00:00:00
foreign [Music] foreign [Music] garage wherever you are whatever you are doing thanks for listening I'm your host
00:00:46
Nick and with me as always is a man that got me a Mogwai for Christmas and one month later my house is completely
00:00:52
destroyed burnt to the ground he is the captain not my fault bro I gave you the instructions you dummy it's good to be
00:01:00
seen and it's good to see you thanks for listening and thanks for telling a friend
00:01:04
[Music] tonight we are drinking Secret Stairs by Trillium Brewing Company garage grade
00:01:14
four and a half bottle caps out of five secret stairs this is a stout that is bold and balanced and unlike most Stouts
00:01:22
it's not syrupy or too sweet but there are hints of caramel in here Secret Stairs was brought to us by These Fine
00:01:28
members of the garage crew first up we have Dede in Owasso Oklahoma and a big we like your jib to Tiffany and
00:01:36
Barberton Ohio all right let's go down to one of the garage's favorite States and say hi and thanks to Brad and Katie
00:01:42
in Texas also in Texas we have Eric and Austin and then the little State of Rhode Island we have Elisa and we give a
00:01:49
big thank you to Sarah in Joplin Missouri and last but not least we have Tim and Cindy a full metal Rock in Las
00:01:56
Vegas thanks to everybody for filling up the fridge for this week's show if you want to help us out with next week's
00:02:02
show go to truecrime garage.com and click on the Donate button and you can follow us on social media Instagram
00:02:08
Facebook Twitter all that stuff at True Crime garage and if you want to keep up with all of my beer Adventures follow me
00:02:15
on untapped at True Crime garage and you'll notice when he's on his app he's a wassailin
00:02:21
all right Captain that's enough of the business everybody gather around grab a chair grab a beer let's talk some true
00:02:27
crime [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] on August 7 1972 in Springfield New
00:02:46
Jersey parents Salvatore and Florence De Palma tried to call the police they wanted to report their daughter Jeanette
00:02:54
who is 16 years old either is missing or as a runaway they were told that their daughter would have to have been missing
00:03:02
for at least 24 hours before they could take the report earlier that day Jeanette had had at
00:03:10
least one argument with a parent before leaving her home to venture off to her friend's house which was eight
00:03:17
miles away the plan was she was going to walk three miles by herself and take the
00:03:22
train the rest of the way to her friend's house she was also scheduled to work at her part-time job later after
00:03:29
going to her friend's house she never arrived at work she never arrived at her friend's home
00:03:35
we did cover some speculation and some rumors regarding of where she may have gone that day however there are people
00:03:42
to suggest that either she did go to this party or there was no party at all we also suggested that that could be
00:03:51
just poor recollection on the on the part of these young teenagers who are being asked questions why are they being
00:03:58
asked questions because not only is this girl missing but approximately six weeks
00:04:03
later her body is found in a wooded area on a cliff known as the devil's teeth right and so they're asking her they're
00:04:12
asking these kids about these events that took place six weeks prior now we got into the whole thing of
00:04:18
whether this was a situation where the parents had reported her as missing or as a runaway the police state that the
00:04:26
De Palma family called in a situation that their daughter had run away right the police would later give different
00:04:33
accounts on this situation because they were interviewing the parents and according to the police it was the de
00:04:41
Palmas that had reported Jeanette as a runaway police would later say that a runaway situation is not really
00:04:49
investigated that they they give a description of the girl they give some brief information to their beat cops
00:04:55
right and if nobody sees the girl they don't really do anything you might kick the bushes a little bit but you don't
00:05:00
spend a lot of time working on a situation where somebody left willingly from their home
00:05:06
now they did interview Jeanette's parents the problem that investigators had with with her parents was this they
00:05:15
claimed that the answers that they got from her parents regarding the the final day the
00:05:22
day that Jeanette had disappeared these answers were short and often vague answers and almost with no details and
00:05:31
the police did not seem to like this they thought that the the the Palmas would have more answers for them they
00:05:36
would have some details some information that might provide some leads into the eventual murder of their daughter but
00:05:44
just a few days after their daughter was found the mother said some odd things to
00:05:49
the newspaper yes and this a lot of people in the public took some issue with these statements now this was
00:05:55
Florence De Palma this was just two days after the discovery of jeannette's body
00:06:00
she tells a local newspaper this is the Newark Star Ledger and quote she says she had resigned herself to her
00:06:08
daughter's death weeks ago now mind you she's saying weeks ago and yet her daughter's body was just found two days
00:06:15
before giving the statement to the newspaper and she states that the Lord had told her and had gave her peace
00:06:23
weeks before finding the body of her daughter and some would point out that that suggests that maybe the parents
00:06:30
knew something or maybe the parents had some kind of involvement in the the actual murder or what took place with
00:06:37
their daughter yeah so maybe the parents know a little more or maybe it's just some other intuition that she eventually
00:06:44
felt like she had to accept well when I find out a little bit more information about the parents and about the De Palma
00:06:51
family I don't find her statement to be so incriminating let's say um we have statements from her other
00:07:00
daughter Cindy now Cindy was older than Jeanette from my understanding there were two other daughters living in the
00:07:08
home with Jeanette now I said that they had a large family like seven or eight kids I'm assuming the other kids had
00:07:15
grown and moved out of the home but it's often reported that the two remaining daughters you know after they found the
00:07:21
body of Jeannette newspaper articles will say the two remaining daughters so I'm assuming just two of them live there
00:07:28
now Cindy is the only one that I could find that would give statements that would talk about this case for years to
00:07:34
come I wish we had a little more information from Cindy as to what was going on with inside the walls of that
00:07:42
De Palma home during the course of when Jeanette was still missing and the body had not been found because I'm assuming
00:07:50
that if her mother had resigned herself to her daughter's death weeks ago before
00:07:55
before the discovery of the body that there would be things going on with inside that home you know you would
00:08:01
think that she would almost be would she be comforting her husband or her husband
00:08:06
comforting her you would you would think there would be a lot of dread inside that home prior to the finding of the
00:08:11
body but the reason why I say that it I don't find that that statement to be so incriminating is one thing we have to
00:08:20
keep in mind here and factor in in this situation is that the De Palma family especially the parents were extremely
00:08:27
religious from my understanding that they went to the way that it's been reported was they
00:08:33
were not just the type that that attended church on a weekly basis that they would often go multiple times
00:08:40
per week and that they were extremely religious and I that's why I don't find it so
00:08:48
incriminating because I could see with somebody being incredibly religious and their daughter having been gone for
00:08:55
three four weeks I mean you start hope you lose hope you lose a little bit of Hope every day each
00:09:03
day as it gets further and further from the last time that you saw your child and at some point you might just have to
00:09:09
put that faith in God and you might be looking for answers and she may have come to this conclusion
00:09:16
or or felt that felt that she was being given this information well this is part
00:09:22
of the reason why this case to me is so frustrating because for every bit of information that you think maybe you're
00:09:28
going to get closer to having a picture of what was going on [Music] it seems like there's a counter story so
00:09:35
one story is that the family is really religious and so again she had this uh God told her your child pass accept it
00:09:44
okay that's one story the other story is that the family is not that religious and that one of their daughters started
00:09:52
going to a different church that was not their denomination right but then the family started going to that church and
00:09:59
then there's reports that Jeanette is highly involved in church Works uh for some teen crisis center type thing maybe
00:10:10
crisis center is not the whole right word but um you know where she's like mentoring
00:10:15
yeah and there's other reports that she was not involved in church at all that she possibly was involved in like
00:10:22
witchcraft and so that's what's so frustrating about this case the same it's the same
00:10:27
thing we saw when we discussed her Jeanette's character what kind of person she may have been what kind of teenager
00:10:33
she could have been yeah it's you have half the room telling us that she was super religious and she was super into
00:10:38
going to church and she was uh trying to Mentor some of her peers to find religion and to join the church and then
00:10:46
you have the other half of the room saying almost the opposite the exact opposite stating no her parents drug her
00:10:53
there her family drug her there multiple times a week I think they called it a drug and alcohol counselor which is
00:11:01
weird to have a drug and alcohol counselor be 16 but I think it was more of a system setup where
00:11:08
if if a teenager was having issues where they could call and it would be somebody
00:11:14
of their own age to say hey come to the church we love you we care about you let's get
00:11:21
you some help if that makes any sense well yeah because you would have that that would
00:11:26
provide someone the opportunity to discuss what's going on inside their life and things maybe that they've
00:11:32
experimented with right without the fear of getting in trouble you know from anybody without their parents finding
00:11:38
out or a teacher or something like that yeah so supposedly she did do this you know but again
00:11:45
probably a story out there that says that she never even went to that church well while we're on the subject of these
00:11:51
newspaper articles there were several that came out within the two weeks of the discovery of her body and there were
00:11:58
several that of significance in my opinion there are two that I would like to discuss and here are the headlines
00:12:04
from these two the first one is uh headline girl sacrificed in which right and the second is De Palma's say Slayers
00:12:13
possessed by demons I think we should go through both of these because this is where this might
00:12:20
be where the the Genesis of where these rumors about Witchcraft and Satanism having been involved in jeannette's
00:12:29
murder let's start with the one that's called uh Girl sacrifice and which right yeah and here's the important little
00:12:36
snippet from from that article it starts investigation into the death of 16 year
00:12:43
old Jeanette De Palma is focusing on elements of black Witchcraft and Satan worship a review of death scene photos
00:12:50
according to reports is leading authorities to believe the girl's death may have been in the nature of a
00:12:57
sacrifice pieces of wood at first thought to be at the scene by chance are now seen as symbols detectives
00:13:04
throughout Union County have been alerted to the possibility that a cult or a cult member played a part in the
00:13:12
death a search party discovered her remains she had been missing six weeks on September 19th in a wooded area of a
00:13:20
quarry atop a 40-foot Cliff about 400 yards from shun Pike Road one Searcher said two pieces of wood
00:13:29
were crossed on the ground over her head more wood framed the body like a coffin
00:13:35
another person who was there said I guess if you were looking for signs they were there all right just go ahead and
00:13:42
read the next one so we can dive into both of them at the same time and I'm going to kind of give a summary of this
00:13:49
article because it's it's a bit longer but it starts by saying parents say daughter may have been murdered by
00:13:55
persons whose bodies are possessed by demons then the article mentions the following incidents of Witchcraft in the
00:14:03
area also stating authorities said that Jeanette's death may be linked to a coven or witchcraft assembly in the area
00:14:13
and what's especially troubling here is this is the first mention of of this situation
00:14:20
this article also mentions acts of animal sacrifice this taking place in a reservation nearby stating that State
00:14:27
Park police found these acts committed against dogs cats and even a goat the reporter wrote about a bowl of blood
00:14:36
that was found the bowl of Blood also contained the bodies of pigeons who had had their necks snapped I think it's
00:14:44
important to point out though when we're talking about the animal sacrifices that
00:14:49
the State Park police had found yeah that this was in a nearby reservation this was not in the same area where
00:14:56
Jeanette's body was found it's I think it's key to point that out yeah but how many miles away
00:15:03
I don't I don't know off the off the top of my head here I mean look if it's five
00:15:09
to ten miles in that radius could it be linked possibly what I'm getting at though is yeah is there possible that
00:15:16
it's spillover or at some point that they moved into another area yeah that could happen but what I what I want to
00:15:23
make sure that I point out here is those acts those things that they believed were going on in that reservation were
00:15:29
not going on in the area where Jeanette's body was eventually found they found no evidence of that at any
00:15:35
time right there's rumors that there was witchcraft activities going on at Devil's call or Devil's teeth but those
00:15:44
were just rumors and maybe maybe the name itself Devil's teeth inspires those rumors yeah this again Devil's teeth is
00:15:53
a difficult place to get to so you know we're a bunch of devil worships going up
00:16:01
there to perform to acts uh probably not likely right and it sounds like they were leaving I hate to be gross but they
00:16:09
were leaving the carcasses and they were leaving evidence of such at this reservation like it was pretty easily
00:16:16
found you know they were finding blood and they were finding bodies of animals now I could find one story specifically
00:16:23
talking about chickens and I know that that newspaper article referenced dogs cats and a goat right however I couldn't
00:16:33
find anything specifically saying that they had found carcasses of a dog cat or even a goat right again these could just
00:16:41
be rumors then the other rumors that are weirder these items that were left at her body these Blair Witch type
00:16:50
items that would be be left at the at our sacrifice scene yeah well and that's what I want to kind of focus in on we
00:16:59
should push away the stuff that's going on may or may not be going on at the reservation and talk specifically about
00:17:05
what was found with her body and at the crime scene now there are three generally three different reports of
00:17:13
what are considered to be likely what was found there because this is all over the shop Captain we have different
00:17:19
people saying different things were found at the crime scene the first one I want to discuss is we have the police
00:17:27
officer officer Don that we had spoke about yesterday he was involved in he was the one that responded to the call
00:17:33
about the arm at the apartment complex and he was part of the search he was one of the first people to see her body atop
00:17:42
of that Cliff yeah now what he described at the scene was he described a single cross a single wooden cross now I have
00:17:51
to we we have to be clear here this is not a wooden cross that somebody built and had nailed into the ground this is
00:17:58
what he describes as a large stick crossed over by a smaller stick that would form the appearance of a cross
00:18:05
lying on the ground this would have been just above if you were at the feet if you were at her feet looking at the body
00:18:13
this would be just above her head right so some people would say it's like you know a headstone almost right but he
00:18:21
also says that it looks like there was a tree and that possibly a tree just fell
00:18:25
over and therefore making the cross he says between the cross itself and Jeanette's body
00:18:34
were four or five stones that looked like they were placed around her head giving the the image of almost a Halo
00:18:43
right those are the only things that he describes finding there or seeing before
00:18:49
he's told by detectives to get off the cliff and go down and tell tell people to back up and get away
00:18:56
we have another account this is from a girl named Lisa she's about she would have been about Jeanette's age and I
00:19:03
don't want to give her full name but she says that she went to the crime scene two days after the body was found
00:19:12
and when she got there the crime scene tape the police tape was still they had still roped off the area right right but
00:19:19
that there was nobody guarding the area so she went up there this is almost like
00:19:23
uh like a Stand By Me situation you know going out to see a body but they've already removed Jeanette's Body by this
00:19:31
time but it's not as cool I mean think about that if stand by him if Stephen King said hey I'm going to make a movie
00:19:37
or there you go you want to see a body yeah and they go but there is no body do you want to go see where it happened not
00:19:46
as cool right hey for anybody out there listening this is just my own opinion the movie Stand By Me incredibly good
00:19:53
the the book that it's based from the body very good that's something people should check out anyway let's go get
00:20:01
into what Lisa says that she had saw there now remember we said that that Jeanette's body had kind of sunken into
00:20:08
the ground right so when Lisa went up there you could still see the outline of where the body once was so it's not like
00:20:16
you she's looking at some random spot she's looking at a spot that is correct and what she described was that there
00:20:24
was a large log that would have run uh above where her head would have been and then a smaller log that would have been
00:20:34
right at her feet and then to each side of the body were multiple makeshift crosses from from small branches
00:20:45
this gives a vague picture of maybe a coffin-like thing or resting area for some some say that they were building
00:20:57
kind of an altar and that's where the sacrifice had to happen was on this altar you know
00:21:03
but you know not not where we look at it as like you know I was raised Catholic so you think of alter being something
00:21:09
that was raised right but this was you know basically we're creating an altar on the ground like a perimeter around
00:21:16
the body right so not so much uh a casket the third account is what is described according to newspaper
00:21:24
accounts and this is kind of a combination of the two we have the cross that we spoke about that officer Don saw
00:21:32
above the head and then we had the log going up by the head area the log also at the feet area and then the body is
00:21:42
positioned between two logs as well giving a full outline of either an altar or a coffin-like uh situation now with
00:21:51
inside that perimeter that was created by those four logs we have multiple makeshift small crosses created by
00:22:00
branches small branches on both sides of the body this is coming from Lisa this is the from newspaper accounts okay so
00:22:08
we so we have Lisa's accounts that are similar to this newspaper account well in a sense it's it's almost like
00:22:18
officer Don's account is minimal you know they're he's only finding a few items there and then Lisa's is a little
00:22:27
more extravagant there's the addition of the logs with multiple makeshift crosses
00:22:32
on both sides of the body right and then the newspaper account is like a combination of the two but on steroids
00:22:38
where you have everything involved and you have you have a bunch of stuff surrounding
00:22:45
this body so what's your gut telling you what I think Captain is I I favor officer Don's account as well as the
00:22:53
teenager leases account rather than the newspaper and I have nothing I have very
00:22:57
little to base this off of but the newspaper account seems to be the most extravagant it seems to contain the most
00:23:05
items up there oh right but they're they're in the business of selling stories right it could just be
00:23:11
sensationalism you know for the purpose of their articles which you and I absolutely hate that I I think I
00:23:19
question that if any of the writers had even been to the location I think that they were probably basing what they
00:23:26
thought was there off of other people's stories and off of other people's accounts of what they may or may not
00:23:32
have saw okay so what was found by the body in my opinion yeah um I I think that it was probably like I
00:23:40
said I think that the more accurate statements would be either Lisa's account or officer Don's account
00:23:46
so okay so to contradict officer Don's account we have another officer that says yes there were Sticks and Stones up
00:23:54
there near the body the body was found in the middle of the woods and in this officer's opinion the Sticks and Stones
00:24:00
were just there by chance they weren't arranged by anyone nobody had placed them there that they were just there
00:24:06
because Sticks and Stones exist in the woods right now officer Dawn you know these two are not really these two
00:24:14
officers aren't really saying one is right and one is is wrong you know he's saying Don would have seen Sticks and
00:24:21
Stones up there but I don't believe they were arranged now officer Don would say
00:24:25
well this officer was only up on top of that Hill for a very short period of time before being asked to leave and
00:24:33
what I believe I saw appeared to have been purposely placed in position near the body
00:24:40
the thing here is under this situation both of these officers would have been asked to leave the area relatively
00:24:46
quickly after finding the body where you have somebody like Lisa who if she did venture out there two days later she's
00:24:55
she's looking at something and not being removed she she can stand there as long
00:24:59
as she likes and observe whatever is there whatever's present now keep in mind it is in fact two days after the
00:25:06
body was removed from there somebody could have altered the scene I think that leases could be slightly
00:25:13
exaggerated she I'm just factoring in that she's a teenager I'm factoring in that she might have been scared while
00:25:19
she was up there that also she's like think about what the one officer said yes of course there were Sticks and
00:25:25
Stones up there it's the woods for crying out loud right I think maybe she may have seen things up there and put
00:25:31
into a little more uh thought that was necessary into what items she was looking at
00:25:38
I think the answer for me and what my belief would be is that it's somewhere between officer Don's account and Lisa's
00:25:45
account of what was seen up there and it's also possible that somebody went up there and had these little crosses made
00:25:52
out of sticks and put them down as like a memorial to the girl I mean you see that all the time somebody dies in a car
00:26:00
wreck you know two days later it's like there's a bunch of crosses that put somebody put down could be something
00:26:05
like that but from all the accounts and all the interviews I've heard the majority of
00:26:11
the police officers say there wasn't anything there right I'm not going to go too far-fetched with this Lisa
00:26:20
Turtle story you know there was no crosses there was no nothing because that would have been
00:26:26
reported by multiple cops if there were crosses there weren't were there some sticks that were placed in certain you
00:26:33
know look it could be as simple as the area was altered before or after the murder and that's
00:26:42
why there there is some sign of any of that but to me there is no sign of that this was a sacrifice or witchcraft yeah
00:26:50
it's it's a strange situation because like you said we have multiple officers saying that there was nothing up there
00:26:56
to suggest that and then we have two of the officers one who says at the scene hey this looks like Witchcraft and then
00:27:04
another officer officer Don stating I saw a cross and I saw some Stones arranged near the head
00:27:11
thank you [Music] [Music] all right we're back cheers mate cheers captain now I tell you what regardless
00:27:32
of what was found up at the scene okay because it's all over the shop either nothing was found
00:27:38
some items were found or a whole bunch of items were found that were resembled items that would be satanic in
00:27:47
nature or witchcraft the thing here is we there was a great book written about this case and it's
00:27:53
called the death on the devil's teeth and this was written by Jesse Pollock and Mark Moran now one thing these two
00:28:01
guys did these guys are authors I believe they work for or founded something called weird New Jersey or
00:28:08
weird NJ which I guess is like a bi-annually publication that comes out for uh weird things that happen in the
00:28:16
state of New Jersey is that right Captain biannually does that mean twice a year or every other year I always get
00:28:22
confused when I hear that I but I believe their publication comes out twice a year now one thing these guys
00:28:28
did which was great was they took the information of what was speculated to have been found at the scene according
00:28:36
to officer Dawn according to the teenager Lisa that we discussed and according to the newspaper Accounts at
00:28:42
the time and they took this information and they presented it to some experts in
00:28:47
the field of of which craft and Satanism to get their opinions on you know if if
00:28:54
in fact these items were found at the scene what can we make of it right okay so the the first Professor that they
00:29:02
talked to and this is Ronald Hutton now he teaches courses on contemporary paganism at the University of Bristol he
00:29:10
says that the items that he sees and the items that he has been told and described to him as being placed at the
00:29:18
at the murder scene at the crime scene and his opinion are not even items considered to be that of a pagan or
00:29:25
ritual magic relationship he says that um regardless of what or wasn't found at the scene items described in his opinion
00:29:36
these are all traditionally Christian symbols that would have been found there we talked about cross-like things being
00:29:42
found uh maybe a coffin or an altar like situation being found at the crime scene
00:29:47
right which hence my idea that somebody could have left these after the body was
00:29:52
removed now another professor teaching on the subject points out that uh and I was happy to find this because I I know
00:30:00
a little about this subject I like to read about cold cases um but crunch you know I
00:30:08
I think it out sorry sorry but you know I know a lot of people think that Satanism and Witchcraft and things like
00:30:15
that can come up a lot in these cases and actually that's just not a thing when it does come up it's usually simply
00:30:23
a bad lead or misunderstanding and the reports on Satanism slash with witchcraft being involved it's often
00:30:32
described very hollywood-like presented in ways that seem cheesy and fake to me so I was happy to find this something I
00:30:40
had thought this is from Dr Jason Coy professor of history at the College of Charleston he's a renowned expert in the
00:30:49
field of Witchcraft and he says modern day witches or wiccans have nothing to do with historical Witchcraft and are
00:30:57
generally peaceful environmentalists and feminists who who practice a sort of New
00:31:04
Age neo-pagan religion which he says seems to have nothing to do with this case at all nothing that was presented
00:31:12
to him and nothing to do with Jeanette's murder in his opinion he states that this looks more like the work of some
00:31:19
psychopath with a type of religious fixation well some of those ideas that he was talking about kind of get brought
00:31:26
up in the West Memphis Three case where Damien talks about that he wasn't it was
00:31:33
more so a spiritual View and almost feminist views as well yeah and that's one thing I had always thought like I
00:31:42
said I knew very little about this but that was always my understanding that these are not traditionally violent
00:31:48
people looking to go out and make actual sacrifices on humans or or animals uh while we're on that subject though
00:31:56
Captain I want to mention though I you had asked about where uh regarding the location of those quote unquote animal
00:32:03
sacrifices that we discussed right that took place at a place called the wachung
00:32:09
I hope I said that right this is not right I did not say that but I'm not terribly off I can't be terribly off
00:32:15
because it's w-a-t-c-h-u-n-g reservation now I don't know the location and proximity to where
00:32:23
her body was found well what good are you but what I do know is I'm just reviewing my notes here that according
00:32:29
to police they refer to these as uh Santeria acts that they found evidence of this in the uh reservation and this
00:32:38
is the the largest park in Union County so it's in the same county as where she was found and the reservation is a
00:32:49
1945 acre Force so a very extremely large area now we pulled that information from the article that was
00:32:58
titled the Palmas say Slayers possessed by demons there was also one thing that was extremely interesting near the end
00:33:07
of this article and that is the and this is straight from the article stating quote the investigation has also been
00:33:15
widened to include a review of the list murders well Captain we have not even got to
00:33:21
this portion of the case yet not Lisk right list some people hear that and they hear Lisk l-i-s-k but it's a list
00:33:30
yeah like I wrote a list I was researching in this case and I was like this might have something to do with the
00:33:36
Lisk murders and I thought Long Island serial killer like again it goes back to 72. oh my God this is so fascinating
00:33:44
then I realized that was a [ __ ] so why would why would they suggest that the investigation according to this article
00:33:51
and quote the investigation has also been widened to include the review of the list murders
00:33:57
well we have to paint a picture here captain and it's not a party box murders so the list murders are a a family was
00:34:05
murdered in this area just months before Jeanette had gone missing and this is considered to be one of the
00:34:14
most famous cases from the state of New Jersey you got to keep in mind though the
00:34:20
community was still suffering and still trying to heal and and still trying to make sense of this
00:34:28
horrible crime that had happened just months before this teenage girl goes missing and then is ultimately found
00:34:34
dead in the woods right now the list murders were not discovered until December 7th of 1971. remember our
00:34:42
Jeanette De Palma case is taking place in August and September of 1972 so less than a year later
00:34:51
what we have here though Captain is upon a welfare check to a home occupied by The List family
00:35:01
now this home is referred to as a mansion and it was given the name Brees Knoll and I don't know if that was given
00:35:08
to the home by the family or if it had had that name prior to their purchasing of this Mansion but
00:35:15
police are responding to a welfare call at this seemingly well to do family we have a home where what was reported is
00:35:25
that the family would be gone on some type of vacation visiting the um the mother's mother who lived in North
00:35:34
Carolina and they had told people that they would be there for several weeks the the milk deliveries had stopped at
00:35:41
the home the mail had been stopped as well as newspapers but there were lights that were left on
00:35:47
inside the home day and night and apparently no activity going on within or around the home
00:35:54
finally neighbors began to get concerned as the lights began to burn out one by one and it almost appeared like the
00:36:02
family had left the home and they were never going to return so when the police respond to this welfare call they decide
00:36:09
to enter the home they find an unlocked window in front of the house towards the
00:36:14
front of the home and they decide to enter the home through there as they made their way through the home they
00:36:20
could hear what sounded like either symphony music or religious music like being played over a radio
00:36:27
they made their way to now mind you this was referred to as the ballroom I believe which you would think would be
00:36:34
like some big grandioso room right but it was two feet by two feet it was a ballroom for a puppeteer as for
00:36:44
all those tiny dancers but they get to what was referred to as the ballroom and when they get there the
00:36:51
room's not as large as one would would expect to see but they find the bodies of
00:36:58
of children and of a woman and they are lying face down on on sleeping bags now all of the victims had been shot in the
00:37:09
head the police are pretty frightened by this discovery and shocked to say the least
00:37:15
but now they're going to move room by room throughout the home they're kind of expecting that they could encounter a
00:37:23
killer that is hiding in a corner somewhere in one of these rooms with a gun ready to kill whoever finds them
00:37:29
yeah Psycho Killer so as they move room to room they make their way to what is in fact the man of the home uh the man
00:37:38
of the house it's his office and this is John list it's his office and on the desk they they see a series
00:37:47
of letters and they find an envelope that is addressed to John List's pastor this is Reverend Eugene raywinkle the
00:37:57
letter is dated November 9th 1971 and it reads dear pastor I'm very sorry to add this additional
00:38:08
burden to your work I know that what has been done is wrong from all that I have
00:38:13
been taught and that any reason that I might give will not make it right but you are the one person that I know that
00:38:22
while not condoning this will at least possibly understand why I had to do this I wasn't earning anywhere near enough to
00:38:31
support us everything I tried seemed to Fall to Pieces true we could have gone bankrupt and
00:38:39
maybe gone on welfare but that brings me to my next point knowing the type of location one would
00:38:47
have to live in plus the environment for the children plus the effect on them knowing that they were on welfare was
00:38:55
just more than I thought they could handle I know that they were willing to cut back but this involved a lot more than
00:39:02
that with Pat being so determined to get into acting I was also fearful as to what this might
00:39:11
do to her continuing to be a Christian I'm sure it wouldn't have helped also with Helen not going to church
00:39:21
I knew this would harm the children eventually in their attendance I had continued to hope that she would begin
00:39:29
to come to church soon but when I mentioned that to her she just blew up and stated that she wanted
00:39:37
her name taken off of the church roles again this could have only given an adverse result for the children's
00:39:44
continued attendance so that is the sum of it if any one of these had been the condition we might have pulled through
00:39:55
but this was too much at last I'm certain that all have gone to heaven now if things had gone on who knows if that
00:40:05
would be the case of course mother got involved because doing what I did to my family
00:40:12
would have been a tremendous shock to her at this age therefore knowing that she was also a Christian
00:40:21
I felt it best that she be relieved of the Troubles of this world that would have hit her
00:40:28
after it was all over I said some prayers for all of them from the hymn book that was the least I could do
00:40:38
now for the final Arrangements and the children have all agreed that they would prefer to be cremated
00:40:47
please see to it that the costs are kept low for mother she has a plot at the church
00:40:54
Cemetery also I don't know what will happen to the books and other personal things
00:41:03
but to the extent possible I would like for them to be distributed as you see fit
00:41:10
some books might go into the school or church library originally I had planned this for
00:41:17
November 1st All Saints Day but travel Arrangements were delayed I thought it would be an appropriate day
00:41:25
for them all to get to heaven as for me please let me be dropped from the congregation rolls
00:41:35
I Leave myself in the hands of God's justice and mercy I don't doubt that he is able to help us
00:41:42
but apparently he saw fit not to answer my prayers the way that I hoped they would be
00:41:49
answered this makes me think that perhaps it was best as far as the children's souls are
00:41:55
concerned I know that many will only look at the additional years that they could have
00:42:01
lived but if finally they were no longer Christians what would be gained also I am sure many will say how could
00:42:11
anyone do such a horrible thing my only answer is it isn't easy and was only done after much thought
00:42:23
one other thing it may seem cowardly to have always shot from behind but I didn't want any of
00:42:31
them to know even at the last second that I had to do this to them John got hurt more because he seemed to
00:42:39
struggle longer the rest were immediately out of pain John didn't consciously feel anything
00:42:47
either please remember me in your prayers I will need them whether or not the government does its
00:42:55
Duty as it sees fit I am only concerned with making peace with God and of this I am assured because of
00:43:05
Christ dying even for me P.S mother is in the hallway in the Attic on the third floor
00:43:13
she was too heavy to move signed John so very obvious captain that John list murdered his wife three children and his
00:43:27
mother before writing that letter on November 9 1971. yeah after he wrote the letter he
00:43:35
turned on the music he locked the doors and he left the house the police obviously looking for Mr list who is now
00:43:43
a mass murderer they did some checking into his background because they had some
00:43:49
evidence regarding the letter that he left them or for the pastor more appropriately of what led him to
00:43:56
committing these crimes and he talks a lot about uh being a Christian and going to church and however ultimately he
00:44:03
commits a very unchristian-like act to solve his troubles and not wanting to put his family
00:44:11
through any troubles well maybe discuss this with them first right he Cho he he chose to get a redo and didn't give them
00:44:19
the option for that now what it appears to me to be Captain is that this family was living well
00:44:25
beyond their means and this has got to be um primarily his fault he's the man of
00:44:32
the house he's the one that's in charge of paying the bills and probably setting
00:44:37
a budget for the household his wife did suffer some type of illness and I don't have that specifically here in my notes
00:44:45
but I know that she suffered some type of illness that caused their um maybe even some dementia uh from her
00:44:54
where she would she would act out at times and this was a big reason why she was not attending the church like he had
00:45:02
referenced in the letter he does mention his oldest daughter in the letter saying that she had kind of
00:45:08
fallen out of the church that she wanted to get into acting and that caused him to question her Christianity yeah and he
00:45:16
also thought that maybe the more she got into acting the worse that would get for
00:45:21
her Christianity correct and if had he not done this act uh when he did maybe she would not have been received into
00:45:29
heaven apparently Not only was he overspending and spending beyond the means of their
00:45:38
income but the mother lived with them because this was such an expensive home that he
00:45:44
had to go to her for money uh whether it be for the down payment or to pay the mortgage probably both but the agreement
00:45:51
was that she would live in an apartment that they basically furnished in the Attic of this Mansion quote unquote
00:45:58
mansion she lived there and he apparently at some point lost his job and rather than informing his family of
00:46:08
this it was for it was for many many months every day he would wake up he would shower he would get ready for work
00:46:16
he would dress in a suit and tie and he would leave the house and he would go to
00:46:20
a local bus station and he would sit there and he would read all day long and he would come home at the end of each
00:46:28
day now I'm sure at times he was probably looking for work because he did ultimately find work but once he had the
00:46:36
family was so far behind on its bills and behind in in debt that he chose to take the lives of his family and like I
00:46:45
said give himself a redo but not give anybody else the option of this and as sad as it is I mean it's it's horrible
00:46:54
and it reminds us so much of the William Bradford Bishop case that we discussed when we covered the FBI's most wanted
00:47:01
list it's a guy that did the same thing to his family and to his mother just a couple years after this took place uh
00:47:09
with the list family he shot John list shot all of his family members with a nine millimeter gun and like he said in
00:47:16
the letter from behind in a very cowardly way leaving them displayed in the Ballroom in the mother up in the
00:47:23
attic where this ties to the case to the case of Janet De Palma It's Tricky it's really tricky to say
00:47:30
but I feel like we needed to cover this into uh give somewhat of a detailed description of this crime because it
00:47:40
would be rare when you research the Jeanette case when you research her case it is rare to find any mention of her
00:47:47
case without them referencing the list murders or John list and his family well one because in this area these are the
00:47:55
two biggest probably murder cases ever in this area and and they're happening less than one year apart both unsolved
00:48:04
at the time of the investigation and then you have books that were found it seems to be that there were things found
00:48:11
within the list home that would suggest that the oldest daughter the one that was getting into
00:48:17
acting and that John said was getting further from the church right that she may have been involved in some
00:48:25
witchcraft or Wiccan type activity now it has been referenced from her Diaries uh entries that she made into
00:48:34
her journal and books and materials that were found within the home this is the tie this is what ties this to De Palma's
00:48:44
case when you talk about Satanism and the possibility of witchcraft the even the possibility that that
00:48:51
Jeanette herself was involved in witchcraft books yes were these books and that's it right yeah that well
00:48:59
really that's it and that's what's sad is that this is reported that oh the police are now going to widen their
00:49:04
investigation into the list murders because of Jeanette's case however it's it's a lot of what we've seen before and
00:49:13
what we suspect with some of those newspaper articles regarding things that were found at Jeanette's crime scene was
00:49:21
that there's some sensationalism going on here oh yeah and for first of all ah Mr list you use my friend
00:49:32
use a piece of [ __ ] but this has nothing to do with it his daughter probably was interested in
00:49:40
probably some spirituality stuff she probably was doing some research uh Curious you know just because you have
00:49:48
some books on the Shelf about a subject matter doesn't mean that you're into that right I mean like if somebody went
00:49:56
to the Colonel's house right now right the alarm would go off okay right but they get past the alarm okay to get past
00:50:04
the five dogs or whatever you got two dogs Mr dog lover leave the dogs alone please
00:50:11
I would like to have my dogs when I get there well one might bite your head off but then they get to the Bookshelf right
00:50:18
past all the porno mags they get to the Bookshelf there's no porno backs but go ahead
00:50:24
you know just because you have all these books about serial killers and mass murderers and
00:50:31
all that doesn't make you one right that's my point and I think is it just the naivete of the of the 70s
00:50:43
where they just jump to these crazy conclusions or or is it what you said during our
00:50:49
break if it bleeds it leads yeah and I mean it's sad but that's the truth you know
00:50:55
you you talk about some of the biggest murder cases serial murder and otherwise throughout the history of the world
00:51:03
and what we've seen time and time again it sells newspapers and magazines and people do TV shows about it and two guys
00:51:10
sit in a garage and drink some beer and try to figure things out so we're part of the problem I guess we're part of the
00:51:16
problem yeah maybe I shouldn't have highlighted that for everybody but in this situation 1972 uh neither of us
00:51:23
were around and they this is sensationalism in my opinion for these newspaper articles in reality what we do
00:51:30
know is this is there any chance that these cases are have any involvement in one another
00:51:36
other than being from the same area in the same time period no I couldn't find anything to suggest that that that the
00:51:45
list family even knew the De Palma family yeah the other connection that people were trying to make was that the
00:51:51
oldest list daughter was into Witchcraft and they did seances and they did witchcraft
00:51:58
activities arts and crafts with witchcraft uh up at Devil's skull and so that therefore that maybe she was
00:52:10
Loosely connected to Jeanette and it's it's not true right there's there's really no evidence that there was any
00:52:17
kind of activity that happened at Devil's Devil's teeth is the is there any connection no there's no connection
00:52:24
with the list murders but when you research this uh you know I kept on hearing about these murders and they
00:52:30
might be connected so we thought was important to go through it at least especially if we're going to reference
00:52:35
them later but it's one of those things captain that you have to in this case you have to get over the fact that
00:52:42
they're not connected to the list murders and you have to get over the fact that there's it's leaning towards
00:52:48
that it's more likely that Witchcraft and Satanism was not involved and Jeanette De Palma's murder and once you
00:52:57
get past those two things those those little mountains there and you venture on then you have to question I think that's
00:53:04
when you can start to see what maybe really truly happened here why did she disappear why did she go missing and
00:53:10
ultimately why was she killed and are there other cases that are connected to this one yes and that leaves us here
00:53:17
Captain we have so much more to get to there's been speculation that if this was not witchcraft or satanism
00:53:23
could it possibly have ties to the mafia could this could she have been killed by
00:53:28
a stranger or a friend or a boyfriend was this ultimately some kind of cover-up involving the police
00:53:36
and this is going to lead us down the road of looking into some other murders that may be connected to Jeanette's case
00:53:45
and we also have plenty of suspects to discuss as well all right thanks for joining us in the
00:53:57
garage and telling a friend we had no clue this was gonna turn out to be four episodes it was kind of a
00:54:03
last minute punt situation right Captain we got into this we're like holy moly there's a lot here on the surface it
00:54:09
doesn't appear to be such but there is a lot more to get to We Appreciate everybody joining us this week in the
00:54:15
garage if you want to continue to chat go to truecrimegarage.com we have our blog there there's room for your
00:54:22
comments and your questions there on our website all right until next week Colonel you be good and Captain you be
00:54:29
kind and everybody please don't litter [Music] thank you [Music] [Applause] [Music]