MFM Minisode 181

[0] This is exactly right.

[1] Hello.

[2] Welcome.

[3] To my favorite murder?

[4] The minisode.

[5] The minisode.

[6] Short, sweet, filled with horror.

[7] Just the way you like it.

[8] Just the way, real quick like on a Monday.

[9] Mm -hmm.

[10] You love Monday.

[11] What's your pandemic Monday look like?

[12] Staying in?

[13] Better be.

[14] Better be.

[15] And if not, wearing a mask wearing a mask everywhere please political it's not up to you dad sorry you go first no no after you no please I insist okay the subject line of this is drugs murder pagans my mom's endocrinologist whoa hello ladies and Stephen allow me to start with the traditional thank you so much for making this podcast you guys have kept me company through finishing pharmacy school and moving to Connecticut to start my residency yada yada let's get to it i was raised in a town called egg harbor township new jersey not known for anything as far as i know in 2012 april coffman local radio host and veteran affairs advocate was found shot dead in her home her husband was suspected but there was insufficient evidence to pin anyone to pin on anyone and the case went cold was an endocrinologist, parentheses, my mom's actually, who operated out of E .HT, Ag Harbor Township, and also worked as a veteran's advocate since he was an armed forces veteran himself.

[16] He filed a lawsuit to obtain a payout from April's life insurance, but they refused to pay him until they received verification that he was not involved with the murder.

[17] April's daughter publicly claimed that he was responsible for the death and filed a suit to prevent him from claiming the life insurance.

[18] Wow.

[19] Fast forward to June 2017, when police go to endocrinology office with a search warrant due to, quote, suspected criminal activity unrelated to the murder case.

[20] This is where shit gets crazy.

[21] Is it growing weed or something?

[22] He's growing blood.

[23] Isn't that what endocrinologists are about?

[24] I was going to ask, but then I thought that sounds stupid.

[25] No, hematologists are blood.

[26] Endocrinology is like hormones and hormones.

[27] And thyroid.

[28] It's pretty gallbladder specific, I would say.

[29] I go to one and yet I don't fucking know.

[30] What part of you is it for?

[31] She's giving me pills.

[32] That's all I know.

[33] Pill doctor.

[34] So when the police arrived, pulls a 9mm handgun, points it at himself and claims he's going to kill himself.

[35] He's caught on a police body cam saying, quote, I'm not going to jail for this.

[36] After a brief standoff, no one got hurt.

[37] He's arrested.

[38] And they search his office.

[39] First, they find that he never served in the military and had lied to everyone, including his wife, about being a veteran.

[40] Holy shit.

[41] Then they find evidence that he had been supplying narcotics to a drug ring run by a pagan motorcycle gang since 2011.

[42] What?

[43] A motorcycle gang that worships the earth, Mother Gaia?

[44] Here in egg township?

[45] Oh, it's like, they're a...

[46] all about Easter.

[47] Okay.

[48] Back in 2012, he was having marital issues and his wife wanted to divorce.

[49] She also threatened to expose drug operation.

[50] The leader of the gang hired to take her out.

[51] Frizzled April's home, shot her twice, and left without detection.

[52] He was found dead from a heroin overdose 18 months later.

[53] The drug ring continued until B .S .man was arrested for weapons and obstruction charges in 2017.

[54] I was actually working at a local CVS at the time and we were amused by the arrest story until multiple patients came in requesting medications with zero refills left and guess who the prescriber was.

[55] Not sure if you can call the county jail to verify a new prescription.

[56] Anyways, after that arrest was also brought in on charges related to the drug ring.

[57] He was also accused of making plans to have killed for fear that he would flip on him.

[58] Both men were charged.

[59] charged with first degree murder of April Kaufman in 2018.

[60] One week after the murder charged was found dead in his jail cell due to an apparent suicide although some including me 100 % believe this was a hit job by the gang.

[61] Either way there's one less devious asshole alive on earth.

[62] Wow.

[63] Wow.

[64] Thank you again and sorry for the lengthy ass email.

[65] Stay sexy and vet your doctors, Cassidy.

[66] Wow.

[67] That would have been a good like full episode.

[68] I mean that's crazy.

[69] That story is insane.

[70] Should we cut it?

[71] And so one of us can cover it but I mean that's like it's what is it with doctors and these I just I think of that one date line I watched where the doctor whoever the host was I bet it was Keith Morrison was like basically asking him all these questions and he was just very flatly answering and you just knew he did it.

[72] Right.

[73] Right.

[74] The way he was answering like absolutely was not there and you're like like, oh, my God.

[75] You were there.

[76] You're making yourself seem guiltier.

[77] Doctors, don't let your husbands grow up to be a drug, drug, drug, drug, drug, mule for the motorcycle gangs.

[78] God, please.

[79] That's intense.

[80] Yeah.

[81] Okay.

[82] This is called a girl, a murder, and a pizza place.

[83] Hello, spooky murder friends.

[84] This is a bit long, so I'll just get right to it.

[85] I'm from a small town in Northern California called Rodeo.

[86] Do you know it?

[87] Is it Rodeo?

[88] It's out.

[89] I don't know how that what the pronunciation is but I think it's it's east it's northeast okay there's more but I just want to make sure I'm saying it right I don't know yeah okay rodeo that's probably right our biggest import is meth and our biggest export is members of Green Day oh maybe it's not too far yeah the lead singer's mom still lives there oh shit kind of a lot of fucked up shit happens there but those are stories for another day one of the neighboring towns is called Crockett and it is also tiny you know it Not heard of, no, I haven't heard of either of those towns.

[90] Okay, Crockett is most famous for the C &H sugar factory.

[91] All the kids from Rodeo in Crockett attend the same elementary, middle, and high school.

[92] We all know each other, and the vibe is a very typical small town suburban weirdo vibe.

[93] There is a single pizza parlor in Crockett called Four Corners.

[94] On September 24th, 1996, a sweet baby angel named Priscilla Lewis was working her usual shift at the pizza place when she was attacked and murdered in the creepy basement bathroom of the strip mall in which four corners is located.

[95] Oh, fuck.

[96] That's horrible.

[97] She was only 21 years old and was working hard to save to buy a home.

[98] There's some conflicting theories on how she died, but the most popular one is that someone snagged her from the top of the stairwell.

[99] The staff at the restaurant hardly used that bathroom because it was so creepy and dragged her downstairs where she was then strangled to death.

[100] Her body was found by the cook when he went downstairs to look for her after she didn't returned from her break before closing.

[101] The case is still cold and Priscilla's murder has yet to be caught.

[102] I was six when this happened, so my mom rightly so shielded me from Priscilla's horrifically sad death.

[103] When I got to middle school, one of my older sister's friends told me Priscilla's story while we were eating at the pizza place.

[104] And I was hooked.

[105] I convinced myself that I would solve Priscilla's murder and asked my mom 3 ,000 questions about it every single day for at least a month.

[106] Alas, I never solved the case, but I also never went into that creepy fucking bathroom, which I'm pretty sure is 100 % haunted.

[107] This is just one of the many upsetting stories from two tiny Northern California towns, a planned murder suicide between sisters that went awry, that asshole Lawrence Singleton being moved in and then promptly being run out of town by the locals.

[108] Sorry, that's a rodeo?

[109] Yeah, or I think, Crocket or...

[110] She doesn't say.

[111] It doesn't say.

[112] I feel like that's the way I know the name, could be.

[113] Yeah.

[114] Yeah.

[115] Well, that's yeah.

[116] Yeah.

[117] And then, but it's the main one that has had a lasting impression on me. Thank you for all you do.

[118] And I can't wait to catch a live show when this shithead pandemic is over.

[119] I truly don't know what I do without the podcast.

[120] SSDGM, Nikki.

[121] Wow.

[122] Oh, that's also small.

[123] I mean, a town so small that two tiny towns share a high school.

[124] Those are tiny towns.

[125] And that To me, it doesn't seem like a murderer just like swoops in real quick, kills the girl at the pizza place and swoops out.

[126] Like, that's someone from town.

[127] So that's got to be terrifying to just have it go unsolved.

[128] Yeah, entirely because they, what is it, 90 % of murders are someone, someone knows.

[129] The likelihood that it's a stranger is very low.

[130] Right.

[131] Or a stranger to her, but it's, he's still somebody's like neighbor.

[132] I don't know.

[133] Yeah, like known in town.

[134] Connected.

[135] somehow.

[136] Connected.

[137] Okay.

[138] Okay.

[139] This just starts.

[140] Hi, Karen, Georgia, and everyone.

[141] Thank you.

[142] Thank you.

[143] Just everybody.

[144] Hi.

[145] My hometown is from Alexandria, Egypt.

[146] In 1920, two sisters, Rea and Sakina, ran several brothels in a poor area called El Le Bonn, pretty close to my house.

[147] We're talking to someone, we're reading an email from someone who lives in Egypt right now.

[148] That's crazy.

[149] I am, first of all, hi, I love all the Nova specials about your town.

[150] Can we get an honorary degree from?

[151] I'm sorry about Alexandria's library.

[152] That's a real disgrace.

[153] Okay.

[154] Welcome.

[155] We're so happy to have you.

[156] Okay.

[157] Let's get back to this email.

[158] Okay.

[159] The brothels were interesting because they didn't just house sex workers, but were, quote, secret homes to anyone who wanted to get it on away from, prying 1920s Egyptian eyes Oh shit Oh man Many of the patrons were actually married women Meeting their lovers Oh Around that time Many women were being reported missing Witnesses said They were always last seen wearing a lot of gold And with either or both Of the sisters For some reason That wasn't enough proof They were questioned The sisters were questioned Then released Until one night A police officer was passing by Rea's house and smelled a really strong incense.

[160] I guess that was more suspicious than being seen with every single one of the 17 missing women.

[161] And they searched the house's brothels finding 15 bodies buried under all of them.

[162] Oh no. Apparently Rea and Sakina would go to the market, find the woman wearing the most jewelry, invite her over to the house for drinks, then suffocate her with a wet cloth over her nose and mouth.

[163] They stole their jewelry, money, and clothes before burying them.

[164] This news was pretty sensational because at the time, women's crimes were usually limited to, quote, killing their husband's second wives.

[165] Oh, my God.

[166] Because it's the 20s.

[167] Wow.

[168] Egypt and the 20s.

[169] The media went crazy and at some point a headline read, Raya and Sakina in the zoo, which got people to flock to the zoo to see them in a cage and then realize it was just.

[170] just a room.

[171] Oh my God.

[172] Good.

[173] I was like, wait.

[174] I know.

[175] That's horrible.

[176] Hold up.

[177] The sisters were helped by their husbands and two other men who were all convicted.

[178] Raya and Sakina were the first women to be executed by the modern state of Egypt.

[179] There were many movies and plays written about them, for some reason mostly comedies.

[180] I used to watch the play about them, recorded off the TV on VHS on a loop as a kid.

[181] I thought they were so funny only to realize they were actual serial killers.

[182] when I got older.

[183] This is amazing.

[184] Stay sexy and don't go for a drink with the lady not breaking eye contact with your jewelry.

[185] Salma.

[186] Say her name again.

[187] How do you say?

[188] Salma.

[189] Salma.

[190] S -A -L -M -A.

[191] Salma.

[192] Salma.

[193] That was excellent.

[194] We're so excited to have you.

[195] Yeah.

[196] In the commune.

[197] Tell everyone we say hello, everyone.

[198] Please.

[199] Tell all Egyptians everywhere that we say hi.

[200] Okay, this one is called underwater ghost town and I just realized it's also from Northern California.

[201] So, oh, all right.

[202] Hey, ladies.

[203] After listening to a recent episode and learning about Georgia's deep passion for underwater ghost towns, I felt compelled to tell you my story.

[204] I grew up in a small town.

[205] Is it your deep passion or mine?

[206] I think both of us.

[207] I think most people.

[208] Okay.

[209] Yeah, how could you not?

[210] I don't really care.

[211] No. You're made of stone that you don't want to hear about the town covered in water?

[212] No curiosity about life whatsoever.

[213] I grew up in a small town in Northern California just off the American River and adjacent to Folsom.

[214] Yes, Folsom as in the prison, but also Folsom as in the lake, a man -made lake that was built on top of the town known as Mormon Island.

[215] So a little history.

[216] In the 1840s, a ton of people came to Northern California in search of gold.

[217] A group of about 2 ,500 Mormons settled in present.

[218] present day Folsom and founded Mormon Island.

[219] In 1856, a fire destroyed the town and it was never fully rebuilt.

[220] Only a few families remained into the 1940s.

[221] In 195, the government built the dam, relocated the cemetery, and flooded Mormon Island.

[222] Crazy.

[223] Are there a lot of Mormons in North California?

[224] No, I'm completely surprised because Folsom isn't too far from Sacramento.

[225] It's like around the area.

[226] And I've never heard of Mormon Island.

[227] I've never heard of any of this.

[228] Well, check this shit out.

[229] It gets crazier.

[230] Check this fucking shit up.

[231] We learned about this weird history in school and in anecdotes from parents and grandparents, but during the drought of 2011 through 2017, we saw the evidence for ourselves.

[232] Foundations of homes started to emerge from the beaches and rusted tools and gold panning equipment were taken to museums.

[233] Treasure.

[234] Treasure.

[235] True treasure.

[236] Then on November 13, 2015, the skeletal remains of a human were found by a 12 -year -old boy.

[237] Oh, lucky.

[238] No, it says Nightmare Town, kid, wait, nightmare town for that kid.

[239] Back up then if you can't handle it.

[240] Don't go to underwater ghost towns if you can't handle the truth about underwater ghost towns.

[241] All I wanted was to find a skeleton in the last 12.

[242] 100%.

[243] The remains were transferred to Chico State University for forensic analysis.

[244] And in June of 2018, they were identified as the remains of Oleg Zelivnikov.

[245] Oleg was a Russian immigrant.

[246] who had gone missing while swimming in the lake in freaking 1996.

[247] Oh, no. Which means I spent my entire childhood swimming with a dead guy.

[248] Yeah.

[249] When Oleg disappeared, he left behind an eight -year -old daughter.

[250] She lived in Russia still.

[251] So with the help of the FBI in Sacramento and Moscow, they were able to confirm his identity using DNA.

[252] Oh.

[253] I know.

[254] Olig's remains were then cremated in the same mortuary as my grandma.

[255] The daughter came to El Dorado County in October of last year.

[256] year of 2019 to collect the remains and bring them home to Oleg's final resting place.

[257] Love you gals.

[258] Stay sexy and don't swim with dead bodies.

[259] Lacey.

[260] Oh, I know.

[261] Karen, you know I'm all about vintage shopping.

[262] Absolutely.

[263] And when you say vintage, you mean when you physically drive to a store and actually purchase something with cash.

[264] Exactly.

[265] And if you're a small business owner, you might know Shopify is great for online sales.

[266] But did you know that they also power in -person sales?

[267] Right, Shopify is the sound of selling everywhere, online, in store, on social media, and beyond.

[268] Give your point of sale system a serious upgrade with Shopify.

[269] From accepting payments to managing inventory, they have everything you need to sell in person.

[270] So give your point of sale system a serious upgrade with Shopify.

[271] Their sleek, reliable POS hardware takes every major payment method and looks fabulous at the same time.

[272] With Shopify, we have a powerful partner for managing our sales, and if you're a business owner, you can too.

[273] customers in line and online, do retail right with Shopify.

[274] Sign up for a $1 per month trial period at Shopify .com slash murder.

[275] Important note, that promo code is all lowercase.

[276] Go to Shopify .com slash murder to take your retail business to the next level today.

[277] That's Shopify .com slash murder.

[278] Goodbye.

[279] I'm not going to read the subject line of this one because it gives it away.

[280] Okay.

[281] Hey, y 'all.

[282] It just starts, hey, y 'all.

[283] Fun fact, when you die as a way to recite.

[284] your body, you have the option to have your body cremated and the carbon from your ashes pressed into pencil lead and made into pencils.

[285] Why would you do that?

[286] Why would anyone want that?

[287] I would totally do it.

[288] There's so many other ways to...

[289] This process yields about 200 pencils per human body.

[290] So when the unspeakable should happen, you can become pencils.

[291] Or you can do what I'd like to do, which is have the carbon from my ashes pressed into a diamond and give it to the youngest person in my family.

[292] No, no, do pencils.

[293] I think pencils is more, it's more of a keepsake to do a fucking number two pencil.

[294] Instead of a big old diamond ring.

[295] But wait, they say, give it to the youngest person of my family.

[296] So when someone explains how beautiful the ring is, my distant relative can say, oh, thanks, it's my grandmother.

[297] Moving forward.

[298] My aunt Lydia, sister of my mom's sister's husband, died suddenly a few years ago from something I think diabetes related.

[299] I wasn't very close with her because she and my aunt and the other sister -in -law severely disliked one another and so she rarely attended family gatherings.

[300] She had been a very wealthy and very eccentric woman always wearing very colorful, flowy outfits and enormous jewelry made from beautifully exotic stones.

[301] Those Egyptian sisters would have loved her.

[302] Oh, that's right.

[303] They would have been all over her.

[304] the jewelry pieces always had some amazing story behind them like who they belonged to and most importantly to Lydia how much they had cost so when she died you can bet your ass that the sister -in -laws raided her home immediately to snatch up all of her beautiful expensive jewelry Lydia had had kept a handful of the more expensive pieces in a safe in the wall of her garage but over the coming days they found more pieces hidden throughout her home jewelry was hidden in the rafters stowed away in holiday decoration boxes taped up in the back of cabinets inside mattresses and stowed in her safe deposit box.

[305] Whoa, she sounds awesome.

[306] I love this.

[307] This is the dream.

[308] Yeah.

[309] So the sister -in -laws gathered up every piece they could find sprinting straight to the jeweler to have the pieces of praise.

[310] And you guessed it, every last piece was fake.

[311] Yay.

[312] Worthless jewelry.

[313] Every single piece of jewelry Lydia had ever owned Shone often talked about had been nothing other than costume jewelry the whole story makes me kind of sad but I like to think that it was just a long con executed by Lydia to disappoint the women she hated the most one last time from beyond the grave I wish I had the discipline so stay sexy and become wealthy by buying fake jewels Dana I love it is Just perfection.

[314] Epic.

[315] Because if that's really what she, if she did it on purpose, which clearly she did.

[316] Right.

[317] Oh my God.

[318] That's the best.

[319] That's all taped up into her house.

[320] Like it's even more valuable.

[321] You got to just at least let your family think you're hiding some worth like some shit that's worth something, right?

[322] Got to.

[323] Just get just so that that one weekend, it's not just sad that they clean your house out.

[324] There's also a bit of treasure hunting involved.

[325] Okay, here's my last one.

[326] This is called Things You Find in the Desert.

[327] Hi, I obviously wouldn't be writing in if I wasn't deeply obsessed, so let's jump right in.

[328] My dad was 16 years old when both his parents died in a plane crash in Arizona.

[329] His mother had taken up piloting, is that a word?

[330] Question mark?

[331] Yes, right?

[332] When my dad got into high school and they died at an unexpected plane crash in January 1977.

[333] Fast forward to 1997 and my family was living in Phoenix.

[334] It was around the date of the 20th anniversary of, the accident and the priest at our church suggested to my dad that perhaps they try and visit the site of the crash to get closure they never had.

[335] My dad said, I saw the trip to be an opportunity to introduce my mom and dad to my adult life.

[336] My dad was connected with a retired sheriff from the area as he was trying to gather more information about the location of the crash.

[337] Unbeknownst to my dad, the sheriff had been the first deputy on the scene and was the one who had found his parents' bodies.

[338] When my parents' aunt and my parents' aunt and uncle were hiking to the crash site, they saw something totally unexpected.

[339] My grandmother's plane, the one that had crashed 20 years prior.

[340] What?

[341] They had no idea it was still there when they set out on the hike that day.

[342] As they approached the crash site, they found the ragged remains of his mom's cosmetic bag that still held a bottle of perfume with some perfume still in it, that my dad had given her for Christmas in 1976.

[343] And they found her curling iron.

[344] No. So that's the story of my grandparents dying in a plane crash and my parents finding the plane in the desert 20 years later.

[345] Stay sexy and next time we're allowed to touch another human being, hug your loved ones tight, Exo, Jordan.

[346] Oh, Jordan.

[347] That was beautiful.

[348] Like just finding a little treasure, a memory that no one had found in 20 fucking years.

[349] Well, you know what's funny?

[350] Every time I go back, you know, I was just back up in Petaluma, I always go through my mom's drawers to see if there's something because it's all kind of as it was.

[351] Yeah.

[352] But I always look for if there's something I've never seen before.

[353] Yeah.

[354] Or like something, you know, something to take or whatever that isn't just like, most of it's like old nail polish.

[355] Yeah.

[356] Or, you know, there's nothing.

[357] But like that idea that there would be something so connected, you know, because the smell or just the bottle itself, like he can take that back with him.

[358] Have you looked for any hidden treasures like maybe your mom taped an envelope I would think like an addresser to the top of the drawer that's where I would tape an envelope well you know what I did I did find a card from her when it was I think it was like right when our stuff started popping off and there was a card from her from when I very first moved to L .A. just about how proud she was of me and it was very like it was perfect because it was like I forgot that my normal regular mom was big into sending cards so it'd be like you know St. Patrick's Day cards or like Halloween cards she was like so cute yes she was a big card person she had a drawer full of like unsent cards because she always had one ready and so I strive for that and it's so fucking bless me that soul for doing that she did it and it's like one of the many things I took for granted that then later on when I went and pulled this thing and I can't read I must have been keeping it somewhere and just kind of forgot yeah so yeah that that was like the closest like something like that because it was her writing and it was her words yeah but I love that every time you go in and like see if something jogs a memory or is actually a keepsake that you hadn't even thought of I've gone through the does it still smell like her or nail polish it smells like nail polish the nail polish all that kind of stuff there's old lipstick and stuff Oh, yeah.

[359] That's adorable.

[360] Oh.

[361] Well, send us your touching one.

[362] Touching stories, please.

[363] We need these.

[364] And times like this, on Mondays like this.

[365] On Mondays like this, we need some touching, touching things.

[366] Yes, please touch us.

[367] Touch us from a social distance.

[368] Yes, don't touch us, but touch us.

[369] Touch us deep inside.

[370] That's right.

[371] And stay sexy.

[372] And don't get murdered.

[373] Goodbye.

[374] Elvis, do you want a cookie?