to me the the the
00:32:19
writing seems a little feminine um possibly that's you're pointing out something that's good that we have not
00:32:24
pointed out that the letters are not identical no there's several different styles of writing in the handwritten
00:32:32
letters there's also some that are typed some are on postcards some are on these
00:32:36
little weird looking tag things some are on signs as we've pointed out but yeah it's like even though they're they're
00:32:43
using they're almost like creating their own different fonts but even the one uh
00:32:48
font where they're using like really boxy letters it still looks like more more likely that a female would have
00:32:56
wrote that than a man I don't think you in my opinion I can't apply gender to any of the writing that's cuz you're not
00:33:04
an expert okay so once you become an expert in junk science I'm just I'm in a room full of experts I just don't I
00:33:11
happen to be not be one of them so the the thing here though Captain would you agree that
00:33:19
no would you agree that saying that Paul fresh hour was not the letter writer does not then make him innocent of the
00:33:28
attempted murder charge yeah but it's also I mean the the reason why Karen makes sense is because she would have
00:33:37
opportunity to get his gun all they did was uh basically shave off like part of the number but that would have to mean
00:33:48
there'd be some reason why Mary Gillespie's sister wanted her dead if in fact it was actually rigged up in a way
00:33:55
that it would work right you know that's where it this story gets really complicated the case does get very
00:34:01
complicated because there's about 8,000 different rabbit holes that you could go
00:34:06
down and the problem with this case is the people again I keep going back to who is Central to this story and it's
00:34:15
the fresh hours it's the Gillespies it's Gordon Massie and it's the school board
00:34:19
where it all kind of starts and the victims if there are real victims are Ron Gillespie Mary GES
00:34:27
and at this point Karen Gillespie you can say whatever you want to say about Karen Gillespie and people can think
00:34:33
whatever they want to think I'm telling you her husband beat her up we know that
00:34:38
to be a fact because we have a police report it's presented in court proceedings and through his own attorney
00:34:46
admits to it yeah so what you're saying is Karen is telling us this uh Paul right correct Paul with the shitty
00:34:54
mustache and the half mullet he beat her up so again if may look maybe she was the
00:35:03
letter writer and it was just she was getting kicks telling people hey you're not supposed to be doing this you're
00:35:08
doing this maybe she loved her sister but said hey you're doing wrong because I love my brother-in-law he's a good guy
00:35:15
and you're cheating on him bad for you right but then your husband beats you up maybe and let's look if it happened once
00:35:25
beats are up in 1982 right the letter start in in 76 early 77 I understand that just I know I'm just
00:35:34
pointing it out for all involved okay again I'm not an expert I just that's what I'm saying I'm trying to keep up
00:35:39
you try you when you get your certification on the wall then we'll let you speak okay follow me on this though
00:35:47
you pointed something out really interesting was this booby trap even going to work it seemed like it would
00:35:58
hypothetically right but it didn't what a great way to frame the son of a [ __ ] that has beat
00:36:07
you probably multiple times you see what I'm saying you're now you're you're out
00:36:12
of the relationship for all you for all we know he can't let it go he he might still be harassing her here and there
00:36:20
and she goes hey I'm I'm going to set this trap up with his gun and he's going to go to jail for this I
00:36:30
agree if Paul fresh hour was set up it had to be somebody extremely close to him somebody that had access to that gun
00:36:37
that as he just said I don't know when it disappeared someone stole it from me that's how that's how inside the person
00:36:44
would have to be well if you're the letter writer and I'm right write us a note the thing is know that we're right
00:36:52
you're talking to a you're talking to a room full of people and I don't mean here in the garage I mean I don't
00:36:58
believe for a second that there was anything of at least half a dozen people writing these letters really because why
00:37:07
would Karen fresh hour why would she be the original letter writer I don't believe the person that started the
00:37:13
letter campaign and Back in 77 was the same person that was still writing the letters in the late 90s yeah if there's
00:37:20
hundreds maybe a thousand of these letters yeah you're going to have multiple writers cuz also it'd be so
00:37:25
easy like you hate your job your boss is a little bit of a [ __ ] muffin so you're
00:37:31
like hey I'm going to write him a note get all my grievances out get my point across and they'll just assume it's a
00:37:37
part of these other letters so I'm cover I'm going to be covering myself up well
00:37:43
the issue for me becomes with Karen being the letter writer for the entire campaign if if she's upset about an
00:37:54
affair why wouldn't she just tell her brother there's no point in mailing a letter to
00:37:59
Gordon Massie and take it a step further yeah but if you start with that hey I know
00:38:05
hey you stay away it's easier to send them a threatening letter but not say stay away
00:38:12
from so would you not want your brother to to know you just want the affair to end and it's it's prob maybe it's better
00:38:19
he doesn't know yeah yeah because where my mind goes is you just tell the if you
00:38:24
really care about them you just tell them hey I think this is going on or I know it's
00:38:28
going on because of a and C the other tricky thing too is somebody definitely had some kind of insid or knowledge of
00:38:37
the the school buses the high school the superintendent and the employees there I
00:38:44
don't know unless she's being fed that information from Mary Gillespie I don't know that Karen would
00:38:50
know that information mhm and it's equally difficult to believe that Paul fresh hour would know that information
00:38:57
where I don't think that Paul I think that Paul was the letter writer for a portion of this story but I don't think
00:39:04
that he was the letter writer when it first started but that's why I'm saying with so many letters it's it's it really
00:39:11
puts law enforcement or any armchair detective at a loss I mean you're going to be chasing your tail we have
00:39:21
businesses that we're ridden to we're talking about three or four lines sent to him on a on basically a posted note
00:39:29
right I think a lot of those are just random people that knew hey as long as I go up to Columbus and send it from
00:39:38
Columbus people are going to assume this shit's coming from the Circleville letter writer well and in some cases
00:39:45
they're just simply placed in mailboxes they weren't mailed at all right the early letters were all coming from
00:39:50
Columbus the letters the majority of the letters that were being sent and received while Paul was in prison are
00:39:58
coming from Columbus but not all 10,000 are actually mailed and through the through the system itself well the but
00:40:06
the reason why you wouldn't tell your brother-in-law is that you're well it's your brother it's not your
00:40:11
brother-in-law if you're Karen yes if you're Karen then it's your brother is you're you're now
00:40:20
taking um guilt away and and people that are they're obviously if they're having this
00:40:29
affair they have guilt because they're obviously not telling people they don't know exactly what they want to do with
00:40:35
their lives they kind of using their spouses as they continue to have this affair and you're just you're now just
00:40:42
creating pain where if you can get to your sister-in-law if you can get to the other guy that's having the affair and
00:40:51
you can get one of them to see the light that maybe the affair will just stop he doesn't have to know about it he
00:40:58
doesn't have to be in pain about it um and they could just move forward but you end up telling him
00:41:06
anyway well because nobody nobody did anything you see what I'm saying so you you kind of gave them the chance and
00:41:13
they didn't and so you also can't know that Mary would open the letter addressed to
00:41:19
her you see what I mean it gets very complicated very quickly when you try to assign a certain person to being the
00:41:27
letter writer no no yeah no and it it it works that way for every single person that you try to apply it too not just
00:41:35
Karen it works that way for Paul for Mary for Gordon for uh a lot of other people involved and I think the reason
00:41:43
why it works out that way is a the letter writer constantly contradicts themselves the threat to Gordon Massie
00:41:50
hey if you don't do this I'm going to go to the school board but then you don't give him time to do anything about it
00:41:54
you just go to the school board hey if you don't Mary if you don't come out with this affair I'm going to go to the
00:42:01
school board well you've already gone to the school board uh and then you tell the husband
00:42:07
but what's the husband supposed to do he's not he's supposed to end the affair it seems to be the original letter
00:42:15
writer was more concerned about ending the affair rather than actual consequences for any of these people
00:42:23
well and I actually think that like I said there's there's probably lot of letters that we've never seen that the
00:42:28
public has never seen because nobody came forward and said hey I got this letter talking about this affair I had
00:42:36
um with so and so because they never came forward with that letter and I think if we had all those early letters
00:42:43
would' have a better idea of who was who was writing these but again the problem
00:42:48
with this case is once you get all these letters out there and like I said if I think my boss is the biggest you know
00:42:56
you know douche in the world right I can write him a letter in this style and and
00:43:02
get away with it and how many other people in that town decided I can do the same thing now take that same logic and
00:43:12
go in 82 I'm beat up by this little [ __ ] of a man that thinks he can put his hands on women whenever he wants and
00:43:23
uh I'm tired of his [ __ ] and maybe he's threatening her even afterwards and decides to set him up it's not
00:43:30
impossible I find I find it difficult there again to believe that Karen would be the letter writer based off of the
00:43:38
nasty things that were said about her on the signs no did you not hear what I said has nothing to do with her being
00:43:45
the letter writer it's now opportunity oh some people are questioning whether Paul is the letter writer let me set up
00:43:54
this scenario using his gun that I stole from him right and make it seem like these signs were set up and it didn't
00:44:03
seem like there was a lot of eyewitnesses that saw those signs there's some reports of oh yeah I think
00:44:09
I might have saw this I might saw this but but then she collects that evidence and what did she find a booby trap that
00:44:16
does not work for whatever reason and she takes it back and just so happens to be Paul's gun and what a great way for
00:44:26
you know Karen or possibly Mary and Karen to set up uh so this son of a [ __ ] Goes to
00:44:33
Jail see what I'm saying oh I agree because of a [ __ ] beat up my sister and she came to me and
00:44:41
said hey we're going to I got this little ruse because they're not going to put him behind bars they're not going to
00:44:47
protect me I'm going to protect myself I could totally see going okay yeah that makes a lot of sense and then it's his
00:44:54
gun and if they think he's the rider this guy goes to jail I get what you're saying and many people have thought that
00:45:01
and it's certainly an interesting angle to look at many people have said you know what maybe Paul is innocent here
00:45:06
and maybe Paul's the actual hero and Karen is the villain all along that we should have been looking for when we
00:45:13
thought Paul was the villain well I mean Paul's Paul's a villain in my eyes I mean you you don't put your hands on
00:45:19
women there's a couple things that get again conveniently left out from the story along the way one the incident of
00:45:27
Paul actually being a violent man on record when people say he's not capable of such horrible things so the gun
00:45:35
itself is lab tested so they can come up with the serial number to trace where it
00:45:40
came from they cha they trace it to a sale at a pawn shop in Columbus and it's proven that that pawn shop sold the gun
00:45:47
to Paul fresh hour that's not really in question because Paul admits to the sheriff yes in fact that is my gun but
00:45:54
it was stolen and I don't know when it was stolen why didn't you ever report it stolen H I don't know why because I
00:46:01
didn't know it was stolen yes that's fair right however he does say that his home was burglarized so I again I that's
00:46:11
where he loses me a little bit is there a report of this burglary it was there an insurance claim of this Burg burglary
00:46:19
those are things that I could not find if he chose not to report the burglary why the other thing that gets lost along
00:46:26
the way is when we go back to the writer and and when we look at Paul's guilt again we've
00:46:33
both agreed that whether or whether or not he was the writer at any time during this story has little to do with him
00:46:41
actually being guilty he doesn't have to be the writer and be guilty of this attempted murder the thing that gets
00:46:48
really tricky with this when you think about how many possible writers there were along the way is we have a
00:46:57
situation where four people readily admit we were receiving letters Ron and Mary
00:47:05
gaspie and the four of us took action we took actions into our own hands and decided we are going to send some
00:47:12
Anonymous letters to the person we think is writing them to us right there we see
00:47:17
a chain of events that sets into place multiple writers mhm how many other people received letters and thought they
00:47:24
knew who was sending them the letter and anonymously wrote them and then that person anonymously writes somebody else
00:47:32
and then somebody else and it continues on and on and on a great this reminds me
00:47:38
of another great book Needful Things where somebody does something wrong to one person they assume somebody else did
00:47:45
it to them they wrong that person and then that person wrongs somebody else and somebody else and then somebody else
00:47:52
and the circle and cycle continues and itow grows and it gets more vicious as it goes oh again that's the funny thing
00:48:00
about where it happened Circleville the difficult thing against Paul fresh hour is one he admitted that with that group
00:48:11
of four that they sent several letters Anonymous letters m later according to Dwight Radcliffe Sheriff Dwight
00:48:20
Radcliffe Paul freshh hour this is before he was convicted before his trial during interrogation admits to Dwight
00:48:28
Radcliffe as to sending 40 to 50 of the 1,000 Circleville writer letters this is
00:48:36
magically left from the story as well Paul fresh hour his original statement to the courts against
00:48:44
the charges of attempted murder of Mary Gillespie he pled Innocent by reason of insanity on August 8th
00:48:52
1983 he later changed that to Simply innocent and he decided to fight the charges and lost in court at the
00:49:02
trial Karen his wife who may not be innocent we don't know I I can see your point there captain and other people
00:49:10
have brought up that scenario as well but Karen testifies in court that on more than one occasion she caught Paul
00:49:18
with strange letters one that he had ripped up and tried to flush down a toilet one that she found between the
00:49:26
mattresses she thought that Paul was the letter writer but she also didn't think
00:49:33
that he was doing it since 77 I wonder if there's a situation here Captain where Paul fresh went off the
00:49:43
rails do we have a situation where his life is spiraling out of control and he uses this already existence of the
00:49:52
letter writer and the letters themselves as something easy for him to step into to take advantage of his
00:49:59
situation he loved Ron Gillespie there's no doubt about that that's his own words
00:50:04
that I'm using there he says that Ron Gillespie was his best friend he's convinced that somebody killed or Ron
00:50:13
Gillespie was involved in some type of Foul Play that led to his death is there a chance that he
00:50:20
ultimately believed Mary Gillespie was somehow responsible for the death of his best friend
00:50:26
and then after his nasty divorce and after he is brought into the light and shown to be who he really is uses this
00:50:34
writer as an opportunity yeah to attack his to further attack his ex-wife by posting
00:50:44
nasty signs about her and attack Mary Gillespie posting signs about her and sending nasty letters along the way
00:50:52
David longberry who we've mentioned several times in these episodes he's not without fault here he's not just another
00:50:59
innocent person along the way he in the 9s was accused of raping or sexually assaulting an 11-year-old girl and he
00:51:09
went on the run I couldn't find exactly what happened to him or confirmation of such
00:51:16
but the story has always been that he hung himself somewhere in Texas I happen to wonder Captain I'm not going to sit
00:51:23
here and pretend to know who the writer was I'm not sit here and pretend to say that Paul was 100% guilty or that Ron
00:51:30
Gillespie died 100% in a in a one car accident that involved nobody else but it looks to me to be a situation where
00:51:39
Paul was guilty of what he was charged with and Ron's unfortunate ending was probably just an accident I also think
00:51:48
that there's a good strong chance David longberry who resigned in 1981 and who worked for the school
00:51:56
system in 76 and 7778 and leading up to 1981 knew the inner workings of such he may have been the writer or one of the
00:52:06
writers in the beginning and I think Paul was probably one of the writers at some point along the way maybe in ' 82
00:52:14
83 maybe he figured out a way to continue to write them or had someone on the outside that's the other thing here
00:52:20
too that I think gets missed people assume because the letters continued that it couldn't have been Paul they
00:52:26
also assume that he had to have been getting letters out of prison he doesn't somebody could have helped him on the
00:52:32
outside with getting no information from Paul at all no help from Paul at all M nothing well when people say well he got
00:52:38
a letter I mean if he was the letter writer he could just go well look guys I got a
00:52:43
letter I just it's he does this hey guys I got a letter I just finished writing it no but but that's
00:52:55
what makes this case so complicated like what like what you were saying is there one writer or multiple
00:53:03
writers and are the writers even aware of each other or are they all using each other as a pond to not get be caught as
00:53:12
the main writer and a lot of times we should point out the light the writer is not committing any actual crime right to
00:53:20
send somebody a letter saying hey I know your secrets that's not a crime sounds like a good time you have this whole
00:53:27
situation with this car accident was that caused or was it an accident was it so that there that becomes a Twist and
00:53:36
then you have this whole possible booby trap that was set up and then how many other little stories that
00:53:44
have just been left behind in the past of the Circleville letter writer of other possible wrongdoings happening one
00:53:54
of the stories that has been left behind and I would like to highlight it before
00:53:57
we wrap up here today Captain is that in March of 1992 Chief mcken he's the police chief in Grove City where Paul
00:54:07
fresh hour one time lived he actually went back there and lived after he got out of prison and he passed away while
00:54:15
still living in Grove City all those years later but in March of 1992 the police chief of Grove City receives a
00:54:22
letter that says that Mary Gillespie is responsible for the letters but includes
00:54:28
this tidbit of information whoever killed Ron Gillespie is also the person who killed a woman named Vicky cotch I
00:54:38
agree with all the people out there that say that this mystery is super intriguing it's super
00:54:43
fascinating what I don't love and I know that they're pushing a different product
00:54:49
we have True Crime here in the garage but what is often said is that the Circleville letter writer is the
00:54:56
greatest mystery in the history of the state of Ohio or one of the greatest mysteries in the state of Ohio I would
00:55:04
like to point out regardless of whatever this letter said I don't have the exact
00:55:09
wording in front of me that was received by The Grove City police department but
00:55:13
it did say whoever killed Ron Gillespie also killed Vicky cotch Vicky cotch her murder is still unsolved to this day and
00:55:23
she was killed in Pickaway County and this is from Dave Yos the Ohio Attorney General's List of unsolved homicides
00:55:33
their database the details of the case are this on August 14th 1980 Vicky kotch was reported missing from her residence
00:55:42
in Circleville Ohio Vicki was last seen by friends on or about August 10th 1980 after attending an event in Ross County
00:55:51
Ohio on Friday August 15th 19 80 her vehicle was found parked approximately five blocks from her residence
00:56:00
unoccupied neither residence nor her vehicle revealed any evidence of a struggle or altercation on September
00:56:07
17th 1980 a nearly skeletonized body was discovered in an area of Madison County
00:56:14
Ohio The Remains were identified as Vicky cotch through dental records the cause of death is listed as death due to
00:56:23
violence again her case is still unsolved to this very day and she was a teacher working in that area back in
00:56:33
1980 before she went missing when we highlight mysteries of Ohio or anywhere for that matter I think we need to sift
00:56:42
through some of the sensationalized and some of the ones that are filled with bright lights and
00:56:49
shiny objects and confusing rabbit holes and look to the real cases like that of Vicky
00:57:07
cotch thank you our friends for joining us again for another fascinating case if
00:57:14
you need more True Crime Garage in your earballs check out our bonus show cut off the Record that's on Stitcher
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premium Colonel do we have any recommended reading for this week this week we are recommending a great Ohio
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crime stories from the Miami Valley area of Ohio which has a rich but gruesome and bloody history so check out murder
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in Mayhem in Dayton and the Miami Valley by upand coming true crime author Sarah
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kushel find that great title and others on our recommend page at true Crim garage.com much love to you guys I see
00:58:00
you here in the garage next week and until then be good be kind and don't [Music]
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