422 - I Wish You Hadn’t Told Me That

[0] This is exactly right.

[1] And welcome to my favorite murder.

[2] That's Georgia Hardstark.

[3] That is Karen Kilgariff.

[4] And we're about to podcast at you.

[5] That's right.

[6] I've been in the backyard just now trying to make friends with the crows in my neighborhood.

[7] Oh.

[8] Yeah.

[9] We got a big bag of peanuts and I've been, we've been shaking them at them and like throwing them and leaving them.

[10] And I think it's happening.

[11] I think my dream, I think they know us now.

[12] Are you going to train them to go find money for you and bring it back?

[13] to a drawer in your office?

[14] Bring me shiny things, yeah.

[15] Like, that's my dream to be friends with, like, crows.

[16] So I think it's working.

[17] You're making it happen.

[18] Yeah.

[19] What's up with you?

[20] How am I celebrating the spring equinox?

[21] I mean, it was such a pretty day today.

[22] Like, light breeze, bright skies.

[23] Mm -hmm.

[24] Real nice.

[25] Real spring is here kind of vibe outside today.

[26] Definitely springy.

[27] It feels positive.

[28] Yeah.

[29] Are you ready to, like, have a new season of your life.

[30] To self -tan.

[31] Are you ready to go to the tanning beds every day?

[32] Is that what we're doing now?

[33] Is that the new trend?

[34] Yeah, that's our new thing.

[35] To get deeply tan by April 30.

[36] I don't know.

[37] How will spring be different?

[38] I guess I'll leave my house more.

[39] Oh, that's the key.

[40] That's a good challenge.

[41] Do you try to leave your house like once a day to like run an errand or like?

[42] I have to walk those dogs.

[43] Okay.

[44] That's good.

[45] That's positive.

[46] Yeah, that's definitely help me. It is.

[47] It can make it kind of fun.

[48] Like, you're just walking around and like, what's up here?

[49] What's going on over here?

[50] It's helped me that like, like, I can't take a nap because it's like, well, it's a half an hour until cookies walk.

[51] So stay away.

[52] My naps are two hours, by the way.

[53] Some people could do a half an hour nap and they're like fine for the day.

[54] But like, not me. Yeah.

[55] So stay awake for cookie.

[56] Powering through.

[57] Yep.

[58] Dogs obligate us to participate in this thing called life.

[59] That's what I got one.

[60] yeah cats like beg us not to cats are like i don't care what you do i hope you die soon i did i have been walking mo in on a leash and a harness outside in our backyard a little bit and what's the result of that what's happening there nothing yet fleas no no fleas yet oh just to like so he can get out there but you don't have to risk him getting eaten by a coyote yeah oh my god there was like so many coyotes over the weekend in our neighborhood there's always coyotes here so yeah just because he wants to go outside.

[61] He's such a bad boy.

[62] He needs some energy, like, you know, expended.

[63] So we take him outside now or I take him outside now.

[64] You should get him one of those, like, horse training octagons where you run him in a circle.

[65] That's a great idea.

[66] Right?

[67] Just keep on building things on your property for Mo to experience nature inside of.

[68] I mean, what else is there to buy when you don't have children?

[69] Right.

[70] Exactly.

[71] Just fill it up.

[72] The coyotes are serious, though.

[73] I told you the story of the one that was walking up to my back sliding glass door.

[74] It's just like, sir, we can't be doing this.

[75] He's going to start knocking.

[76] You should start trying to be friends with him.

[77] I'll be friends with crows.

[78] He's going to be like, oh, hey, I want to know if you needed your windows cleaned or it's like, what?

[79] Hey, can I crash on your couch tonight?

[80] Whose friend are you?

[81] Get away from my door.

[82] Get out of here.

[83] I have a TV show.

[84] Let's hear about it.

[85] that I want to recommend.

[86] Okay.

[87] Maybe it's the same.

[88] What if it's the same?

[89] Is it Diora from Detroit?

[90] No. Okay.

[91] Dara, D -I -A -R -A from Detroit.

[92] It's on B -E -T.

[93] It is so perfect for us.

[94] This incredible actress, writer, comedian, Diyara Kilpatrick, it's her show.

[95] The premise is she has a one -night stand and gets ghosted by this dude and then puts it together that the dude is the, kid who got kidnapped in the 90s, the like five year old kid who got kidnapped in the 90s and something's happened to him and she has to track him down and I'll find him.

[96] Like he's like the most, you know, America's Most Wanted like Unself Mysteries kid.

[97] Right.

[98] And she has to go find him.

[99] That's hilarious.

[100] But it's also like it's really dark.

[101] It's really funny.

[102] It's very much like search party was.

[103] Yeah, that's the first thing I made me think of.

[104] Yeah.

[105] That's funny.

[106] It's got those vibes.

[107] It's it's so good.

[108] Like it's just really fucking good.

[109] That sounds like a very cool.

[110] show.

[111] I want to see that for sure.

[112] She's trying to hunt down a missing child that she hooked up with and like, that sounds gross.

[113] That's not what I meant.

[114] But it's really good.

[115] At one time missing child.

[116] Yes.

[117] We get we get it.

[118] But also the passion with which people go about being a citizen sleuths for dating.

[119] Yeah.

[120] Like you don't have to save it up for true crime.

[121] That's just what people are doing these days when they're trying to figure out what their situation.

[122] is where they are and why they won't speak to them anymore.

[123] Like, just tell me, just how.

[124] And she's going through a bad divorce, so she's a little, like, not doing well on the love front stable.

[125] Yeah, exactly.

[126] Yeah.

[127] It's ugly.

[128] It's ugly.

[129] Tough.

[130] Oh, that sounds amazing.

[131] Diyara from Detroit.

[132] What about you?

[133] What do you have?

[134] Mine is, it's a TV show called Renegade Nell.

[135] And it's about a woman, and she is like, I think she's Irish.

[136] Anyhow, she becomes a highway woman.

[137] So it's like she's a highway robber in like the 1700s.

[138] It's Orla from Dairy Girls.

[139] I love Orla.

[140] So that actress, Louisa Harland, is a completely different person.

[141] Which obviously we know she's not Orla.

[142] Right.

[143] But she is Orla.

[144] It's all I can think of.

[145] I know.

[146] It's all we know her as.

[147] And all of a sudden, she is this badass woman who's gone off to find her own fortune, her family thinks she's dead and she has a run -in with some bad guys on the highway and suddenly has like superpowers but she doesn't know why so no man can kill her like real superpowers like sci -fi super...

[148] Yeah you gotta see it oh my god and they have all these like special effects when I saw the trailer I was like put on playlist I don't think I'd ever put anything on a playlist and I was like save for the playlist or whatever it's really great and girl powery and then just kind of like very well done What's it called?

[149] It's called Renegade Nell.

[150] Renegade Nell.

[151] And if I'm not mistaken, not the superpower part, I think they blew that part up, obviously.

[152] That was the, but I think it's based on a true story.

[153] Yeah.

[154] It sounds like Annie Oakley -ish, right?

[155] It's based on a true supernatural story.

[156] Yeah, it's based on a story of, you know, superheroes.

[157] You would think that in the first couple articles about it, it would say based on.

[158] So, yeah, so maybe not.

[159] Probably not.

[160] Maybe, what do they say?

[161] Like, cold from real events.

[162] Yeah.

[163] But even then, that seems not appropriate here.

[164] But anyway, it's just like, it's fun.

[165] And it's like watching Orla leave Derry and go off and, like, become a great actress.

[166] Yeah, like fulfill her destiny.

[167] It's wonderful.

[168] Okay, I love it.

[169] Do we have any corrections corners?

[170] Wait, you said a town wrong last week.

[171] Oh, yeah.

[172] Or a state or something like that.

[173] I don't remember.

[174] Sorry.

[175] That's that's quite that's I didn't mean to call you out, but that is you are correct.

[176] That is right.

[177] That is corrections corner now.

[178] I bet I've never been there and it seemed right to me. You know those capitals when they're just the initials like that make me panic.

[179] Me too.

[180] Yeah, I feel like you have the same thing where it's like all of a sudden it's like, I don't know.

[181] Is this South Dakota?

[182] Yeah.

[183] Is it Missouri?

[184] or is it Michigan?

[185] I'm married to a Michigander.

[186] I should fucking know and I don't.

[187] Yeah, you have a little bit of a bias.

[188] Like, I think I want it to be Michigan.

[189] Yeah.

[190] But what if it's just incorrect?

[191] Like North Dakota and Nebraska?

[192] Like, come on.

[193] Actually, those are obvious.

[194] Oh.

[195] Do you want to brag about the news that Amy Poehler said that this was her favorite podcast?

[196] That's wild.

[197] So tell the people.

[198] Well, they had this podcast conference that they have every year called Podcast Movement.

[199] Although sometimes I like to call it podcast uprising because it sounds a little bit sinister.

[200] You have to admit.

[201] I like that.

[202] It's like, let's all the podcasters get together and start some shit.

[203] But anyway, she was a keynote speaker, if I'm not mistaken.

[204] And in her keynote speech, she said that this was her favorite podcast.

[205] And I didn't know about it until the next day.

[206] And then Aaron Brown told me and showed me the Instagram post.

[207] And I kind of sat there for a second.

[208] and then I got like choked up because no it's weird it's crazy it's Amy Polar we obviously adore her and have for a long time yeah she's one of the greats yeah she's one of the greats and has one of the best gifts there will ever be which is her at the Oscars with her sweatshirt on throwing up the deuses it's so funny that's the first thing I thought of when I heard that I was just like her it was great so yeah thank you Amy Polar, you're our favorite, too.

[209] Yeah, you're our favorite podcast, too.

[210] In this podcast called Life.

[211] Oh, my God.

[212] Life is one big podcast, really.

[213] It really is.

[214] Okay, well, speaking of podcasts, we have a podcast network, even.

[215] Yeah.

[216] It's called Exactly Right Media.

[217] Hey, here are some updates.

[218] Well, the first one is that the fourth episode of Butterfly King is available right now.

[219] Host C .J. and Becky are back at the Vrona Palace in Sophia Bulgaria, where a new piece of evidence allows yet another suspect to slither into the frame.

[220] Follow the show wherever you like to listen so you don't miss an episode.

[221] Such a good show.

[222] And more exciting true crime podcast news, episode one of 10fold more wicked's 11th freaking season is here.

[223] Kate Winkler -Dawson, the queen of true crime podcasting, heads to Portsmouth, Rhode Island to investigate the death of a puritanical pioneer who mysteriously died in the town that she founded.

[224] You've You guys have to listen.

[225] History.

[226] Murder.

[227] What more do you want?

[228] Truly.

[229] On That's Messed Up, Kara and Lisa cover Missing Pieces, which is an SVU'd episode from season 13 in 2011.

[230] You can go to That's Messed Up Live .com for Lisa's live comedy tour dates.

[231] She is performing at clubs and colleges all around the country.

[232] And she is so truly hilarious.

[233] You have to see Lisa Trager live.

[234] If you have not yet, please go support her live.

[235] You will not be.

[236] Sorry, you did it.

[237] And the newest episode of MFM animated by Nick Terry is now playing on the exactly right YouTube channel.

[238] So please subscribe to that.

[239] The episode's called Emotional Support, Oxen, and comes from episode 254 from December of all the way back in 2020.

[240] And it's from a live show, too.

[241] I love that he's just like pulling.

[242] You never know where he's going to go, you know?

[243] I love that.

[244] It's great.

[245] Also, just so you know, we've restocked the MFM store with two popular.

[246] tote bags that sold out over the holidays.

[247] So if you wanted to buy the SSDGM tote bag or the still life skull tote bag, go on to that website, which is my favorite murder .com and go shopping.

[248] I feel like we have such a tote bag audience.

[249] You know what I mean?

[250] Yeah.

[251] Because it's like, oh, are you going to the library to get books?

[252] Are you going to a farmer's market to get your like weekly produce?

[253] It's like, we're such tote bag people.

[254] We're tote bag people, that's for sure.

[255] Are you Did your dad subscribe to PBS at one point in the 90s?

[256] And now you have a tote bag to prove it.

[257] That's right.

[258] You have that one New Yorker bag that everyone, including me, has that has like the monster and the building.

[259] You know what I'm talking about?

[260] Yep.

[261] Yeah.

[262] You're like, oh, that person's smart.

[263] Cool.

[264] Does Bloomingdale's make tote bags out of their small, medium, and large bag design?

[265] They must.

[266] They should.

[267] And then the one that's like the takeout food bag that says like, thank you, thank you, but they made it into a tote bag.

[268] Oh, smart.

[269] Genius.

[270] So good.

[271] What else could they do?

[272] My favorite murder tote bags.

[273] Hey, there we go.

[274] That wasn't planned.

[275] No, it wasn't.

[276] Because I was actually like, let's think of five new good tote bags that are like the thank you, thank you, thank you, tote bag.

[277] What could it be?

[278] What about a tote bag that looks like a shiny garbage bag with the yellow pole at the top?

[279] And is scented with like frieze?

[280] It has a really strong lemon scent that you're.

[281] trying to get away from all the time.

[282] Oh, I hate it to like cover up whatever weird shit you have in there because you've got to like throw your banana away from Friday and your gym shoes are in there.

[283] Ew, Mrs. Fabriz is here.

[284] I always think I'm going to like be a tote bag, like workout person and be really good at it.

[285] And then I find like the socks from three months ago in the back of my car and the tote bag that I was like, this is a new tote bag.

[286] It's going to make me who I am.

[287] And in a way it does because when you find that tote bag so many months later and you look inside there's like little pieces of paper at the bottom or like an old calendar or something ear plugs i find a lot of ear plugs and you're like wait where do i get these oh that flight oh i took this to this game oh this and you like piece your life backwards through what's like old pennies and a piece of gum or the weirdest thing when you find a face mask in your coat or whatever.

[288] Oh, yeah.

[289] From fucking, from the pandemic.

[290] And you're like, I haven't worn this in a while.

[291] Deep pandemic.

[292] But people are still getting COVID.

[293] So you can slap it right back on.

[294] Go, go ahead.

[295] My cousin just got it.

[296] I was just like, oh, yeah.

[297] Shut up.

[298] Yeah.

[299] Yeah.

[300] Okay.

[301] I don't want to do that.

[302] I don't want that.

[303] I know me either.

[304] Oh, well.

[305] That's right.

[306] You know what that means.

[307] That means.

[308] It's, it's time to start our stories.

[309] ding dong.

[310] When Karen yells, oh well, and kind of panicked, like nervous.

[311] I mean, we have a platform, but we can't cure COVID.

[312] And that is the issue.

[313] You guys, we tried.

[314] You know we tried.

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

[316] Absolutely.

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

[318] Exactly.

[319] And if you're a small business owner, you might know Shopify.

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[322] That's right.

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

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[329] Connect with customers in line and online.

[330] Do retail right with Shopify.

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

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

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

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

[335] Goodbye.

[336] Are you first this week?

[337] Yes, I am.

[338] Because, as I promised you, today I'm going to be covering part two of the Butchers of the Bayou.

[339] Don't look excited and clap because this guy is a pure piece of shit.

[340] I'm sorry to clap because I am not clapping for the serial killer or for his actions.

[341] Of course.

[342] But it is so satisfying to get a part two when you really enjoyed a part one.

[343] On this show, especially where there's a lot of dangling part twos that never come to be on my.

[344] part as well, we're always like, we should do that later.

[345] And then we don't.

[346] And you turned around and did it.

[347] Those dangling part twos, we can't have those.

[348] We can't have those.

[349] Now that spring is sprung.

[350] Let's not do that anymore.

[351] You know what I miss?

[352] And Alejandra, can you please remind me that I miss this?

[353] Is when I used to do episodes of like three, three stories of like handwritten notes that turned into clues or whatever.

[354] Remember I used to do that when I couldn't find a full story and I was panicking and it was the day of our recording in our, in my apartment.

[355] I didn't know what to do.

[356] Absolutely.

[357] No, those were good where you do.

[358] It was like a medley episode.

[359] With a theme.

[360] Here's some examples of.

[361] Exactly.

[362] Those are easy, too.

[363] Okay, let's do that.

[364] Stop on air producing.

[365] This is episode number what?

[366] 500 and 422.

[367] So that means back when we left off in episode 420, that en Rouge police.

[368] had just apprehended serial killer Derek Todd Lee.

[369] That was in May of 2003, right?

[370] With Lee behind bars, police are sure that they finally gotten the monster responsible for all the murders that took place in the area between 1992 and 2003.

[371] And they're kind of like bragging, like, hey, we're heroes.

[372] Hey, we finally found this guy, you know, applauding themselves, right?

[373] Yeah.

[374] However, DNA and other evidence links Derek Todd Lee to only seven of the murders they're investigating and to the police's surprise in horror, at least another six murders that they thought he had committed were not a DNA match to him.

[375] Wow.

[376] Wait, how many murders were there?

[377] Well, so there was like 60 -some missing and murdered women in that time period in Baton Rouge, or in the area.

[378] So they were thinking that he had committed like 10 plus murders, but a whole six of them don't.

[379] match up to him.

[380] Horrifying.

[381] Terrifying.

[382] So then just five months later after he had been apprehended in October of 2003, a group of ATV writers are on a ride through a remote wooded area when they come across the body of a 45 -year -old woman.

[383] She's a mother of three.

[384] Her name is Johnny Mae Williams.

[385] And she's also a sex worker.

[386] And this butcher targeted sex workers is in the area for sure.

[387] Her cause of death is determined to have been from blunt force trauma.

[388] Both of her, this is, like, this is classic, psychotic, fucked up inness.

[389] Like, nothing special about him except it was all happening at the same time in this one area.

[390] You know what I mean?

[391] Yeah.

[392] Like, just a psychopath.

[393] He had cut her hands off post -mortem.

[394] Hmm.

[395] And this discovery confirms the police's worst fear.

[396] there is another serial killer in Baton Rouge, and he's still on the loose.

[397] So let's go all the way back to 1994.

[398] On the morning of March 21st, 1994, police respond to a call at St. James Place, which is a retirement home in Baton Rouge.

[399] They enter the private apartment of 81 -year -old retiree Anne Bryan to find that her throat had been slashed, and she had been stabbed about 50 times.

[400] And just like that, no leads, case goes cold.

[401] Like, there's nothing for them to go on.

[402] Awful.

[403] Five years later, on January 4th, 1999, the body of a 29 -year -old sex worker named Catherine Hall is found at the end of a dead -end street near construction site, and her body is laid right beneath a dead -end sign, almost like this killer's fucking with the police.

[404] She's left naked.

[405] There are ligature marks on her neck.

[406] indicating she's been strangled and she's covered in deliberate lacerations.

[407] So this killer likes to do post -mortem cutting.

[408] It's very sick.

[409] By the lack of blood of the scene, police suspect the cuts were made post -mortem, perhaps in a different location before being dumped at this construction site.

[410] It's a horrifying scene made even more disturbing by the sick joke of the body being placed beneath the dead end sign.

[411] But police find hair on the body.

[412] believed to have belonged to the killer.

[413] But because Catherine was a sex worker with a criminal background, her murder receives little media or police attention.

[414] You know, it's like when Derek Todd Lee was attacking all these LSU students and local women who weren't in the sex or occupation got so much attention, but these women are thorough away to the police.

[415] So they're not getting as much attention in the media.

[416] Also, there's that piece that sometimes is true, not always, that there's just no one to fight for if a sex worker is in a situation where they are, you know, say, just like cut off from their family or because they're on drugs or because whatever, like that idea that these people, these murderers are praying on the people that have the least backing.

[417] Yeah.

[418] The least like anybody that will fight for them.

[419] Totally.

[420] Absolutely.

[421] I think that's part of it, right?

[422] It's like they just want to kill.

[423] And so they find the most vulnerable victims they can who have nobody no resources at all it's terrible okay but then a third murder occurs in the spring of 1999 and it gets much more buzz because the victim is the wife of a local attorney and it's almost like if if he hadn't murdered this woman I wonder how much longer he would have gotten under the radar he would have green rivered his way through exactly right I mean I mean, that's, it's such a, yeah.

[424] Yeah.

[425] So, Hardy Schmidt, she's 52.

[426] It's May of 1999, and little does she know that a man has been stalking her for the last three weeks, driving around and trying to find her during her morning jogs.

[427] And at about 5 .30 a .m. on the morning of Sunday, May 30th, 1999, he finds her jogging along quail run drive in Baton Rouge.

[428] And it's a safe neighborhood.

[429] She lives in a good community.

[430] I think she lives in a gated community.

[431] So, oh, this is, this is so fucking awful.

[432] Get ready.

[433] A man drives up behind Hardy.

[434] He hits her with his car.

[435] It sends her flying into the ditch alongside the road.

[436] We've had these stories before where like someone hits a kid with a fucking bike to incapacity.

[437] It's just, I don't stop thinking about that.

[438] Yeah.

[439] He gets out, Zivties her around the neck and forces her into the car and drives away with her.

[440] He takes her to a part.

[441] He takes her to a part.

[442] nearby where he rapes her and as soon as he's finished he uses a zip tie to strangle her to death.

[443] Two days later on April 2nd, 1999, a bicyclist riding along a bayou bike trail off of Highway 61 in St. James Parrish spots Hardy's body.

[444] She's been dumped roughly 35 miles away from where she was last seen like the victim before her.

[445] She's left naked.

[446] Her body's mutilated.

[447] And despite the extra efforts from police, the few leads they have, bring them no closer to finding the culprit.

[448] The case, again, goes cold and the community is now living in fear of another attack.

[449] I mean, just imagine thinking you live in a safe neighborhood and something like that happening.

[450] Right.

[451] And it's already been happening, whether it's to students or whatever.

[452] It's almost like there's something out there that won't be stopped.

[453] That's so creepy.

[454] Yeah.

[455] Like he got caught, but you're not safe yet, you know?

[456] Yeah.

[457] It's still.

[458] It's happening.

[459] The killing spree continues for the next two years, 1999 and 2000, claiming the lives of another three women.

[460] First is the murder of 36 -year -old Joyce Williams, who was killed on November 12th, 1999.

[461] It's a really gruesome murder and sticks out in police minds because the killer had severed Joyce's leg post -mortem.

[462] Like, what kind of sick fuck does something like this?

[463] The next murder is a 52 -year -old Lillian Robinson in January of 2000.

[464] her naked body is dumped in a local fishing hole and a fisherman eventually finds her body.

[465] And then one month later, in February of 2000, the third victim in this string of murders is 38 -year -old Marilynnevels killed in late October of 2000.

[466] Her body is discarded in the Mississippi River and discovered on Halloween Day in the year 2000.

[467] So as the murders continue for the next three years, the people of Baton Rouge are paralyzed with fear.

[468] So these murders are happening that I just told you about concurrent.

[469] with Derek Todd Lee's murder.

[470] This is right before he's caught.

[471] So he's finally caught, and then the murder, the first murder I told you about Johnny Mae Williams happens.

[472] So with Derek Todd Lee behind bars and several cold cases left unsolved, police start looking for similarities between the recent murder of Johnny May Williams that happened right after Derek Toddley was arrested and murders from the past 10 years that don't connect to him.

[473] In their investigation, they noticed that in addition to her hands being cut off, Johnny also has a marking on her neck, indicating a ligature was used to strangle her, much like the 1999 murder of Catherine Hall.

[474] And what's also similar to Catherine Hall's death is that a hair was found on the body of Johnny Mae Williams that didn't belong to her.

[475] So the hair is stored as evidence in hopes that maybe one day they can lead, the hair can lead to the killer.

[476] This is, you know, before DNA was used to actually like match people.

[477] They were just like this could hopefully potentially help in the future.

[478] future.

[479] Like 1999, some of our listeners weren't alive yet.

[480] I don't want to talk about that right now, Georgia.

[481] I'm just saying they don't know what, like the fact that DNA.

[482] I don't care.

[483] It wasn't a given.

[484] I know.

[485] They live in a world where the internet DNA and cell phones were always from history, always existed.

[486] What sounds awful.

[487] You guys are at a disadvantage and we acknowledge that like it sucks.

[488] But then going the other way.

[489] I mean, phones in the internet.

[490] DNA is great.

[491] But they must think of us in our childhood and go.

[492] That's the most pathetic thing I've ever heard about.

[493] How boring are they?

[494] How did you do this?

[495] How did you write one paper?

[496] I went to like Easter, whatever, my mom's birthday lunch with my family yesterday.

[497] And my now 14 year old nephew, Micah, could not be more of a celantine who, when he's not on his phone, looks so miserable.

[498] like you're almost like get on your phone please you're bumming everyone out it's the old junior high slash freshman year of high school oh you wanted me to be a bright shiny magical child well a load of good that did me right so watch this now we're going in reverse he hasn't had figured out how to fake it like the rest of us do we all want to be that sullantine I want to be in my phone too but he's the only one that gets to be like he only has about a year or so more of this before it gets real old.

[499] So it's like, do it while you can't.

[500] Like go to El Coyote and like eat your food and laugh at the jokes.

[501] Like you don't have to.

[502] But parents' jokes are so painful when you're 14.

[503] Everything.

[504] It's just like being there is awful.

[505] It's humiliating.

[506] It is.

[507] And you see somebody your age and then they see your family and you're like, oh my God.

[508] Don't tell anyone you saw me here.

[509] I'm the only person with the family and they're so embarrassing, except Auntie Georgia and Uncle Vince who are the coolest fucking people.

[510] on the world.

[511] Okay.

[512] So then fast forward, like that's 1999 when they're like maybe this hair will lead to something.

[513] Fast forward to February 27 to 2004.

[514] So five years later, the body of 43 year old Donna Bennett -Johnston is found in a drainage canal by two people just walking their dog.

[515] Yeah.

[516] You know.

[517] And it's just three blocks away from her own house where she's found.

[518] And like Catherine Hall and Johnny Mae Williams, she's found nude with post -mortem cuts on her body.

[519] And the police realized there's a good chance that these three murders are connected.

[520] So in March of 2004, Captain Brian White of the Baton Rouge Police Department leads the task force investigating the unsolved murders.

[521] They're like, aware that there's another serial killer out there.

[522] He has his forensics team searched the site where Donna Bennett Johnson's body was discovered.

[523] And like with both Catherine Hall and Johnny Mae Williams, DNA is again found at the scene believed to belong to the murderer.

[524] So then on March 13th, 2004, police analyzed the hairs found on all three of the victim's bodies.

[525] All those profiles turn out to be the same.

[526] So police now know they are looking for a lone white male who's responsible for all three murders.

[527] But here, okay, so forensics, it's like, it's amazing.

[528] It solves everything, right?

[529] But the key break in the case comes from a member of the forensic team who noticed, This is, this is detective work, a tire track left in a moist part of the road near where Donna Bennett Johnston's body was found.

[530] He takes a photo impression of this simple tire track and goes to a local car dealership, and he compares the tire treads until he finds a match.

[531] Wow.

[532] The tire ran, it's a good year, aqua tread three, you know, your favorite brand of tires.

[533] Oh, I love a lot of good years, but the aqua tread three.

[534] is excellent for my lifestyle.

[535] It was sold to about 100 people in the Baton Rouge area.

[536] This is so crazy.

[537] Okay, investigators do track down two men.

[538] Like, they start going through the list of people who had bought it.

[539] They find these two men who owned these tires, and they appear suspicious.

[540] It's a father and son, and they live together.

[541] And they admit to knowing one of the victims, and I just don't understand this.

[542] Her purse is even found at their home.

[543] It's not them.

[544] They check her DNA.

[545] I don't understand the story.

[546] Like it's, you can't find details online.

[547] It's like, what?

[548] Well, but also it's like if this is a small town in this part of Baton Rouge or this specific area or whatever, it's like that is the truth of coincidence.

[549] Yeah.

[550] That sometimes does happen.

[551] Sometimes.

[552] Maybe they found her purse while walking their dog or whatever, but they also knew her because it's a small town.

[553] Like, I just don't have an explanation why the purse was there.

[554] But it's not them 100%.

[555] Right.

[556] It's like the most suspicious thing that can be found in their home and it's not them.

[557] Wow.

[558] Well, thank God for DNA because, you know, five, 10 years earlier, they would have absolutely been arrested and prosecuted for this.

[559] Right.

[560] Well, but again, that would have been circumstantial evidence.

[561] Yeah.

[562] So may not have held up in court.

[563] Those are those moments where we always get frustrated as the laymen reading these stories over and over where it's like, how did they not go to jail or whatever?

[564] Yeah, but what are the chances?

[565] But that's just it.

[566] It's like the law allows for those chances and says those chances do exist in reality.

[567] Yeah.

[568] So you can't just have circumstantial evidence.

[569] Yeah.

[570] Okay.

[571] But then if you're going to argue that, like what if they had, you know, violent criminal backgrounds?

[572] That's why you don't hit people.

[573] I told you this.

[574] I'll stop.

[575] I've got to stop hitting people in public.

[576] What's my favorite, though?

[577] Okay.

[578] So that lead is ruled out.

[579] So Captain White's task force split up the remaining tire owners list and painstakingly question each one, hoping to find their killer.

[580] Finally, one of the officers, Detective Todd Morris, interviews someone who during questioning puts himself at the scene of the crime on the night of the murder.

[581] That man is Sean Vincent Gillis.

[582] And obviously I said his middle name, so he is a serial.

[583] killer.

[584] Right.

[585] People ask that all the time, like, isn't it crazy that they have three names?

[586] And the answer is no, they use the middle name so that random Sean Gillis guys from Utah or whatever aren't like attacked on Facebook for being a serial killer.

[587] Yes, exactly.

[588] The one thing that might be able to delineate you from somebody else is the name Lee.

[589] Right.

[590] You know, fingers crossed.

[591] Yeah, exactly.

[592] Yeah.

[593] So let me tell you a little about Sean Pence and Gillis.

[594] He's a life lifelong resident of Baton Rouge.

[595] He's born June 24th, 1962.

[596] So what is that?

[597] A Leo?

[598] Cancer.

[599] June 24th?

[600] Is that a Gemini?

[601] No, thank you.

[602] It's not.

[603] He's not one of us.

[604] No, thank you.

[605] We don't want that.

[606] Shortly after he's born, his father bails on the family, all the same shit you hear.

[607] He racks up a DUI, numerous traffic citations, cannabis possession, and a contempt of court charge.

[608] By the 90s, when Sean is in his late 20s, early 30s, he gets work as a computer programmer, but his drinking and drug use become too much of a problem, and he loses his job.

[609] So he's just kind of like a loser flake.

[610] He looks like a Jeffrey Dahmer type.

[611] He's got the mustache and the glasses and the nerdy haircut and just kind of, you know, he looks like, he looks like Ned Flanders.

[612] Oh, wow.

[613] Yeah.

[614] But also it sounds like if he could get, I could not get a job as a computer programmer.

[615] Like that's not easy.

[616] He must have been smart in some ways.

[617] So he had a serious, like, personality disorder, basically.

[618] Yeah.

[619] And it's like he had no violent criminal history.

[620] So it is just kind of out of the blue.

[621] And so in 1994, he also was a girlfriend, a long time, like girlfriend.

[622] They always do.

[623] They always do.

[624] He starts dating a young single mother named Terry.

[625] And Terry works the midnight shift at a local convenience store, which just happens to be located across the street from St. James Place, the retirement home where 81 -year -old Anne Bryan lived before her murder in March 1994.

[626] So he was just sitting there staking out the place.

[627] Yeah.

[628] So he's brought in for questioning.

[629] He's calm and nonchalant.

[630] And in the documentary Butchers at the Bayou on A &E, they show some of his interview.

[631] And, I mean, like, cool as a cucumber.

[632] like almost like this is a card game they're all playing drinking beers or whatever it's like not a big deal to him lizard person lizard yeah so he admits to knowing johnny may williams and says she's even been inside his house and his car before police proceed to question Sean for four hours and he just lets it happen as time wears on they're confident that this is their killer but they lack a confession or any hard evidence against him and so they're forced to let him go but they do manage to get a DNA swab before they release him.

[633] And he just...

[634] He just gives it up.

[635] Yeah.

[636] Hmm.

[637] So then police covertly surveil Sean at his home because they're like, we need to keep an eye on this guy.

[638] It's clearly him.

[639] Then the DNA results come back.

[640] And it's a perfect match for the hairs found out three crime scenes, those of Catherine Hall, Johnny Mae Williams, and Donna Bennett Johnson.

[641] Thank God they're keeping an eye on him.

[642] And so as soon as it comes in positive before the sun comes up, on April 29th, 2004, a SWAT team forces their way inside Sean's home and places him under arrest for the first -degree murders of Catherine Halt, Johnny Mae Williams, and Donna Bennett -Johnston.

[643] Police search his house where he lives with his longtime girlfriend and her teenage daughter, who like gets along great with Sean.

[644] They thought he was a normal dude.

[645] They find in the house knives and hacksaw blades suspected have been used as murder weapons, several, heavy -duty zip ties and a collection of true -crime books detailing other murders.

[646] They even find a belt that belonged to Donna Bennett -Johnston and an earring in the trunk of his car that belonged to another one of his victims, along with blood in the trunk's interior.

[647] And even the kitchen floor baseboards are confiscated by police.

[648] As forensic show, they are saturated with blood residue, meaning he had murdered at least one of his victims in his own home when his girlfriend and her daughter were out of town.

[649] Wow.

[650] But perhaps the most horrifying things they found were post -mortem photos of his victims stored on his computer and digital cameras.

[651] They had tons of images.

[652] He also looked into Derek Todd Lee's murders.

[653] So he was like he felt competitive against the other serial killer who was killing in Baton Rouge at the same time as him.

[654] And when Derek Todd Lee got one murderer over him, he went out and killed so that he could, like he felt like a competition.

[655] Oh, my God.

[656] This guy, I mean, it's, yeah.

[657] So as soon as the police described the evidence against him, Sean Vincent Gillis confesses to eight murders in total in vivid gruesome details, like casually.

[658] Captain Brian White said, once that floodgate was open, you just couldn't stop him.

[659] Quote, he wanted to tell you every detail of everyone.

[660] Like, who was a gay?

[661] In total, there are more than 34 hours of Gillis speaking to the police, 34 hours.

[662] Wow.

[663] However, because he asked for an attorney during the interview at one point, his detailed confessions were inadmissible during trial.

[664] So even though Sean confesses his guilt, even throwing in a guilty plea in 2007 for the second -degree murder of his victim, Joyce Williams, he still goes to trial for the three first -degree murder charges beginning in July of 2008.

[665] Despite his open confession to all eight of his murders, there's only hard evidence enough to convict him of the three he's initially charged with.

[666] When it comes time for his sentencing, the jury can't agree on whether or not he deserves a death penalty.

[667] Remember, they couldn't listen to his confessions, his like casual confessions.

[668] So they only had this information.

[669] They wind up deadlocked, and the judge, sentences Sean to three consecutive life sentences in July of 2008.

[670] Sean is taken to the Louisiana State Penitentiary, where he remains today.

[671] And that is the story of the other butcher of the bayou, Sean Vincent Gillis.

[672] The main sources used in today's story include, again, the four -part A &E documentary, Butchers the Bayou, episode three of season two of the investigation discovery series, The Devil You Know, and an article from oxygen, by Joe Jemionovich, and the other sources are listed in the show notes.

[673] Oh, just a, I so regret clapping.

[674] I so regret clapping.

[675] I know what you meant.

[676] It's like when we're doing live shows and they clap when we say who we're doing.

[677] Like, you know, it's that thing.

[678] Yeah.

[679] It's just like, oh, I want the other shoe to finally drop, but I want to know the rest of this story because it was a true cliffhanger.

[680] That's this podcast.

[681] That's this whole podcast.

[682] is, I wish you hadn't told me that.

[683] Right.

[684] That actually should be the name of this podcast.

[685] Wow.

[686] Incredible.

[687] And to be not only a policeman in, like, Baton Rouge at this time, but just to be an average citizen that makes the huge mistake of taking a walk by the river or anything.

[688] Like, what a scary, awful thing.

[689] Goodbye.

[690] I would move immediately.

[691] Not that there's anywhere safe because, look, listen.

[692] No. Oh, I mean, it would seem like it's all around you at that point.

[693] Yeah.

[694] Good Lord.

[695] Oh, well, good job.

[696] Thank you.

[697] All right.

[698] Let's take a hard left.

[699] Not only away from the bayou and America, but back in time to a little place I like to go when I'm feeling blue called Victorian England.

[700] Yeah, the smells.

[701] The smells.

[702] The smells.

[703] Oh, my God.

[704] I am following some mudlark.

[705] on TikTok.

[706] So good.

[707] And I think it's a woman because it looks like a woman's hand that picked it up.

[708] The other day it was just this close up on, you know how the gravel?

[709] It's gravel, but then you look at it and you're like, there's a penny.

[710] There's a ring.

[711] It's like chalk full of stuff.

[712] I read a thing that was like when you look at the gravel, that nature doesn't have perfect shapes.

[713] So when you're looking at a bed of rocks or whatever, look for the perfect circle because that doesn't exist in nature.

[714] So like you have to focus your eyes on that.

[715] Oh, yeah.

[716] Unfocus your eyes on that.

[717] Right.

[718] You know what I mean?

[719] Kind of like you have to get what you're looking out for.

[720] Well, this lady in that very way where you can tell she knows the tricks, reaches out and moves some rocks and then picks up this little blue ceramic bird.

[721] And like, I don't know why.

[722] I'm starting crying.

[723] I was like, wait, what?

[724] That was just under there.

[725] And it was like underneath and kind of like hidden.

[726] Some Victorian Child's tea set toy.

[727] A Victorian child's opium pipe That they loved so much as an eight -year -old It was their pay for 12 hours of work in the factory Oh, the jolly old days The time So we're going back now to Victorian England So here's a quote from NPR Describing London in this period of time To set the scene Quote, London was infamously filthy it had choking sooty fogs the thames river was thick with human sewage and the streets were covered with mud gross so yeah there you go these days mud larking is much cleaner event than i bet it would have been back in the day this is also a period during british history where the public is very concerned about crime the income gap between rich and poor is stratospheric theft and vandalism are up from previous decades and the newspapers and tabloids run headline after headline detailing grisly sensational murderers taking place across the nation.

[728] But before Jack the Ripper terrorized Whitechapel, there was another Victorian murderer who stunned, horrified, and transfixed the British public.

[729] So much so, the sculpture of her was put on display at Madame Tussaud's Wax Museum before she was ever convicted.

[730] Her of her crimes.

[731] This is the story of murder.

[732] Kate Webster.

[733] Fuck.

[734] So the sources used today are from a 1925 book called The Trial of Kate Webster, edited by Elliot O'Donnell, The Murderpedia page for Catherine Webster.

[735] Shout out to Murderpedia.

[736] So good.

[737] Going Strong after eight long years.

[738] Excellent.

[739] And the book Victorian Murders by Jan Bondison.

[740] And Jan Bonison, that name might sound familiar to you and I, because he was heavily cited in the boy Edward Jones packet.

[741] Good one.

[742] The little creep that snuck into the palace.

[743] That was a classic.

[744] The greasy little creep.

[745] And the rest of the sources are in our show notes.

[746] Come back with me now.

[747] The story begins in 1849 when Catherine, who will end up going by Kate Lawler, is born in a small, remote Irish village.

[748] We don't know much about her childhood, except that she comes from a farming family.

[749] And although the Lawlers belong to the lower class, they're described as quote respectable people but little kate's trying to change all that she is described as having a very intense appearance that makes something for a child i think i'm going to show you but oh it's so funny like i wish there were obviously back then and especially for poor people there was no pictures yeah there's no there was no nothing those are that was back when you had to like pose for 15 minutes for a picture but let me see This was a little girl who was so creepy looking that she put people on edge.

[750] Oh, honey.

[751] That can't go well for the beginning of your life.

[752] I don't think it makes you love the world.

[753] No. Go to our Instagram if you want to see it.

[754] Now, this, I'm just showing your, this is the wax figure that was at Madame Tussow's.

[755] Okay.

[756] Yeah.

[757] There's like a Willem Defoe aspect to it.

[758] It's a look into the hypnotic eye.

[759] There's that vibe.

[760] They went heavy on the eye shadow.

[761] and there might be some, what's that cheek thing called that you get when you get your cheeks hollowed out?

[762] Oh, the buckle fat removal?

[763] Buckle fat removal.

[764] She may have gotten that.

[765] But also, she has the thing where her irises don't go, there's white on the bottom of her eyes.

[766] And she probably, if she gets mad, there's white on the top of her eyes.

[767] Which get, move away from that area if you ever experience that in the real world.

[768] Okay, so imagine that as a child.

[769] Those eyes would be like three times larger.

[770] Oh, dear.

[771] Oh, dear.

[772] She didn't stand a chance.

[773] Oh.

[774] Okay.

[775] They say she has a quote, particularly sinister face with dark gleaming with dark gleaming and slightly oblique eyes.

[776] Hurtful.

[777] End quote.

[778] Or maybe they're just on edge because Kate indiscriminately pickpockets and steals and is constantly in trouble with the law.

[779] Oh, my gosh.

[780] Truly.

[781] But she, it feels to me like she has a very young sociopath.

[782] or psychopathic vibe about her where she's just kind of like, you know what, fuck all y 'all.

[783] And she's a big liar, and she lies either to get what she wants or to get out of things she doesn't want to be happening, to get away with things.

[784] When she's later asked about her childhood, Kate will often claim that she married a man named Captain Webster in her early teens and that they had four children who, along with the captain, all died by the time she was 15 years old.

[785] What the fuck?

[786] now given the math most historians think this is probably a made -up story and that kate simply wanted to get a new last name to distance herself from her long childhood criminal record while at the same time garnering sympathy for being a bereaved wife and mother and it's such a implausible story when you hear it but then it's like it kind of is a credit to probably how convincing she was that as insane as that story was it stuck around yeah Yeah.

[787] Because she probably made a couple people believe it.

[788] Elliot O'Donnell, who edited the 1925 book Trial of Kate Webster, has said, quote, she was astonishingly self -possessed, had a wonderful control of her facial expression, and had extraordinary aptitude for grasping situations and getting out of difficulties.

[789] Sociopath.

[790] Got it.

[791] Yeah.

[792] So Marin left me this note.

[793] Note to Karen, on the point about Kate's alleged dead husband and children, it's not technically impossible to have four kids by the age of 50.

[794] Yeah, you know what?

[795] I don't think anyone was, like, shocked by that because it was, like, everyone at 15.

[796] Back then?

[797] Yeah.

[798] You're an old maid at, like, 20.

[799] Yeah, you're a child bride at 12, and you're washed up by the time you're 20.

[800] But there's just no evidence to support it.

[801] So when Kate is 15 years old, she's arrested on larceny charges and sent to prison in Wexford, Ireland.

[802] It's unclear how much time she spends behind bars there.

[803] But when she's released, she goes right back to stealing.

[804] By 1867, she's in her late teens, and she's stolen enough money to buy one -way ticket out of town.

[805] Her family are completely worn out by her and her eyes and her constant arrests and her scandals.

[806] So I almost made Georgia spit on her microphone.

[807] So they encourage her to move to Liverpool for a fresh start.

[808] And so she does.

[809] Beautiful Liverpool.

[810] Just go start again in one of the most forgiving and refreshing cities in all of England, Liverpool.

[811] You love mud, right?

[812] Because I've got a place for you.

[813] And Marin then notes, at this time, Ireland is a part of the UK.

[814] Ah, okay.

[815] Just FYI.

[816] So once in Liverpool, Kate falls in with other street criminals.

[817] And before long, she is once again in trouble with the law in 1868, just before her 20th birthday, She's caught stealing.

[818] This time she's convicted and she's sentenced to four years in prison.

[819] When she gets out from that stint, she finds herself under constant surveillance from the Liverpool police.

[820] So she decides to ditch Liverpool and head down to London where she cycles through her first round of fake names, Kate Webb, Kate Gibbons, etc. Surprisingly, Kate's first few years in London are actually very quiet.

[821] She later claims that she was doing her best to keep on the straight and narrow during this period.

[822] But she pops back up on the radar in 1873 when she's around 24 years old.

[823] And that's after she moves into a home in Hammersmith and becomes friendly with a family named the Porters.

[824] They live next door.

[825] And Kate tells the Porters she's a domestic worker who's currently out of a job.

[826] For obvious reasons, she doesn't bring up her criminal past.

[827] Sure.

[828] So Kate then begins a relationship with a man who in Kingston, and after becoming pregnant with this man's child, she moves in with him.

[829] We don't know much about this man or about the baby, including their names.

[830] And Kate herself only identifies the child's father as strong or sometimes as Mitchell.

[831] And no one knows if those are last names or nicknames or anything.

[832] What if your nickname was Mitchell?

[833] Or strong.

[834] Your nickname's Mitchell.

[835] Mitchell.

[836] But this boyfriend is described as a shady character who, according to Kate, eventually walks out on this family.

[837] When Strong leaves her, Kate says she has no choice but to start stealing again, saying, quote, I became very impoverished, forsaken by him and committed crimes for the purpose of supporting myself and my child, end quote.

[838] Which, of course, very common in Victorian England, things were bad, as was it NPR at the very beginning, said, is a rough town.

[839] And everyone was just, trying to get by the book the five about the five confirmed victims of jack the ripper talks so much i mean the workhouses you just had no chance if you slipped under that kind of like speeding train of poverty in england you were done and and the cycle of like and very understandable cycle of drinking to like to get rid of the stress drinking after an 18 hour day in the you know, the steel mill or wherever the hell.

[840] Yeah.

[841] It was just, yeah, people got eaten up.

[842] And so it's very, I love that book.

[843] So the five is by Haley Rubenhold, FYI.

[844] Yes.

[845] Great book.

[846] Please read it.

[847] So on March 4th, 1875, when Kate's 26 years old, she's picked up by the police once again.

[848] And this time she's handed an impressive 36 larceny charges.

[849] And she's sentenced to 18 months in prison.

[850] And then in February of 1877, just after she gets out of prison from that stint, I don't know that many synonyms for stint.

[851] Stint sounds good.

[852] Stint's pretty good.

[853] She is arrested again and sentenced to another 12 months behind bars, all for theft.

[854] And so Kate and Strong are now both out of the picture.

[855] So the couple's young son is raised by a woman named Sarah Crease, who met the couple while they were living in Kingston.

[856] So Sarah and Kate aren't friends, but Sarah sees Kate struggling and feels really sorry for her.

[857] And in 1878, when Kate has served out her latest sentence, Sarah tries to set her up with a legitimate job.

[858] At first, she invites Kate to come along with her on her own cleaning gigs because she's, you know, somebody's made.

[859] And then she asks her employer, a woman named Miss Loder, if Kate can cover a few shifts for her here and there.

[860] Ms. Loder eventually takes a liking to Kate and connects her with a friend that's looking for a full -time living maid.

[861] And that woman's name is Julia Martha Thomas.

[862] So clearly Kate's like, I got to get it together.

[863] I have a kid.

[864] I'm in London.

[865] Like, I can't be in jail all the time.

[866] And so it seemed like she was like, I'm going to be a lady's maid like so many people are.

[867] Yeah.

[868] So Julia Thomas is in her mid -50s.

[869] She has outlived two husbands and she lives alone in a semi -detached apartment.

[870] in a large stone villa in Richmond, which is in southwest London.

[871] This is far from the hustle and bustle of the city center.

[872] Julia's home is surrounded by gardens.

[873] It's on a relatively quiet street with just a few houses and one business nearby.

[874] It's the pub next door and it's called the hole in the wall.

[875] So according to the people who knew her, Julia has an interesting personality.

[876] You know what that means.

[877] Fun.

[878] She's described as, quote, distinctly eccentric.

[879] and, quote, easily roused to wrath.

[880] And despite being middle class, she reportedly likes to present herself as being very rich by wearing lots of jewelry and fine silk dresses.

[881] If you put them all on at once, you look really rich, all your jewelry.

[882] Yeah, and then you act real eccentric.

[883] Real roused, what was it, roused to anger?

[884] What was it?

[885] Rouse to wrath.

[886] That means she like, the bitch like to fight.

[887] Yeah, Julia's out in these streets with her fine silk dress.

[888] It's suspected Julia Thomas hires Kate simply because it sounds aristocratic to have a maid.

[889] Sure.

[890] It's not clear that she actually needs one.

[891] Another thing about Julia, she's reportedly very, very rude to the people that she hires to work in her home.

[892] When Kate starts her maid duties in early February of 1879, she seems to get along with Julia well.

[893] So for several days, Kate doesn't say anything negative about her boss, only that she's grateful for the opportunity to work.

[894] but then somehow everything goes sour very quickly, and by the end of her first week, Kate says, quote, at first I thought her a nice old lady, and I hoped I might be comfortable and happy with her, but I found her very trying, and she used to do many things to annoy me during my work.

[895] When I finished my work in my rooms, she would go over it again after me and point out places where she said I did not clean, showing evidence of a nasty spirit towards me. So according to people who've written about this case, Julia's nitpicky attitude towards Kate results in Kate being very chilly, if not outwardly hostile toward her boss.

[896] In fact, it's said that by the end of Kate's first week on the job, Julia is afraid of her maid.

[897] And because of this, she fires her.

[898] Okay.

[899] Which is, you know, fair is fair.

[900] It's like, you're kind of acting like an asshole.

[901] And then the person that you hired doesn't like that.

[902] And then you're like, oh, no, I don't like this.

[903] So then you're like, okay, this whole thing isn't working out.

[904] It's how it is sometimes.

[905] But Julia doesn't want any trouble.

[906] So she tells Kate that she can keep living in her house and continue working for her until the end of the month and makes Kate's official last day, Friday, February 28th.

[907] She doesn't feel great about this arrangement that she has concocted.

[908] She's already super uncomfortable living with Kate, according to Elliott O'Donnell, quote, Ms. Thomas tried her hardest to get someone to stay.

[909] with her she asked several members of the church she attended and on their refusing eventually succeeded in getting a lady and her daughter to lodge with her for a fortnight what do you think happened in those couple days like something someone snapped like intense fighting probably julia the lady of the house thought she could kind of do what she wanted and she came up with kate who's like no no no I do what I want.

[910] Yeah, and they butted heads.

[911] And they seriously butted heads.

[912] And maybe, like, Kate at that point was so kind of street worn that she went street real fast.

[913] And Julia was like, I thought that was.

[914] Yeah.

[915] She's used to people, like, cowtowing to her, probably, Julia.

[916] Probably because if you think about that, like, British politeness thing, we're like, you don't raise your voice.

[917] And it's like, it's super crazy to raise your voice.

[918] Yeah, especially that's someone rich and, you know, aristocratic and shit.

[919] Pretending to be rich.

[920] Your boss.

[921] Yeah.

[922] I think it's very interesting, though.

[923] I'm reading a lot into Julia not being able to get anybody to come and stay at her house.

[924] Yeah, they're like, Julia, no. Yeah, they're like, you are the most high maintenance and you, now I go there and you're going to yell at me. Yeah.

[925] Like, you yell at the main.

[926] Yeah.

[927] Or like, you always panic about something.

[928] Yeah.

[929] So eventually Friday the 28th.

[930] rolls around and as planned the mother and daughter leave like they said you got me for two weeks that's it or a fortnight but not kate kate asks if she can keep boarding there through the weekend complaining that it's too hard to find short -term lodging on a friday or a saturday she says she'll have a much better shot at leasing a new place at the start of the next week when there's less demand more vacancies it's unclear of julia feels sorry for kate or if she's just afraid of her either way she agrees to let Kate stay through the weekend.

[931] Not good.

[932] So finally, it's Sunday, Kate's last day, working and in the house.

[933] Even though the two women don't like each other, they both know they don't like each other, Kate's just carrying out her normal duties that day.

[934] Everything seems to be fine.

[935] Except as part of their work agreement, Julia always gives Kate Sunday afternoon off on the condition that Kate has to return in the early afternoon, so she can help Julia get dressed for evening church services.

[936] But not today, as you would imagine, as I would also do.

[937] I'm not coming back to fucking help you on my last day.

[938] My last day of work, I'm done.

[939] You can't fire me more.

[940] You can't fire me. I quit.

[941] So Kate is next door at the hole in the wall.

[942] Oh, drinking at that pub.

[943] Easy to find.

[944] She getting drunk, chatting up the other patrons.

[945] She is not concerned about the time.

[946] When she finally does decide she's ready to go, she stumbles back over to Julia's house.

[947] Julia has not left for church yet, and Julia is furious.

[948] She wastes no time reprimanding Kate for keeping her waiting, but at this point, as we well know, Kate's not having it because she's drunk.

[949] According to Julia herself, who would later confide in her fellow church members, quote, Kate flew into a terrible passion.

[950] Kate becomes absolutely enraged and hurls every insult and curse word in the book at Julia.

[951] This absolutely freaks Julia out so she gets dressed by herself and then just runs out of the house and runs to church.

[952] Surprisingly, after the service, Julia heads straight home and as far as we know, she doesn't make any attempt to have somebody come back to the house with her.

[953] so all those church people who were talking about it afterwards like she didn't go around and go will you please come back with me and help me get this crazy maid out of my house i wonder why well it says on this piece of paper maybe julia thought that kate would have calmed down by then right or even better that she would have just taken her shit and gotten out right that was the end of it yeah she could have been in a full fantasy of like that's over and that was it she yelled we're done but when julia does arrive home she finds neither seem to be the case and here's what happened next according to kate webster herself quote upon her return from church before the usual hour mrs thomas came in and went upstairs i went up after her and we had an argument which ripened into a quarrel which i didn't realize quarrel was one above argument apparently it is yeah which which ripened into a quarrel and in the height of my anger and rage i threw her from the top of the stairs to the ground floor.

[954] She had a very heavy fall.

[955] I felt that she was seriously injured and I became agitated at what had occurred, lost all control of myself.

[956] And to prevent her screaming and getting me into trouble, I caught her by the throat.

[957] And in the struggle, she was choked and I threw her on the floor.

[958] She was choked.

[959] No, no. You choked her to death.

[960] Julia Morgan is dead.

[961] Kate Webster killed her.

[962] Wow.

[963] So Kate, of course, immediately starts covering her tracks.

[964] in my least favorite way these true crime stories always have.

[965] If you do not like grizzly things, you're going to want to dip for about a minute and a half.

[966] Well, you shouldn't have listened to my story either.

[967] Yeah, exactly.

[968] If you're still upset from George's story, it gets worse.

[969] Is there a post -trigger warning?

[970] Is that a thing?

[971] Yeah, and does help at all?

[972] Kate proceeds to dismember Julia's body, boil her limbs and torso on the kitchen stove.

[973] Whoa.

[974] And burn her organs in the oven.

[975] She would later say her goal was to shrink the remains so they'd be easier to get rid of.

[976] She cleans up all the blood around the home from dismembering her boss in her own home.

[977] And then she puts Julia's remains into a big wooden box and everything fit except for one of Julia's feet and her head.

[978] So she keeps those outside this box.

[979] Oh my God.

[980] It's a big wooden box that's incredibly heavy.

[981] and Kate realizes that she's going to have to move it, but she needs more time to figure out how she's going to do that.

[982] So she just closes it up and like kind of like she doesn't put it aside because it's really heavy, but just like that's going to go there for a while.

[983] She has snapped in a big way.

[984] And then she takes Julia's foot or severed foot to a nearby garbage dump and tosses it onto the garbage heap, which is so Victorian England, or at least the way, I shouldn't say, that because there'll be a thousand historians being like actually no it wasn't but i picture that you walk down the street and there's like there's old kind of falling down houses and antique stores and stuff and then just to the left there would just be a big like three -story pile of garbage yeah heaps of garbage everywhere heaps of garbage here and there yeah they hadn't learned yet to put it outside the city limits right into the thames yeah where we can now dig it up where we can mud lark the fuck out of it now.

[985] Exactly.

[986] Exactly.

[987] Then she puts Julia's head into a large handbag.

[988] I think I was talking about all the other stuff, because it just gets worse, of course.

[989] She puts Julia's head into a large handbag, a bag that witnesses will later report seeing Kate leave Julia's home with.

[990] It's gruesome, it's horrible, and it is, you know, it's a part of all of these stories that we get to, and then we go, why did we start out on this journey in the first place?

[991] but I think we do it for this reason to talk about what is this escalation that Kate just experienced between lifelong larceny of just like I just want what I want when I want it to the serious gruesome murder and dissection of her boss like that's so so extreme like to have that in you it's like how have you had that in you your whole life and it comes out now and it's scary to think like that there are people out there who do have that capability in And is it all of us that?

[992] Because is that also a human capability if some of the humans can do it, do all the humans have the capability?

[993] I mean, I think that's what's so fascinating.

[994] One of the things is fascinating about true crime is like, is that in all of us?

[995] Or is that nature, nurture or circumstance or what?

[996] I just don't think when they get to the problem solving point, which to me is the point of no return.

[997] Yeah.

[998] where they're like, I'm going to cut up a body.

[999] Right.

[1000] That I can't ever go there.

[1001] Do you remember the movie Shallow Grave?

[1002] No. It was like a huge 90s movie.

[1003] It was so good and it's they have to kill a roommate.

[1004] And then they cut the body up and I'm like, in the movie, I was just like, no, no. Well, can we go even further back and met her solution for having shoved this person down the stairs and not wanting to get in trouble for that was to then kill them.

[1005] Like, that's where I'm like, no, no, no, no. Like, that's not, that's not how you don't get in trouble for hurting someone.

[1006] Well, and also, doesn't it sound like part of a lie where it was like, the truth is she snapped and went berserked.

[1007] Yeah.

[1008] And then in retrospect, she was like, well, it's her fault that I did that because she was going to tell on me by screaming because I was killing her.

[1009] Right.

[1010] I had to.

[1011] Like, what are you talking about?

[1012] She made me. Yeah.

[1013] She made me. Yeah.

[1014] Okay.

[1015] Was any of that worth of trouble?

[1016] I'm not sure.

[1017] We solved it.

[1018] We solved human experiences.

[1019] We know why women listen to true crime now.

[1020] This is incredible.

[1021] So two days after Kate Webster kills Julia Thomas, Kate decides to pay a visit to her old neighbors in Hammersmith, the porters.

[1022] She hasn't seen them in several years, and she hasn't stayed in touch.

[1023] So the porters, who last knew Kate as a down -on -her -luck domestic worker, are shocked to see her at their door.

[1024] in a nice silk dress, wearing lots of jewelry.

[1025] I bet.

[1026] Kate was no time telling Henry Porter, the patriarch of the family, that her name is now Kate Thomas, claiming that she's been married and widowed since she's seen them since she's lived in Hammersmith.

[1027] She also claims to have recently inherited a house in Richmond from an aunt who just passed away, and it's through this inheritance that Kate says she ended up with a bunch of furniture that she has no need for.

[1028] So she asks Henry, if he might, know anyone who'd be interested in buying it so according to eliot o'd donnell kate's scheme is obvious here she wants to make cash by selling julia's belongings to people who don't live in richmond and have no way of connecting them back to julia because at this point julia is just dead and missing but she hasn't been like reported missing by anybody yeah and i guess luckily for kate Henry Porter agrees to set her up with someone who might be interested in buying those things.

[1029] And then Kate asks the Porter's for one more favor.

[1030] She needs help dropping off a box in Richmond.

[1031] She claims it's a gift for a friend, but it's way too heavy for her to carry herself.

[1032] So Henry's son, Robert Porter, kindly offers to help her.

[1033] After returning to Richmond with Kate and picking up this very heavy box, Robert carries it all the way to a bench in the middle of Richmond Bridge.

[1034] where Kate says she will be meeting her friend.

[1035] And at this point, it's well into the evening.

[1036] It's very dark outside.

[1037] But instead of asking Robert to sit with her while she waits, Kate asks for some privacy and tells Robert to walk to the end of the bridge and when she's done with her meeting, she'll come find him.

[1038] Before Robert can even make it to the end of the bridge, he hears a big splash in the water, turns around, looks back toward the middle of the bridge.

[1039] And even though it's dark, he can see Kate leaning, against the bridge and the box is now gone.

[1040] He's pretty sure that Kate just threw the box into the river.

[1041] Yeah.

[1042] A little time passes.

[1043] Kate meets back up with Robert at the end of the bridge.

[1044] She no longer has the box.

[1045] She tells him that her friend stopped by to pick it up.

[1046] Robert decides he's not going to confront Kate about this.

[1047] He just decides he's going to commit the whole thing to memory and talk about it to someone else.

[1048] So meanwhile, Kate is living up.

[1049] of Julia's apartment wearing Julia's clothing and her jewelry and basically trying to sell anything that she doesn't want to keep for herself.

[1050] Get ready if you're a squeamish.

[1051] This includes the gold bridgework from Julia's teeth, which Kate has pulled from her decapitated school.

[1052] So we're talking about just someone who does not care.

[1053] Yeah, like a huge sociopath.

[1054] Yeah, a disconnect from like.

[1055] reality and like human emotions and kind of just like all business it's very like I need to get mine yeah here it is and here it is so the morning after the suspicious bridge activity Kate's heavy wooden box is spotted under the Richmond Bridge an unsuspecting man opens it up and finds dismembered body parts inside and immediately alerts officers at the nearby Barnes police station So these officers look through the box and they basically, they can tell that the victim is a female.

[1056] They think that all of these body parts belong to one person, but because there is no head, they have no idea who it is and they don't know how to identify the person.

[1057] So it soon becomes the talk of the town and newspapers are, of course, flooded with information about the so -called Barnes mystery.

[1058] So back in Hammersmith, Robert Porter sees all this newspaper.

[1059] coverage and gets a very bad feeling.

[1060] So he goes and tells his father about that night with Kate on the bridge and how he felt certain that she had lied about meeting a friend to hand off this gift.

[1061] And instead, he thinks that she's the one that dump that big box filled with body parts that the police and the newspapers are now describing.

[1062] Before Henry Porter heard any of this from his son, he had connected Kate with a furniture broker named John Church.

[1063] And John ultimately agreed to buy multiple pieces of furniture and clothing from Kate, but once he brought the items home, he begins to look through them and he becomes very unsettled.

[1064] He finds a diary belonging to someone named Julia Martha Thomas, as well as a mail that's addressed to Julia Thomas.

[1065] And he suspects that he's been sold, stolen goods.

[1066] So he calls up Henry to tell him that.

[1067] And that's perfect timing because Henry tells John about the Barnes mystery that they saw in the paper and his son's unnerving story.

[1068] So all three men decide it's time to go to the police.

[1069] So up until this point, Julia's neighbors have been watching as all of her belongings have been carried out of her apartment and they have been growing concerned.

[1070] It's reported that one of them even approaches Kate directly and asks her what's going on.

[1071] But it's not until the police finally visit Julia's home that the terrifying reality hits.

[1072] Upon entering, they discover charred bones and axe and a razor believed to have been used to dismember Julia's body.

[1073] So now police are looking for Kate Webster, but suddenly she's nowhere to be found.

[1074] On March 23rd, several weeks after the murder, Kate's description is finally printed in all the newspapers in connection with the Barnes mystery.

[1075] So, of course, it becomes like it's all the headlines.

[1076] Kate realizes now for sure that the police, are looking for her, but she has a plan.

[1077] So she takes the money that she's been making from selling the furniture and the clothing and she picks up her young son and high tails it to Ireland.

[1078] But she is tracked down by British police because investigators assumed that she'd be trying to head back home.

[1079] Plus, with Kate taking her son with her, she's instantly identifiable.

[1080] So on March 30th, Kate Webster is arrested and charged with Julia Thomas's murder.

[1081] So, of course, this trial is a media sensation, and the line between fact and fiction becomes incredibly fuzzy.

[1082] One particularly creepy and very persistent rumor is that Kate tried to sell off rendered fat from Julia's body.

[1083] There's even a quote attributed to the owner of the hole in the wall, saying, quote, a day or two after the murder, Kate went around amongst the neighbors offering for sale two jars of fat, which she declared to be the best dripping, end quote.

[1084] Oh, my God.

[1085] The story almost certainly isn't true, but basically it added to Kate being branded as the female Sweeney Todd.

[1086] Yeah, I think it's true.

[1087] I'm on the jury and I think it's true.

[1088] I wouldn't doubt it only because if she's pulling gold plates out of a decapitated head, why is that going any further?

[1089] She's done all these horrible things to the body.

[1090] Totally.

[1091] Why wouldn't she?

[1092] She's not like a mastermind because she left letters inside of the furniture she's selling.

[1093] She's not like, she's just doing her thing.

[1094] Yeah, she's just doing it.

[1095] Okay, so alongside the nonstop and over -the -top newspaper headlines, publishers are also churning out so -called souvenir booklets, recounting Kate's life, crimes, and eventual execution.

[1096] Soon, street ballads and street poems are written documenting this case.

[1097] But the cherry on top of the sensational coverage comes when Madam Tousseau immediately gets to work creating a wax version of Kate.

[1098] And on Easter Sunday, 1879, it's put on display at Baker Street and people flock to see the murderous's wax likeness up close.

[1099] Creepy.

[1100] So that's the picture we're going to put on Instagram for you guys of this creepy picture I showed George at the beginning.

[1101] It really is, I mean, they would have to make it creepy or they would just be making a way.

[1102] wax figure of a lady.

[1103] Absolutely.

[1104] But meanwhile, over at the old Bailey, Kate's trial is the hottest ticket in town.

[1105] In fact, the future king of Sweden makes the long trek to London to watch the proceedings.

[1106] Oh, murderina.

[1107] Right?

[1108] A lot of fuss is made about what Kate looks like, but that also has to do with her Irish heritage coming into play and the racism about Irish people at the time.

[1109] As Jan Bondison writes in the book Victorian murders, quote, she's described as not merely savage, savage and shocking, but the grimest of grim personalities, a character so uniquely sinister and barbaric as to be hardly human.

[1110] So that's basically, that's Jan quoting the papers at the time.

[1111] Okay.

[1112] And then he says, her appearance and behavior were seen as key signs of her inherently criminal nature.

[1113] Her callous lying in court caused revulsion.

[1114] The anti -Irish sentiments of the time were also fueled by her crime.

[1115] The denigration of Kate Webster was part of the public perception of the Irish as innately criminal.

[1116] Damn.

[1117] Yeah, the Irish weren't liked at the time.

[1118] So even though the verdict is all but decided in the court of public opinion, the actual criminal case against Kate Webster is very weak.

[1119] As Kate's trial drags on, police still haven't found a head that matches the dismembered remains that they have.

[1120] Oh, they have other heads, but they can't match it up.

[1121] Like, that's troubling.

[1122] Probably.

[1123] what the prosecution does have though is a lot of circumstantial evidence against Kate but Kate is claiming she's innocent which is the most psychopathic thing to do right?

[1124] I didn't do any of this I'll describe to you in detail how I did it I didn't do it right so on July 8th just six days after the trial began the jury hands down their verdict Kate Webster is guilty when asked if she had anything to say before the court Kate once again denies killing Julia, and then she drops a bombshell.

[1125] Out of the blue, she now claims to be pregnant.

[1126] At first, this sends shockwaves to the British public.

[1127] It's yet again another sharp turn in a rapidly unfolding real -life mystery, but Kate's pregnancy claims are soon dismissed as yet another one of her lies.

[1128] A few weeks later, on the night before her scheduled execution, Kate finally confesses her guilt to a lawyer and to her presiding priest.

[1129] And the next morning, July 29th, 18, 179, Kate Webster is hanged to death in a shed, not in view of the public, on the property of Wandsworth Prison.

[1130] And her last words are, quote, Lord have mercy upon me, end quote.

[1131] Wow.

[1132] She was 30 years old.

[1133] 30.

[1134] It is not clear whatever happened to her son.

[1135] I think her son, like at that point was probably, hopefully Sarah Crease took him under her wing.

[1136] But now we're going to fast forward.

[1137] Here's a little addendum to this story.

[1138] Okay.

[1139] that I think you're going to enjoy.

[1140] We're going to fast forward 128 years to 2007.

[1141] And this is when British National Treasure and naturalist Sir David Attenborough just so happens to own the property adjacent to Julia Thomas's old apartment.

[1142] After all these years, the hole in the wall pub is still standing next door, but it has fallen on hard times.

[1143] And by 2009, the pub is shuttered.

[1144] So David Attenborough buys the property with the hopes of converting it into an outdoor space, complete with a greenhouse and an orchard.

[1145] By 2010, Attenborough hires contractors to carry out the remodeling plan, and that October, just in time for Halloween, workers are breaking up the pub's foundation when they find a human skull.

[1146] What?

[1147] Because of the hole in the walls association with Kate Webster, the skull is immediately suspected to be.

[1148] be Julia's missing head from all those years ago.

[1149] I have chills.

[1150] According to Jan Bondison, quote, carbon dating indicated that the skull was dated between 1650 and 1880, but it had been deposited on top of a layer of Victorian tiles.

[1151] The skull had fracture marks consistent with Kate Webster's account of throwing Mrs. Thomas down the stairs and was found to have low collagen levels consistent with being boiled.

[1152] It entirely lacked teeth, something that is of importance, since we know that Kate Webster stole Mrs. Thomas's snappers, which is from this quote.

[1153] I'm not saying snappers.

[1154] From 2009, oh my God.

[1155] Yeah, which contained a gold plate to have them sold.

[1156] In July 2011, the coroner concluded that the skull was indeed that of Mrs. Thomas.

[1157] David Attenborough.

[1158] Right?

[1159] Yeah.

[1160] And so, with that, with David.

[1161] Attenborough's remodel, that little mystery that was still left over from this horrible murder was solved.

[1162] And that is the story of the Victorian -era murder of Julia Martha Thomas by Kate Webster.

[1163] Wait, so did that, she like put it in the rafters?

[1164] Like, what's the story there?

[1165] Behind some tiles?

[1166] Like, what does that mean?

[1167] They don't specify.

[1168] I'm not sure.

[1169] But it sounds like it was, if they were down breaking up the foundation, she may have figured out a way to bury it.

[1170] it or put it like in the basement somewhere yeah like she knew the little crawl spaces and crevices in this bar she used to go to all the time oh my god yeah isn't that crazy yeah wow that was wild like that is a book that's yeah right so interesting so interesting so crazy what was the book called that's about that i'll tell you well there's of course there's murderpedia don't forget sure the book murder pina there is the book from 1925 is called trial of kate webster okay and then the jan bondison book is victorian murders so he that's where he kind of doesn't it's like an anthology yeah is like the is that the right word he goes over a bunch of different stuff that happened yeah i can hear the parrots the literal parrots screaming in the trees outside of my fucking house now which means that this episode is over.

[1171] That's our cute.

[1172] That's our, that's our goodbye music.

[1173] There's literally, we have parrots in the neighborhood.

[1174] They're like literal green parrots.

[1175] Like, it's such a trip that have like escaped from their end.

[1176] They scream their fucking heads off.

[1177] And they're like, stop podcasting.

[1178] You're driving us insane.

[1179] And if you're going to give the crows peanuts, you have to give peanuts to us too.

[1180] It's only fair.

[1181] Yeah, but they're like, we want crackers.

[1182] So let's change this shit up.

[1183] I'll do crackers.

[1184] Throw more good stuff.

[1185] Listen, if you want to be my friend, you can have any snack you want.

[1186] Any snack there is.

[1187] Well, thanks, listener, for listening.

[1188] You're good at it.

[1189] We appreciate you using your senses to be here with us.

[1190] We know, it's hard in today's world.

[1191] You know, it's a slog.

[1192] Jesus.

[1193] We just got one of your full -on senses for like an hour and what looks to be an hour and a half.

[1194] That is generous.

[1195] And you got a bunch of hours.

[1196] It may not feel like it, but you did.

[1197] Yeah, you did.

[1198] You know what, listeners, stay sexy.

[1199] And don't get murdered.

[1200] Goodbye.

[1201] Elvis, do you want a cookie?

[1202] This has been an exactly right production.

[1203] Our senior producer is Alejandra Keck.

[1204] Our managing producers, Hannah Kyle Creighton.

[1205] Our editor is Aristotle Acevedo.

[1206] This episode was mixed by Liana Squalachie.

[1207] Our researchers are Marin McClashin and Ali Elkin.

[1208] Email your hometowns to My Favorite Murder at gmail .com.

[1209] Follow the show on Instagram and Facebook at My Favorite Murder and Twitter at My Fave Murder.

[1210] Goodbye.