Criminal (2014)

Debbie Schum waited a long time to receive the cremated ashes of her friend, LoraLee Johnson, from Sunset Mesa Funeral Directors in Montrose, Colorado. When she did, she felt relieved to finally take them home with her. But then, she got a call from the FBI. It turned out that the owner of the funeral home, Megan Hess, and her parents Shirley and Alan Koch had been operating a body brokering business—without permission from anyone. We speak with Debbie Schum, Elena Saavedra Buckley, Melissa Connor, and Danielle McCarthy. To learn more, check out Saavedra Buckley’s article in High Country News, “‘None of this happened the way you think it did.’”

In the spring of 1922, the United Mine Workers of America announced a national strike. And then, that summer in Herrin, Illinois, 23 people were murdered over two days. Men, women, and children came out of their houses to watch, and in some cases, to take part in the violence. Scott Doody’s book is Herrin Massacre. Special thanks to the Special Collections Research Center at Southern Illinois University, Carbondale, and Matt Gorzalski, and to John Griswold, who wrote Herrin: The Brief History of an Infamous American City.

One day Adam Braseel got a phone call from his mother. She said that a man in Grundy County, Tennessee had been murdered, and the police thought Adam had something to do with it. Adam was charged with and convicted of the murder of Malcolm Burrows and assault against Rebecca Hill and Kirk Braden, despite there being no physical evidence against him. And then, 8 years later, Judge Justin Angel ordered a new trial. We speak with Adam Braseel, Judge Justin Angel, and Sergeant Mike Brown.

“The police had surrounded the house. They had been there for quite a while. They didn’t want to try to rush the house because they thought he might kill one of the innocent people. But after waiting for a long time, I asked the police: ‘Let me see if I can talk to the guy.'” For decades, TV news reporter Russ Ewing stood beside more than 100 people—at their request—as they surrendered to the police. We speak with Charles Thomas, Marijane Placek, Pat Arnold, and Ken Bedford about Russ Ewing, and Chicago’s former police detective and commander, Jon Burge. Thanks to CBC Licensing.

Just before midnight on October 15, 1990, police arrived at 527 Lime Street in Jacksonville, Florida to find the small wood-frame house on fire. A man named Gerald Lewis was standing in the front yard. He said there were people inside the house. What happened next was so unusual that it changed the way we think about arson. We speak with attorney Frank Ashton and fire investigator John Lentini about the Lime Street case and why it was so important.

Sgt. David Mascarenas was the Dive Supervisor for the Los Angeles Police Department. He’s been diving his whole life, and prides himself on never refusing a dive, no matter how treacherous. At least until the summer of 2013, when a murder investigation led him into the unusually murky waters of the La Brea tar pits. We first spoke with Sgt. Mascarenas in 2015. This week, we’re adding to the story with information about the crime he couldn’t tell us before. In 2011, a man named Alonzo Ester was shot and killed in LA. The LAPD received a tip that some evidence was at the bottom of the La Brea tar pits.

In April of 1995, wildlife biologists flew small airplanes over Yellowstone National Park, looking for two missing wolves. “They’re just gone. And that’s implausible because wolves don’t just disappear.” The missing wolves were two of 14 that had been brought down from Canada in an attempt to reestablish the wolf population in Yellowstone. Not everyone supported the Yellowstone Wolf Project—including a man named Chad McKittrick. We speak with Thomas McNamee and Joe Fontaine. McNamee’s book is The Killing of Wolf Number Ten. We’re trying something new. Two stories about the same family of wolves in Yellowstone. One is a crime story, and one is a love story. For the love story, check out Episode 19 of This is Love. It’s called The Wolves: https://apple.co/2wSJs7B

In January 2000, the bodies of two First Nations men were found frozen in a remote area of Saskatoon, Canada. It was a place where nobody walked, especially in the winter. And then, a man named Darrell Night came forward and said he had been dropped off by police on the outskirts of town, but he had made it back alive. We speak with former police officer Ernie Louttit and reporter Dan Zakreski about the deaths of Neil Stonechild, Lawrence Wegner, and Rodney Naistus, and “starlight tours” within the Saskatoon Police Service.

“I’ve been teaching law for almost 40 years. And I recently realized we don’t really teach people in law school about the tools of forgiveness that are built into the legal system.” Today, we’re talking with Harvard law professors Dehlia Umunna and Martha Minow about when and how the law should forgive. Martha Minow’s latest book is When Should Law Forgive.

In May 1991, a bank robber walked into a bank in Irving, Texas, and without speaking handed the teller a note that read, “This is a bank robbery. Give me your money. No marked bills or dye packs.” Witnesses reported that the robber was wearing a cowboy hat and a brown leather jacket. And then it happened again. And again. But when FBI agents finally got a lead, they discovered that robber wasn’t who they expected at all. We speak with writer Skip Hollandsworth and former FBI agent Steve Powell about Peggy Jo Tallas. To learn more, check out Skip Hollandsworth’s Texas Monthly article, “The Last Ride of Cowboy Bob.”

On August 10th, 2014, one day after 18-year-old Michael Brown was shot and killed by Officer Darren Wilson in Ferguson, Missouri, Edward Crawford went to his first protest. “The people, you know, I guess they were out there to be heard,” Ed told us. We also speak with Robert Cohen of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. We first released this episode in 2015—this version includes an update. This episode contains references to police brutality. To see Robert Cohen's photographs, visit the episode on our website.

On May 13, 1862, in Charleston, South Carolina, a man named Robert Smalls took command of a Confederate ship called The Planter and liberated himself and his family from enslavement. As they passed the Confederate-held Fort Sumter, Robert Smalls was said to have saluted it with a whistle, and then added an extra one, “as a farewell to the confederacy.” Robert Smalls’ great-great-grandson, Michael Boulware Moore, tells the story.

“I didn’t do what they said I did. And it was like, I don’t know how to disprove the police. I mean, it’s my word against theirs. I don’t really stand a chance.” In 2015, the 15th Circuit Drug Enforcement Unit in South Carolina gave a confidential informant $100 to buy marijuana from Julian Betton. And then they broke down his door. Officers David Belue, Chris Dennis, and Frank Waddell shot at Julian an estimated 29 times. We speak with Julian Betton and Jonny McCoy.

People incarcerated in California’s San Quentin State Prison aren’t allowed to have pets — but some people, like Ronell Draper, have found ways to work around that. Meet Ronell Draper, also known as “Rauch,” plus Ear Hustle’s Nigel Poor and Earlonne Woods join Phoebe to talk about the impact of Covid-19 at San Quentin.

In 1989, Helen Ackley decided to sell her old Victorian house in Nyack, New York at 1 Laveta Place. It didn’t go as planned. There were stories of ghosts, and the house became the center of a case that’s referred to as “The Ghostbusters ruling.” The judicial opinion read: “as a matter of law, the house is haunted.” We speak to Mark Kavanagh, Cynthia Kavanagh, Richard Ellis, University of Chicago law professor Lior Strahilevitz, and Randall Bell, who specializes in real estate damage economics. Randall Bell has consulted on the property where 39 members of the Heaven's Gate cult died by suicide in 1997. He also consulted on Nicole Brown Simpson's condo, and one of the sites of the Manson family murders. Part of his work is evaluating how the psychological stigma attached to these properties affects their value.

Tim Jenkin was a member of the ANC (African National Congress). The organization had been declared unlawful in South Africa, seen by the white minority as a threat to public order. In 1978, Tim Jenkin was charged under South Africa’s Terrorism Act for disseminating anti-apartheid material and sentenced to 12 years in prison. Just before he was convicted, someone gave him a book called Papillon, by Henri Charrière, which he said “was really a manual of escape.” Along with two other incarcerated activists, Stephen Lee and Alex Moumbaris, he began to secretly collect materials and cash, following instructions from the book. Tim Jenkin knew that the only way to open the many locked doors between him and the outside world would be to find a way to make some keys. Lots of keys. Tim Jenkin’s book is Escape from Pretoria.

The summer after Jessica Maple finished 6th grade, she found out that her great-grandmother’s house had been burglarized. So, 12-year-old Jessica got out her notebook, looked for fingerprints, and decided she would conduct her own investigation. This week, four stories of kids who cracked the case. We speak with 10-year-old Griffin Steele, Griffin’s dad Shane Steele, his mother Carol Steele, and his brother, Jackson. Logan Hultman, age 10, and his mother Alyssa Hultman share a story about helping out. Plus, National Police Service tactical flight officer Rory Niblock tells Phoebe about the day he was in his helicopter searching for two suspects in a rural part of England. Some children on an Easter Egg hunt showed which way to fly, by lying down on the ground to create an arrow with their bodies.

Early in his career, Errol Morris read about a shocking series of alleged insurance crimes in a small town in Florida, which some referred to as “Nub City.” There were allegations that men and women were mutilating themselves -- removing hands and feet -- in order to exploit accidental dismemberment clauses in insurance policies, and collect money. It was very difficult to prove that these injuries were intentional and not accidental. As one insurance official put it, “it was hard to make a jury believe a man would shoot off his foot.” When Errol Morris told an insurance investigator he wanted to go to Florida to make a documentary about it, the investigator said, “Don’t even think about it.” Errol Morris went anyway. Today, the story behind the “Nub City” movie he couldn’t figure out how to make, plus his memories of making The Thin Blue Line, his work as a private detective, and meetings with Ed Gein, James Grigson, Randall Adams, David Harris, and Herbert Mullen.

In the mid-1800s, Harvard Medical School had a reputation for being a “den of body snatchers.” And then, in November 1849, the school’s most prominent supporter, Dr. George Parkman, went missing. He was last seen walking into the medical school building. Several days later, a janitor, named Ephraim Littlefield found something strange in the lab of faculty member Dr. John Webster. Paul Collins’ book is Blood & Ivy: The 1849 Murder That Scandalized Harvard.

On May 8, 2013, a man named Timothy Jones was arrested in Chicago. He says it wasn’t until he got to the police station that he found out that he was being charged with murder. He didn’t even know someone had died. Earlier that day, a woman named Jacqueline Reynolds had been driving through the intersection of 76th and Yates Boulevard when she was hit and killed by a police car. Because the officers driving the car, James Sivicek and Jairo Valeriano, had been pursuing Timothy Jones, Timothy Jones was charged with felony murder. We speak with Timothy Jones, Livonia Noble King, Keith Spence, and Guyora Binder.

In 1932, a group of men in a speakeasy in Prohibition-era New York City hatched a plan — to take out life insurance on a loner named Michael Malloy, and make his death look like an accident. They thought it would be easy money. But Michael Malloy would become known as the man who just wouldn’t die. Simon Read’s book is On the House: The Bizarre Killing of Michael Malloy.

Early one morning in 1948, a phone call woke up the police chief in the small town of Clearwater, Florida. The caller said he’d seen something strange at the beach. Residents woke up that morning to find an odd set of footprints in the sand, and a rumor began circulating that Clearwater Beach had a sea monster. The rumor spread so wide, it caught the attention of a biologist in New York named Ivan Sanderson. Ivan Sanderson coined the term cryptozoology in the 1930s, meaning the search for creatures that haven’t been found and aren’t recognized by science—like the Loch Ness monster or Bigfoot. But even Ivan Sanderson couldn’t figure out where, or what, the footprints were coming from. We speak with Jeff Klinkenberg, Richard Grigonis, Jeff Signorini, and Alyssa Shimko about Tony Signorini, Al Williams, and the Clearwater monster.

One Sunday night in November 1987, something very odd happened in the middle of the WGN nine o’clock news in Chicago. Sportscaster Dan Roan had been talking about the Chicago Bears, when the screen suddenly went black. Then a person appeared, dancing back and forth in front of a moving striped background, and wearing a mask. The mask was the face of a fictional character from 1985 named Max Headroom, who was supposed to be the world’s first computer generated TV host. He supposedly came from our “not so distant future”—a future where the world is run by TV executives. The interruption lasted about 30 seconds. And then, two hours later it happened again on a different channel—WTTW—during a broadcast of Dr. Who. As one television viewer said, it felt like someone threw “a brick through your window.” A little boy said it was “very, very funny.” We speak with Dan Roan, Larry Ocker, Al Skierkiewicz, Jim Higgins, and Matt Frewer.

When Nathan Myers and Clifford Williams were charged with the murder of Jeanette “Baldie” Williams in Jacksonville, Florida on May 2, 1976, neither of them were worried they would be convicted. They had dozens of witnesses that could confirm that they had been at a party when the shots were fired. But during their trial, not a single one of those witnesses was asked to testify. The prosecution’s entire case rested on the testimony of a woman named Nina Marshall, who'd been in bed with Jeannette Williams at the time of the shooting. Nina Marshall herself had been shot three times, but said she recognized the men who had shot Jeanette Williams, and that they were Nathan Myers and Clifford Williams. We speak with Nathan Myers, the director of the Conviction Integrity Unit for Florida’s 4th Judicial Circuit, Shelley Thibodeau, and with forensic artist Jim McMillan.

With Covid-19 shutdowns, people have been taking advantage of quiet highways to drive as fast as they can from New York City to Redondo Beach, California. They’re trying to break records set in an unofficial and secretive race called the “Cannonball.” Car and Driver Magazine editor Brock Yates came up with the idea for the race, and described it as a “balls-out, shoot-the-moon, rumble.” He also wrote the screenplay for the 1981 movie based on the race, “Cannonball Run,” which starred Burt Reynolds, Farrah Fawcett, and Roger Moore. In today’s episode, the history of the illegal cross country race, how it has evolved since 1971, and why fans say it will never go away. We speak with Brock Yates’ son, Brock Yates Jr., and Ed Bolian tells us about his record-setting cross-country drive in 2013.