Chambers of the Occult - EP #17 False Faces and Devil Places: Tall Hot Blond and The Devil Baby of Hull House

Episode Date: September 6, 2024

In this episode of Chambers of the Occult, we explore two stories of deception and the supernatural. First, J unpacks the infamous Tall Hot Blond case—a real-life catfish scheme that spiraled into obsession, betrayal, and murder. Dive deep into the shocking twists and turns of this tragic love triangle, where false identities led to deadly consequences that no one saw coming.Next, Kai leads us through the eerie history of Hull House, a historical Chicago landmark haunted by the terrifying legend of the Devil Baby. We’ll discuss the mysterious events and strange sightings that have fueled fear for over a century, as well as how this dark tale became intertwined with the legacy of Hull House.We’re also joined by our guest Katy, who shares a personal and hot tale that brings a unique perspective to the conversation. Prepare for an unforgettable episode filled with deception, darkness, and intrigue. You won’t want to miss this one!Send us a text

Chambers of the occult may contain content that might not be suitable for all listeners. Listener discretion is advised. Hello. Hello. Hi. Welcome back. I'm so excited. I'm so excited. I'm so excited. I'm so excited. I'm so excited. I'm so excited. I'm so excited.

I'm so excited. I'm so excited. I'm so excited. I'm so excited. I'm so excited. I'm so excited. I'm so excited. I'm so excited.

I'm so excited. I'm so excited. I'm so excited. I'm so excited. I'm so excited. I'm so excited. I'm so excited. I'm so excitedbers of the Occult. I'm Jay. I'm Kai. And we have a guest. I'm Disembodied Voice Number 13. Oh my god. I, we, okay, you're definitely not number 13, but once we get to the 13th guest, I feel

like, I don't know, we have, maybe we do something special for that. I don't know. Do we have 13 guests? Do we? I don't think, I don't think we have 13 people to bring on to be quite honest. So yeah, I don't know if that'll come. But maybe anyway, this is Katie. Yeah, Katie, our guest here. Yeah. Well, we thank you a lot for coming back listening to another episode. Another one we're excited to record. Yeah. So as usual, we've got three stories for you. True Crime, Paranormal, whatever Katie's got after we'll find out.

And I will be starting us off with a fun story that is across state lines. Oh, you know, I, whatever we call like a true crime, whatever we call a true crime story, like a fun story, it's always like, what is the story going to be? How fun can they really get? I don't know. Now that you say that, I want to call my story a fun story. I know it's meant to be true crime, but I do think it's a fun story. But before I start the story off, because it takes place across line, like state lines, but also like in the internet. I just have a quick question. Have any of you or the listeners ever heard of the website called pogo.com? No.

I don't think so. Okay. It's nothing super crazy. It's just like an online gaming site that allows like strangers and like friends to like come together and play like card games, board games, like just online games. Like it's a little get together thing. So users just enter specific rooms in the gate, uh, in the website of their choice. They play games by typing messages to each other. It's, it's almost like if you're too, if you're playing with a friend, just, you can chat. It's the same thing.

It's nothing crazy. Got it. So the reason I'm bringing this up is because this story goes back to 2005. So not a super old story, not super recent. Got it. So like, I like that. I like hearing about like sort of recent, but sort of not cases,

because I'm like, that was really not that long ago. Yeah. So this starts with a user on poka.com named Marinesniper. You know, people choose their usernames and they're gonna be what they want them to be. Yeah. So MarineSniper was playing a game of blackjack in one of the poker rooms and then he received a message from another player going by the username TallHotBlonde.

This is 2005. The username was not taken for them. So Talha Blahn introduced herself as an 18 year old Jesse. And then she pointed out that Maureen Sniper was in the wrong chat room. Because the room that they were in was for teenagers. And Maureen Sniper's profile clearly said that he was 46 years old. Got it. Yeah. So Marine Sniper quickly reassured Jesse that he wasn't in the wrong room at all.

He explained that he was actually 18, just like her, but that he was using his dad's account to play. And that's why the profiles listed him as 46 years old. It wasn't his own account, it was his dad's. Okay. I know. So with this issue addressed, Taha Blonde and Marine Sniper were free to just keep messaging each other.

And you can probably guess that this is the only beginning of a much darker story. Because it didn't take long for Marine sniper to start sharing more information about himself with Jesse. He revealed that his real name was Tommy and that he lived in upstate New York, near the city of Buffalo. Tommy had big dreams. He was set to join the Marines like his dad, which would explain the username. And he wanted to become the best and like the toughest version of himself that he could be. And Tommy hadn't always felt this way. Because the more that Jesse and Tommy talked, the more he confided in Jesse. And that's when he told Jesse that when Tommy was 12, his mother died of cancer, and then after that he was,

he never felt capable of loving another person again. So Jesse was, not Jesse, Tommy talked about how after feeling betrayed by a couple of different people in his life, he gradually began to shut off his feelings. He became the loner type as far as thinking and talking to people in his life. And he confessed to Jesse that when he was 17, he, we give a content warning. Uh, when he was 17, he raped a cheerleader from his high school. Okay. Yeah.

So once again, something about being online and not really talking to a person really gets people talking. Um, so Tommy explained that he reached like rock bottom, and he experienced a sense of total hopelessness. And he found purpose by enlisting in the Marines, and he was getting ready to attend boot camp in two months time. So Tommy would head to Parris Island in South Carolina to undertake this training. Now when he opened up and confessed all these things to Jesse, Jesse wasn't completely horrified by Tommy's admission that he had that he was a rapist. In style, she felt compassion for what he'd been through and she even told him that she was proud of the steps he'd taken to better himself.

So she said that she understood that it was maybe from a lack of direction. And Jessie did not live in New York. She lived in West Virginia in a small town called Oak Hill. And her lifestyle was fairly typical. She lived with her parents and younger brother. Although she often fought with her mom, and Jessie was passionate about sports, playing football, basketball, and she worked as part-time as a lifeguard for some extra money.

So Jessie had a pretty regular life going on, pretty average. And she was in her final year of high school. She was getting ready to graduate, but she wasn't really sure what she wanted to do with her life. And because she was talking to Tommy so much, she started seeing a possible exciting future with Tommy. Oh no.

Okay. Yeah. So I wonder how that future is going to. Oh, you're gonna fight it out. Yeah, unfortunately. Once again, this was all through the website pogo.com, so they were playing games and just chatting meanwhile they were playing. And during their very first conversation that they started,

Jessie sent Tommy some pictures of herself in a bikini. Okay. Yeah. And just as her username suggested, Jesse sent Tommy some pictures of herself in a bikini Okay, yeah And just as her username suggested she was tall and athletic. She was Yeah, she was a tan skinned Yeah That's how you know it was 2005 her username matched your person. Yeah. Yeah Like wasn't actually like Catfishing or anything.

No. That was normal. That's what I am. And it's what you're going to find out because she got comfortable with him real quick and started sending him lots of pictures. More pictures followed, including glamour shots that she had taken by a professional photographer, more casual shots and candid photos of Jesse playing sports. Jesse even began making photo slideshows for Tommy,

set to like background of romantic power ballads like Aerosmith, I Don't Wanna Miss a Thing. So she was getting really invested in Tommy. And Jessie was just curious of what Tommy looked like. So Tommy described himself as six feet tall, muscular with broad shoulders. And that was something that definitely caught Jessie's attention because she had a thing for big shoulders, apparently. Which I always find interesting. I'm just like, okay. I was like, cool. Eventually Tommy

sent Jessie a picture of himself wearing his cadet uniform, like sporting just like a stern expression. And Jesse thought he looked handsome, so they kept talking. And as days went by, Jesse and Tommy chatted more and more. They communicated by instant messenger on Pogo as well as email via Yahoo when Yahoo was still used. Wow. Yeah. And then eventually the two exchanged phone numbers and they began talking over the phone as well. So when Tommy headed to South Carolina for the boot camp, his time became somewhat limited with computers, but he always tried to make time

to talk with Jesse. It wasn't long before the two teenagers declared their love for each other. And their conversations became a little bit more rare. And of course, eventually they started to engage in cyber sex. Whatever that was in 2005. Crazy times in 2005. Yeah. Yeah. I was two years old. I'm five.

Yeah. So we wouldn't know what it was like in 2005. So no, Tommy and Jesse, uh, Tommy told Jesse that he had gotten a tattoo on his arm in the honor of their relationship. Um, and that it featured the word always and forever alongside a heart with Jesse's name inside, um, and always and forever was both a nod to the Marines motto, Semper Fidelis, which is just like what the Marines, if they're saying. And it was also like a special saying that Tommy and Jesse would like refer to their love. So like they would make lots of references to that. So after the boot camp that Tommy was in, and it was completed, he received word that he was gonna be deployed

to fight in the Iraq War, which the United States had initiated for more than two years earlier. So he told Jessie that his internet access would be restricted during this time, and that if she needed to reach him urgently while he was out in this dangerous mission mission or wanted to send him a care package that he should do so to his father, Tom Senior. And that's because Tom Senior was the

marine contact. So technically he could receive the packages and then deliver them to his son. So Jesse started sending letters and photographs to Tom Senior. But being away, far from Jesse, and unable to see her in person, it started to show a little bit more of Tommy's jealous side. Okay. Because the less they talked, the more he accused her of flirting with other men on lot other men online and sending them pictures.

So this led to like their first fight as a couple. Um, and eager to make up, Jesse ended up sending Tommy a special parcel that included a necklace with a pendant in the shape of a half heart. She kept the other half for herself. But there was something else in this parcel that is a little odd for someone to send. She also sent him a pair of her underwear. Oh, I'm sure that lasted.

That's crazy. I cannot imagine receiving or sending that to anyone. No, no, no, no, no. Sorry, Sargent. I was late because I was sniffing the panties. Sorry, Sergeant, I was late because I was sniffing the panties. The closest thing I could say is that I'm expec She like grabbed my backpack. She like put her bra in it and then gave me back my backpack. And I opened it. I was like, I was like, why the fuck did you put your bra in my backpack? Did she give a reason? No, she just like put it in there.

I was like, okay. And then I made her take it back. So anyway, that was not nearly as as we're sending a pair of on the And then I made her take it back. So That was not nearly as as we're sending a pair of on the mail So can't and I would imagine it'd be if the dad was to open the parcel And they're like Why is he receiving like yeah under garment weird as hell? Yeah, yeah receiving like undergarments. Weird as hell. Yeah. Yeah. Eventually Tommy got in a brief argument

with his dad, Tom Senior, who actually didn't agree with Tommy and Jesse's relationship. Tom Senior just encouraged Jesse from pursuing his son any further, telling Jesse that he would no longer relay any messages between the couple because he thought the relationship should end. And Tom Senior told Jesse, you will hurt him and he's an idiot

and will believe your lying ass. Holy shit. So this point, Tom Senior just doesn't want Jesse with his son. But Jesse, you know, it didn't really matter to her because she was in love sending panties over the mail. So she continued to contact Tommy, telling him that she was worried about his safety while he was fighting in Iraq. And in one message, she wrote, I know you're being careful, honey, and you have the best with you, but I also know anything can happen. So I don't know if that's sweet, but it was, I guess it's kind of sweet and realistic. But Tommy just

kept replying to Jesse reassuring her that nothing was going to happen to him. He also told her about the battles that he was fighting in the Iraq city. I don't know how to pronounce this name of the city, but he mentioned the cities that he was fighting in. Time continued going by, so as December rolled around, the couple had been in contact for roughly eight months. Okay, that's kind of a while. Yeah, eight months. So for Christmas, Tommy surprised Jessie by proposing to her.

Oh, how cute. I guess that's sweet, but that's really short. That is, yeah. Especially for someone you haven't met in person. Yes. Wait, they haven't met yet? No, they haven't. And it's like 2005, and long distance stuff is just like unheard of previously pretty much.

Yeah. stuff is just like like unheard of previously pretty much like yeah so unless like you were already a married couple that you know one of yeah of course but but especially like a long yeah like meeting online like that was just untreaded water so yeah definitely crazy how you can just be so trusting of someone immediately like that. And it took a lot less to start sending those pictures. So, Jesse accepted. And to mark their engagement, Tommy sent Jesse some red poinsettia flowers because they were popular during Christmas time. And then Jessie mailed Tommy another care package with more of her underwear. Oh! Yep.

As well as dog tags engraved with the words, Tom and Jessie always and forever. So the couple agreed to get married when Tommy returned home from Iraq. And Jessie wrote excitedly about how she would take Tommy's last name, which was Montgomery. She also imagined what their wedding night would be like, and their communications to each other. They talked about how their future together would be incredibly bright. Then two months later, in February of 2006, Jesse received an envelope in the mail. So she opened the envelope because she's been communicating with her fiance at this point. And inside was what appeared to be a family photograph taken in a professional

studio. Okay. There now in the picture was a middle-aged woman with a shoulder length blonde hair. She stood in the center. Sitting behind her was a middle-aged balding man wearing glasses. And on either side stood a couple of two girls who looked to be in their early to mid teens. Along with this photo was a handwritten letter. It opened with the words, Jesse, and close you will find a picture of my family. Let me introduce you to the people. The man in the center is Tom, my husband.

What? No. That's crazy. That's like so surprising, but it's not at the same time. Yeah. So the writer, whoever wrote the letter, explained that her name was Cindy Montgomery and that she was the woman in the picture

and that the two girls were their daughters who were age 12 and 14. Cindy explained that she and Tom didn't have any sons. Tommy, the young cadet, Jesse had been having a relationship for almost a year didn't exist. Jesse had been speaking to 46 year old Tom the entire time. Oh, fuck. Shoulda known.

Yep. So yeah, Cindy had, go ahead, go ahead. Talking to this old man. Get an engage to this old man. So, sending your panties to this old man. Crazy, what is he doing with them? Yeah, yeah. So Cindy, the wife, had uncovered this ruse when she stumbled across some of

Jesse's letters to Tommy, which Tom had stashed away. So he was trying to hide them. And Cindy was concerned for the young woman and decided to let her know what's been going on. She closed her letter off with the following message and it said, From what I am pulling from your letters, you are much closer to my daughter's age than mine. Let alone Tom's. Are you over the age of 18? In this alone, he can be prosecuted as a child predator. He's taken advantage of you. You need to be much more cautious with your safety. You will only be hurt by a man who has mastered the art of manipulation and lies.

Do not trust words on a computer. Yeah. Definitely can't. And that holds true even today. Especially today. Oh yeah. I think people are a little bit more aware of this now, but this was 2005. Yeah, for sure.

Thankfully. And as a young man in the 1970s, Tom had actually enlisted in the Marines, but he never saw active combat. By the time that he was discharged, he developed a drinking problem. And then when he married Cindy and they had their first daughter, Montgomery found the motivation he needed to address his addiction. A few years later, Cindy welcomed their second child, Tom Montgomery, became a dedicated father who volunteered for his daughter's swimming club and taught Sunday school at the family church. He provided for his family by working as a mechanic for a power tool company with headquarters in New York town, in New

York town of Clarence. The job didn't engage him the same way that the military did, but he made a go of it and became friends with some of his coworkers. So over the years, Montgomery began to struggle again. He had difficulties with erectile dysfunction and his family and his marriage suffered both physically and emotionally. I wonder. Yeah. So communication between him and Cindy dropped all new low. And that's when Montgomery sought refuge on the internet.

So he spent countless hours on online gaming rooms, playing games and chatting with strangers, because it was easier for him to find comfort and confide in people he didn't know, just via words on the screen. So Montgomery was careful to not share any of this information about his wife or his daughters, but he opened up to some of the problems with other gamers he met. So the first time Jesse reached out to him on Pogo,

it was in a blackjack room and Montgomery was enticed by the thought of a young, attractive woman. But when Jesse asked why he was in a room for kids and his profile said that he was worried six year old, Montgomery panicked and he heard about sting operations where like undercover agents would like infiltrate online spaces and look for like sexual predators. So out of impulse, he just pretended to be an 18 year old using his dad's account. Because saying, whoops, my dad wasn't that hard, right? No.

Yeah, like go to a different like game room. Like it doesn't really matter. Yeah, like, go to a different, like, game room, like, it doesn't really matter. Yeah. So, when Jesse sent him photos of her wearing swimsuits, it's when he was enticed, and he began, like, creating this character of Tommy so he could keep talking to her. And Montgomery made up some stories about Tommy's past and gave him an altered and troubled background to help Jesse sympathize with him. And the photo that he actually sent Jesse

was a picture of himself, but it was a picture of him when he was 30 years old in his Marine uniform. So it wasn't a picture of him when he was 18 or 20, he was 30 years old in that picture. So he wasn't a picture of him when he was 18 or 20. He was 30 years old in that picture. So he wasn't sending a fake picture, but he was sending like a really old picture. Yep. Yeah.

So as this whole thing started to develop before he was exposed, Montgomery battled like whether he should put a stop to this or not. Because he created the personality of Tommy's father to maintain contact with Jesse. He was trying to kind of distance himself with creating Tom senior and having like messages through him. Um, but he also used this persona to try to break things off with her. When like Tom senior, like the father was like You shouldn't be with him like you're gonna hurt him

Of course, it didn't end up working. So his obsession with her Started affecting his personal life and it became a little too strong So Montgomery's wife Cindy she noticed that her husband had a fixation with the internet. He would often kick out their daughters off the computer so he could use it himself. And then he would stay up well into the night. And the truth was exposed in February of 2006 when Cindy stumbled across a parcel that Jessie had sent to her husband. Inside was the letter, some red underwear

that clearly had belonged to a teenage girl. And of course, yeah, Cindy was disgusted and horrified. So not only had he been lying to their children, but he was also manipulating an 18 year old. Cindy confronted her husband. Good. And the couple agreed to divorce. Yep. In the meantime Montgomery would move into the basement. So yeah especially when you find out that this is what's like you have two children and he's pretending to be like a younger person to talk to an 18 year old.

So Cindy of course was disturbed by the thought of Jessie blissfully being aware that her young fiance was actually a middle aged man. As a mother of young girls herself, she felt that she had to do something and that's when she wrote the letter to Jesse and sent it on the return address on the parcel. So after Jesse read the letter, she immediately sent Montgomery an angry message telling him that he should be in jail. So yeah. Crazy, but good.

I support it. Yeah. She asked Montgomery why he'd done what he did. Montgomery couldn't provide a satisfactory answer. He said that he wished he could explain it, but he didn't have any answers. He told her that he planned to kill Tommy off by saying he died during the combat in Iraq. But Cindy had discovered the secrets before he had a chance to kill Tommy off. Good. Yeah. So Jesse didn't know what to think. She decided to reach out to a third party who might be able to shed some light in the situation. Through the whole eight year, I think it's at this point, it's a year, the year that she had talked with him

online, she remembered that he mentioned one of his friends named Brian, who was also active on pogo. So she remembered the Brian's username, which was beefcake 1572. Love it. Okay, this is a little funny. Yeah, no, it's great. Creative names. So she messaged Brian. He was 22 years old and his name was Brian Barrett. He was a college student who worked part time with Tom Montgomery at the factory that he did. And he still lived at home with his parents

and a 15 year old brother. So she knew that every weekend, weekday, Brian got up at 630, spend the day in college and then headed straight to work. And then the evenings that's when he would log on to Pogo around 10pm. So Jesse sent Brian a message and she exposed Montgomery for what he had done. Brian had no idea of this. He was shocked by his co workers actions. And of course, he provided Jesse with a sympathetic sympathetic sympathetic ear sympathetic, there we go. So then that's when Brian and Jesse began messaging each other.

And they started growing closer. So Jesse was just Brian's type, which good for Jesse, I guess. And then Brian was also attracted to Jesse, not only was he attracted to blondes, but he also played football and baseball in school and he found Jesse's athleticism, wow, very appealing. So this is kind of the start of a cycle because just like she had done with Tommy, Jesse sent Brian photos of herself.

Okay. All over the place. Telling him how much he meant to her. Okay. And it wasn't too long before Brian and Jesse declare their love for each other. There it is. Oh, yep. Yep. Was there more underwear sent this time or?

Um... We will get into it. Okay. Okay. There is some other stuff involved. But one of the things that they bonded over was the disgust that they had towards Tom Montgomery. Okay. So they would actually go on chat rooms that Tom was often in, and they would tell everyone about what Tom had done,

and that would call him a loser and a predator. Yeah, fair. And as a result, Montgomery was like temporarily suspended from playing on Pogo. Good. Jesse also shared her login details with Brian. So he would be able to use her account to and I, I get this, but I also I'm not sure if I'm fully on board. But the reason she gave him his login information was so he could log into her account and send Tom mocking messages.

I mean, that's kind of funny, but... Yeah. She's getting him back doing the same thing he did. Yeah. Basically. So, Jesse and Brian decided that Montgomery's colleagues also needed to know about this incident as well. So, they debated how Brian should tell them, with Brian asking Jesse, what should I say? Up to you, baby, she replied. I have to fuck with them, Brian typed back.

You are so bad, Jesse answered. They get him freaky. So that's when Brian started telling people at work what Montgomery had been up to because he ended up leaving printouts of the conversations that Montgomery had with Jesse throughout the factory just laying around. So anyone could just pick it up, read it and see what was going on. He just printed a bunch of them and put them throughout the jar. He was not trying to hide it anymore. He wanted everyone to know.

No. Okay. Yeah. So Montgomery colleagues were aware that he had been flirting with a much younger woman, but they didn't actually know that it was an 18-year-old teenager that he was flirting with. They just thought, oh, maybe in the late 20s, early 30s, not expecting an 18 year old. An adult. Yeah. Yeah. The fallout was a swift was swift. Montgomery sent Jesse a private message letting her know that

because of her and Brian's actions, many of his co-workers thought of him as a sexual predator. People no longer trusted him to be around their kids. Yep. And as far as Tom Montgomery was concerned, his life had just been destroyed. So he ended up telling both Brian and Jesse to leave him alone that he would no longer talk to Brian online or when they cross paths at work. So they just like fuck up his whole life, having the info exposed. Yeah. I mean, hey, that's what he gets. And the coworkers were aware that Montgomery was talking to a younger woman. They didn't know that by younger woman, he meant an 18 year old teenager. Yeah.

So because of this, many of his coworkers thought that he was a sexual predator. People no longer trusted him and they did not want him to be around their kids. As far as Tom was concerned, his life had been destroyed. So Tom just told both Brian and Jesse to live him alone and that he would no longer talk to Brian online or when they cross paths in person at work. Now, when Brian told the colleagues that he, Brian told some of his colleagues that he was planning

to go down to West Virginia to meet up with Jesse. And of course the news made it back to Tom Montgomery. So of course this made him even more upset because he knew that Jesse was a virgin and Tom was fixated with the idea of being her first. And now him hearing this it sounded like she was planning to have sex with Brian. But Jessie wasn't done with Tom because after two weeks of silence, she began to message him again. And yeah, so Jessie started saying that she missed Tommy's alter ego and Jesse explained that she had truly fallen in love with the 18 year old Marine sniper that she believed he was real. Now

she said she didn't feel the same way about Brian and she had only flirted with him to get Rick bench against Montgomery. So yeah, so the revelation that Tommy never existed, yeah, had just like left him, left her in despair because she thought she was engaged in this marine sniper. He's not real. So she thought if he existed, I would still be holding, I would still hold him every night and share dreams with him every night. She was infatuated with the idea of this man that wasn't real. Yeah.

Oh, here, let me insert those floppy disks. Like, what she said, like, it's kind of cute, but also it's like, damn, like, so this person does not exist. And you you have such strong feelings. And then he alternated between making hostile messages towards Jesse or like messages towards like Jesse and Brian's relationship. He eventually apologized for having lied to her and Jesse asked if they could be friends.

Tom? Yep. And the reason for that was because Tom was her only connection to Tommy, who she still loves. That doesn't seem like it's going to go well. And Montgomery admitted that he missed Tommy too, typing, I still feel Tommy in my heart. It is. Yep. It is. Yeah. So he added that he never stopped caring for Jessie and the two agreed to start over. It definitely does.

However, this new friendship was a lot more fragile from previous issues. And for starters, it was clear that Montgomery still wanted a romantic relationship with Jessie. So during their long, yeah, during the long late night chat sessions, he sent her self-pitying messages about how he wanted to, he wanted more than she could give. And whenever he caught wind of Jessie's online friendships with other men, Montgomery would lose that sweet scent, like that sweet tone, and he would switch it up in an instant. He said Jessie, he sent, he said Jessie a barrage of messages, just calling her like a whore and other like derogatory terms, racial slurs.

Yep. As he described how he hoped that she would get raped by black men. That's crazy. That is wild. Yeah. Holy shit. It's like, yeah, we can be friends, but I'm going to start insulting you when I think you're flirting with other men. So this is when Montgomery started to stock Jessie's account on social media, networking sites like MySpace, and he grilled her about who she'd been talking to. He reserved a large portion of his rage

for his colleague, Brian Barrett. So half of his rage was towards Jesse, half of the rage was towards Brian. And Montgomery told Jesse, I hate him with a passion. And for 10 cents, I would eliminate him. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So that's when Jesse replied, that's a little drastic isn't it? And Montgomery said, is a bitch. Jesse and I am the ultimate weapon. I am I am a Marine. Brian will pay in blood. Payback is a bitch. Yeah, he was. Technically. Technically. Okay, I forgot he is a maroon. So Montgomery also had a confession for Jesse. Forty-six year old dad.

And after Brian outed catfishing Jesse to their colleagues, uh, Montgomery had seriously considered shooting him. So this, yeah, despite the threats and admissions, Jesse said nothing to Brian or the police. She just kept it to herself. Um, she merely promised to talk to Montgomery and that she wouldn't talk to Brian ever again. So over the few following months, Jesse and Montgomery's relationship fell into a

toxic pattern. Sometimes they would get along and even engage in role play when Montgomery pretended to be Tommy again, which is a little weird. Yeah. So, uh, and then when he pretended to be Tommy, it's when they would engage in cyber sex again. Whatever that was in 2005. Crazy. Oh, here, let me insert those floppy disks. Oh, that's too much RAM.

Oh, no, please. Yeah, it probably went something like that. However, during this time, Jesse continued to use his laptop. Yeah, I wouldn't be surprised. Oh, Jesse continued to message under the name... Yeah, I wouldn't be surprised. Oh, Jesse. Yep. So, Montgomery found out about this through their online community. And of course, he was full of jealousy. He sent Jesse abusive messages, threatening to polish her address online.

Eventually, Montgomery told Jesse that if she didn't leave him alone, she would travel to West Virginia and physically hurt her. Wow, Jessie! Holy shit. Like actual like physical threats at this point even though like Jessie, I don't know, so many like mixed signals from Jessie is crazy. Yeah. He didn't stop just by threatening Jesse herself. He also made threats against his mother, against Jesse's mother. Oh. So Jesse backed off, but only for a little while. She soon reached out again, explaining to Montgomery that her mother, Mary, wanted to speak to him.

Okay. Huh? So at some point, Jesse told her mom, Mary then contacted Tom and she demanded that he stay away from her daughter. Fallon. Yeah. Yeah. So Montgomery agreed, but told Mary that he also wanted Jesse to stay

friends with him. Which clearly has not been going well. Yeah I don't know about that one. After that conversation with the mother there was like dead silence and a couple weeks went by before Jesse messaged Montgomery again. Really? Jesse! Jesse come on!

Come on, girl. And then that's when he pointed out that her mother had forbidden her from speaking to him, but Jessie just shrugged it off, writing, well, she'll never know. Jessie's kind of insane. Yeah. Jessie needs therapy.

Jessie needs... I think everyone in this story needs therapy. Yeah, true. I need therapy. Me too. Yeah, so Jesse had promised Montgomery, yeah same, that she was no longer speaking to Brian Barrett, but it would be in September 2006, almost like two years after they started that conversation, that Montgomery was looking at Jesse's MySpace page when he noticed something enraging,

because Brian Barrett was listed as one of her friends, and the two had been messaging each other on there. Damn. So Montgomery confronted Jesse again, asked if she and Brian were back together, and it said, I can handle you with I can handle you with anyone but him, he messaged. Jessie insisted that the two weren't together, but they had just talked. She said that there was someone else that Jessie had met this new guy who went by the nickname of Shake.

Okay. Yeah. And she thought that the two of them had something special. Of course, Montgomery didn't believe her. So he was convinced that Shake was actually Brian and that the two were in a romantic relationship. Of course. I mean, that's a valid thing to like piece that together, I guess. Yeah. So Montgomery also discovered that Brian had plans to drive down to West Virginia in two months and spend Thanksgiving with Jesse. No fucking way. And he sent a warning that said, you better be very afraid now. I told you what would happen if you and Brian got together. Oh dear. Yeah. Now, at around midnight on Wednesday, September 13, 2006,

Jesse and Montgomery began chatting online. Jesse repeatedly insisted that Shake and Brian were not the same person and asked Montgomery to just leave her alone. She told him, I'm asking you to love me enough to let me go. That's manipulative. Jess is trying to get out of this. Oh, 100%. But then she keeps coming back to him. Exactly. That's what I mean. even gonna believe. Jess is trying to get out of this. Oh, 100%. But then she keeps coming back to him. Exactly, that's what I mean.

Oh. Yeah. Yeah. It's like high school shit. So that's when, it really is. So Jessie announced that she was gonna delete her accounts on Pogo and Yahoo before signing off with the final message. I love you and will miss you, Tom.

Goodbye, baby, I'm leaving now." And at 1.30 PM, Montgomery replied, Run to Brian, you whore. He's waiting for you. That's ominous. Yep. Four hours later, Tom Montgomery checked back online to see if Jessie had indeed deleted her profiles, which she hadn't.

He sent her several abusive messages calling her a liar. Then he messaged Brian, stating, your girlfriend is just like you, nothing but lice. Keep the fuck away from me. You wanted her, you got her. Did Brian respond? Uh, Brian, we'll see more of Brian. Okay. Oh,

on the morning of Sunday, September 17 2006, Brian's parents and younger brother walked through the door in their home and locked port New York and immediately knew that something was wrong. Yep. The trio had spent the weekend camping with some family members while the 22 year old Brian stayed at home. But as they walked through there's no sign of Brian anywhere and it was clear that the family's cat hadn't been fed in a couple days. So this was completely unlike Brian. He was quite reliable and responsible. Even if he had planned to go out, he would have made sure to feed the pets. Yeah. So roughly around an hour

after they got home, there was a knock at the front door. When Brian's father, Daniel Barrett, went to answer it, he saw officers from the local police department. Oh no. So they realized something must have happened to his son. Yeah. Daniel, the father immediately began to scream. Okay.

I mean, your son is missing. You see cops at the door. Yeah. About 36 hours earlier at 10 16 PM on Friday, September 15, Brian had finished his shift at the his job. He punched out. He headed to towards his Ford Ranger truck, which was parked near the back of the employee's parking lot. He climbed behind the wheel. He was prepared to leave when sharp sounds of gunshots pierced through the air.

Fuck! Oh no! The driver's side window was shot three times, shattering the glass. One of the bullets landed in Brian's upper left arm, while the other two went into his neck. Oh. He was done. He slumped over towards the passenger seat and died.

Oh no. Now, because Brian's family was away and no one was at the factory that weekend, because it was the end of the shifts. It took two days. Yeah, they just didn't know. It was discovered. The detective found witnesses who had heard the gunshots and seen an individual dressed in camouflage and a ski mask lurking the area. Marine sniper. No, not Marine sniper! Goddamn! So this witness along with Brian's time card helped to narrow down the time of the murder.

The killer had used a 0.30 caliber carbine rifle. But there was no sign of the spent shell casings. The only clues recovered were a gun clip with what appeared to be dog hairs on it and a peach pit. Interesting. Yeah. Which was found laying around nearby. The police, to police the crime looked like a sniper style shooting. Oh my God.

Yeah. Now, Brian's family members couldn't imagine who would want to do harm to the 20 year old. No, yeah, of course. Brian was just a young like man by people. He really didn't have what people would consider enemies. But his coworkers did tell the police about the bizarre online love triangle between Brian, Tom, and the 18-year-old Jesse. So they said that not only had Montgomery been bad-mouthing Brian for months,

but he also recently made some disturbing comments. According to one colleague, Montgomery said that if he ever killed someone, he'd use an M1A1 military rifle and wouldn't be stupid enough to leave the shell casings laying around. But stupid enough to say that. Yep. So this was significant just given the fact that the bullets were found in Brian's body matched the type of the rifle that he mentioned. And according to the colleague, Montgomery had also inquired about what time Brian's shift ended. Oh, so he was like really like strategizing this. Yeah, he planned it out for quite a while. Investigators were eager to speak to Tom

Montgomery, Montgomery themself, but they couldn't track him down. Of course, so they began to worry that perhaps Montgomery had left the state to take revenge against Jesse as well. Crossed eight lines. Mm-hmm. So using a number saved in Brian's cell phone, officers were able to reach Jesse, they called her. Good.

She was safe and well. Jesse confirmed that she had been involved with both Brian Barrett and Tom Montgomery, and that she had been increasingly concerned about Montgomery's erratic behavior. Now, according to Jesse, Brian told her that Montgomery had tried to hit him with his car in their work parking lot several locations. Okay. Yeah. So, none of these people are recording this? Well, he never spoke or made eye contact

with like the person that tried to run him over. He just sat behind the wheel with like a stony expression on his face. So he didn't like really recognize him or anything. It was just- Either that or like he just was, I I don't know like he was like in a trance just okay doing whatever he did. Yeah. So when Jesse warned Brian that Montgomery was making violent threats against him, Brian asked if he should report this to the boss or other

co-workers. Jesse didn't reply directly to this. She was simply saying that she was very scared of Montgomery and replied, Yeah, me too. He's crazy. So she never actually encouraged him to go report this to like the higher ups. Yeah. Interesting. I wonder why. Yeah.

Now the last that Jesse had heard from Tom was on Friday, September 15, having finally cut the ties with him two days prior. Yeah. So Montgomery had continued to message her saying things like, Hey whore, you suck. Your boyfriend's dead today. Jesse never replied to this messages. She just left them. I don't know if she left them red or like on red. I don't know if that was a function function back in 2005, 2006. So early on Friday morning, she'll walk to the sound of her cell phone ringing. Tom Montgomery was on the other line screaming like obscenities to her like in a wild rage. Jessie just hung up on him.

obscenities to her like in a wild rage. Jesse just hung up on him, but he reached out again later that night, about an hour and a half after Brian was killed. Okay. So Jesse received an online message from Montgomery asking, you waiting for your boyfriend? Fuck. Smug son of a bitch.

Yeah, definitely. Holy fuck. Also the fact that he was messaging her like literally saying that he was going to kill Brian. Yeah. And like that's crazy. You're like, you're saying you're smart enough to not leave like your shell casings behind and clean up, but you're leaving

this trail of like messages saying that you're going to kill this person and then this person dies. Like, yeah. Right. And you talk about it with your coworkers. Yeah. Like, there's talk about it. So hours later, he tried messaging her again and he sent her a message that said, come

on, Brian won't mind you talking to me. Or are you talking to your boyfriend? Oh, boy. Yeah. So the officers in New York were worried that Jesse might be endangered. Yeah. They contacted the police in West Virginia and asked them to visit Jesse at home. It was around 6am where Officer Lee Kirk and his partner arrived at the address Jesse provided. It was a white house with peeling paint in the small town of Oak Hill. I don't know if they knocked the door, they rang the doorbell, but they got to the door and a short middle-aged woman with a bob haircut answered the door. She identified herself as 45 year old

Mary Schuyler, which was Jessie's mother, and the officer asked her if anyone named Jessie lived at the home. Mary replied that her daughter Jessie no longer resided there as she was away at college. Okay. Oh gosh. So was that like, was that like a recent thing that like just happened or? I'm not sure. It doesn't really give me a date that it happened. So I can't figure out if it was like Yeah, but according to the mom

She was she was often. Yeah, she was off to college So officer Kirk reported this back to the police in New York who told him that they had just spoken with Jesse hours earlier And she told them that she wasn't home So officer Kirk returned to the house and asked Mary if Jessie had been home recently. Mary said no, she didn't have a phone number for Jessie either. So that's when Officer Kirk found this to be a little hard to believe.

He told Mary that there were concern about her daughter and that she could be in danger and that they needed to talk to her right away. Mary looked anxious because of what the cops were telling her. So officer Kirk, officer Kirk could tell something was bothering her. And as he continued to press for information, Mary began to cry. And she said, I'm Jesse. I've been using my daughter's name on the internet.

No way. I'm Jesse. I've been using my daughter's name on the internet No Holy shit, nobody's real Holy fuck That's it for poor Brian. Holy fuck. So 45 year old Mary Schiller had been using her daughter's online account to pretend to be her. So it's like two like 45, 42 grown ass adults, pretending to be kids, get another kid killed

because they. Yes. A match made in creepy heaven. This shit's insane. They both catfished each other. Holy fuck. Yeah, she said, I've been using my daughter's name on the internet. And Mary would later explain in an interview with Wired magazine, she claimed to have signed

up for an account on Poga to play games as a way of relaxing. It was only after paying for like the pain a fee for a premium service, that she realized that she had inadvertently used Jessie's name on the details and was therefore redirected to the site for teenagers, for the room of teenagers. Now, I'm not sure how simple that was or how that would happen or why you would use your daughter's name

to sign up for an account. I mean, it's 2005, computer technology technology still new and you're a 46 year old woman so like yeah Okay, I guess Yeah, right So as they kept talking more to like the cops and like there was more conversations between them Mary said Mary said that she was happily married to her husband and she had no romantic feelings for anyone else No fucking way.

So she said she only started talking to Tom, alter ego Tommy, because Tommy seemed troubled and in need of care. Because that's how he made himself sound. Now there is questions that rise up because Mary offered no explanation as to why she was sending pictures of her daughter wearing a bikini. Oh yeah! And then who was wearing it? Engaging in cyber sex with him.

That's... Or why she agreed to marry him. That's or yeah, why she agreed to marry him. Did she send her underwear or her daughter's underwear? She was sending her daughter's underwear. That is not. No, no. Like at the like, this doesn't make it any better, but like at the very least, send your own underwear, like not your daughters, but like it doesn't make that's. Yeah, I'm going to leave now. So everything that she had to send in was for daughters.

Yeah. Um, and then after learning from Cindy that Tom Montgomery was not actually Tommy, that he wasn't real. Uh, Mary said that she became concerned that Montgomery might be talking to other young women online So that's the reason that Mary continued talking to Tom because she thought if he talks to me He won't be talking to other young girls. That's actually insane Yeah This woman is not real

This woman is not real. None of them are real. No one online. She just she was an she was an old lady. She loved the attention she was getting. Like this these kids are like bullshit. Yeah. So she basically decided to continue talking to him as a way to distract him from talking to other girls. Wow.

And as his temper started to flare and he became increasingly jealous, Mary continued to speak to him out of fear that he might harm himself or others if she didn't continue talking to him. So Mary said that she never had feelings for Tom or Brian. She said she had no romantic feelings for either one. She said he was simply a sweet kid who started flirting with her, and she hadn't known what to do with exposing her, what to do without exposing her true identity. You don't need to expose anything, just stop talking to him. Exactly.

No. What? Oh, make a new account. Literally delete it. Like, holy fuck. Yeah. So the investigators in New York who had been communicating with, quote-unquote, Jesse, were also stunned about this revelation. About Mary Schuyler, who had, you know, sounded just like a teenager over the phone when they called her.

So, one detective was so disbelieving that he drove down to West Virginia to meet Mary himself. Oh I don't blame him. I would have done the same thing. Yeah and the fact is that Mary and Tom were talking on the phone, this 45 year old people pretending to be teenagers and not one of them caught that they were not teenagers. Because they don't know what teenagers sound like. No. So, they ended up going through Mary's computer because it was confiscated. And at this point, she had been communicating with Tom roughly for a year and a half. So they had all these messages, hundreds of images, and hundreds of these images were of Mary's daughter, Jesse.

Yeah. How did she get them? How was she getting them? Yeah. Here's the thing. Many of these pictures were clearly taken without Jesse's knowledge or consent. Some of these photos focus on particular body parts and were taken from behind in a video that Mary had clearly filmed without her daughter's knowledge or consent.

She aimed the camera right up at Jessie's skirt and then took the footage and sent it to several men online. That's crazy. And she did that for like a year, if not longer. A year and a half, if not longer. And her daughter just like never noticed? What? She never knew. Aww.

So she would send this footage, this pictures and videos of her daughter to men online. And she would ask them if they liked it. Oh god. Disgusting. Um, and of course, she had also sent photos of her daughter and pairs of Jesse's underwear to multiple men online. Online admirers. Bro, what? So not just to Tom, but to multiple men? No, that's like actually fucked. If you take her explanation of like, oh, talking to Tom because I wanted to make sure he wasn't talking to other girls because of him, that is disgusting in and of itself, but at least

there was some sort of purpose behind it, but like, quote unquote purpose. All these other things come to life. But all this other shit, it's like, unquote purpose all this other things but all this other shit it's like why are you fucking doing that you are disgusting and you do not deserve to be a mother like what no exactly so jesse's mice page page my space page um had actually been faked and maintained by Mary. So it wasn't Jesse's real mice page. Wow. Oh, poor Jesse. Yeah. Investigators also gained access to the chats and logs between them on my page, on my space.

And hundreds and hundreds of pages documented the countless hours that Mary had spent talking with both men. Now Montgomery's message made it clear how much he hated Brian for becoming involved with Jesse. He may repeated threats against both Brian and Jesse's life. And it was clear that he fantasized about committing violent acts. Yeah. He talked about how he was a former Marine

and how he knew how to assassinate people. Now eventually, the investigators managed to track Tom Montgomery down and he hadn't gone down to seek revenge against Jesse after all. After all, he was still in Buffalo. He had just shown up for a shift at at work like normal. So detectives visited him at work and they asked if he could accompany them for questioning.

Yeah. Montgomery agreed, but asked if he could go to his car to retrieve his lunch first. He explained that he brought peaches and that he didn't want to spoil them by leaving them in the car. Now, of course, the detective took note of this because the detectives found what? A peach pit by, yep.

Shocking. Where Brian Barrett was murdered. So Tom denied any involvement in the crime, of course. He said that on the night of in question, he had gone out to eat at a local restaurant. He arrived somewhere between 10 p.m. and 10 30, at least six minutes before Brian was killed. Now Montgomery's wife refuted this saying he arrived home at least half an hour later than he claimed. In addition to that, cell phone records confirmed that Montgomery was in the vicinity of Diner Braid at the time. So this test, this, they also tested the peach pit that was left near to Brian's truck for

today. And it came back positive matching Montgomery. Whoa, yeah. Tom Montgomery. Whoa, crazy. So a search warrant was obtained. You get hungry when you commit crime, clean up after yourself. So he's a murderer and a litterer. Yeah, this guy just overall sucks. So you know, a search warrant was obtained for his family home and they found the computer where they found hundreds and hundreds of pages of conversations between Jesse and Montgomery

as well as photos of Jesse. They found the lingerie that Mary had sent pretending to be Jesse. Um, and they found them that there were stash among like Montgomery's belongings. Investigators did take note that Montgomery's family had a pet dog with fur that matched the dog's hair. Yep. Yep. So Montgomery also owns several firearms, but there was no M1A1 rifle in his gun cabinet. However, investigators did find an interesting picture in one of the family albums, an old

photo of Cindy Montgomery. The gun cabinet was visible and in the background there was a photo of the M1A1 rifle. Yep. Now Montgomery's work items were also seized, tucked away in the toolbox. Investigators found a note that he scribed at the diner. And it read, on January 2, 2006, Tom Montgomery, 46-year-old, ceases to exist and is replaced by 18-year-old,

battle-scarred Marine as he's moving to West Virginia to be with the love of his life. Oh, God. Weird. It really is. It's like he's, it's like he's writing a book. He's like, yeah, I'm killing myself off to like be reborn as an 18 year old. Now the note also described how 18-old Tommy had a black belt in karate, 2.5 million in the bank. Oh, hell yeah. And looked like a redheaded Harrison Ford. That's so funny.

Oddly specific. Yeah. I'm sure someone told him that and that's probably why he wrote it down. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, that's just how he fantasized about himself. I don't know. Yeah, it could be. Now, it appeared to be some kind of attempt by Montgomery to manifest himself into this

entirely different person. Yeah. And as the detective sat Tom down for the interview, they revealed that the woman he killed was in who Montgomery thought he was. This is when the like they tell him, Jesse's not real. They say she was a woman around his age who had been posing as an 18 year old as his 18 year old daughter. Yeah. And as soon as I told him this, the blood drained from his face.

It was so bad. Oh, so that's bad? Oh my God. Now when he got caught by the cops, but when they tell him, Jesse is not real. Oh my God. You have been talking to Jesse's mother this entire time. He was like, fuck, I did this all for some 46 year old bitch. Like, like. Basically. He was like, fuck, I did this all for some 46 year old bitch. Like, like, basically. Insane. Yeah.

So it would be on November 27, 2006, that Tom was charged with the murder of Brian Barrett and held in remand. Now, in a recorded phone conversation to his wife Cindy from jail Montgomery seemingly admitted that he had the gun clip that the gun clip found near Brian's truck was his. So those phone calls are being moderner. He explained that the case had been covered in his dog's fur because his car was filthy. Yet he also maintained that he hadn't killed Brian. So once again, he's just not coming clean. According to Montgomery, Brian had been receiving phone calls at work from

people who disliked him. And he believed that one of these individuals must be responsible because Montgomery claimed he didn't mind when Jesse became involved with Brian. He was just happy that she found someone closer to his own age. No, that's literally like deranged. I don't know. Yeah. Nope. Now, as they got closer to the trial date, both Cindy and the couple's daughters cut all ties with him. So his wife was just like, I'm out. You're not hearing from me. You're

not hearing from the kids. And Montgomery's attempt, he attempted to take his own life. Of course, not successful. Yeah, eventually he agreed to the plea guilty to first degree manslaughter and wanted to spare his daughters from his ordeal of the criminal trial. That's why he took the plea. Now, during the sentencing, the judge described the crime as, I quote, a totally senseless killing, the result of a non-existent relationship, a love triangle between three people who did not even know each other. It's a great way to sum it up. Yeah. So Tom was sentenced to 20 years in prison, making him eligible for parole in

2024. No. Do you have any info on that? Nope. Okay. What happened to Mary? So let me get into that. Got it. So during one of the interviews with Mary Sheila, which was playing Jesse, where is it? Blah, blah, blah.

Because like, she should have had something happen to her as well, I feel like, like being so involved in the situation. Yeah, so Mary also spoke about, she spoke to media, but she just refused to be filmed or recorded. So it was all like, newspaper and like, magazines. She said that she wanted to be a good mother and after her children grew up she became bored and lonely leading her to seek company online. She maintained that she only spoke to Tom to prevent him from taking talking to real teenagers. Mary intended

to write a book about the dangers on the internet. However, Mary never apologized to her daughter, Jessie, or acknowledged that she had done anything wrong. Wow. She never told her family about what she had been doing, not even after the police came to talk to her about Brian's murder. Now, the only time she brought it up was when she had to fly to New York to testify

in front of Tom Montgomery. That's when she finally told her husband that she had done something bad. She said that she had been chatting online with two different men who worked together and that one of them just became jealous and killed the other one. Mary insisted that there was nothing sexual or romantic in the conversations and it had just been chit chat about online games and the weather. Bruh. Oh my god. I don't... Jesse did end up finding out about this.

Good. Yeah. The truth came out when one of Jesse's friends heard about the case. Jesse decided to Google her mother's name and the search returned news stories about Brian's murder roughly about 400 miles in upstate New York. So Jesse was horrified to discover exactly what had happened and how her mother had used her identity. Not only had Jessie's photos been shared with numerous men, but they had also been splashed all over the internet in coverage of the case. I feel like the police should have immediately notified Jessie that her pictures and all of this is out on the internet,

was used by her mom, like that is insane, what? Yeah, so Jesse ended up telling her father, who was of course equally distraught, he divorced Mary and Jesse cut off all communication with her mother. Good. Good. Now, despite Mary's actions, she didn't technically

commit any crimes. Yes, she fucking did. What? Sorry. That was loud. That was really loud. Dispersal of child pornography. She was 18. Illegal explicit photos without somebody's consent. Oh, I bet they didn't have those laws yet. Oh. 2006, 2006. Her daughter was 18 at the time. She was off in college. That's why she got away by sending panties

because her daughter wasn't home. So I know it like sucks because like we want justice on this side as well, but technically she didn't commit any crimes. Therefore she couldn't be charged in relation to Brian's murder. Um, Tom, however, has strong feelings. He feels that Mary should be incarcerated for the role that she played. Um, as do and Brian's parents also feel the same way about Mary.

They're like, yeah, she should be behind jail. I mean, I guess it was 2006. There were laws they didn't have that we have now. Yeah. But also I feel like there's something that got to be in there of being like complicit in a murder or some, some shit like that. She should have been charged for, I don't know. Yeah. Brian's parents, the Barrett's, have also just advocated for laws requiring greater accountability online.

So once again, in 2006, there wasn't that many laws in place, but they, you know, they wanted to change that. They remember their son as being shy and quiet despite, you know, his tall statue and athletic built. At the time of his death, Brian was gaining confidence in discovering who he wanted to be. On weekends, he would spend his time volunteering as a coach for a Little League baseball team. Brian loved working with kids so much that he decided to become an industrial arts teacher, teaching students to work with wood and metal. That's cute. Unfortunately, Brian's father, Daniel, he occasionally blamed himself for his son's death

because it was Daniel who had found the advertisement for the job and encouraged his son to apply. Okay. That guilt from his dad and his parents must be so unimaginable. Yeah, and they believe that, you know, if, quote-unquote, Jesse had told Brian to do report that behavior to the upper management, that he would still be alive. Aww. Sucks.

that he would still be alive. Oh. Sucks. And that is the story of Tall Hot Blonde or sometimes known as Marine Sniper. That was kind of insane. Thank you for sharing. Yeah. Thanks. Oh my God.

I wanted to switch it up and I ended up finding, you know, catfishing gone wrong and then the catfish got catfished and murder was involved and wow wow not the way I thought this was gonna go like you were explaining it at the start and I was like I was like how is this gonna turn into like a true crime case you know what I mean yeah yeah there are at least three times I thought you were about ready to finish and then it just kept going and getting worse yeah crazy yeah thank you that was a you know what great I I guess I would call that a fun case. And the fact that there were so many

like emotions. It was like a roller coaster going up and down. Yeah. And I just think it's fun that the catfish got catfish. I don't find it. It is pretty honestly. Yeah. There is something kind of satisfying knowing that they both were like catfishing each other. Yeah. Right. So that's my story. Awesome. I'm glad you enjoyed it. I know that was good. Crazy. Okay. You ready to tell us about your case?

Yes, I am ready. All right. So my story is quite a bit different than the marine sniper in Tohono O'odham. So my story takes us to the Hole House Museum located in Chicago, Illinois. H-U-L-L House, not like Hole. H-O-L-E. So it was built in 1856 for a man named Charles Hole and his wife Millicent Hole. Simply put, they were rich. And they had the home built as their summer house in a quote, rich part of the city. So they owned it for a time, they spent their summers vacationing there.

But eventually as the neighborhood began to fill with immigrants and became a not so rich part of the city, Charles gave the house to his cousin, a woman named Helen Culver. Helen was a real estate developer who would rent out different properties in the area. She would eventually rent out the whole house to a woman named Jane Adams. Do either of you guys recognize the name Jane Adams? I think so. Nope. But I can't tell why. Fair. Are they related to John Addams? No, because this Addams, it's spelled with two D's which I find pretty interesting. Oh, is this a lady who does the huge thing about education? Yeah. No, that's someone else. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So I do know Jane Adams. She was

hugely influential, you know, during her time. She became a leader in women's suffrage, activism and social services for people, you know, around and within her communities. She is widely considered to be one of the country's first social workers and became the first American woman in history to win the Nobel Peace Prize. So she accomplished a lot during her time. And I think it's really awesome. There's so much to read about Jane Addams. So definitely check out more if you would like.

So she had a vision for what she wanted to create when she eventually got the whole house property. Jane, along with another woman named Ellen Star, they co-founded the whole house settlement in 1889. It started out primarily as a shelter for women, especially those seeking shelter from their abusive husbands, as well as shelter for immigrants coming to the area. It became a community center that provided basic healthcare, daycare for children, English lessons, so many other activities. So it originally started out as just a simple mansion that was built for Charles and his wife Millicent. But eventually after Jane and Ellen were given that property as a whole, they just started

purchasing all the homes around and they built up this big community, a big settlement where they offered so many of these like civic services to their community. Okay. It was actually really awesome. It became a refuge, you know, meeting center and really one of the headquarters for social change in the Chicago, Illinois area, but also around the world. And so I could go on and on about things. It's really cool. But it seemed like it grew. This is not a history lesson. It did grow very fast. Yeah. So Helen Culver,

the lady that rented out the property to Jane and Ellen. So they were initially renting it out. And that's when Jane and Ellen started to really build the place up. But they eventually started getting lots of donations, you know, to build it further. And then Helen, the lady who owned it, she just really liked what Jane was doing. So she just gave her the property and also donated lots of money and back the project as well. So they got a lot of funding pretty quick to really build up this place and make it a huge area. So it got really big. Today though, because of development around and it also sort of being purchased

by the University of Illinois around there, a lot of those surrounding buildings got demolished and really only the main mansion and like the dining hall still stand so there's not too much of it left. But yeah, like I was saying, this is not a history lesson. Is it called the dining hall? Because that's what I'm interested in. Not too much actually from what I found. So this is a paranormal case and the haunting started even before Jane and Ellen even moved into the place. So I mentioned, remember how it was

owned by Charles Hole and his wife Millicent that lived there. They lived there for a time, but then in 1860 Millicent, his wife would pass away inside of the home. That is one of the things that sort of drove Charles to even give away the home in the first place. And so when Jane and Ellen moved in, some stories, some information says that the rooms in the house were being rented out to tenants that were already there. So those tenants, if real, as well as nearby neighbors, they told Jane and Ellen that stories of a white lady who would wander the halls of the whole house. And this lady was believed to be the spirit of Millicent Hall. Oh. Yeah. So... Is there a reason that they thought it was her? Um, not necessarily. Not that I could find. It was just, I think it was that she kind

of looked similar to Millicent, who had lived there previously, and also of course she was the only person who was known to have passed away inside of the house, so they just assume that. She wasn't a particularly evil or aggressive spirit, but there definitely was still some fear that went along with it. Now, Jane really was not a believer in spirits. She thought it was more of a fun kind of folklore thing than anything. She believed in science. Exactly. She did.

She believed in the reality of the world, which really is one of my favorite parts of this story. I'll get a little more into that. But Ellen was a bit more skeptical, I guess, the partners who founded it. So what the two of them did to protect themselves from this white lady is they would set out buckets of water, like on the stairways and inside in front of their doors. It was believed that the like the old like superstition that spirits can't cross through running water and so... But there's still buckets of water so I...

Okay. Because I knew about the superstition that they can't like cross running water but I'm like this is buckets. Buckets. Yeah. And that's part of the reason, you know, Jane was skeptical, like I mentioned. And so she was like, whatever, I'll do this because it's kind of fun to think about if it could be a real thing. She was fascinated by it all. So they learned to share the space with the white lady.

But it wasn't until 1913 when the hauntings and the superstitions, the rumors really sort of took off. It was as actually told by Jane herself in a newspaper article she wrote back in 1916, There was what would be called a devil baby that would trade the stories. Yeah. There's this lady who died, but she's not malevolent. She's just doing her own thing, but there is a devil baby. Yeah. Oh yeah, the devil baby. Pretty big jump.

So there are a couple different stories that are told. There's a couple different ways to look at it. The story of this Devil Baby, it sort of varies by ethnic group in a way. So there's two widely believed versions of it. The first one is the Italian version. So it said that in around the city of Chicago, you know, in the neighborhood, in the neighborhood, listeners, you can't see it, but Jay just did the like, like spaghetti like that. The hand movement. He had the hotel in the neighborhood. There was a devil baby.

That's what you meant by different powers. Okay. Yes. Anyway. Okay. Yes. Um, go ahead. Anyway, um, so this story says that there was a Catholic woman who was married to an atheist. And so their relationship was obviously turmoil and troubled. Um, the lady she put up a, you know, lots of religious paintings throughout her home and her Abusive husband finally had it and he proclaimed that he would rather have a devil in the house than any Catholic icon hanging on the wall

So that's one but another one is like a Jewish version of the tale Where it follows the same lines of like an abusive, angry husband. But this one reclaimed, or this one, he and the wife, they had only had daughters. And so he proclaimed that he would rather have the birth of a devil than have another daughter in his family. Oh, so of course, a devil baby was born. It was dropped off at the settlement house because of its, um, you know, refuge status. Um, the midwives were disgusted. They were terrified. But it was said that

this devil baby was taken in by Jane. Now, Jane describes this phenomenon herself. It happened in 1913 in this article that I mentioned she wrote. It says, quote, the knowledge of the existence of the devil baby burst upon the residents of whole house one day when three Italian women with an excited rush through the door demanded that he be shown to them. No amount of denial convinced them that he was not there, for they knew exactly what he was like, with his cloven hoofs, his pointed ears, and diminutive tail. Moreover, the Devil Baby had been able to speak as soon as he was born, and was most shockingly profane. So this baby was described as being a little devil, you know, like reddish skin, horns, hooves. It was said that it could speak English,

Latin, and Italian fluently as soon as it was born. Jane went on to say that, were but the forerunners of a veritable multitude. For six weeks, the streams of visitors from every part of the city and suburbs to this mythical baby poured in all day long, and so far into the night that the regular activities of the settlement were almost swamped. So would people go see the baby? Yeah, so they would knock on her door, they would call on their phone, and they would demand to see this devil baby.

I don't know how I feel about that. Like, leave the child alone. But I also want to see it. There are some reports that that the devil baby was taken in and then just locked away in the attic to keep it away because it was a devil baby. But the reason why I don't believe that happened is because not even Jane herself believes that the devil baby was everything and she was the owner of the place. So I mentioned, you know, she was skeptical in In this letter that or this newspaper article she wrote she detailed how during the time, you know when the rumors were spreading

She never pushed forward the idea that a devil baby was actually there. She constantly denied it She said there was no such thing answering those phone calls, but it didn't matter. People still were so intrigued into this devil baby and wanting to know of the hauntings there at Whole House. Of course. Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, eventually that's what happened back during that time. The rumors were crazy. And I think that's is one of the coolest things is that like even Jane herself just was like,

no, guys, this is not real. Nice campfire story. Exactly. Poor Jane. So one of my favorite things though is that this conversation, there were so many people who believed so strongly and had such a conviction that this thing was real and that the paranormal was real that it actually created like a moral dilemma within Jane as well. She would go on to write more. She'd actually go on to write books about it of like, if somebody believes this so strongly, is it going to be even more

of a detriment to tell them the truth or not? Like, should I just let them believe because that's what they want to believe type of thing? Shows more of who Jane was. Now, the paranormal beliefs were sort of, I guess, shut down. But even still to this day, people are going to believe what they want to believe. He'll definitely still believe the whole house is haunted, even after everything that's happened. And a lot of people think that maybe the devil baby is not there, but maybe the white lady is not there, but there could be spirits as well. So it is still currently an open museum. People are allowed to go and take tours of the place. And, you know, there, I've read recounts from former tour guides, from guests who have said that they will go

into the house and they'll hear a baby crying in the distance of the devil baby. They'll see doors slam shut, feel chairs pulled out from under the tables, things like that. There have been also lots of stories that of people saying they've captured photos of the white lady on the staircase or even of the devil baby on the stairs as well. How true these pictures actually are, of course, you know, we'll never really know. But I during this, during researching this a bit, I was, I found the, the watcher video, Watcher Entertainment with Ryan and Shane, primarily from BuzzFeed, or previously from BuzzFeed Unsolved. They actually did go visit the whole house to do an investigation there. It's a fun video. You should definitely check out. And now, if you don't know about Ryan and Shane, two friends, Ryan Bergara, he is a

definite believer. Shane Madej, he is a definite skeptic. They go into houses, they investigate. They're pretty funny. There's a good back and forth they always have. But in this video, it is actually sort of one of the more conclusive investigations that they had. Okay. Nothing interesting. Yeah, nothing like outlandish, nothing crazy.

Shane fights a ghost. I don't know. No, so they do lots of investigation, you know, using like spirit box and the Estes method as well as like a rem pod, ovulus, things like that. You know, during the investigation, they reached out to Jane Addams, because supposedly she's there as well. They reached out to Charles Hole, to the double baby itself. And they got lots of very like cohesive words through their spirit boxes, through good answers, like timely answers through like, like the the flashlight the mag light turning on and off

and So once again, you know, it's up it's up to you to believe and determine what you want But at the end of the day, it's a very fun video to watch and I think this is just a fun little case about a devil baby Who maybe should have been treated a little bit better? Who knows? baby who maybe should have been treated a little bit better, who knows. Yeah, I mean it doesn't seem like it's doing anything horrible. It's... No, I mean, really, the real devil is like the abusive husband who didn't want the baby

in the first place. From, you know, eat? Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Stories of like devil children and devil babies were not, were nothing new back then. One of the explanations I was reading is that fetal alcohol syndrome was actually pretty rampant back then, because they didn't know, you know, alcohol during pregnancy could affect your child. And so there are a lot of children born with deformities and people would kind of run wild with those ideas and, you know, make their own rumors, things like that. So I think that is a very plausible explanation for it. Okay. So there are some theories that black was having.

Yeah. Okay. For sure. Yeah, I mean, there's not too too much to actually research or put into this story, but I ultimately thought it was a fun thing to look into and definitely check out the Watcher video about it, the devil baby of the whole house. Anyway, that's my story. Thanks for listening. Thank you.

Thank you. If you guys couldn't tell, listeners mainly, I think most paranormal stories are very laughable because like I just don't believe them most of the time. So, yeah, I don't know. I think they're fun more than anything. So, hope you enjoy. I'm on the side of like, I want to believe, but in order for me to do so, I need like a book thrown at me or something.

Yeah. Like, yeah. And when I say like conclusive evidence like in investigations people have done, of course, it's not like a demon jumping out at you to show itself. It's like, you know, responses to different investigation tactics or tools that, you know, could actually be indicating something, but who really knows?

So yeah. Cool. Thank you. It's just fun how we humans try to communicate with the world. It is, it is. And I think that's something that like Jane, you know, really, really realized as well.

So pretty interesting. The article that she put out is just available to read through. It's a pretty interesting read. It's called The Devil Baby at Whole House by Jane Addams. So check that out if you'd like. But yeah. Never heard of The Devil Baby and I'm glad you brought it up. I also wanted to sort of I thought it was interesting doing a Chicago case because one of my cousins like just moved to Chicago like a month or two ago. So I'm going to be like, hey, listen to this.

You got to check out this place. Check out the old house museum. Yeah. So yeah. Love that. All right. You're cool. Thank you.

All right. Now, Katie, what do you have for us? I feel like you picked the wrong story for this episode. Why? No wrong stories. Mine's like really serious. No. You guys have some silly ones. There's got to be balance. There's always like the heavy story and then like silly ones. So yeah, you're good. I think this will fit. Well, this one I might, I mentioned in the beginning is technically still ongoing, but some definitive rulings have been made on it, which made me feel pretty comfortable talking about it.

I'm going to take you guys back to the night of October 8th of 2017. Okay. Recent. Not that long ago. Pretty recent. of 2017. Ow, okay. Recent. Not that long ago. Yeah. Pretty recent. You see what I mean by there is still a lot of things going on.

That might be our most recent case. I think it might. Oh shoot. That we've covered. Okay. I know one case I did had some results that were posted recently, but like it actually happened. Yeah, a few of the cases we've covered

have like recent like updates, but I don't think they've happened as recent as this one. Cool. So probably not. All right. So where we going? I was going to say a lot. Well, before we go, I always like to preface by saying, I think oftentimes true crime is focused on individuals with motive. And I think it's good to remember that it's not just individuals who have bad motive. It sometimes can be corporations.

Oh, intriguing. And so this is a little bit of a personal story, I guess. So yes, I'll take you back to, I guess, the early afternoon, I think is a better place to start as on October the 8th. It's a fairly windy day in Northern California. In fact, over the 49 counties, 44 of them have been issued red flag warnings. Okay. Yeah.

Sounds like California. No one thinks anything of it. Yeah, no one thinks anything of it. There's always constant in Northern California in general, and generally all of California to be expected. As many suspected, sometimes there were some rolling blockouts, but widely speaking, no one thought anything of it. A lot of kids tucked in ready to go to bed as the night was coming to a close.

Some people were complaining on social media about the weather, the rolling blockouts, but overall it didn't seem like much until around, it was around I think 11 when people started to realize, it was about 10 or 11 when people really started to realize something was going on. You see there had been notification that a small fire had been started off of what is Calistoga Road in the mountains, so not many people were concerned. But that concern quickly shifted as the fire expanded far beyond anyone's expected size. You see, this fire had more than tripled in spies and all of

a sudden was bearing down upon the sleeping inhabitants of the Rincon Valley area, the northern Santa Rosa city. In their desperate attempts to save human life, firefighters were not left to fight the fires, but simply run their sirens as loud as they could and drive through areas, hoping that people wake up, go as many to door to door as possible to get as many people out. And shaken residents only had seconds to run out the door or jump in a swimming pool, or make whatever decision they could as a fire was so hot that even the air was catching fire. At this point, it had changed from a fire into a firestorm. For those who don't know, a firestorm is when a wildfire or multiple wildfires create its

own wind system. So it basically props itself up and can lead to fire tornadoes, in fact. And the issue is the fire was moving so fast. At that point in time, there's a, where I'm going to focus is where the firefighters were really focusing on. And there was this place called Fountain Grove. And so what happened is it was a hill filled with very nice houses and the fire fighters were trying to evacuate from everyone from there. So they sat up base across the highway at the local Kmart. The thing

was the fire moved so fast that when one of the other fire trucks from the Bay area that had driven up to respond to what was supposed to be a tiny fire, the Kmart, where the base of operations was at, was fully engulfed in flames. Oh. Yeah. And people only had seconds to respond. Most people only had seconds to respond. Unfortunately, there was a significant loss of life as far as wildfires in California would be considered. Unfortunately, there was a significant loss of life. As far as wildfires in California would be considered,

there'd been one of us earlier that had seen significant loss of life as well. But unfortunately, this one too saw the loss of 44 people and the injuries of 129. Oh wow. Yeah. As mentioned, a lot of people did. Oh, wow. Yeah. As mentioned, a lot of people did what they had to.

And fled with nothing. In fact, several stories I heard from my friends who did end up fleeing said they grabbed the most mundane things. Because as mentioned, the next day was Monday, which was a school day. So a lot of kids grabbed their backpack. My teachers grabbed her grading supplies. We'd had a concert that week. So many of my friends grabbed their outfits for the concert.

Not family photos or treasured memories, unfortunately. Now the fearful part of this is I can tell you all this now, but in the moment, no one knew where the fire was or where it was spreading. No one had even heard of a firestorm at this point in time. All they knew was that there was fire and it was somewhere and it was moving faster than people could imagine. Got it. And it was moving faster than people could imagine

Now Luckily After those first couple days there was some control that was regained The issue was that wasn't the only fire to start that night that one I just described was to be named the tubs Okay now not too far below it, not even a full city below, in a half below it, was another fire, the Nuns fire burning. So there was-

And then about- Two at the same time. 20 miles north of it was another fire burning. Three. Called the Pocket Fire. So there's- In fact, there is not just three fires going on. It is estimated that a total of 250 fires within the entirety of NorCal had been ignited that night.

Yo, just North California? Just Northern California and in a fairly small region. Wow. Now, the reason I bring this up on a true crime is because the Tubbs fire that I'm talking to you about, one of the worst ones essentially of all these fires to occur, was started, none other, by PG&E, Pacific Gas Electric. The very people who had said that they were doing their best to keep the red flag warning in the...

Of course. Okay. Now, according to this, or to following this, it was ruled as faulty faulty equipment that had caused this fire like many fires that happen in the modern day. The issue is what preceded this actually. You see it was around 2007 when the records start to indicate that PG&E had budgeted a certain amount for upkeep and maintaining their equipment and power lines, that they started to not need it. In fact, they were under-spending.

What? Oh. Now, the margin by which they were under-spending was small at first. No, just maybe five, you know, five million dollars below. Okay. Just slightly. Just slightly, of course. I think one of the worst years is, it wasn't until the 2010s when it started to really get worse. About 2013, they estimated they were going

to spend $86 million, but they only spent $69 million. That's a huge difference. What? And to give you an idea, that fire happened, they pledged to spend $60 million, which is less than the 2013 spent amount, but only ended up spending 28 million. Wow. That's less than half. Exactly.

So you can see a growing trend of not maintaining their equipment. Now, I mentioned that there were three main fires I wanted to focus on, the tubs, the numbs, and the pockets because of how close they were together. The tubs was in the middle of it all and did some of the worst damage as far as residential destruction was considered. But all three were happening at the same time and it is Suspected that some of these other fires were also started by them So, of course now we have their negligence coming to a point all at once Now to be fair there was significant wind The wind was peaking at high points at like 85 miles per hour the wind was peaking at high points at like 85 miles per hour. Okay.

Just above hurricane gusts. That's strong. But nonetheless, it should have been able to maybe not spark the entirety of Northern California to just go up in a tinderbox. Now, one of the other bits that's mentioned is that in 2001, the PG&E company filed for bankruptcy because of shortages, because a lot of their power was being generated by water, but with the drought, there was not enough water to generate the power. And so they had to purchase electricity from without their reach. And it's good to note that PG&E holds a monopoly in Northern California for energy. So they went bankrupt. And because they were considered now a privately funded

public utility, the state of California decided to step in and say that PG&E can make its decisions about how they want to charge customers and decide if they want to let the customers pick up the bill because of course, they'll totally not run away with it. Yeah, definitely. So while customers were paying normal amounts of money and eventually they start to get their prices raised, PG&E was not utilizing that money to go and fix any of this stuff. Not to fix it, not to up it, not clearly going under budget. Now as you can imagine, the victims of the fire I mentioned were of course devastated by the loss. None of them could ever have foreseen this coming, at least in their minds. Of course, historic fire maps show that fires have burned

through these areas, but you would imagine, considering that the NOAA says that only 10% of fires are sparked naturally, you'd expect that knowledge to be very important to a company like PG. And you said there was like 100, hundred fires in North California at the time? Like hundreds. They're enduring that particularly. It's called the October fires or the wide country fires. It was 250 or so.

So that means only 10% occur naturally, which means? Which, which, yep, yep. And of course that fire, by the way, all those fires encompassed about 245,000 acres. God damn. That's a lot. Which is really hard to imagine. It's just one of those unbelievably big numbers. So of course, the residents who were wronged and those who had unfortunately lost family members, I know my mom lost one of her patients that night. But unfortunately, those family members, you know, group together

and to seek legal action. Yeah, they should have. Good. So, as a response, PG and Ene, of course, you know, made their public statement, but then decided to fire for bankruptcy. What? Again. Again? Because it did once in 2001 when there was the shortages.

And that's when the state of California decided to be so kind to them and help them out. How does... And yet again. How does the Jini file for bankruptcy? Because it is the monopoly of all of the Northern California energy, you simply can't get rid of that much input. That's why it really is a monopoly. That's why I'm like, you're the monopoly. How like do you file for bankruptcy? Like there's no one else to like come in.

And so finally there was a little bit of closure that did occur in 2018, Cal Fire, a government agency investigated and issue official reports, including that PG&E had caused at least 12 of the 2017 North Bay fires. And it specifically eventually ended up mentioning the Tubbs fire. Yeah. Now here's the thing that always irks everyone, at least that I know today, is that

they've only spent a fraction of the money that they've put aside for the fire fund that they had already had built up. And it still continues to be an issue today. One of the things that came out in the court proceedings, though, was in 2014, they found an email stating that there was a likelihood of failed structures happening

in being high. And then 2016 PG&E made a request to regulators, but state that they needed to install fresh wires, but stated that they would not be replacing any of the lines and any of the century old powers that connected the line. I have no words. That is so like, stupidly negligent. Like, how are you just going to allow all of that? Oh, to make it better. Here is the official PG&E response. PG&E said it disagreed with the conclusions, but has acknowledged that the devastation of the 2017 and 2018 wildfires made it clear that we must do more to combat the threat of wildfires

and extreme weather while hardening our systems. As we have disclosed publicly, we are taking significant actions to inspect, identify, and fix these issues with our electric system. And adding, while the number of safety issues we have identified in our electric system is a small percentage, it is unacceptable. And again, the reason they filed for bankruptcy, this was before really anything was filed was ahead of the lawsuits. But the lawsuits couldn't get the job done.

Of course not. It's, it must be nice to have money to like secure yourself from these things, to protect yourself. Right. Incoming lawsuits and you know and people holding you accountable. I don't know if any of you are aware, but now in Northern California, it is nearly impossible to get insurance for fire damage. Really? It is next to impossible because of how frequent wildfires are up in Northern and California now. So the companies are just like, it's gonna happen and we don't want to pay for it, so we're not giving you the insurance.

Correct. You call them and you're like, that's insane. Which is wild. That's insane. Secure supplies? Would you say anything about hurricanes? No, like, ugh. It's your job to insure my house for a fire in case of a fire.

Steal from corporations. So unfortunately, it does get worse. I will note that according in the modern day PG&E said it will allow regulators to monitors practices for five years. And the judge had mentioned that within that time period that even during this, when people would be outed, they would still account the time for energy. And that just proves that even in the modern day, even with being, you know, you know, pleading guilty to 85 felonies, they're still willing to put profits over safety.

Of course. And that's the most horrid thing about like, so many corporations and the people that run them, like they're so out of touch with the reality of everybody and how much of an impact they have on like our safety and... They see numbers, they don't see lives lost. That's all. Now, yep. One of the greatest devastation.

Welcome to capitalism. Indeed. Now, I mentioned that a lot of those fires in 2017 were attributed to PG&E. This includes, but not limited to, the Redwood Valley fire, the Cascade fire, the Sulphur fire, Cherokee fire, 37 fire, Blue fire, the sulfur fire, Cherokee fire, 37 fire, blue fire, North Bottom, Abadobe, Patrick Pythian and Nun's fires, Pocket fire, Atlas fire. And that's just for 2017. Because as shocker, things got worse. Of course they did. Are you guys? So a few years before that, in 2015, the Butte fire also caused demonstration.

It was only a single fire and only two people died, but it destroyed a great section of Amador County and it was residential. But unfortunately, apparently that was enough. So of course then 2017, the fires that I discussed happened. But you think that after those fires that PG&E would do better, right? Hopefully, but we know them. Are you guys familiar with the campfire or the fire that burned Paradise? No. with the Campfire or the fire that burned Paradise.

No. No. Wow. Okay. This is the, at the point, this point in history, it was the deadliest and most destructive wildfire in California history. The Tubbs fire, I claimed it in 2017, but just a year later, the Camp fire had been put out. Oh, so it was just a camp fire. As I mentioned, same thing.

Luckily, this one was during the day, but the devastation was worse. There had been a fire that had been started, shocker, by faulty PG&E equipment. Okay. It never comes as a shock when that's the issue. The shock is that they still haven't fixed it. Like they continue to let this happen. Yeah. Yeah.

Here's the tragic thing though, is that this, the fire I first talked about took place in a mountain, in a hill community, but it was very well off. And so everyone had transportation and there was plenty of ways to escape. Unfortunately, the town of Paradise is one that a lot of young people move to

as a way of making an economic decision to stay in California, but live in an area that was more affordable. There was limited ways to escape as the fire turned into a firestorm and ravaged through the city of paradise, killing 85 and injuring 17. Even more loss because PG&E sucks. And it always seems like it's cheaper for them to pay the fine than to fix the issues. Then as no surprise later, a year later, the Kincaid fire occurred because of faulty TG&E equipment,

causing my family actually to have to evacuate and it came within a half a mile of my house. Wow. Now, luckily, our firefighters up in the Northern California area are much better trained on how to deal with a fire that size and thankfully lives were no one was lost in that fire and houses were saved and are very minimal injuries but that's only because we've had to learn yeah i mean of course and that came half a mile from your house. And... And fortunately and unfortunately, there has been, at least in Northern California,

a break in time of fires. But as you saw recently, there was another major wildfire up near Chico recently. And many in Northern California grow weary at this time of year, as it marks the start of fires. When all the greens that got all big and growthful because of the beautiful rains that we had start to dry out and become kindled. Yeah, we have all the seasons everyone else does,

but just throw fire season in there as well. That's so true. One last little thing to sprinkle on because we hate hegeny so much. They switched CEOs as a way of trying to show that they're re-brown. I was gonna ask you if anyone stepped down or anything happened with the upper people. But

they made a big show of it. but it was but a show. I hate that. If that's the case, they should be switching CEO every single year because the fires just keep on happening. And they're clearly not. So... And so that's where we are today. PG and E still remains to have a large monopoly over Northern California energy.

Prices of energy are still going up as they claim climate change being the sole responsibility for all this change. And yet nothing has actually happened all that much. Now, the workers of PG&E are fantastic humans. The people on the ground who work tirelessly to do what they can are the most wonderful people to exist. It is in this case that our true crime focus is those with all the money who only see greed as their own. Because I'm sure that the people that are actually there doing the work are just not given the resources or time. Yeah. It like it. There are so many people that care so deeply about our spaces and preventing accidents and fires and things like this happening. But there's just no power. There's nothing

you can do when the people who are calling the shots and making the decisions are so separated from reality and they're sitting in their rich little coves of living where they don't have to experience any of the hardships of life and it sucks. And it happens all over. PG&E sucks. California, the wildfires are rampant. But like, everywhere. It's devastating. Yeah.

I will say a small glimmer of hope is that within emerging, there's a new field, I should say a regrowing effort to reach out to native tribes to bring back prescribed burning. And so these, unfortunately, it's led, this is what it's taken to get to this point. But it is really nice to see city and county officials as well as state officials embracing traditional tactics in order to preserve the land and keep it healthy. I love that. I think the idea of like prescribed burns are really good. Like part of the reason

I like I am like on one of my career objectives is like, like park ranger just being involved in like our natural spaces and a big part of that is like, like park ranger, just being involved in like our natural spaces. And a big part of that is like wanting to be involved with like prescribed burning and, and just conservation because it, the state of the world we leave it in right now is, is terrible. So yeah. Oh yeah, quick last little tidbit. On the 2017 fire, I felt very lucky to be relatively safe through most of it.

Of course, we could never know where the fire was, and that's where most of the fear arose. But my cousins evacuated into our house, and unfortunately, they did lose their place of residence. About half my high school did, more than half my high school I want to say. And then in 2019 the Kincade fire got really close to my house and then 2020 the glass fire which has not been proven yet to have been started by PG&E. I want to hope that's only a matter of time but that's just not conclusive yet. That one ended up destroying the house that I had been living in at that time. So it's

something that is ever present within the lives of people who live in Northern California. And I think awareness to it is just one of the better ways to help it so that people can vote for legislation and make real change. It's one of the things that just keeps bothering me. We don't learn from our mistakes. We could write it all down, we could record history, and we still don't learn from the mistakes that people have made. This is unrelated, but kind of at the same time.

I don't know if you guys have been like been seeing like the memes or the trends going on lately of like Hamilton the musical coming back into play because like the like the negotiations like the political state of like like our candidates now of like Kamala and Trump is like so reflective of what happened with like yeah back then during Hamilton's I I don't know. It's super funny. Not funny, but it's funny. Yeah. Yeah. We have people who will actually step in to stop this from happening again. I just came back from a trip to Hawaii from Maui. And last year in August, there was the Lahaina wildfires there in Maui, and that was also one of the biggest wildfires in the past decade. You know, like 102 people lost their lives during it.

And so, like, I have family that lives around that area. Luckily, they were far enough away. But, you know, going on this trip, like, I on this trip, I drove through La Jaina and those areas. Even a year later, it's still so devastated by what the fires did. So many of the houses are just completely burned down. It is very sad to look at. And though the full investigations, the findings aren't fully released yet, Hawaiian Electric Company, their version of PG&E, did admit that some of the fires were started

because of downed power lines. So, once again, it's like, you know, companies refusing to be proactive And it's like, you know, companies refusing to be like proactive in saving things as well. Yeah. Yeah. And also just the idea that something we all need is owned by a private corporation and not in the public. That's stupid. I don't know. That's stupid. I don't know. I have thought that for a long time. Why is this the one legal monopoly that's allowed? Because there's other tiny electric companies that are out there. So that's why it's not a monopoly. But stupid.

I don't know if you guys... Thanks for listening. Yeah, of course. Thank you. I don't know if you guys... Thanks for listening. Yeah, of course. Thank you. I was also going to mention, I don't know if you guys have heard of the Jasper fires up in Canada that happened recently. So they started in July, which also is insane because I visited Canada in July, Alberta, and Alberta is like the state, whatever, but it's the

province. But I was in Calgary, and Calgary is just a few hours from Jasper where the fires were going. When I got there, it literally looked apocalyptic. The air quality was terrible. It's once again, one of the biggest wildfires that they've had. I actually had a friend who was working in Jasper when the wildfires started. And so the fires literally like right next to him.

And so, you know, he had to evacuate and he literally was like scared for his life along with all the other people around him. So it's crazy. And once again, that was because of, you know, government management ignoring the warnings that like, hey, fires are going to happen, we need prescribed burns, we need to clear this up before. So I'm just looking it up. And that was a that's huge. Yeah, 1000 acres. Yeah. Like my friend who was working in Jasper at this point, he's now back in Jasper working again, because it's been enough time. And so he's literally sent me and our other friends like before and after pictures of like, where he was staying. And like the houses of his friends in those areas, and it's all just burned to the ground. So yeah. Yeah, nature is a scary thing. It is. Humans are scarier. Yeah, definitely.

I'm gonna go with that. I mean, I'm sure that you have like seen like that question that they ask women. They're like, would you rather like bump into a man in the forest or bump into a bear? And they always pick the bear? Yeah. Yeah. Humans are scary. Anyway, thank you for letting us talk telling about that. I think that was a very much. It was very much needed to hear. So yeah. Thank you, Katie. Thank you for being on. Thanks for having me. Thank you for still being here.

Like, I am so glad you did not die in that fire. Me too. Yeah, very scary. So thank you guys for listening. Question mark. If you made it this far, we started this far downhill. No. Yeah. Once again, I think some of that we all needed to hear. So thank you listeners for being here. Thank you, Katie, for talking about it. Yeah. And like always, feel free to like give us a rate. It really puts us out there.

If you have questions, comments, concerns, send us a text, go to the description and let us know. Reach out. Yeah. We have gotten some comments, responses lately from different people. We will be responding to those very soon. And if you want to get a response, you know, reach out, let us know. Yeah. We've also got in a few stories suggested. So send in some stories. We'll probably, we'll cover them at some point. Yeah. I should pick one of them to cover it soon. But yeah,

Yeah, yeah. I should pick one of them to cover soon. But yeah, thank you. Yeah. Being on again, Katie, and... Thank you. Until next time. Bye. See ya. Thanks for listening to Chambers of the Occult. For photos, sources, and anything else mentioned during the episode, check out our website at chambersoftheoccult.com.

You'll find everything you need there if you do find yourself wanting more. You can also follow us on all of our socials at chambersoftheoccult and on twitter at coto podcast. If you have any questions, comments, recommendations, personal anecdotes, or concerns, let us know. Fill out our contact form on our website, email us at chambersoftheoccult.gmail.com, or leave us a message on our socials. We would love to hear from you. And if you enjoyed what you heard, we would greatly appreciate it if you could drop a like, leave a comment, and subscribe. It is absolutely the best way to show your support, and it would mean the world. Until next time. I see you. you