Murder With My Husband - 220. The Killer In The Attic

Episode Date: June 10, 2024

In this episode, Payton and Garrett dive into the case of Fred Oesterreich, a husband who was tragically shot by a home invader. As witnesses come forward, police realize this case is a lot stranger than it seems.  Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/themwmh Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/murderwithmyhusband/ Discount Codes: https://mailchi.mp/c6f48670aeac/oh-no-media-discount-codes Watch on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@murderwithmyhusband Listen on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/murder-with-my-husband/id1508098400 Listen on spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6GaodpBsSpBuUMhmEXhjK2 Case Sources: Milwaukee Magazine - https://www.milwaukeemag.com/the-legend-of-milwaukees-most-infamous-love-triangle/  All That’s Interesting - https://allthatsinteresting.com/dolly-oesterreich  LAist - https://laist.com/news/la-history/hidden-history-of-la-the-murderous-lover-who-lived-in-a-silver-lake-attic LA Times - https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1995-03-20-me-44878-story.html Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

That's the sound of unaged whiskey, transforming into Jack Daniels Tennessee Whiskey in Lynchburg, Tennessee. Around 1860, nearest green taught Jack Daniel how to filter whiskey through charcoal for a smoother taste, one drop at a time. This is one of many sounds in Tennessee with a story to tell. To hear them in person, plan your trip at TNVacation.com. Tennessee sounds perfect. What if we told you you're already off to a great start with so many ways to squeeze

the most out of summer right here? From our largest shrimp skewers ever to a Vietnamese-inspired dish ready in minutes, PC makes any culinary adventure an on-budget breeze. You're listening to an Ono Media podcast. Hey everybody, welcome back to the podcast. This is Murder With My Husband. I'm Peyton Morland. And I'm Garrett Morland. And he's the husband.

I'm the husband. If you are listening on Spotify or Apple and don't actually follow the show, can you please click that follow button and then also turn on downloads, automatic downloads. Just a great way to support us. and don't actually follow the show, can you please click that follow button and then also turn on downloads, automatic downloads. Just a great way to support us. It really, really helps us out.

So please pause right now and go do that. Okay, I hope you did it and you're back because we are ready to jump into Garrett's 10 seconds. Well, we had our live show in Utah. Thank you to everyone who came out. We really appreciate it. Thank you for supporting us. We had a great time and we hope you had a great time too.

Just kind of updating everyone on my home gym. Should be done next week. We'll see. I'll get some pictures going. I got all the equipment. Pretty excited. I think I'm gonna be a bodybuilder now. And so, it's kind of what I got going on over here.

That's my 10 seconds. We've just kind of been on tour doing our live shows, recording episodes, and yeah, that's kind of what we got going on. OK, our sources for this episode are Milwaukee Magazine, All That's Interesting, LAist, and LA Times. Now, Garrett, before I start telling today's story, I want to walk through a hypothetical situation with you. OK, so imagine we're home together. It's just the two of us, no one else is

over. Like always. We're having an argument, as couples do. Like never. Like never. Suddenly you look up and there's another man in our house holding a gun. He's just standing there. Like we're in an argument, you look up and there's a guy there. Wait, where's the guy? I need to know like his E so he's upstairs? Yeah just wherever we're having the argument. The balcony? No he's in the room with us. But he said I'm looking up so he's like on the ceiling? I mean you look up from talking to me. Okay got it. You look over. Okay okay there we go okay. And he's just standing there. Got it. You didn't even hear the front door open. You

don't know how this man got inside. And weirdest of all, this isn't some random stranger. This is someone that you used to know who last you heard lived on the opposite side of the country and had nothing to do with either of us. This is someone you haven't thought about in years, just a random acquaintance. But here he is, like he just appeared,

and he's armed, and he's inside your house. What would you do? Oh, I'm killing him. Okay, well, that was a fast answer. You think I was gonna think about it? You know this guy. You know who this is, you're not gonna... Oh, no.

You're not gonna say, what are you doing? No. My first thought process is guns blazing. I'm all in. I'm running at him. I don't even care. You don't even ask a question? No questions asked. No words need to be spoken. I'm full sprinting. I'm full sprinting straight at him. Get out of my house. If he has a gun, right? He's got a gun. Yeah. Yeah, no questions asked. If he didn't have a gun, for sure I'd ask him questions. But if he's got a gun pointed at me, it's do or die.

What if it's not pointed at you? What if he's just holding it down? It's flight or fight. Fight or flight? What did I say? That's what I said, right? You said flight or fight. I've just never heard them the other way.

I guess it could be, right? It is, I guess the correct words. I've just never heard them in that order. Yeah, it's fight or flight. Okay, well, you keep thinking about that a little bit. Okay, okay, I'll keep thinking about it. As we get into it. Okay.

So on August 22nd, 1922, people all over the Los Angeles neighborhood of Silver Lake called the police to report that they'd heard gunshots go off. Again, this is 1922. Specifically, the sounds seemed to be coming from the home of a married couple named Fred and Dolly Osterreich. They lived in a nice multi-story home overlooking Sunset Boulevard and they had been there for four years. And until tonight there's never been any major disturbances at the home so it's really unsettling for the

neighbors to hear these gunshots now. So the police show up and the scene they find is baffling. So Fred, the man of the house, is dead in the living room lying in a puddle of his own blood and he's been hit twice in the house is dead in the living room, lying in a puddle of his own blood. And he's been hit twice in the chest and once in the head. And his wife, Dolly is locked in a closet. The lock is latched from the outside. So she had no way of getting out before the police arrived. And she doesn't seem hurt.

So the detectives get her out and they question her right away. They're like, hey, your neighbors heard guns, gunshots. We responded right away. Your husband's dead on the living room floor. What happened? And Dolly says that she was standing in front of the closet, hanging up a fur coat when a strange man broke into the house. She assumed he was there to rob the place, but she didn't get a chance to see what went down.

And that's because the robber came in and pushed her into the closet and then locked the door. Oh, Dolly heard the gunshots go off while she was still in the closet. But of course she didn't actually see her husband get shot. She just waited until the police came to rescue her. Now, okay, this story is odd for a couple reasons. First, Fred's watch is missing and it looks like the intruder took it off his wrist after shooting him. But otherwise, none of his or Dolly's valuables were taken. So if this was a robbery, what did they take?

Plus the police are able to determine that the murder weapon was a 25 caliber pistol. And that's a very lightweight gun. And for this next point, I do need to remind you, this was 1922 and people weren't particularly enlightened about gender at the time. So 25 caliber pistols were actually considered women's guns in 1922 because they were just small and dainty.

It wasn't a gun that typically a man would use. And the detectives just can't believe that a male robber, especially one who's capable of murder would use a feminine weapon. And again, we're in 1922. They expect them to be holding like a big bazooka. Yeah, literally. Cause that, cause just a dainty gun can't be. But I mean, that helps back then,

narrow everything down, right? Right. And that's why the, that's why I'm even bringing it up because this is the avenue police are taking. So they pressed Dolly a little more trying to see, okay, you're locked in this closet. We're just not really buying this story Do you have motive to hurt or kill your husband? They asked her if she and Fred ever fought and she answers very abruptly and firmly No, like never ever did we fight and the fact that she's so adamant actually makes her look less

Trustworthy if her relationship with Fred really was so healthy and good, she wouldn't have got so defensive about the question. After all, we know even happy couples fight sometimes. However, she insists that they never argued about anything for their entire marriage. She's like, no, we've never been in one argument. Which, that's, look, Payton and I love each other. We have a very healthy marriage and things are great,

but people are just gonna bicker. It's gonna happen every once in a while. I actually know someone who claims this exact thing on Instagram. No, that's false. 100%, hot take, false. There is no way that you're married to somebody for more than, let's pick years,

for seven plus years, six plus years, five plus years, and you've never once bickered or disagreed on something. Because that's humanly impossible. Maybe she thinks they disagree, but they've never argued. She says they've never fought. I guess what's the, where's the line though, right? Cause so many people have different lines of what fighting means, right?

Like I feel like if you were to disagree- But you've never got your feelings hurt? Yeah, no, that's impossible. You've never disagreed, you've hurt each other's feelings. Even if you don't mean to, I mean, people's emotions just get the best of them sometimes. Right. I'm not saying that you have to scream at each other. No, which I don't think it's healthy to scream at each other.

But like, you know, sometimes if your feelings get hurt or you misunderstand each other, you're going to get defensive. And to me, that's fighting. Right? I agree. Sorry, this is kind of off topic a little bit. I just had to nip this in the butt because no way that's possible. Is it nip it in the bud or the butt? I don't know. I thought it was butt, but maybe that's possible. Is it nip it in the bud or the butt? I don't know. I thought it was butt, but maybe it's bud. I think I've heard both. So I'm sure.

All right, back in action. So it's all definitely enough to make police suspicious, but not enough to actually arrest her or name her as a suspect. And the biggest point in Dolly's favor is the fact that she had been shut in the closet from the outside. There was no possible way for her to put herself in there and lock the door of the closet.

So with no real evidence to prove Dolly is lying, the police focus on trying to identify the intruder. And the investigation basically stalls right away. There just isn't much to go off of. And apparently, Dolly just can't stand to live in the same house where her husband was murdered, so at some point she moves to a new place. It's another decent-sized house still in LA and it has an attic, but I don't want to make it sound like she's completely devastated by grief because

before too long Dolly is ready to move on. And within just a few months, she begins dating a lawyer named Herman S. Shapiro. He makes a lot of money in his job as an attorney, but he also works long hours and he doesn't have a lot of time to focus on Dolly. And this is a problem for her because she wants a boyfriend who is more attentive. So in no time at all, Dolly starts cheating on Herman

and her new boyfriend is a businessman named Roy Klum. He's originally from Milwaukee, which is where Dolly lived before she and Fred moved to LA together. So they must have some things in common, you know, given their shared backgrounds. They get along well for just under a year, but in the summer of 1923, Dolly breaks up with Roy.

This is her lover. And he does not take the rejection well. In fact, on July 12th, he goes straight to the police and says, I need to tell you about Dolly and her husband's murder. All right, good old Dolly, let's hear it. Don't piss off your lover. So specifically, Roy goes in and says that while he and Dolly

were still together, she gave him a 25 caliber pistol one day and asked if he could get rid of it for her. She told him that it had nothing to do with Fred's murder, but she knew it looked bad for her to own a gun that was the same caliber as the gun that killed her husband. So she wanted Roy to make it disappear before the police could find it

and ask her some uncomfortable questions. And according to him, he didn't ask any more about the weapon, he just tried to find a way to destroy it for her. Roy actually threw the gun in the La Brea tar pits and he figured there was no way anyone would ever find it there. And he was mostly right.

Nobody had bothered to look in the pits prior to this point. But after they get Roy's tip, the police searched the stinky smelly grounds, which are dotted with puddles of water and asphalt. No way, it's still there. And they find the gun. Oh my gosh. The problem is that the chemicals at the tar pits are very corrosive and the firearm at this point is badly damaged. It's in bad condition. There's no way to prove that this is the same gun that had killed Fred.

I'm sure the serial number was... Do you know if it was still on there or you're not sure? I have no idea. I just know they couldn't prove it and I know that they now couldn't prove that Roy's story is true. For all the police know, he's making things up to hurt Dolly, he's offended that she's broke up with him, and this gun might have come from somewhere else entirely. Except this story about the police finding a firearm at the tar pits makes it on the news. And one of Dolly's neighbors actually sees the story and this inspires them to go to the police with another tip. They come in and say, I saw you found the gun. Dolly has a second gun that she's also trying to get rid of.

Dolly's got, Dolly's loaded man. She said, the neighbor says she gave it to this neighbor and the neighbor buried it in their yard for her. So a search team goes straight to this neighbor's house, digs in the spot they described, and sure enough, they find a pistol buried in this hole. Unfortunately, this one is just as corroded as the one from the tar pits. All those months sitting in a damp hole meant it was rusty and worn down,

and there's still nothing to prove it had anything to do with Fred's murder. But let's be real, two separate people come forward saying Dolly has tried to destroy guns that fit the exact description of the murder weapon in her husband's murder, it's definitely suspicious. Yeah, it seems pretty obvious, right? So when the police asked Dolly about the firearms, she admits she's like, okay, yeah, I did try to get rid of those guns, but she explains that it's the same reason she told Roy.

She says she owned these 25 caliber pistols, and it was all for perfectly innocent reasons, but when Fred was murdered and she knew the police might suspect her, she didn't want to be caught with two weapons that might appear to implicate her. And so she panicked and she called on Roy and her neighbor to help her. So the police are like, okay, yeah, we're not buying

your story and roughly a year after Fred's murder, Dolly is actually arrested. Okay. And her boyfriend, Herman, agrees to represent her as her attorney. Dolly, Dolly must be hot. That's all I'm saying. Dolly's a doll.

So Herman, who she was cheating on with Roy, who then turned her in, is like, yes, sweetie, I will represent you in your husband's murder case. While Dolly is in jail and waiting for her case to go to trial, she asks Herman to do a very odd favor for her. Dolly wants Herman to go to the store, buy a bunch of groceries and leave them in her house.

But remember, this is a house that's empty. She doesn't have any living family members or roommates who'd eat that food. So of course, Herman thinks that this is a house that's empty. She doesn't have any living family members or roommates who'd eat that food. So of course, Herman thinks that this is a weird request and he demands Dolly explain what's going on. He's like, why do you need groceries delivered to your house if you're not living there?

This is why you just need DoorDash, Dolly. And she's like, well, someone's staying with me. Someone she'd never mentioned to Herman before. She says it's her brother. She says he fell on hard times. Someone's staying with me. Someone she'd never mentioned to Herman before. She says it's her brother. She says he fell on hard times, he didn't have anywhere else to live, and he was living in her attic. Red flags all over the place.

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to impress dad this Father's Day. The Glenlivet, live original. Please enjoy our products responsibly. And as for why she never thought to tell Herman that her brother was literally living in her attic, she's like, well, he's hiding. He's hiding. Like he can't be seen by the public. And she doesn't tell him what the reason is. She's like, it's not my business to tell, but he just, he has to hide up there. So honestly, her explanation makes no sense. But like I said before, Herman is nothing if not a loyal boyfriend.

Cause at this point, he obviously knows about the cheating and he's like, I'm still gonna represent you. So he buys all the food that she asked for and he drives it to her house. And he goes into Dolly's bedroom and climbs into her closet, just like Dolly requested. And then he taps twice on the ceiling, which is

supposedly like a secret way that Dolly and her brother would communicate. It's a sign for him that it's safe to come downstairs. And sure enough, after Herman pounds on the ceiling, a strange man climbs down out of this. That is so scary. That is weird.

Yeah. His name is Otto Sandhuber. And as soon as he sees Herman, he's like very relieved. So he's nervous and stuff climbing out, but as soon as he sees that it's Herman with the food, he's like, phew. Okay. Otto has been all alone in that house for a very long time and he really needed someone to talk to,

just needed someone to see. And on top of that, the attic, it's not like, it's a huge attic. It's dark, it's small, it's stuffy. There's no bathroom. So Otto was going to the bathroom in a bucket in the attic. What is going on? There also isn't much up there to keep

him occupied. There's a shelf of books and a typewriter so he can write down his own ideas. And ironically, during this reclusive life that Otto had been living in his sister's attic, he actually published a couple of short stories. I guess that when you have nothing to do all day, but write that you might be a little good at it. And it's clear he's been up there for months. So he's had plenty of time to hone in on his craft. Needless to say, this is no way to live. And Otto seems not okay. Like he seems not okay when he comes down. He seems desperately lonely. In fact, when Herman shows up, Otto's like, can you just talk to me? Like I really, really want to talk to you. I just need some company. So he tells Herman all about how he came to live with Dolly and all of the history they have together.

So it's hard to say what Herman thinks of all this, but after his conversation with Otto, he posts bail to get Dolly out of jail. And then he uses all of his legal knowledge to fight the murder charges that she's facing. And Herman is very good at his job. He convinces the state to drop all of her charges. He's like, you just do not have enough evidence.

You have no proof. Like there is no point in taking this to trial. And thanks to Herman's hard work, Dolly goes free. And they decide to move in together and they live in the same house where Otto is now living in the attic. I think I know what's going on. What? Like I think I know what's happening. I think Otto did it.

I think Dolly's hiding him. I think Dolly was obviously involved and had planned a thing or something similar. And I think I should be a detective now. All I'm saying is if I started dating you and then you got arrested for murder. And I still believed you that then you got arrested for murder and I still believed you that you didn't commit the murder but you were like, hey, I need you to go deliver food to my sister who lives in my attic full time. Who I've never heard about.

You need to do a secret little knock and let her come down and she's just like this little hermit crutch. No, you better divorce me. I'm not moving in with you for sure. No. Like Mr. Attorney, what are you doing? It's crazy So they move in and Otto continues to just dwell upstairs while Dolly and Herman share the downstairs And then after seven years

she and Herman finally break up and A lot like what happened with Roy before Herman takes the end of the relationship very hard. It wasn't mutual. And he decides to go to the police and tell them that actually, even though he worked tirelessly to get those charges dropped seven years ago, he believes that Dolly killed her husband. Dolly's got to figure something out because... She's got to stop pissing off these guys. Yes. She's in a bad position right now. And to back up his speculation,

he tells them everything that Otto had explained to him all those years ago when Herman had went and met him and Otto had come out of the attic. So I didn't tell you their conversation, but I'm gonna tell you now. So as it turns out, Otto isn't actually Dolly's brother. Surprise. He used to work as a sewing machine repair man

in an apron factory owned by her husband, Fred, before he died. This was in Milwaukee, not Los Angeles. And at the time, Otto was just a teenager. Now, occasionally, Fred would bring his wife, Dolly, to work. She was a bit older in her late 20s, early 30s at the time, but that did not stop her from developing an age-inappropriate crush on this teenager, Otto,

who worked with her husband. So one day in 1913, Dolly complained to her husband, Fred, that her personal sewing machine wasn't working properly. She wanted him to send someone over to the house to fix it. Now the truth was her sewing machine was fine. Presumably she made this story up because she knew that Fred would ask Otto

to come take care of it. So when Otto came over and knocked on the door, Dolly answered and she was in nothing but her silk robe and her stockings. So she was basically naked. Little Dolly was naked for teenager Otto. Okay. And it wasn't too hard for Otto to guess at Dolly's intentions as soon as she opened the door. This is alright. And from that day forward the two of them become lovers. Now we know that by the 1920s Dolly was very comfortable having affairs.

She was sleeping with Roy while she was also dating Herman, but in 1913 she was new to the idea of cheating. Prior to that she'd been loyal to her husband, but her marriage had taken a dark turn when their one and only child passed away suddenly and it was a huge blow that Dolly and Fred had both struggled to move past. So now Dolly was unhappy and this was kind of her way at lashing out against Fred. And cheating on him was one way that she could help herself feel better. She didn't want to get caught so she and Otto would meet at hotels where nobody knew them. But as time went on this became impractical like it was a little expensive you can't just keep going

to hotel rooms over and over. it was actually just a lot cheaper for Otto to come over to Dolly's house during the day while Fred was at work at the same place of work where Otto works and just stay in the attic then he'd leave her house before his boss came dude Dolly's kind of a ho well here's the issue in Milwaukee this was a problem because Dolly had nosy neighbors they couldn't help but notice this young man who dropped by almost Well, here's the issue. In Milwaukee, this was a problem because Dolly had nosy neighbors. They couldn't help but notice this young man who'd drop by almost every single day

and then spend hours alone with Dolly. And when the neighbors asked Dolly about her visitors, she lied and said, oh, it's just my half brother. It was similar to the story she told Herman years later, that this half brother of hers was financially in a bad situation. He was coming over so she could help him out. Now this wasn't the most believable excuse

because if this guy really was related to Dolly, it didn't make sense that he'd only come over when Fred wasn't home. In fact, the news got back to Fred that Dolly's half brother was visiting every day and he was like, what? So he confronted Dolly and she was like, yeah, so I'm actually just having an affair.

And it's not clear if she told Fred who she was seeing or if this had any professional implications on Otto. Either way, she promised to break things off with her lover and Fred believed her. He agreed to stay with his wife and just try to repair the marriage. But almost immediately, Dolly breaks her promise. She keeps sleeping with Otto,

and she came up with a way to keep seeing him without drawing the attention of Fred or her neighbors. And what do you think it is? 17-year-old Otto. And that is hide him in the attic. So he's 17. She says, quit your job and move into my attic. So he's 17, she says quit your job and move into my attic. Okay she's kind of freaky. She one is cheating on all her different husbands and lovers which

that's not okay. Two, grooming this kid at 17 years old and saying live in my attic so we can have sex with each other that's that's that's scary and she's like yeah just quit your job I'll take care of everything I'm providing your housing your food your toiletries everything else he never set foot outside or left the house for any reason she's like the neighbors can't see you like they know that you're my half-brother now and they cannot see you leave the house so Nuts. So his world becomes very small. It consisted of the four walls of the attic, those books, the typewriter, and daily trips downstairs to spend the day with Dolly until

it was time for her husband to come back from work. And honestly, it sounds like Dolly just kind of saw Otto as her little secret, but from Fred's perspective, if he'd had any idea what was going on, this was, this is something out of a nightmare. This strange man is living in his home under his own roof and he has no idea. Yeah. Well, even though Fred didn't know exactly what was going on, he did have some suspicions.

He noticed that food was going missing from the kitchen, um, and there was no way Dolly was eating all of it. And he occasionally heard going missing from the kitchen, and there was no way Dolly was eating all of it. And he occasionally heard noises coming from the ceiling, like something was in the attic. Beyond that, he just got a weird feeling whenever he was home. He just, he like, he was like,

something is not quite right. Fred thought this was weird, but whenever he spoke up about these eerie feelings, Dolly would just gaslight him. She said Fred was just too stressed from his job. He was making things, it was making him imagine things. She also pointed at Fred's tendencies to drink to excess and suggested that maybe the alcohol was making him paranoid, which is that's crazy. And ultimately Fred decided to trust his wife. She told him not to worry

about the missing food or what was in the attic or anything else. So he did his best to put everything out of mind. And meanwhile, Dolly had the perfect setup. She got to play the role of a loyal wife without drawing too much suspicion. She also got to enjoy the perks of an affair with a live in lover. But the arrangement obviously could not last forever. In 1918, Fred's business was expanding and he wanted to open up a new factory in Southern California. So Fred announced that the family was going to move from Milwaukee to Los Angeles and Dolly didn't push back on the plan at all. She said she was fine with relocating so long as the new house had an attic.

I don't know what Fred thought of this highly specific request. I also don't know if Dolly ever bothered to ask if Otto was just willing to pick up and move cross-country I Truly don't understand how he is living in the attic this long with one out Fred knowing in two he has to be so unhealthy Groomed like that, but that's just like not good for you physically. No, I'm mentally For sure

So Fred and Dolly had their house all picked out in LA. They took their time packing up their things in Milwaukee. And meanwhile, she snuck Otto down and said, get to LA somehow. Get to LA on your own. So he then moved into the attic there. So he would be all set up and comfortable before Fred and her even got there to arrive in the house.

So that setup lasted for four more years. Oh my gosh. Until August 22nd, 1922. This guy is not ever going outside. And he's in his mid 20s at this point. Yeah. So that day, Fred and Dolly got into an argument and it's unclear what they were fighting about,

but it was loud enough that Otto could hear them shouting from the attic He wasn't used to the two of them being so angry and aggressive and the first thought in his mind was that Fred might be mad enough to hurt Dolly So intending to protect her, Otto grabbed two guns at least one of which was a 25 caliber pistol And he headed down the stairs. So he comes out of the attic for the first time with Fred home. And as soon as Otto got within Fred's line of sight, Fred lost his mind. And this goes back to the question I asked him and think about it. Fred had no reason to expect anyone else was even in the house at this point. He thought he was home

alone with his wife. So not only was an armed man unexpectedly walking down the hallway, it was also someone he'd known years ago. Remember this kid worked for him as a teenager. This kid who quit years ago is now standing in his home with a gun and he has no idea how he got in here. This is crazy. It was a situation that was impossible to make sense of. And again, I don't know if Fred realized Otto

was the person Dolly had been cheating with, but if he knew or even suspected it, that had to just add to the intensity of the moment. Plus, Fred was fighting with his wife. His emotions were already running high. So just like Garrett said, as soon as he saw him, he ran and attacked Otto. Oh, yeah. Okay, so I'm not alone.

No. Me and Fred are one in the same. So the two men begin grappling and during the fight the gun goes off and it hits Fred three times, killing him. Okay. How to stop loss is work on Kraken. Let's say I have a birthday party on Wednesday night, but an important meeting Thursday morning. So sensible me, pre-books a taxi for 10 p.m. with alerts.

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now. Alcohol in select markets. Product availability may vary by regency app for details. Now going by that story, it sounds like Fred's death was kind of accidental. Otto and Dolly, it wasn't like a planned thing that they killed him, but they also knew the situation didn't look good. I mean, what police officer was going to believe that a cheating wife and her lover, who was secretly living in Fred's house for years, had just accidentally shot him while wrestling with a gun?

And if the gun really went off on accident, it seemed too coincidental that it hit Fred twice in the chest and then once in the head. That's true. You'd think some of those bullets would have hit Fred on a less deadly part of his body. Well, rather than deal with the possibility that they might be charged with murder, Otto and Dolly came up with a plan to cover everything up.

They knew Dolly's neighbors had probably overheard the gunshots and they most likely had already called the police. So Otto quickly locked Dolly in a closet, latching it from the gunshots and they most likely had already called the police. So Otto quickly locked Dolly in a closet, latching it from the outside, and they assumed, correctly as it turned out, that the police wouldn't be able to hold her responsible if someone else had locked her in the closet. And then Otto took Fred's watch, hoping that it would look like a robbery, and then he just went back up into the attic. Oh, Otto's kind of smart. He trusted that the police wouldn't think to look for him up there the same way Fred also hadn't looked for him up there for years.

And the plan worked. Dolly and Otto probably would have gotten away with it if she had just been able to keep her mouth shut. But instead, after she moved out of Fred's house, she made the mistake of asking her new boyfriend Roy to dispose of the murder weapon and then she also made a misstep with Herman her other boyfriend She gave him a diamond watch and As soon as Herman laid eyes on it. He knew that it was it was the one that was allegedly stolen from Fred during that deadly break-in I'm not sure what her thought process was there because if someone gave me a watch that I knew was from a killing yeah I'd be scared well he asked her he was like is this that watch like isn't this the watch that was stolen and she's like yeah it turns out it wasn't stolen I just found it under a seat

cushion get out of here but now after the breakup when all this is coming out Herman our attorney hands over the watch to the police and like, here, take this. And as for Dolly's other boyfriend, Otto, he continued to live in Dolly's attic at the new house while she was living with Herman. So her husband dies and instead of saying, lover, let's move, you can now come out and we can just date out in the open. She's like, no, you're going to keep being my lover in the attic. That part, I mean, I think at that point, she's like, it's on purpose. She's a little, she's very messed up. Right.

But also, think about it this way, when Herman moves in with her, he knows that Otto is up there. But he thinks that it's- Her brother, but like, why not just have him live on the same floor? Yeah, I don't know, I don't know. I mean, I'm confused too. Yeah. But also Otto moved in with Dolly in 1913 when he was 17 years old. That was

nine years. So nine years he'd been living in an attic. Maybe he was just used to it. Like maybe he didn't even know how to live. That's so sad. In the real world. Yeah. And then it would be another year before Roy told anyone where to find the gun. And an additional seven before Herman went to the police to share Otto's testimony. So that would be 17 years

that Otto spent living above Dolly's home. That's crazy. He was 34 years old when all of this comes to light. That is, there was so much wrong with that. I don't even know where to start. Right. He'd spent his entire adult life living in his lover's eyes. Mentally, I don't even know how you function in society. You just don't live a normal life at that point. Physically, like there's no way he looks okay physically, right?

I would not think I would think so. It's insane So here's where things get a little messy when all this comes out Herman has just come to the police and told them this wild story about Dolly keeping a secret lover in her attic for Freaking 17 years and it's hard to take on faith But it also fits all of the evidence perfectly like this. Like this is the theory that makes the most sense. So the detectives tried to go to Dolly's house to check this testimony out for themselves. And they head up into the attic and they find Otto.

Like Otto is up there, just like Herman described. And when they bring Otto into custody, he immediately confesses. He's like, yeah, I killed Fred. His story is pretty similar to what Herman told the police earlier. Otto says he heard Dolly and Fred arguing that night. He was afraid for her safety.

So he climbed down and he shot Fred to protect her. So the homicide was intentional, but Otto had a good reason to think Dolly was in danger. He was saying, no, like this was clearly. Yeah. I mean, I was trying to protect her. So when the police sit down for an interrogation, she says the same thing.

She's like, okay, I know we told Herman the gun went off by accident, but it didn't. Otto did kill Fred, but it was because Fred was dangerous. Like he was trying to protect me. And these confessions are enough for the police to charge both Otto and Dolly for Fred's death. But before their court dates can arrive, they both end up recanting their confessions

and they go back to saying, "'No, it was an accident. "'The gun misfired. "'It was all a horrible mistake.'" Now, obviously no one thinks Dolly or Otto are that believable with this whole thing being a mistake, but the fact that they keep changing their stories isn't really a good look.

By this point though, there's no actual proof that they did hurt Fred intentionally. Frankly, without Otto and Dolly's confessions, there still wasn't even any way to definitively tie them to this homicide. The best the police can do is charge Otto with manslaughter. So he created a dangerous situation by secretly living in Fred's house and by bringing the gun with him into the fight. Well, during his trial, Otto puts the blame on Dolly.

He at trial says, I was basically a prisoner in this home. Their affair had started out as consensual, but that by the time he'd given up his job and got a little older, he was like, I just couldn't leave. Like there was no escape. He goes, really? He was as much a victim as Fred and the jurors though, they didn't find this argument persuasive. They find Otto guilty of manslaughter. Okay. But this next part is kind of confusing. I've done a lot of research and none of my sources are very detailed.

So I'm not, cause I mean we're in the 20s, 30s. I'm not entirely clear how this happened, but somehow even with a conviction, someone in the court system decides that Otto can't be sentenced. That the state of limitations on manslaughter had passed. Which again, I don't know how this happens, but the police have no choice but to just let Otto go. So it must have been some legal loophole or something back then that wasn't filled and I mean at this point He's been in an attic. Maybe it is time served. I don't know Get that sure too. So the police let him go and as for Dolly in 1930

She's charged with conspiracy to commit a murder But the prosecutors during her trial have all the same problems the police had during their investigation. There's no proof. And ultimately her case ends with a hung jury. No way. Well, I mean, she didn't pull the trigger. Oh yeah, that's true, you're right. So I guess at this point,

the state decides it's a lost cause to try and get a conviction. And rather than move forward with a retrial, they drop the charges against Dolly. Okay, so do Dolly and Otto end up together? What happens now? So they walk free and to this day, nobody has ever actually been convicted of Fred's murder.

Wow. So after her trial, Dolly goes on to settle down with a new boyfriend. Oh dude, Otto was just being, I mean, she had the same pattern the entire time. Obviously that was gonna happen again. It was such a bad case of grooming. Like so time. Obviously that was going to happen again. It was such a bad case of grooming. Like so bad.

She lives a quiet life for 30 more years and then she dies in 1961 at 75 years old. And I hate to say this, but it's harder to say what becomes of Otto. He doesn't get much press coverage after the police realized that they can't sentence him, but it wouldn't surprise me if maybe he just left town and changed his name. This whole case had uttered his whole like young life and the young and he's still young, but 17 to 30 or whatever gone. Well, and it kind of had destroyed his reputation because the newspapers were almost like mocking him. Well, yeah, I mean, back in the twenties and thirties, I doubt grooming and all that was really.

Well, and they're also like, you just lived in an attic. And so they give him the nickname Batboy. So he's. You sure just left. Yeah, so he's just kind of like called Batboy. And it's a wild nickname to give someone who literally survived truly inhuman conditions. And frankly, it feels disrespectful to Fred's memory too, to kind of

treat this case like, Oh, that boy killed you. Like, I don't know, but it's safe to say this story does feel like something you'd find in like a novel or like a thriller movie, living in another man's house in secret so you can sleep with his wife. It's wild that this like happened in real life. And as exciting as it is to cover all the different twists and turns, I can only imagine what was going through Fred's mind

before he died. Confusion, betrayal, heartbreak, like so much else in this case, we probably will never know. And that is the murder of Fred. That's crazy. That is nuts, living in the attic for years and years and years.

Dolly's married and just doesn't care. Why keep getting in a relationship? Why not just go sleep around then, right? Well, I'm just like, well, it's the 20s. It was probably the 30s, 40s at that point, but. Great Gatsby. I just think that you had to be married. This is crazy, man.

What a case. But I also just, how, I mean, it's, I mean, I understand that he pulled the trigger and that he did murder Fred. But for Otto, there's a part of me that's like, you never had a chance. Yeah, it just, things were different. Times were different, things weren't studied,

things weren't looked at like that. Grooming and stuff I don't think was so much of a thing. Why not just leave? Why you're a man? Why aren't you fighting back? You know, it's just different times. And then, yeah, like just to have the husband be dead. And now he's probably thinking,

okay, maybe we can actually be together now and she says no go back up in the attic I'm getting a new boyfriend. Yeah knows her plan all long. She's like that's just she's evil Yeah, all right you guys that is our case for this week, and we will see you next time with another episode I love it. I hate it. Goodbye Shop with Rakuten and you'll get it. What's it? It's the best deal. The highest cash back. The most savings on your shopping.

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