Malicious

[0] Hey, Prime members, you can binge eight new episodes of the Mr. Ballin podcast one month early and all episodes ad -free on Amazon Music.

[1] Download the Amazon Music app today.

[2] There are some truly dangerous and unstable people in this world whose sole intent in life is to harm others.

[3] And today's podcast features two stories that demonstrate that.

[4] The audio from both of these stories has been pulled from our main YouTube channel and has been remastered for today's episode.

[5] The links to the original YouTube videos are in the description.

[6] The first story you'll hear is called Head of the Family, and it's about a recently separated man who decides he needs to do something really special for his estranged wife.

[7] And the second and final story you'll hear is called the Snowball Effect, and it's about a bizarre and disturbing string of events in South Korea.

[8] But before we get into today's stories, if you're a fan of the Strange, Dark, and Mysterious, delivered in story format, then you've come to the right podcast, because that's all we do, and we upload twice a week, once on Monday and once on Thursday.

[9] So, if that's of interest to you, please invite the Amazon Music Follow button to go fishing with you.

[10] But when you're out on the water and they ask you, what are we using for bait?

[11] Say nothing and just stick your hook into them and then cast them out into the water.

[12] Okay, let's get into our first story called Head of the Family.

[13] I'm Dan Tiberski.

[14] In 2011, something strange began to happen at a high school in upstate New York.

[15] A mystery illness, bizarre symptoms, and spreading fast.

[16] What's the answer?

[17] And what do you do if they tell you it's all in your head?

[18] Hysterical.

[19] A new podcast from Wondry and Pineapple Street Studios.

[20] Binge all episodes of hysterical early and ad -free on Wondery Plus.

[21] On December 7, 1993, a pregnant woman named Diane Shapp sat inside of a hospital room in the city of Fulda, Germany, staring anxiously at the nurse who was doing her blood pressure.

[22] When the nurse was done, she would tell Diane that her blood pressure was still too high.

[23] And so Diane, she sighed and she was pretty upset by this.

[24] but at the same time, she wasn't all that shocked.

[25] After all, Diane had come to the hospital because she thought something was wrong with her.

[26] Diane was an American who lived on the nearby Sickles Army Airfield Base along with her husband, Sergeant Stephen Shapp.

[27] And that morning, Diane had begun to bleed, and because she had a history of miscarriages, she panicked and just rushed to the hospital to get checked out.

[28] Now, ultimately, the doctors would tell her that it seemed like she was going to be okay and that the bleeding was not a big issue, but as a precaution, they wanted her to stay in the hospital for a week, just doing bed rest, or they could watch her and make sure she was really okay.

[29] And so far, she was, but her blood pressure was still too high.

[30] The nurse who had taken Diane's blood pressure, finished doing the rest of Diane's vitals, and then afterwards she left the room, leaving Diane alone.

[31] And Diane, now it's the first time she's been alone inside of her hospital room since she arrived, and suddenly she just felt so anxious about the whole situation.

[32] And so as she's laying in her bed, wondering if her pregnancy was really okay, she heard footsteps out in the hallway, and then suddenly her door busted open, and it was her husband, Stephen.

[33] And Stephen, you know, his skin was pale, his eyes were red.

[34] He looked really upset, and he rushed into the room, and he kneeled down next to Diane's bed, and he took her hand, and he just said, you know, how are you doing?

[35] It had been a really hard stretch lately for Diane and Stephen.

[36] Just a few months earlier, Diane had actually asked Stephen for a divorce, because she felt like Stephen had grown distant, and the love was just not there anymore in their relationship.

[37] As for Stephen, he didn't want the divorce.

[38] He felt like their relationship was still good, they still loved each other, but he understood Diane was clearly unhappy, and so he was very gentlemanly about this whole situation, and even went with Diane to the base's cleric where they arranged for Diane to be sent back to the United States while Stephen stayed in Germany.

[39] But before Diane was able to make that move back home, she had discovered that she was pregnant.

[40] Now, Diane knew Stephen really wanted to reconcile and get back together, and especially now that he had found out she was pregnant, he really wanted them to get back together so he could be the dad.

[41] But Diane knew that just was not possible.

[42] Their relationship just didn't work.

[43] And so she needed to be firm.

[44] And so she actually squeezed Stephen's hand as he's sitting there right next to her.

[45] And she just said to him, even though he hadn't brought it up, she said, you know, we can't get back together, even though I'm pregnant.

[46] it can't happen.

[47] But Stephen just kind of shook his head at her like he was not here for that reason.

[48] And he said, look, I just want to be your friend.

[49] Let me go back to your house.

[50] I'll gather up your things and bring them here to make your stay a little bit more comfortable.

[51] And so Diane, who wanted to tell Stephen, you know, no, don't do that.

[52] I'm fine.

[53] She could just tell that he really wanted to help her.

[54] And so kind of against her better judgment, Diane said, okay, Stephen, if you want to go back and get my stuff, I would really appreciate it.

[55] And at that, Stephen stood up and he gave Diane a long hug and said, you know, I'll be right back.

[56] And then he turned and left the room.

[57] A few hours later, at around 5 p .m. that evening, the phone inside of Diane's room began to ring.

[58] And so Diane answered it, and it was her husband's best friend, Gregory Glover.

[59] And he was calling just to check in on Diane because he had heard she was in the hospital about some bleeding and he wanted to make sure the baby was okay.

[60] And Diane would tell him that, you know, it seems like everything's fine.

[61] And then after that, Gregory would tell Diane that he was really worried about Stephen.

[62] He said, you know, this morning I had driven him to work, and all he did was pour his heart out to me about how he wanted to get back together with you.

[63] And I just want you to know that, you know, he's really worked up about this.

[64] But before Diane could even respond to Gregory, the phone just suddenly went dead.

[65] And so Diane, she held the phone out, kind of staring at it like, what's going on here?

[66] She put it back to her ear.

[67] She said Greg's name a few more times, but the line was just totally dead.

[68] And so Diane, she hung up the phone and figured Gregory would just call back.

[69] But 30 minutes went by and Gregory did not call back and then out in the hallway Diane began to hear running and that running continued all the way up the hall and it stopped right outside of her door and so she turned to face her door, the door flung open and what she saw caused Diane to just freeze in total shock.

[70] A few hours earlier, after Stephen had left Diane's hospital room, he had gone straight to her house to begin gathering things up for her.

[71] And so when he got there, he had a gym bag, which was made by a sports and athletic company called Head, and he had gone inside of her house and begun going around the rooms, gathering things she would want, and putting them in this bag.

[72] And at some point, Stephen made his way into Diane's bedroom, and suddenly he was just kind of overcome with sadness, because he looked around the room, and he saw there were still pictures up from their wedding day, and there was a card that was face down on the bedside table that he recognized, and just all of these different things he was seen.

[73] just suddenly made him feel so depressed about losing his marriage.

[74] And so Stephen, instead of continuing to gather up things for Diane, he just began pacing back and forth inside of her bedroom, thinking about ways he could potentially win Diane back.

[75] You know, maybe there was a gift he could give her or some sort of offering or gesture that would show her that he still loved her very much.

[76] And so as Stephen was thinking about this, he happened to glance down at his gym bag, and suddenly he felt totally inspired, like he knew exactly what he needed to do.

[77] And so without another thought, Stephen grabbed something off of the mantelpiece inside of Diane's bedroom.

[78] He threw it inside of his gym bag, then he grabbed the bag and walked out of her house.

[79] Once Stephen was outside, he had a big smile on his face.

[80] He was even whistling as he walked, and he went down and he got into his car, and he drove off.

[81] But instead of going to the hospital where Diane was, Stephen began driving in these weird loops all around Sickles Army Airfield Base, almost like he was going on a joyride.

[82] But as he was driving, Stephen was constantly scanning left and right, like he was looking for something.

[83] And then at some point, as he did one of his many loops, Stephen passed by the mess hall, the cafeteria, and he saw all the soldiers going in and out of this mess hall, and he thought, oh, that's where it will be.

[84] The thing I need is inside of there.

[85] And so Stephen, he parked his car, he got out, and he rushed inside of the mess hall.

[86] But after looking all around, he couldn't find the thing he wanted.

[87] And so frustrated, he turned and walked out of the mess hall.

[88] But when he went back outside, as he was walking back to his car, something out of the corner of his eye caught his attention, and he looked over, and it was this phone booth right on the sidewalk up against the road.

[89] And he couldn't believe it, but there it was.

[90] There was the thing right near this phone booth that Stephen desperately wanted.

[91] And so Stephen, instead of going to his car, just began walking in a straight, very determined line towards this phone booth.

[92] 30 minutes later, Diane heard those running footsteps out in the hallway, and then her door flung open, and she froze in shock at what she saw, because what she saw was her husband, and he had this totally crazed look on his face, like he was smiling, but kind of deranged, and he was holding that head gym bag.

[93] and he walked in holding the bag and just stared directly at Diane, and then he opened it up, he reached inside, and he pulled out his special gift, the thing he had been driving all around base for that he had found inside of that phone booth, and he walked up to Diane, and he put it right in her face and said, look, look what I brought you, look!

[94] And by this point, Diane was screaming bloody murder.

[95] It would turn out when Stephen first arrived at Diane's hospital room that morning, and he had knelt down and taken her hand and asked if she was okay, Diane had been very firm with him that they could still not get back together even though she was pregnant.

[96] Now, this was crushing news for Stephen because he did secretly hope that this baby would bring them back together, but what Diane told Stephen next was infinitely more crushing.

[97] She would say to Stephen that the real reason they could not get back together was because this baby was not his.

[98] Now, Stephen had initially taken this news pretty well and said to Diane, you know, okay, I understand.

[99] you know, at least let me go to your house and gather up some things for you and bring them back here so your stay at the hospital is a little bit more comfortable.

[100] And Diane had maybe been a little bit surprised at how well Stephen had taken this.

[101] And she said, okay, yeah, that would be great.

[102] And so Stephen had left the hospital, gone to Diane's house, he went into her room, and he began putting her things into that gym bag, when suddenly he stopped because he noticed those pictures on the mantelpiece of their wedding day.

[103] And it was just kind of crushing to realize that his marriage really was over.

[104] And then, before he went back to packing, he happened to glance over at the bedside table, and he noticed a card face down on that table.

[105] Now, at first, Stephen actually didn't really react to this card because he knew who had given it to Diane.

[106] It was just a friend of hers, and the card was kind of meaningless.

[107] It was just a card to celebrate their friendship.

[108] But then Stephen's suddenly thinking to himself, wait a minute, this person, this friend of Diane's, gives her cards all the time.

[109] And this person is always coming over to say hi to Diane.

[110] And this person's always complimenting Diane and telling me how great Diane is.

[111] And it was like suddenly everything just kind of fell into place for Stephen, and he realized this so -called friend of Diane's was much more than that.

[112] This friend was Diane's lover and very likely the father of her unborn child.

[113] And who was this friend of Diane's?

[114] Well, none other than Stephen's very best friend, Gregory Glover.

[115] The same Gregory Glover that Stephen just that morning had poured his heart out to on the ride to work, telling Gregory how much he missed his wife and how much you wanted to reconcile.

[116] And Gregory's advice to Stephen had been, well, you know, I know you're hurting, but you really need to let this go.

[117] You need to let the divorce happen and just move on with your life.

[118] And now Stephen realized that Gregory wanted Stephen to end his relationship with his wife, so Gregory could have a relationship with Diane.

[119] And so Stephen felt unbelievably betrayed, and that was when he decided to get a gift for Diane.

[120] And so he grabbed a knife that was on the mantelpiece inside of Diane's bedroom.

[121] He threw it inside of his gym bag.

[122] He got in his car and he began driving around the base, looking for Gregory.

[123] And after Stephen had gone into the mess hall and then come back out again, he had spotted Gregory on the phone inside of that phone booth.

[124] And Stephen had immediately run over, opened it up, grabbed Gregory, pulled him out, and begun stabbing him.

[125] Now, Stephen didn't know this, but at the time he attacked Greg, Greg was literally on the phone with Diane.

[126] And so when that call suddenly dropped and Diane expected Gregory to call her back, well, their call really hadn't dropped.

[127] It was just that Gregory had been pulled away and was being attacked.

[128] Gregory, who was totally caught off guard, tried his best to defend himself against Stephen, but Stephen was just crazed and he kept hacking away until finally Gregory had stopped moving.

[129] And then at some point Stephen stood up and kind of caught his breath and he's looking around that all these onlookers who can't believe what they're seeing.

[130] And Stephen said, I'm sorry.

[131] He grabbed some things off the ground, put them inside of his headbag.

[132] And then he took the bag.

[133] He ran to his car, drove to the hospital, ran through the hospital to Diane's room.

[134] He flung the door open, and Diane is shocked to see him.

[135] And Stephen walks in with this crazed look on his face, and he holds up the bag.

[136] He unzips it and pulls out Gregory's severed head.

[137] And he holds it right in front of Diane and says, look, look what I brought you, look.

[138] And he placed it down right.

[139] on the bedside table looking directly at Diane.

[140] And so Diane began screaming and people began rushing into the room.

[141] Meanwhile, Stephen just sat in the corner calmly waiting to be arrested.

[142] Ultimately, Stephen would be tried by a military court and he would be sentenced to life in prison.

[143] She struck him with her motor vehicle.

[144] She had been under the influence and she left him there.

[145] In January 2022, local woman Karen Reed was implicated in the mysterious death of her boyfriend, Boston police officer John O 'Keefe.

[146] It was alleged that after an innocent night out for drinks with friends, Karen and John got into a lover's quarrel en route to the next location.

[147] What happens next?

[148] Depends on who you ask.

[149] Was it a crime of passion?

[150] If you believe the prosecution, it's because the evidence was so compelling.

[151] This was clearly an intentional act.

[152] And his cause of death was blunt force trauma with hypothermia.

[153] Or a corrupt police cover -up.

[154] If you believe the defense theory, however, this was all a cover -up to prevent one of their own from going down.

[155] Everyone had an opinion.

[156] And after the 10 -week trial, the jury could not come to a unanimous decision.

[157] To end in a mistrial, it's just a confirmation of just how complicated this case is.

[158] Law and crime presents the most in -depth analysis to date of the sensational case in Karen.

[159] You can listen to Karen exclusively with Wondery Plus.

[160] Join Wondry Plus in the Wondry app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify.

[161] I'm Dan Tversky.

[162] In 2011, something strange began to happen at the high school in Leroy, New York.

[163] I was like at my locker and she came up to me and she was like stuttering super bad.

[164] I'm like, stop fucking around.

[165] She's like, I can't.

[166] A mystery illness, bizarre symptoms and spreading fast.

[167] It's like doubling and tripling and it's all these girls.

[168] With a diagnosis, the state tried to keep on the down low.

[169] Everybody thought I was holding something back.

[170] Well, you were holding something back.

[171] Intentionally.

[172] Yeah, well, yeah.

[173] No, it's hysteria.

[174] It's all in your head.

[175] It's not physical.

[176] Oh, my gosh, you're exaggerating.

[177] Is this the largest mass hysteria since the witches of Salem?

[178] Or is it something else entirely?

[179] Something's wrong here.

[180] Something's not right.

[181] Leroy was the new date line and everyone was trying to solve the murder.

[182] A new limited series from Wondery and Pineapple Street Studios, Hysterical.

[183] Follow Hysterical on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts.

[184] You can binge all episodes of hysterical.

[185] early and ad -free right now by joining Wondry Plus.

[186] The next and final story of today's episode is called the Snowball Effect.

[187] On the evening of December 20, 22, a young woman named Moon Suho, along with her boyfriend, whose name was Lee Ki -Young, sat at a table at a Korean barbecue restaurant in Northern Seoul, which is the capital city of South Korea.

[188] The couple didn't even have any food yet, but Moon was not even looking at the menu.

[189] Instead, she was excitedly checking her watch, waiting for her parents to arrive.

[190] This dinner was a very special occasion for Moon because she had been dating Lee for several months now and she was totally in love with him, but she had not introduced him to her parents yet.

[191] And so Lee had surprised her with reservations to this restaurant tonight for four people.

[192] He had invited her parents to come to the dinner so they could all finally meet.

[193] Moon looked across the table at Lee, and she smiled, because she knew as soon as her parents saw this guy, they were going to be impressed.

[194] Lee was a 32 -year -old Army veteran with lots of crazy stories from his time in the military.

[195] He was also exceptionally good -looking.

[196] He was very well -educated, and he came from a family that was extremely successful and very wealthy.

[197] Lee's grandfather owned the high -rise building that Lee was staying in.

[198] I mean, this family was very influential and powerful in South Korea.

[199] But Lee was not full of himself.

[200] He was very humble, he was kind and polite, and he had a total soft spot for little animals.

[201] He had adopted a dog and three cats and adored them.

[202] I mean, this was a guy who was kind of like the total package that any parent would be psyched that their daughter was dating.

[203] After Moon and Lee had been sitting at this table for about 15 minutes, Moon looked up and she saw her parents finally coming in the door.

[204] And so Moon, she stood up and she waved to her parents and flagged them over to the table.

[205] And so they came over, they said hi to Lee.

[206] And right away, Lee, he picked up the menu and he ordered all these very expensive drinks and all the expensive meats on the menu and then before long lee was chatting with moon's father about his military service and then lee was talking to moon's mother and showing her pictures of his dog and his three cats and moon she was just sitting back enjoying watching this because she could see from her parents facial expressions that they seem to really like lee too and so this night was going as good as it could have moon and lee and moon's parents stayed at this restaurant for at least two hours, just enjoying each other's company and throwing back a lot of drinks and eating expensive food.

[207] And by the end of the night, when the parents got up to leave, they were like hugging Lee and slapping him on the back and telling him how great he was.

[208] And Lee was doing the same thing to the parents.

[209] It was like really they had hit it off.

[210] But after Moon's parents were gone, Moon and Lee, they left the restaurant too, and they began walking across the street towards the parking garage where Lee had parked and right away Moon could tell Lee was actually pretty drunk.

[211] She had not noticed it in the restaurant, but now she could see Lee was kind of stumbling a little bit.

[212] But Moon wasn't upset about this.

[213] If anything, she just thought, wow, he was so composed talking to my parents in there, despite obviously being drunk, he had just managed to mask it really, really well.

[214] But despite how impressed she was with her boyfriend, Moon didn't want Lee to drive them home.

[215] It seemed like that would be really unsafe to do because, again, obviously he, is drunk.

[216] And so when Lee and Moon made it to Lee's car, Moon kind of gently told Lee, hey, why don't we leave your car here and just call a taxi and they can take us home safely.

[217] But when she said this, Lee took it as if Moon was criticizing him for being too drunk.

[218] And he felt really offended because in his mind, he had just put on this great date and made this great first impression on Moon's parents and here she is kind of nagging him.

[219] And so Lee just kind of blew his lid and the couple got in this horrible yelling fight in the parking garage, which ended with Lee telling Moon that their relationship was now over, and then Lee turned around and stormed off to hail a cab by himself.

[220] And after he was gone, Moon just stood there next to Lee's car being totally shocked at what had just happened, and then kind of in a daze she went and hailed a cab herself and went home, and then she just laid in bed and cried until she went to sleep.

[221] But Moon was not heartbroken for long because the next morning when Moon woke up she heard a knock on the front door and when she opened it up there was a delivery guy with this huge beautiful bouquet of roses for Moon and so Moon took these roses and quickly found a card attached to the roses she opened it up and there was a letter from Lee saying you know please accept these roses as a part of my apology last night didn't go so well I'm really sorry please come to dinner with me tonight moon was so relieved to get this apology letter that She called Lee right away and said, you know what, I do forgive you.

[222] It's all water under the bridge.

[223] You know, my parents, they loved you, and they have no idea about that fight we had.

[224] So let's just put it behind us and just continue being boyfriend and girlfriend.

[225] And at this point, it was Lee's turn to be totally relieved because he didn't know if Moon would want him back.

[226] But they were back together, and that night they went out for a fancy dinner together.

[227] And then also Lee had booked a very fancy hotel room that night for them to stay in.

[228] and this is really how their relationship went for the next couple of days.

[229] Basically, Lee would take Moon out shopping anywhere she wanted to go.

[230] They went to all the best restaurants and stayed in the best hotels.

[231] To Moon, it was obvious that Lee was really just continuing to shower her with gifts and praise and all these fun things to still try to make up for that big fight they got into, even though Moon really had forgiven him.

[232] And at some point, after several days of being treated like a princess by Lee, Moon finally told Lee, stop buying me stuff, it's fine.

[233] Fine, I totally forgive you, everything is good.

[234] But Lee insisted that he'd be allowed to continue to spoil her.

[235] After all, it was the Christmas season, and she deserved to be spoiled around Christmas.

[236] So in South Korea, Christmas is celebrated a bit differently than it is in Western countries like America.

[237] In South Korea, Christmas is a big holiday, but it's really just a holiday for couples.

[238] It's not really a family occasion.

[239] So in South Korea, on Christmas, lots of couples will go out on the family.

[240] these fancy dates.

[241] And so that's kind of how they celebrate Christmas, whereas, you know, in Western countries like America, it's all about family and waking up and getting presents from Santa Claus.

[242] So that's the difference.

[243] Western is family -centric.

[244] And in South Korea, it's very couple -centric.

[245] It's kind of like Valentine's Day in the winter.

[246] So on Christmas Eve, Lee told Moon that he had a very special dinner planned for Christmas and Wood Moon Mind coming over to Lee's apartment on Christmas morning to feed his cats and his dog because Lee was going to be out running errands in preparation for this big Christmas dinner.

[247] And of course, Moon said she would.

[248] So at around 11 a .m. on Christmas day, Moon hopped off the elevator inside of Lee's apartment building and began walking down the hall towards his door, carrying the key to his door.

[249] But as Moon walked closer and closer to Lee's door, she began smelling this really powerful smell.

[250] It smelled like roses.

[251] And for a second, Moon thought to herself, oh my goodness, this whole thing was a setup.

[252] I'm not here to feed his pets.

[253] I'm here because he must have planned some really elaborate thing for Christmas Day for right now.

[254] And probably it has to do with lots of roses inside of his apartment.

[255] And so Moon was really excited by the time she got out front of Lee's apartment door.

[256] But before she used her key to open it up and just go in, she decided she would just call out for Lee because she figured at this point he's got to be in there.

[257] He knows I'm about to be surprised by this big thing.

[258] and so she calls out for Lee, but there's no answer.

[259] And so she knocks a couple of times to see if maybe she can get Lee to come to the door, but after knocking several times, there was no answer.

[260] So eventually, Moon used her key, she opened up the door, she swung it open, and she stepped inside of Lee's apartment, expecting to be wowed by whatever Lee had planned, but instead, when she looked around, she couldn't really understand what she was even seeing.

[261] Lee was nowhere to be found, but there were roses all over the apartment.

[262] However, these were not new roses.

[263] These were, like, several days old, many of them were wilted, and the petals were starting to fall off, and the water that all these roses were sitting in was very dirty.

[264] But really, there were like vases of roses everywhere on every surface.

[265] And right away, Moon started to feel really uneasy.

[266] It was, like, very creepy to be in this dark apartment where no one's inside of with just these weird flowers everywhere.

[267] And so without going any further into the apartment, Moon once again yelled out for Lee, hopes that maybe he was here, but again, he didn't come out of any of the room, so she knows she's alone, and so she called Lee on his phone to try to get an explanation for what she was looking at.

[268] But Lee didn't answer his phone.

[269] By this point, Lee's three cats were circling around Moon's legs, because they were eager to be fed, and so Moon kind of stopped thinking about this strange flower situation and looked over at the cat's bowls and saw there was no dry food.

[270] They had eaten all of their food.

[271] And so Moon began walking over to the bowls when she realized, Lee had not told her where he kept the cat food, and so she had no idea where it was.

[272] So Moon began opening all the kitchen cabinets, hoping to find this cat food somewhere, but she didn't, and so eventually she left the kitchen and she walked down this hallway inside of the apartment, and she found there was a skinny closet in the hallway that looked like a place where you would store cleaning supplies and vacuums and that sort of thing, so she reached down and tried to open it.

[273] She was able to turn the doorknob, but there was something inside of this closet, that was making it really hard to open, like it was stuck on something.

[274] Now, again, Moon is kind of looking around this dark, dingy apartment that's filled with all these wilted roses, and she's feeling super uneasy, but she thought, you know, I just want to feed these cats and just get out of here.

[275] And so Moon just grabbed that door handle and yanked as hard as she could, and she managed to pop it open.

[276] And for a second, Moon just stared at the inside of the closet, having no idea what she was even looking at.

[277] And then she started to scream.

[278] would turn out virtually everything Moon thought she knew about Lee, her boyfriend, was wrong.

[279] Five days earlier, after Moon and Lee had gotten into that horrible fight in the parking garage, following the dinner with Moon's parents, Lee had made it seem like he was storming off to go hail a cab and drive home on his own, but in reality, after he stormed off, he waited for Moon to walk away and get a cab on her own, and then Lee just walked right back over to where he had parked his car in the parking garage, he got inside, turned it on, and began driving home.

[280] But on his drive home, he actually crashed into a taxi driver.

[281] Now, neither Lee nor the taxi driver were harmed in this accident and both cars were still drivable, but Lee actually had a really big problem with drinking and driving.

[282] Nine years earlier in 2013, when Lee was serving in the military, he was put in military prison for drunk driving.

[283] And then, after he got out of the military, he was arrested two more times for drunk driving in 2018 and 2019.

[284] And so even though this accident with the taxi driver was very minor, Lee did not want to go to police and report this accident because if officials got involved, they would see that Lee has this horrible history of drunk driving and he would get in way more trouble.

[285] And so, Lee convinced the taxi driver to just allow him to pay him privately for the damages in order to avoid getting officials involved.

[286] However, the taxi driver, who was open to this, demanded that Lee pay him in cash.

[287] He didn't want some sort of deferred payment plan.

[288] He wanted to be paid now.

[289] And so Lee said, okay, well, then let's go to my apartment and I'll just pay you there.

[290] However, when the taxi driver and Lee got to Lee's apartment, they got in a fight over how much money Lee actually needed to pay the taxi driver for the damages.

[291] And eventually, Lee just kind of snapped and beat the taxi driver to death and then stuffed his body inside of that cleaning closet in his apartment's hallway.

[292] And so that's what Moon had seen when she had opened up that closet.

[293] She saw the corpse of the taxi driver.

[294] And then after Lee had murdered the taxi driver, he stole the taxi driver's credit cards and his cell phone, and Lee would use the taxi driver's credit card to pay for all those lavish dinners and hotel stays and gifts over the next few days as Lee spoiled Moon for Christmas.

[295] And also during that time, Lee was using the taxi driver's cell phone to send messages to the taxi driver's family to convince them that he was still alive.

[296] Also, Lee went out and bought a whole bunch of bouquets of roses and put them all over his apartment to try to mask the smell of the rotting corpse inside of his closet.

[297] But this murder and Lee's horrible drunk driving were not his only secrets.

[298] Lee claimed he was from this very wealthy successful family that owned all these amazing high rises in South Korea, but that was all a big lie.

[299] Lee was not from a very successful family.

[300] He did not have any money.

[301] He basically just borrowed money from family and friends and then lied about how he acquired the money, claiming he was this big successful wealthy guy.

[302] Also, when the police in South Korea began investigating the taxi driver's murder, they discovered that Lee's apartment was not even his.

[303] It belonged to his ex -girlfriend, who was a bartender in South Korea who was in her 50s.

[304] Also, Lee's beloved three cats and dog that he talked about all the time, about how much he loved them and cared for them.

[305] Well, those weren't his either.

[306] Those were his ex -girlfriends.

[307] And as police continued their investigation into the murder of this taxi driver, they would eventually find traces of Lee's ex -girlfriend's blood inside of Lee's apartment, so his ex -girlfriend's apartment.

[308] And they would discover that Lee had murdered his ex -girlfriend, stolen her apartment, stolen her pets, and even took her cell phone, and to this day, had been sending messages to her family to try to convince them that she was still alive, even though nobody had seen her and had no idea what was going on with her.

[309] Lee was ultimately arrested for two counts of murder, and he would quickly admit that he did kill the taxi driver and his ex -girlfriend.

[310] However, by this point, police had located the cell phone of a missing woman amongst Lee's things, and so they became very suspicious that he might have had something to do with this third woman's disappearance.

[311] However, to this day, Lee has denied having anything to do with this missing woman, and they still have no idea what happened to her.

[312] And so that case is kind of on hold.

[313] Despite how totally crazy this whole story sounds, the craziest part actually happened after Lee was arrested.

[314] Once Lee's crimes were being talked about all over the news, Lee became totally famous in South Korea because he was exceptionally good -looking.

[315] On the news, they would play CCTV footage of Lee interacting with that taxi driver before he murdered him, and the only takeaway from lots of people in South Korea was, wow, this guy is so unbelievably attractive, he looks like an actor, not here's a guy who's about to murder someone.

[316] In fact, Lee became so popular in South Korea for being so beautiful that there became a real fear that Lee's ex -girlfriend, Moon, would become a target in some way, that maybe Lee's fans would blame her for putting their beloved Lee in prison and they might try to attack her.

[317] However, the police in South Korea did a really good job of masking Moon's identity, and so to this day, we believe she is still safe.

[318] And also, for clarity, Moon is actually not her real name.

[319] name that is a pseudonym that we used to protect her identity as well.

[320] In the end, Lee was sentenced to life in prison for those two murders.

[321] Thank you for listening to the Mr. Ballin podcast.

[322] If you enjoyed today's stories and you're looking for more strange, dark and mysterious content, be sure to check out all of our studios podcasts.

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[325] To watch hundreds more stories, just like the ones you heard today, head over to our YouTube channel, which is just called Mr. Ballen.

[326] So that's going to do it.

[327] I really appreciate your support.

[328] Until next time, see you.

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