My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark - 413 - Learned & Forgotten

Episode Date: February 1, 2024

This week, Georgia and Karen cover the Glensheen murders and serial fraudster Anthony Gignac. For our sources and show notes, visit www.myfavoritemurder.com/episodes. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is Exactly Right. In the criminal justice system. If you know how to finish the rest of that sentence, this podcast is for you. I'm Kara Klank. And I'm Lisa Traeger. Our true crime comedy podcast that's messed up, an SVU podcast, is back with all new guests. Just in time for the 25th season of Law and Order SVU.

Every Tuesday we take you through an episode of SVU, discuss the true crime it's based on, and chat with a special guest from the episode. We've talked to Law & Order icons like BD Wong and Kelly Giddish, and guest stars, including Padgett Brewster and Matthew Lillard. So if you like true crime, the Dick Wolf universe, and comedic takes on pop culture, welcome home babies. Don't miss new episodes every Tuesday.

Follow That's Messed Up and SVU podcast wherever you get your podcasts. Dun dun! ["My Savior"] Hello! Hello. Hello. And welcome to my favorite murderer. That's Georgia Hartstark. That's Karen Kilgariff.

We're doing it again. Sorry, we're doing it again. We're just going to. You tune in to see if we'll just stop doing it already. That's Christmas is when we stop. This is regular, we're back. It's still January though, sorry to tell you. Oh my god, it's day 104 of January. Sorry to report from TikTok, but there's some real funny people on TikTok and

there was a video I saw this morning and it was like a guy, it would seem like a guy and his husband. And they were just like, hey, happy Monday, just letting you know. It's still January. And then the husband behind him goes, it's January 49th. And it made me laugh really hard. I think you'll get a kick out of this.

Have you seen Maestro yet? Yes. Okay. Well Saturday night, my dad came over for dinner. We sat down to watch Maestro and I realized like, kind of don't have any idea exactly what's going to happen. And so I text my lady group and was like, Hey, is there any awkward scenes I shouldn't watch with my dad in Maestro?

You know, like I suddenly realized like there could be sex scenes and stuff like that. None other than Cara Clank of That's Messed Up podcast wrote, You mean the anal plug scene? And I almost turned the movie off. I lost my mind. I was like, what? And it turns out she wrote just kidding. The anal plug scene, I was like, oh, no.

How come I didn't know about this? We're watching this with my fucking dad. You dive toward the television. You can't trust that text thread. You're gonna have to go to like, you know, the mom's movie review or whatever, online website thing that tells you. Yeah, everyone don't worry.

You can watch it with your parents. It's that there is no anal plug scene. Unfortunately, that got cut, I guess. Not a part of it. No, that's hearsay and potentially slander. So. Allegedly. Yeah.

Allegedly. That's Kara Klink just being her funny, funny self. What's going on with you this week? What do you need to get off your chest? Thank you for finally asking what I want to talk about. I bought some books online because I realized the only thing that was keeping me from reading and having something to say. This podcast was just the purchase of said books.

It was like I was sitting there going like, well, there's just none here. Therefore I can't read. books. It was like I was sitting there going like, well, there's just none here, therefore, I can't read. And the early recommendations that we can start with you. Well, I'd have to get up and, oh, you know what? Maybe I don't because maybe this woman's name is so outstanding that I remembered it offhand. Her name is Yula Bliss, E-U-L-A. That's pretty. It's a book called Having and Being Had. Ooh. And somebody on Book Talk recommended it.

Time Magazine writes, a powerful look at the ways in which we assign value to the people, places, and things that comprise our lives. So it's just like this very interesting, almost like essay series, but it's all about having and being had, I guess. It's really good writing.

Yeah, there's a lot of awards, a lot of Guggenheim fellowship type stuff in her bio, like good stuff, but it was like one of those kinds of things where the person was like, I couldn't stop reading this book and then they held it up to the camera and that cover art is so appealing to me that I was like, I know I'm going to like that book. Right?

It's like a still life of a table with lobster stuff on it. Yeah. Peaches and lobster. That's me, baby. That's your favorite combo. But you know what it is too? Sometimes I feel like a book like that, it's like, well, I didn't go to college. So I don't know what they'll mean when they're postulating about, I buy this thing and it means that about Greek myths or something. Like that's where I get all freaked out.

And it's not like that. It's a very simple and very compelling book to read. And it's like, that's all you need. You just need to open it and like it and be able to hook in. About college. Don't need debt to enjoy smart things. You know, I feel like most people, maybe 10 years post college have forgotten everything they learned in college. And so that means we're now decades out of what we would have learned.

Forgotten. Yeah. Learned and forgotten. And learned and forgotten. And yet we keep reading learned. Forgotten. Yeah. Learned and forgotten. And learned and forgotten. And yet we keep reading and therefore we keep learning. And I'm going to start reading and then I'm going to start learning. That's my plan.

That's right. It's so simple. These are our tips for learning. I have a movie recommendation, a horror, a fun horror flick that's like fun to watch. Long time friend of the podcast, Joan Aray, is in a movie that just came out called Destroy All Neighbors. You can watch it on, what's it called? One of the greatest recommendation corners of all time.

I'm just trying to remember the name of the network that you could watch it on. Oh, is it like one of those like buzz saw? One of the ones that sounds like it can kill you? Yeah, but it starts with an S. Slytherer. It's on Shutter. Slytherer was close.

It's called Destroy All Neighbors and you know who's freaking in it, his co-star is none other than Bill S. Preston Esquire from Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure. Oh, Alex Winter? Alex Winter. Yeah. It's such a fun movie. Jonah Ray is a very, very close old friend and I highly recommend it, Destroy All Neighbors.

It's really fun. All right, what other, oh, I finished the Fisk series on Netflix, you recommended it and it's the lady lawyer who wears a brown suit and she's just really like, ugh. You recommended it and it's the lady lawyer who wears a brown suit and she's just really like, ugh. I recommended it? Yeah, could have sworn you recommended it. On Netflix?

It's an Australian comedy. I don't know if it was me, was it? Nope. Really? It was me. I watched it for five minutes, but I don't remember. I never watched it. I literally, like, it was probably two Mondays ago when we were recording and when I went to like watch TV I'm like well.

Oh I'm happy for you. Thank you for the recommendation. Well here's the thing about it. I need a series that has at least two seasons. The dream is like four or five seasons. Cause you're done minutes if it's just one season. Yes, exactly. And if you like it and it's the kind of thing like when, you know, I was like really addicted to and very much needed the Poirot series

where it's like, I need to go look at that man in his mustache every night. That's the only way I'm going to go to sleep. It's very strange. For 26 seasons. Yes, exactly. And it's also enough of the like kind of a little bit of flowery British accent where it's like,

it's like a lullaby going to sleep. Did you watch the, there's a new Gary Oldman? Slow Horses? Yeah. The detective flick. I hear people like it though. We liked it. Okay, I'll write that one down.

Watch it like you're like, I know what this is in the beginning. I'm like, I know what that's me. I shouldn't tell everyone that they're a nihilist and really negative. It's just me. You're really negative in the beginning. I'm like, I know what this is.

I don't need to watch this. I know what's gonna happen. And then in the middle or the beginning of like episode two, you're like, oh, this is absolutely not what I thought. And it's good. I've heard other people saying that they like it. Yeah, it's good. I'm fucking Will Gary, not Will Oldham.

Gary Oldman. It's a totally different genre of things. Gary Oldman's music is amazing. Although Will Oldham is also an actor. Huge fan of Will Oldham. Which is kind of crazy. I know I really like that guy, but also really like Gary Oldman. Me too.

My God, yeah. Real good. And he's kind of got it. Like, I said to Vince, like, he's like this farting washed, like literally part of his character is that he farts. Washed up old detective type of thing And I'm like I'm with greasy hair and everything. I'm sorry, but he's still got it You got it bad for Gary old old farting Gary old me. This is Gary. It's not the character obviously

It's Gary Oldman. He's just so fucking cool. He is very cool. He also has like a with holders face He is the kind of face where he's just flatly staring at you. And then you're like, well, you're leaving all this blank space for me to fall in love with you, so fine. That's what I'll do then. I mean, go watch True Romance if you never want to see him the same again.

Oh, is that the one where he has like an eye patch and a gold tooth and a fucking parrot on his shoulder and shit? Oh, the 90s. Those movies. But really quick, I just want to tell you, if you want to go back and watch Fisk, Fisk has one of those quiet, constant, it's like you enter into this little comedy world

of a law firm in Melbourne, and you never want to leave. Every person is hilarious, and it's very low-key. And I loved it and was sad when it was over, two seasons. No, no, we'll watch it, definitely then. Okay, well I'm good. I'm stealing that recommendation from you because you never gave it and I'm giving it now, Fisk. Who knows, knowing me, I was like,

I don't know how to talk about this. Plus if it was a couple of weeks ago, we were on break. I don't even think that happened. Stop accusing me of lying. I remember it so clearly of like the way you said it was like, it's interesting just watch it. But maybe you just said a different title and I saw the F or something. Okay, everyone let us know

because you guys pay attention to our ass. Guys, what happened? What did she say? What is happening? It's been eight years. We don't have enough fucking brain capacity left. We didn't go to college. But also we're acting like the audience has to tell us

like we can't go listen to an old episode. I don't want to listen to this. I don't want to listen to that shit. I am not a fan. Should we go to exactly right corner? Yeah, I think so. I really feel like in year nine we should start writing stuff down and just giving people

kind of more of a show. Boo! That sucks! You can't see this because this isn't video. I still haven't learned yet. I have both my thumbs down and I'm actively pointing them downward. That's my favorite thing that Georgia does in texting, is if you're texting and often in business, it makes me laugh so hard, or people will be like, tell us something, and then she'll just give their text a thumbs down. I'll be like, guys, you have to pay your taxes.

Don't forget, you have to pay your taxes, thumbs down. Don't underestimate the thumbs down response. Very effective. I love it. Okay, we have a podcast network. It's called exactly right media. Here are some highlights. Well, we also have this thing called Nick Terry's MFM Animated series, which is our very favorite

husband of a listener, Nick Terry, got it together to actually start making us animated clips of this show. And there's a new one out. It's Coincidence Island, MFM episode 129, which is the Galapagos affair that Georgia covered and the line, I curse you with my dying breath. So go to youtube.com slash exactly right media. And you can watch that. And you can watch all of the MFM animated.

They are so delightful. They are so good. If you're having a bad day, the little Easter eggs he puts in there are my absolute favorite. It's just, it's really enjoyable. Yeah, thank you, Nick Tara. You've made our lives better of all things.

Yeah, thank you for working with us and letting us pay you to continue to do what's, basically we love, it's our own voices somehow getting reused in a different way. It's the best. I love it. And then on this podcast, we love it's our own voices somehow getting reused in a different way. It's the best. I love it. And then on this podcast, we'll kill you. Aaron and Aaron share all of the biological and historical information about tonsils.

That's fascinating. I've never thought about like what and where and why and how and then when, you know, I love them. Of tonsils. I learned a very disturbing thing about tonsils that I actually don't think I'm gonna share because I learned it over Christmas and it was so gross. No, tell, tell, I love grist stuff.

For real? I love grist stuff. There are things, and I believe they're called, I'm not gonna remember the right name, but let's just say they called them tonsil nodules. You can get, like your tonsils swell up and they get like plaque in them. And then-

I see the little rocks that look like little rocks. Yeah, so if you cough it up, you're coughing up and sometimes it gives people a bad breath or sometimes it like causes problems in other ways, but you can actually cough shit up that's stuck in your tonsils. Oh, I've watched videos. Are you serious?

No purpose, but like if I'm scrolling and it's happening, I'm like, whoa, you know, because I love those gross videos of things. It's like fascinating. Fascinating. I'm sure the errands tell us all about it. Yeah. I love that shit. Get all the facts straight about what we're talking about

by listening to this podcast will kill you. It's not from this podcast, you'll get it. No. I promise you that. Also over on Adulting with our friends Michelle Boutot and Jordan Carlos, Georgia is the guest this week. Hey, that's me. Giving advice, talking about perfectionism and favorite grandma names. Actor and comedian Zach Woods from the office in Silicon Valley visits Bridger's backyard for a very fun episode of I Said No Gifts. You guys.

Come on. Zach Woods is a fucking treasure. Please. Please. Hold on, let me just do a girlish giggle really quick. But also, let me just say, Bridger books the greatest guests on I Said No Gifts. Like if you're ever looking for just like fun conversations, I mean, of course, Zach

Woods I bet is going to be delightful. He also just had Joe Zimmerman on who's a comic who I just started seeing on TikTok here and there, hilarious, like such a funny conversation. It's just so good. That's a great show. Emma Thompson's been on it, like, come on, you guys. Okay, now, and lastly, thanks to your purchase of the MFM logo pin last year, we were able to donate, listen to this,

$13,000 to Planned Parenthood. And we're gonna be updating the Exactly Right Store, so for right now, all incoming money from the sale of those same pins are going to benefit the National Abortion Fund, which is a network of 100 independent abortion funds that work to remove financial and logistical barriers to abortion access, which in this moment in time is about as difficult as it can be in our recent history. So please buy a pin and your money will be going to a good cause.

Yeah, it says black and white pins, just our logo. The proceeds will always go to a charity of some sort. Go to abortionfunds.org if you want to find out more, but 13,000 to Planned Parenthood, you guys, that's fucking incredible. We're so proud to be able to hand that money over in the name of murderinos. Yes, thank you so much.

So badass. Should we match it? Yes. Right? Great idea. Let's fucking match it. Guys, the reason that moment was so exciting was because it was real.

That was not real. That was real because I knew Karen wouldn't say no. Like, can you imagine? I was like, Karen, off camera real quick. Should we match it? I don't think so. Let them do it. No, no. They're? I don't think so. Let them do it. No, no.

They're fine. Let's do it. Let's do it. 26. So we actually, you know what? Should we round it up and just make it 30? 30. Let's fucking donate 30,000 to Planned Parenthood.

Nice. Round number four. Abortion access, Planned Parenthood, women's health care, contraception, fucking anything you need. I mean, my God, the amount of times I couldn't pay for my fucking birth control in my 20s at Planned Parenthood. And it was just like, okay, here you go.

Yeah, we had it so good back then. Oh, we did. Let's try to make it a little bit better for the people right now who need the same and are having it all taken away from them Please. Oh, yeah Georgia, I know you know this but Valentine's Day can be a stressful time. Amen Should you make plans? Is it too late to get a good boyfriend? Oh wait, is it too late to get a good reservation?

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Who's first? You? I think I'm first. I'm gonna do a cold open. So I'm just gonna tell you that today I'll be covering a double homicide that feels like it was ripped right out of an Agatha Christie novel. And the main sources I used in today's story

include an article in Artful Living by Joe Kimball, an article from MPR News by Dan Cracker, an archival article from the star Tribune by Peg Meyer and Joe Kimball, and the other sources are listed in our show notes. Were you saying M as in Mary PR News, not N? MPR, it's real tricky. I wouldn't name my news corporation MPR knowing there's an NPR.

I'm guessing it's from Minnesota, because that's where the story takes place. So Minnesota Public News. Public radio. Public PR, public radio. So like kind of not their fault. I could have put it together. I could have. Okay. So here's put it together. I could have.

OK. So here's my cold open. OK. It's 7 AM on June 27, 1977. Boom. I remember it well. The day nurse for a wealthy elderly heiress of one of Duluth, Minnesota's most prominent local families

shows up at the famous Glensheen mansion to relieve the night nurse. But as she approaches the grand stairwell of the 39 room estate, 39 room, she sees the night nurse lying on a seat beneath the window of the platform of the stairs. And at first it looks as though the night nurse is taking a nap, which I don't think you're supposed to do. No. But as she gets closer, she sees that the night nurse's head

is beaten and covered in blood and that the night nurse isn't breathing. And a brass candlestick holder caked in blood lies on the floor beside her. Panic, the day nurse rushes upstairs to check on the elderly heiress. And when she enters the bedroom, she finds a satin pillow covering her lifeless face,

apparently having been smothered to death. Oh. Years later, the estate would be donated to the University of Minnesota, Duluth, and they still run guided tours of the mansion to this day. But one thing your tour guide won't talk to you about during the tour is the tragedy of Glen Sheen's dark past. This is the 1977 double murder of Elizabeth Congdon

and her nurse, Velma Petia, aka the Glen Sheen murders. It sounds slightly familiar, but it also is how many, many of these stories start. It is very similar to many, many of these stories we have heard before, unfortunately. Yeah. So, here we go. Let's start from the beginning. In the early 1900s, that means that's end cold open.

In the early 1900s. Also, it's the turn of the century. That is. My favorite era. In Karen's favorite era, the early 1900s. Also, it's the turn of the century. That is my favorite era. In Karen's favorite era, the early 1900s, the turn of the century, Chester Congdon ran Duluth, Minnesota, your favorite fucking vacation, hot vacation spot. Can you imagine if you were just the kingpin of Duluth, the kind of fur hats you'd be wearing as you strutted around town at the bowling alley. Oh yeah.

Fucking ordering grilled cheese for people left, right and center. You had a cane and you don't even need it. Yeah. Oh my dude. Come on. But he's a savvy lawyer turned industrialist. He's most known for developing Minnesota's robust iron and copper mining business in the Lake Superior County region, blah, blah, blah. You know, like he does all the things in all places and he gets fucking wealthiest shit

from it. Long story short, this makes Chester, along with his wife, Clara, and their seven children incredibly wealthy. In May of 1905, he uses $854,000 of his fortune to build this mansion. How $854,000 today, I have the number, what do you want? And it's from the turn of the century, I understand. And he's building a 39 room, 22 acre estate along Lake Superior.

So like that's not small potatoes. A little less than a million dollars turn of the century would today be the equivalent of, my guess, is $32 million? You are closer to right than wrong. Oh. 27.8 million. Hey, look at you.

Not bad, not bad. No, probably to furnish the place, you're probably right. That's right, and put in all those beautiful roses. Beautiful roses and the water features, you're probably right. That's right. And put in all those beautiful roses. Oh, beautiful roses and the like water features, you know. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. So it's a long lake superior. It's massive and he calls it glenching mansion. And it quickly becomes the crown jewel of Duluth.

For all his riches and intellect, though, Chester basically sucks. He's a tough old brute. He's a very conservative Republican. He's infamously cheap and uses his political powers to support his business endeavors until his death in 1916. However, though, where Chester was a brute, his daughter Elizabeth is sweet, kind, and generous. After her father's death, 22-year-old Elizabeth drops out of Vassar, where she was attending college to help take care of her mother and the Glensheen estate. That keeps her super busy, but she still finds

plenty of time to volunteer all over the region. She becomes the first president of the King's Daughter Society, later the Duluth Junior League, which is a women's organization for leadership and community work. She volunteers at St. Luke's Hospital. Later, she serves on the St. Luke's Hospital Guild Board. During World War II, she organizes the Nurses Aid Committee for the Duluth chapter of the American Red Cross. She and a friend, a physician named Elizabeth Bagley, also established a women's clinic in the 1930s. So she's just like trying to right the wrongs of her fucking father. Sure. Who among us? She also gives lots of money from her family's multi-million dollar fortune to a wide range of charities, causes and arts groups,

including the Duluth Symphony, her church and even just local residents who have fallen on hard times. And she does it quietly. She's not all big and showy about it like announcing it on a podcast or whatever. She's gonna take that out. Sorry. We didn't even know you have to leave it in because also we didn't raise half of it. So we don't get the credit. Like we make our listeners pay half

and then we're like, guess what guys? Hey, can we split the bill? Elizabeth's love life is very quiet and not active. She dates a few men, but never marries. She still wants children though. So in 1932, she adopts a three-month-old baby girl from North Carolina, who she names Marjorie. And then three years later, in 1935,

she adopts another baby girl and names her Jennifer. So Marjorie, the first daughter, exhibits, quote, troubled behavior as a kid, often getting disciplined at her prep school in Massachusetts. In the summer of 1949, at age 16, she's taken to the Meninger Clinic in Topeka, Kansas, where she's labeled a sociopath. Oh, I don't think you're allowed to do that anymore, people under 18. I bet. Right. But also just the idea that you could ship off,

how old was she when it happened? 16. Oh, okay. At least she was a teenager. It was like, if you're doing that to a kid, it's like, ooh, that is, that is right after the Great Depression. That is some weird stuff people are just doing.

Well, and this is really unfortunate because Elizabeth, the mother, doesn't want this getting out. And so she, in order to sleep it under the rug, Elizabeth chooses not to seek further treatment for her daughter. So it's definitely, you can imagine what the first 16 years of her life, Marjorie's life were like,

without getting treatment for her issues, labeled as sociopath and then she's just doubling down on it, you know? Right. It's like you kind of had no chance at all. Marjorie had no chance. Sadly, over the years, Elizabeth siblings all pass away and then in July of 1950,

Elizabeth's mother Clara passes away as well. So Elizabeth is the last remaining Congdon and so she inherits Glensheen Mansion for her own. So she's going to stay there for the rest of her life, and then she wants to donate it. So in 1951, at age 19, Marjorie Marys, an insurance agent named Richard LaRoy, and moves to Minneapolis. And then four years later, her other daughter Jennifer gets married and moves from Wisconsin. So with her daughters married off and living with her husbands, Elizabeth is the last remaining Congdon living at Glensheen

alongside her staff, which must be huge if there's 39 rooms. Yeah, must be. And also so lonely if you had so much family around you and now you're the last one. Yeah. But I think her community engagement kept her active, which is good. However, she does grow old. She does her volunteer work as long as possible. But in 1971, Elizabeth suffers a stroke that leaves her paralyzed on one side of her body. And so she's relegated to using a wheelchair and has round the clock nurses tending to her.

But she's still a beloved figure in her community and the beacon of kindness and generosity to everyone in Duluth. So her daughter Marjorie, however, prefers to spend her money on herself. Sure. Sure. After marrying Dick LaRoy in 1951 and moving to Minneapolis, Marjorie has seven children. Neighbors and friends see Marjorie as, quote, industrious, successfully taking on projects like stripping and repainting her kitchen cabinets. And her kids are always dressed the nines and proper and polite, which just sounds like an influencer. I know.

So does the stripping of the cabinets. It's like, well, whoa, what are you doing? What's going on in that house? Yeah. Come see my DIY. Fuck. My new DIY project is stripping my cabinets. Are you fucking kidding me?

It's because they were all on speed back then. It was the 50s at this point. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But at the same time, Marjorie's behavior is problematic. She overspends constantly.

She lies compulsively. According to one acquaintance, Marjorie can quote, make up fibs faster than anyone could keep track of. Fun. On top of that, a case arises in which Marjorie is suspected of arson after one of her family's homes in Minnesota catches fire, but the case has quickly dropped. So there's some curious stuff going on with Marjorie.

After 20 years together, Dick files for divorce in April of 1971, wanting a new start, Marjorie moves to Colorado where she meets her next husband, Roger Caldwell. She meets about a parents without partners meeting in 1975. So 1975. What was that meeting like? It's a lot of people in brown, like with mustaches, boys and girls. Everyone had a mustache. Everyone had a mustache and a brown sweater. And the smoking going on in there. Smoking and drinking Sanka and just getting their feelings out there into the community. Keep your feelings out of the community, please. Parents, help partners. That's one like people, I mean, I always said

when we were in grammar school, it felt like all of a sudden, everyone's parents were getting divorced. And I didn't realize it was because they passed a no fault divorce law. And it was like either in 1979 or 1980 or something. So literally that is what happened where suddenly it was like, oh, you don't have to like break the bank

or totally become enemies. You can just divorce because what's the word? It reckons how it differences. Yeah, exactly. And you were close to Reno too, which is like quickie divorce country, right? True, but then you didn't have to go in it. You didn't have to do it quickie anymore.

You could be like, oh no, it's just, yeah, let's. So that's why I'm- Amicably. And then everyone's getting divorced. And then people were going to meetings like parents without partners, either a widow, dad or a, you know, whatever. And all of a sudden you're looking around your grammar school like one of these people could be my new stepbrother or sister. Like suddenly anything's possible in reality.

Oh man. And I asked my parents every time they even slightly raise their voices. like suddenly anything's possible in reality. And I asked my parents, every time they even slightly raised their voices, I was like, are you getting a divorce now? And my mother would be like, you have to stop saying that. It's like, I just want to be prepared so I can start picking my room and picking which one of you I'm going with.

Which one of these bitches at school is gonna be my fucking step sister because I have thoughts and feelings about this. It's not gonna work out. This definitely sounds like the plot of a babysitter's club. Yeah, right? Yeah. So they meet in 1975, they marry and Marjorie's shopping sprees pick back up.

She has a million dollars in her trust fund, all of which she spends on fancy clothing and matching ice skating and horse riding gear for her, Roger and all the kids. When Marjorie's first husband Dick grew frustrated with the spending, the new dude, Roger loves it. Even when Marjorie overspends and bounces checks, the two just sit tight and wait for the mom, Elizabeth to swoop in and pay the bills as she always does. They're fucking wealthy, you know? And she's like, I can buy whatever I want. Right.

But as the stroke deteriorates, Elizabeth's health, she hands the reins of the family bank stuff over to the Congdon Estate Trustees. And the trustees, of course, are far less forgiving than Elizabeth, and they cut Marjorie off immediately, refusing to fund her ridiculous spending any longer. How weird would that be if there was suddenly a group of people involved in your family decision making? Yeah, this is so Seinfeld.

By 1977, just two years into Roger and Marjorie's marriage, they go completely broke. Both of their cars are repossessed, which shows you how like actually cut off they were. And the bank forecloses on their house, but they are not giving up that lifestyle. In fact, in the spring of 1977, they take tours of multimillion dollar ranch properties

across the state of Colorado, assuring realtors that Marjorie's mom will foot the bill. Multi-million dollar ranches in 1977 in Colorado. Yeah. That's a lot of money. It's a lot of money. Yeah. Okay, so now we're back at the beginning of the story.

That summer, back in Duluth at Glen Sheen on the evening of June 26, 1977, nurse Velma Patia makes her last check-in on Elizabeth before turning in for the night. She's the night nurse. And she had been Elizabeth's head nurse for the first several years after Elizabeth stroke. She actually retired the month before in May of 1977, hoping to spend more time with her husband. But the usual night nurse called out sick for the evening. And Elizabeth Stapp tried to find another replacement, but no one else was available. So despite her husband's protest, Velma gallantly stepped in to take care of her friend, Elizabeth. You know, they were closed at that point, but she couldn't leave her hanging.

So at 7am the next morning, June 27, 1977, Nurse Mildred Garvoo shows up at Glensheen to relieve Velma and finds this horrible scene of Velma dead in this chair. There was a brass candlestick holder caked in her blood on the floor beside her and in the bedroom where Elizabeth is found with a satin pillow covering her lifeless face and the bedroom had been ransacked and much of Elizabeth's jewelry is missing, as well as like valuable Byzantine era coins, all this shit, so Mildred immediately calls 911. So three days later on June 30th, 1977, the Congdon family members and friends come from near and far for Elizabeth's funeral,

including Marjorie and Roger Caldwell. Everyone notices that Roger's face and hands are scuffed like he's been in some kind of struggle. Marjorie like blows it off and says he just been kicked by a horse on the ranch. And it's too late, however, and alarm bells are going off in her family members heads. Of course, luckily this time nobody is like, Oh, oh, well, and like blows it off. Everyone says cops like to fucking check this guy out, you know? in her family members' heads, of course. Luckily, this time, nobody's like, oh, oh well, and like blows it off. Everyone says the cops like,

to fucking check this guy out, you know? Yeah. And they also mentioned to the cops, Marjorie's troubled past, her wild spending, her being cut off by the state trustees, and the biggest motive of all, an $8 million trust fund waiting for Marjorie in the wake of Elizabeth's death.

So $8 million today, her trust fund would be worth how much? Let's see. It's an $8 million trust fund, but it's in 1977? Seven, yeah. So it's later. $8 million, 77. So it's going to be, are we going to be up near $70 million? We're at 40.5. Dang.

So like basically half. A lot of money. Yeah. There's a bunch of evidence pointing to them, perhaps most damning of all is that well, there's no DNA identification technology at the time. The hair is found at the scene of the crime, seemed to match Rogers and the blood type

found at the scene also matches Rogers. It's not bulletproof evidence, but it's enough to build a case and Roger is arrested for the murders of Valma Patila and Elizabeth Congdon two weeks after the murder. It's enough to float the first episode of Forensic Files that was on this case. And they were like, they had him. Wait, is that true?

No, no, I'm just making up. But it's like, they're like, this hair kind of looks like his. Or it's like, no, I'm just making up. But it's like, they're like, this hair kind of looks like his. Or it's like, no, that actually isn't. They put two like, what, when Merlin, they'd wheel the overhead projector into your elementary school class to show you. Like they put a hair next to a hair

on an effect, an overhead projector, and it lined up. They looked kind of similar, because that's what human hair looks like. And it was both human hair. Ugh. So much junk science. So much. The trial starts on May 9th, 1978. Basically, the prosecution has all this kind of evidence, but then they're unable to identify the hand prints that are left in the bathroom sink,

where the killer had supposedly washed off Elma's blood before fleeing. The prints don't match Rodgers, but it's also like it matches other people's, you know, it's all kind of inconclusive. However, a lot of it is very suspect. And the prosecution also fails to find anyone who saw Roger in Duluth during the time of the murders, nor can they find any record of Roger having flown

from Denver to the Minneapolis, St. Paul Airport during that time, but it's the fucking 70s. An airport, they're just like, go on ahead. Everybody could walk in and out of the airport anytime they pleased. They'd be like, I need to run onto the plane and tell my mom one last thing. Exactly. It's very different. So the jury deliberates for two and a half days before landing on their verdict, Roger

Caldwell is found guilty of both murders and he's sentenced to a minimum of 35 years in prison. Oh, wow. Yeah. There's like a lot more evidence, but I'm not going to. Oh, okay. So there was some conclusive something or do you think it was just... Yeah.

There was some conclusive stuff for sure. So Rogers' convictions locked in and now authorities come after Marjorie, and they charged her with plotting the crime. They believe that she didn't participate in the actual murders, but she was the mastermind behind the plot. So Marjorie hires Duluth's best defense attorney, Ron Meshbersher, whose strategies to poke holes in the arguments made in Rogers' case, which he does all over the place. She doesn't testify, but Marjorie is very helpful with her case

because she comes to court every day with a smile. She knits at her seat being like, I'm innocent. I knit. I don't know. She even brings a cake that she made to the courthouse on her lawyer's birthday. And everyone's like, she can't be a killer. She knits and bakes. All of those things would be regarded so differently today. If you were... Yeah, you can't do that. You were there just smiling.

Just smiling during your own murder case. Like what? And like, yeah, knitting needles, those aren't allowed in court anymore. There's no way. You had no hobbies during your trial. How about that? What? And like, yeah, knitting needles, those aren't allowed in court anymore. There's no way. You have no hobbies during your trial. How about that? Just sit there.

Jesus. Yeah. But her warm affect wins over the jury, and she's ultimately acquitted of any involvement in the murders in 1979. Wow. Yeah. And so her acquittal does more than just let her walk free.

It also gives Rogers defense attorneys a chance to file for an appeal. Basically, her lawyer had poked so many holes in the prosecution's case against Roger that in August of 1982, the Minnesota Supreme Court overturns Rogers conviction and grants him a retrial. So he's released from prison and he's like, peace out, goes home to his hometown of Latvravi, Pennsylvania. I bet I said that so fucking wrong. Ooh, and they're going to be mad too.

Latvravi, Pennsylvania. Try it three more ways. One of those had to be wrong. And so Duluth officials are afraid that if they retry Roger and he gets let go, you know, it's going gonna look really bad. So they tell Roger that if he admits to the murders and pleads guilty, he won't have to serve any more jail time. So he admits that he waited outside the estate until dark,

clumbed over the fence and killed the women. Whoa, he admits it. He says there was no elaborate plot, it was just meant to be a smash, it was just meant to be a robbery actually. He says, quote, I didn't have any plan. This was the most amateurish, slipshod thing now that I've had years to ponder it.

It sounds like he was just gonna steal some jewelry or something, but the Night Nurse surprised him. Oh, maybe she had the candlestick to begin with or maybe he grabbed it, bludgeoned her and then had to kill, you know, quote unquote, had to kill Elizabeth to get away with it. Right, because she's probably in there screaming, listening to her night nurse being murdered and knows something terrible is happening. Exactly. I don't mean to call you out, but I do think that while you were explaining that, you did say he clummed over a wall. I do think that while you were explaining that, you did say he clummed over a wall.

Like the past tense of climbed. Yeah, I did that on purpose. Did you really? Yes. I love the word clum. I'm sorry. I think it needs to be used more. I'm not just trying to cover my ass.

You know I'll admit when I'm wrong. Clum on over that wall. Oh, shit. OK, sorry. So OK, then that aside, this idea Come on over that wall. Oh shit. Okay. Sorry. So, okay. Then that aside, this idea that they would tell him, you don't have to go back to jail. If you just admit it seems insane to me. It seems insane.

And then it seems it seemed that he would accept it too. Unless he did it. He has nothing to lose. Right. Except. Yeah. I mean, he knows that means they have nothing and are not going to take him back to court, right? Yeah. So he could have said no either way. So he just wanted to get

it off his chest because he really did it? Yes, I think so. I mean, because why would you then you just stay in firm knowing you aren't it either way you're not going to jail. So in my sense of coverage, all the evidence I didn't report, you know, there was definitely enough evidence against him that I don't think anyone was surprised that he, you know. You're saying he's like, he basically was getting off on a technicality,

but they just wanted to know the truth. So they were like, look, we can't send you to jail. Can you just tell us? And they didn't want an untried or unsolved case on their books. Well, it worked. Their plan worked. He also said he was very drunk and doesn't remember much else. But he makes clear that he had no accomplice and that Marjorie was not involved in any way.

Hmm. I disagree. I'm gonna go ahead and be on your side with that. I'm doubting it. So he returns to Pennsylvania, a free man, but his life is sad and lonely. He lives in a small apartment above a bar. He barely gets by. At one point he tries to get more money. Actually he asked for $50,000 from the condons

by promising evidence that there were more people involved in the murders, but they are not interested and he gets nothing. And in 1988 at age 54, Roger takes his own life. Oh no. Yeah, wow. Well, Marjorie was acquitted of plotting to murder her mother. The rest of her life is filled with suspicious coincidences

and blatant crimes. Her first suspicious coincidence comes when she reunites with some old friends, a married couple named Wally and Helen Hagen. After Helen is diagnosed with Alzheimer's, she's placed in a nursing home. And strangely, a few days after one of Marjorie's visits, I'm gonna go ahead and say allegedly,

Helen falls into a coma and dies three days later. And soon after that, Marjorie marries Wally, the husband. Oh my God. Yeah. Then after Marjorie and Wally's wedding, they sell a house in the Twin Cities and the day of the move, the house catches fire. And interestingly, Marjorie still owed mortgage payments

on the house. So she's found guilty of arson and insurance fraud and spends 20 months in prison. Wasn't there another arson allegation in her past? There was another, yes, exactly. She and Wally move into a mobile home in, I'm gonna go Ajo, Arizona, A-J-O. Oh yeah.

Ajo, Ajo. It's a tiny town not far from the Mexican border. And then while they're there, Wally allegedly gets cancer and eventually he's confined to a wheelchair, then Marjorie is caught trying to burn down the neighbor's house with a kerosene-soaked rag. What?

And she says it's because the neighbor's dog had been barking too loudly. So she tried to burn the fucking house down. There's steps in between that we could have taken. Absolutely. She goes to prison for another eight months, and while she awaits her trial, and during which time Wally's health strangely improves. How she's gone.

Oh. Yeah. Oh, she, it's almost like Marjorie's doing all the crimes, like, simultaneous. That's intense. Okay. So her trial comes in 1992. She's found guilty in sentenced to 15 years in prison.

She convinces the judge to give her one more day of freedom to take care of Wally, her husband, the judge grants it. Of course. But orders patrol cars to keep watch over the house though. One of the patrolling officers smells natural gas coming from the house and then knocks on the door. The Marjorie says a pilot light blew out and everything's fine. A couple hours later, Wally is dead.

Wow. Police find a hose running from the stove up to Wally's bedroom. They find pills at his bedside and a quote double suicide note saying Marjorie is innocent and they don't want to go on living without each other. And Marjorie is arrested for Wally's murder, but fearing that the evidence isn't solid

enough, authorities dropped the charges because Marjorie said it was supposed to be a double suicide but she chickened out. I don't know, only one of them ended up dead. That's a real, it's almost like a sensitive position to be in because you're claiming that this was the most noble of like, we don't wanna be without each other and on and on. And then conveniently, conveniently I'm not involved

in the, when the death part comes, like not good. Right. Marjorie serves 10 years for 15 year attempted arson sentence. She applies for early parole in 2001, but her own children write letters to the judge begging to keep her locked up. Yeah. Yeah. So she isn't released until 2004. She moves to Tucson, Arizona. released until 2004. She moves to Tucson, Arizona. There's a computer fraud, stealing money, a thing, charge against her. She manages to get three years probation. And as far as anyone knows, she is still living in Tucson to this day at age 91. Oh, wow.

That's why everything is alleged and always will be. That's right. So Elizabeth Congdon had willed the Glensheen estate to the University of Minnesota Duluth upon her death, and they still run guided tours of the mansion to this day. And they used a really strict rule about not discussing the murders that took place there over 45 years ago. However, now they will discuss it after the tour. They don't do it during, so they don't scare children while they're standing in this room

where this took place. You know what I mean? Listeners, this is a direct message to you. You're not allowed to take that tour and then expect answers to your questions during. Please, discretion at all times. Wait until you're in the foyer at the end of the, or the, you know, the gift shop.

That's probably a pleasant place to be. You probably don't even have to go on the tour if you just grab that tour guide while she's trying to go take her break. Yeah, but however, we do need to know if this place is haunted. So we're gonna need you to go there and then write to my favorite murderer at gmail.com for a hometown story.

Also, how strange would it be that you're kind of broke and living in Tucson, meanwhile, your family's mansion? The state. It's a gigantic, like, that's how much money you had and that's how much money you kind of lost. So fucked up. Wow. I mean, I wonder how the other daughter fared

because it doesn't sound like she had the same. Situation. Situation, you know what I mean? Like maybe she's fine. Yeah. And taken care of. Wow. It's fucked up shit, man. And that is the sad story of the Glen Sheen murders.

Wow. There was a lot of crime in that story. A lot of different crimes. True crime, true crime. All true. When would say? Some alleged. Hey, Georgia.

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That's prettylitter.com.mfm. Code MFM to save 20%. Prettylitter.com.mfm. Code MFM. Terms and conditions apply. See site for details. Goodbye. Georgia, we're going to go ahead and take a slight left turn, although there's elements in both stories that match. But today I'm going to tell you about a serial fraudster who spent three decades of his life scamming his way into palaces,

fancy states, and millions of dollars. First, I'm going to talk about business very quickly. Just cause I'm sure you know most of this, but we're just gonna go over some important items. Okay, I don't know if I know this. Saudi Arabia and the Saudi Arabian Oil Company, or ARAAMCO, is the world's largest oil producer. That might be a given for many people,

but these are those kind of details that I wouldn't have been able to say with certainty if I was playing Jeopardy at my dad's house yelling answers at the TV. Absolutely not. So Saudi Arabia, world's largest oil producer, the company that basically makes all the money off that is called a Ramco. And it turns out a Ramco is the most profitable company in the world. That's how well they do with all of their oil. So it's owned by the state, which means it's owned by the Saudi Royal family

who are as a result wealthy beyond imagination. So they have private jets, multi-million dollar yachts, massive palaces, a fleets of luxury cars. Their wealth is almost limitless. So in early 2016, Prince Mohammed bin Salman al-Sayyid announces plans to sell off a small percentage of a Ramco to private investors,

finally giving outside people a chance to profit off of the world's most lucrative business. So it's always been closed and then suddenly it's like there's some shares available, you too could be wealthy beyond your wildest imagination. The company is valued at an estimated $2 trillion. Holy shit. So that would make this initial public offering, or IPO, the biggest in history. So when a member of the Saudi Royal Family shows up in Miami in early 2017, offering investors a chance to buy stock before the IPO announcement becomes official,

the lucky few in his inner circle feel as though they have just struck gold. But as we well know, things, especially in Florida, are not always as they seem. This is the story of millionaire con man, Anthony Gignac. So the main sources used in this story today are a series of Vanity Fair articles from 2018 by a writer named Mark Seal and then a bonus edition of CNBC's American Greed from 2020. Now here's another little lesson that I'm going to teach you about. I'm going to teach you about a place off the coast of Miami Florida called Fisher Island. Have you ever heard of it? No. Okay. It's a man-made, members-only island reserved for the incredibly wealthy. Oh, what I was like, yeah, I've been there before. Oh, yeah, I love it there. My family vacations there.

The average annual income of a Fisher Island resident or property owner is $2.2 million, making it the richest zip code in America. Wow. Among its most notable residents are Mel Brooks. That's so funny. Yeah, I wasn't expecting that. The list is Mel Brooks, Julia Roberts and Oprah Winfrey. I would think that he, Mel Brooks, lived in like a brownstone in Brooklyn.

Absolutely. Or like a beautiful cottage, Spanish cottage in Cul a brownstone in Brooklyn. Absolutely. Or like a beautiful cottage, Spanish cottage in Culver City or something like that. Yeah. Yeah. But I don't know. He lives on Fisher Island. Okay. So it all made perfect sense when in 2015, word got around that Saudi Arabia's prince,

Khalid bin al-Sayyid, would be Fisher Island's newest resident. So he moves into a three bedroom penthouse suite that costs him $15,000 a month rent. Huh. And then he brings his fleet of luxury cars complete with a Ferrari, a Bentley, and a Rolls Royce. He also has an opulent jewelry collection, tens of thousands of dollars in cash.

So naturally he's got a security detail from Diplomatic Security Services, which is an elite law enforcement arm of the US State Department that's trained to protect diplomats. I just wanna go get coffee at the Starbucks like one day. I sit in there and like see what it's like. See what all the, the first thing I imagined

where everybody's wearing knee-high boots. Yeah. For all different reasons. Calf skin, knee-high boots, or whatever. The hats, the brims of the hats are so wide. Why? Even the princess beloved Chihuahua Foxy sports a diamond-encrusted collar

and is carried around in a $2,700 Louis Vuitton bag. Right. The Prince's flamboyant style attracts the attention of everyone on the island. And those who haven't been lucky enough to spot him in person can go ahead and watch him from afar as he regularly posts photos of himself living it up on his Instagram account. The handle of which is at printsdubi underscore 07. So no social media manager, huh?

I mean, are they trying to say that the Prince of Dubai graduated from high school in 07 or what? Or he created his account in 07, then it's just like, yeah, oh, bro. Guy, what are you doing? But the Prince is difficult to access with layers of DSS security and business partners acting as his royal gatekeepers. And you know people wanted access to the prince, especially when word gets out that he's hired an investment banker in London to offer insiders this friends and family

opportunity to buy a small percentage of his shares in a Ramco ahead of the company going public. So, the word is out that once the company goes public, investors can expect to make three to five times their money back. So, 26 investors jump at the chance and they give the prince a combined total of almost $8 million to invest. They write their checks, sit back. They start flipping through yacht catalogs

as they wait for that money to come rolling back in. But the problem is this man is not Prince Khalid bin al-Sayud. He's no prince at all. He's a convicted con man and identity thief, Anthony Gignac. So let's go to the beginning of Anthony's life. He was born Jose Enrique Moreno in Bogota, Colombia in 1970. He and his younger brother were orphaned and left to fend for themselves on the streets in the middle of a violent drug war.

So it is the worst case scenario. Orphan kids in Columbia in the early 70s were forced to either become foot soldiers, drug mules or worse, and it's worse for Jose. He is a victim of human trafficking at the age of five, and he uses any of the money that he can make from this abuse that he endures to feed himself and his younger brother who's three years old. So it is a complete nightmare. This lasts about two years until these children are taken in by local orphanage as one of Tony's lawyers would later state while trying to argue for a lesser sentence, quote, what Tony learned in his first few years of life was survival at any cost.

Yeah. Then on June 13th, 1977, the orphanage arranges the boy's adoption to an American family. The husband, Jim Gignac, and the wife, Nancy Fitzgerald, take the boys into their home in a small town of Plymouth, Michigan, and there they're raised with all of the comforts of middle-class American life. Jose Morano is

renamed Anthony Gignac, and he picks up English very quickly. He becomes fluent by the second grade, and his new life has begun. But Anthony and his brother, of course, are deeply scarred by their past. Having lived in an almost constant state of starvation on the streets of Bogota, the boys spend their first year of life in Michigan gorging themselves every time they're given food. Oh my God.

Yeah. Anthony becomes obsessed with appearing rich, which is something that ensured your safety in the streets of Bogota is like you're rich, you didn't have to worry about anything. So he starts lying to his teachers and his classmates about how much money his family has, even going so far as to say that they owned

the Grand Hotel on Mackinac Island, which is the most famous luxury hotel in that area. So when Anthony's parents find out that he's been lying like this, they take him to a therapist, but the lies never stop. When Anthony is in sixth grade, he convinces, this is probably one of my favorite details of any story, when he's in sixth grade, he convinces a car dealership that he's a Saudi Arabian prince whose father, the king, has promised to buy him a new Mercedes Benz. After a salesman takes him on a few

test drives and Anthony chooses the car that he wants, he is unable to fork over the cash and the police are called. What? How old is he? He's 12. He's a sixth grader. He's 13 at the oldest. He's a sixth grader. Oh my God. Yeah, no, he deserves that car. Yeah, he earned it with full bullshitting and guts. That's amazing. This is the first time that Anthony will impersonate a Saudi prince, but it is not the last.

A few years later, when Anthony is a teenager, his adoptive parents get a divorce. Anthony stays with their mom, but his younger brother goes to live with their dad. And this split from his brother is more than Anthony can bear. He basically breaks down. He spends time in two different psychiatric hospitals and a halfway house where he lives for a time as a ward of state. By the age of 17, he runs away to a new town. So all that, the beginning of life and everything, it's not just gonna get smoothed over by like American middle class life, there's issues.

So he makes it to Ipsilanti, Michigan, and that's where he begins to call himself Prince Adnan. He convinces a local Arab family to take him in under threat of violence by the secret police and he is so convincing that he fleeces some University of Michigan frat boys out of cash and booze. They think they're partying with like a prince. Then he steals his friend's dad's credit card and he uses it to buy himself a limo ride around Detroit.

Oh my God. What year is this? This is, oh he's 17 so it's 1987. When limos were king. Oh my God. Yeah. David Lee Roth in the hot tub in the back of the limo from that video. Nothing is hotter.

All of this leads to his first arrest in 1988. Oh, it was right there, 1988. He's released on bond and two months later, he runs off to California to start over. He makes it to the capital city of all phonies, Los Angeles, California, don't be man. And he's still using the name Adnan. Then he changes it to Prince Khalid bin al-Sayud.

So this faux Saudi prince runs up and astronomical charges at luxury hotels. He's still spending on those limo rides. Also shopping sprees at, of course, LA's ritziest retailers, Cartier Rolex, Louis Vuitton, Neiman Marcus. Sometimes he uses fake or stolen credit cards, and sometimes he just tells people his father is going to come and pick up the tab.

Oh my God. Which I love. He does wear traditional Arab garb and of course thousands of dollars worth of jewelry, so his victims tend to believe him even though he bears absolutely no resemblance to the royal Saudi family or Arabs in general. He has much darker skin. He wears a weird bowl haircut that's like not trendy or hip at all. It's kind of funny. It's more to his credit of like how he's doing this because he really wants to be doing it and he's really believable. His schemes work yet again. His first arrest in LA comes in the fall of 1991 after the 21 year old fails to pay a $3,500 bill at the Regent Beverly Wilshire Hotel and a $7,500 limo bill.

He can't let it go with the limos. Shit. I mean, before Uber, like, what did you do? I guess you just rented a stretch limo like we had in New York that time. Oh, yeah. God. Anthony's nicknamed the Prince of Fraud by the LA Times.

He has given a two-year prison sentence, but of course this doesn't deter him. As soon as he's released, he just heads right up to San Francisco and he's right back at it. He winds up spending 53 days in jail for failing to pay his bill at the Ritz Carlton and when he gets out, he flies to Honolulu, immediately violating parole. In Hawaii, he fleeces a random tourist out of $8,500 promising to invest the money in a Saudi Arabian oil field that does not exist.

How does he do that? He must be the slickest talker of all time. Like, he just must, he has the eye of the tiger. It's wild, yeah. Yeah. Then he convinces another tourist to pay for his 20,000, it's almost $21,000 resort bill because he convinces them his life is in danger.

So this is almost like the Nigerian Prince scheme in person. Like he's just coming up to you and it's at this point the early 90s where it's pre-internet. No one knows about this. So from Hawaii, he then travels to Orlando, Florida. He immediately racks up another $14,000 in charges at the Walt Disney World Resort. He gets caught again. He pleads guilty in court. He's given probation, which he again promptly ignores and then he just vanishes for a month. When he reappears, he goes on

an even more extravagant shopping spree, spending $27,000 at the Grand Bay Hotel and $51,175 at Saks Fifth Avenue. What the fuck? What's he buying? How do you get the number up? and $51,175 at Sax Fifth Avenue. What the fuck? What's he buying? How do you get the number up? It's like Brewster's Millions after a while, where it's like, how do you spend that much?

I mean, my mind. For coats? Reels, yeah. Big old ranks. Rolexes, yeah. Yeah, this spree lands him in jail for a little over a year and a half. But even while he's behind bars, Anthony is always scheming. He contacts a lawyer named Oscar Rodriguez,

and he tells him that he is the Saudi prince Khalid bin al-Sayyid, and he convinces the man to bail him out of jail and fight his case, promising his family will reimburse the lawyer for the bail and pay for the attorney fees. So Oscar takes the bait. He hires bondsman who post $46,000 for the prince's release. Then Anthony gets out. When the money fails to show up, the bondsman threatened to take him back to jail. But Anthony, as the prince, convinces the bondsman that he's a misunderstanding. And he has

the bondsman take him into an American Express office, where he then delivers a sob story about how his royal highness has been robbed. He pleads with the American Express employees there begging them to issue him a new credit card so that his father, the king doesn't get angry at him. Oh my god. The Reps miraculously believe this story. I mean, he must have been an unbelievably incredible like actor. Like, I can't even lie to Cookie about snacking on something she doesn't want. You know what I mean? Like, I swear you don't want this. Like, I can't even lie to Cookie about snacking on something she doesn't want. You know what I mean?

Like, I swear you don't want this. Like, I can't even do that. When the pressure's on, like say you had to be like, hey, lie to the waitress so we can get our bill and leave or whatever, cut something like that. I just can't do it. In that way where people are looking at you and it's like your lie depends on like a whole string

of other things, like the pressure. Okay, so the reps miraculously believe this story, but to confirm his identity, they asked him to verify the last two purchases made with the real prince's existing American Express card. And incredibly, Anthony is able to name the last two charges made by the real Prince Khalid. One was in France and the other one was in California. Holy shit. So he does it, he's able to say what they were and with that he is given a new American Express card under the name Prince Khalid Ben Al Sayud and this card has a $200 million limit on it.

They have those? I guess. Can you imagine? No. Instead of like a black card, it just has a bunch of dollar signs all over it. It's like whatever you want. Just whatever.

So Anthony as the prince takes the bondsman with him on a shopping spree. He's like guys, come on. And on that spree, he spends over $22,000 on an emerald and diamond studded bracelet and two Rolex watches. And then he buys out the entire first class cabin of a Delta flight for him and the bail bondsman and flies all of them back home to Michigan. He then visits one of the state colleges where he tells an administrator that he's going to donate a million dollars if they'll provide a friend of his with a scholarship. He makes that deal, which of course he never fulfills his end of. And then he and the bondsman fly back to Miami all in the same day. What the fuck? That's a true spending spree. I mean,

go to the beach. Just relax. Have a couple frothy drinks. Yeah. Have a mocktail at the beach. He's like, no, I must buy jewels and make promises I can't keep. Right. Okay, so a few days later, those two bondsmen get a call from American Express. They're told that the man they've been hanging out with is not in fact a Saudi prince and that he's committing fraud right before their eyes. That's where you say, no, man, you didn't buy me anything. I don't know anything that he bought me.

Yeah. I don't know what you could be talking about. Are you kidding me? I'm a bondsman. I wouldn't fall for that shit. Why would I have an emerald bracelet in my possession? I just don't. So the bondsman call the prince's lawyer, Oscar, to let him know what's actually happening.

And Oscar is horrified, not only because he's been taken in by a con man, but because that con man has just taken Oscar's wife and daughter to New York with him. What? Turns out Oscar's wife was taking their daughter back to school, so the prince upgraded them to first class and went with them and then checked them into the four seasons where he reserved an entire floor

for himself and Oscar's family. I mean, that's pretty generous. He's like, let's all have a great time while I'm getting away with these lies. Yeah, he's also overdoing it though. It's like you only need three seats on that bucket. Yeah, or just like. I'm not cheap I am.

I'm like, don't use that credit card that's not yours for the whole cabin, like get three seats. But clearly it's about having the money and then flexing. Flotting and flexing. Living like a true Saudi prince. Yeah, baller, shot-caller. And somewhere along the line he learned about like this is a thing rich people do, they

buy the whole floor of the hotel. Right, and it works on people who don't believe you. Yes. Well, yeah, of course it does. Probably if you're calling the Four Seasons to try to make a reservation, you're like, here's my name and here's what I'm asking for. I'm not looking for a king-size bed. I want the entire floor to myself and they're like, yes, of course. Of course. What? Okay. Right away. Yeah, that's true. Look into it. Okay, so the bondsmen race up to New York, they corner the prince, Anthony, in his hotel room.

Anthony begins one of his usual tirades screaming at these men for treating royalty this way and for threatening to call the embassy. But of course the bondsman don't buy it this time. They're not falling for it, not a fourth time. So they actually rough Anthony up until he gives in and agrees to go back to Miami with them where they will return him to jail.

But when the group gets to LaGuardia, Anthony begins yelling at the first police officer he sees saying he's a Saudi prince and these men are trying to kidnap him. Fucking double down. Right? The police swarm around the men, pointing guns at all of their heads until basically the bondsmen have the chance to explain.

Luckily no one gets hurt. Now the bondsmen decide they've got to rent a car and drive Anthony back down to Florida because they can't risk trying to go back into the airport because he's clearly a super loose cannon, who never says die, and not wanting to take any chances, they throw Anthony into the trunk of the car

for the duration of the ride. Yeah. And that's when he confesses everything, his real name, his history, and his secret to duping American Express. And his secret was he had two accomplices on the inside who gave him those answers to the security question about the real Saudi prince's recent charges.

And those two Rolexes Anthony bought on that subsequent shopping spree were gifts for those inside men that he had at AmEx. Okay. So Anthony spends the rest of the 90s in jail, but of course that doesn't stop him from scheming. He runs a number of wire fraud schemes from his jail cell, each time getting caught convicted

and then having time added to his sentence. At one point in either 1994 or 95, he attempts to escape from jail by lighting his cell on fire and coating the floor with shampoo so that when the guard runs in, he'll slip on the floor cartoon style and then Anthony can run out. Oh, Anthony. This doesn't work. This is not fucking the three Stooges.

Yeah, he's just trying to work with what he has in front of him and... I guess they didn't have bananas in the fucking. Banana peels. So when it doesn't work, he gets another 37 months added to his sentence. He's finally released in the early 2000s. So he decides, Anthony decides to return to his humble hometown in Michigan,

but he's still flaunting his over the top style. He reunites with his adoptive mother who has since remarried to a woman. He meets and immediately hires his new 17 year old step sister to be his assistant. Having her manage his schedule and run various errands for him. So he's just, he's coming in and like flexing. Yeah. Like how could I manipulate this situation? And to feel like the big man,

because I just got out of jail. I'm not here to be the guy that just got out of jail, like looking for a handout. I'm immediately hiring a teenager to be my assistant. Yeah, yeah, I'm a businessman, got it. Yeah, we're gonna get stuff going. So this is when he learns, around this time he learns, some of the real members of the

Saudi royal family have existing accounts at various department stores like Saxmouth Avenue and Neiman Marcus. So he manages to fraudulently charge $11,300 to the very real Princess Fadwa al-Sayud's actual SACS account. And he charges $17,691 to the also very real Prince Khalid's Neiman Marcus account. And then on January 3rd, 2003, he's promptly caught and arrested outside of the mall for impersonating a diplomat. Arrested outside of the mall, so embarrassing. Oh, fuck yeah, like the limited two, and then you're getting arrested. Oh. He's like, oh, he's got an account there. I'm going to go, I'm going to put my outfit on and go

do my thing. Nope. Okay, so while in custody, Anthony tries a new angle for his defense. Instead of claiming to be the true Prince Khalid, he tells the police that he's actually a secret lover of one of the male members of the Saudi royal family. Meanwhile, homosexuality is illegal in Saudi Arabia. It's basically a threat. It's kind of a veiled blackmail threat. Anthony claims that the family has given him hush money in the form of a Saudi diplomatic passport and a $480 million trust fund because of course you'd go set up a very official trust fund for someone you're trying to pay off.

Authorities managed to contact the royal family who say this story is completely fabricated and they have never heard of an Anthony Gignac. So with no proof to back up his wild story, Anthony remains in jail awaiting trial. Of course, from his jail cell while awaiting trial, he reads the complete Jane Austen. Just kidding, he makes another attempt at

wire fraud and he gets caught. Oh, it's a real ad, I hopes. He gets caught and on October 12th, 2006, he pleads guilty to impersonating a diplomat and attempted bank fraud. He remains in prison until December of 2011. So when he gets out this time, he celebrates by violating his probation and going to Florida,

where he tries to buy the Ritzy well-known hotel in the Florida Keys called the Chica Lodge and Spa for $200 million. Nobody falls for it this time. He is promptly caught and extradited back to Michigan where he is placed right back in federal prison. From 1988 to up to this point, which is around between 2012 and 2014, Anthony Gignac has been arrested 10 times for these scams.

But it's not over yet. This time he's released from prison in 2015, but he has learned a lot in prison on this last stint. He realizes now that if he wants to keep up appearances as a member of the Royal Saudi family, he needs to have people working under him to add to the realism and create distance between him and his targets. So they can't talk to him directly or confront him once they find out he's full of shit. So shortly after his 2015 release, this is amazing.

He logs on to LinkedIn and reaches out to a British financial asset manager living in North Carolina named Carl Martin Williamson. And the two men agree to become business partners, I guess through the magic of LinkedIn. And together they covertly plan Anthony's biggest scam yet, all under the banner of their newly minted company, Martin Williamson International. So later that year in 2015, well, Anthony moves into his new,

so we're back at the beginning of the story. And Anthony moving into his new, so we're back at the beginning of the story. Anthony moving into his Fisher Island penthouse that costs $15,000 a month to rent. And he's renting because he can't actually buy property on Fisher Island like he wouldn't be able to. So then he brings in his DSS security detail who are actually mall cops who are wearing fake DSS badges. Whoa.

Right? Meanwhile, his partner Carl meets with a prominent investment banker saying he represents Prince Alsayud and is looking for a new investment opportunity. So are all of them in on it? They're all in on it. This partner is. Okay. Yes. But the person that the. This partner is. Okay. Yes.

But the person that the partner calls is not. Okay. It makes it look even more realistic because now he has other people speaking for him. Absolutely. It's like, yes. Apprentice of Saudi Arabia is not rolling calls trying to get investment people.

And if he has a security team, I mean, that's all I need to fucking see. Right? Personally, yeah. Someone just kind of quickly ducking into the back of a car with blacked out windows. That's all. Then you're on board. So then Carl shows this woman, the investment person, the Prince's bank statements, and a family tree proving the Prince's identity and financial standing, all of which looks legitimate enough for this banker to agree to work with them. So then the banker starts trying to round up entrepreneurs who are in the market for an angel investment from a Saudi prince.

She connects them with Carl and the Prince, and then those two then forge relationship with these business people, but the Prince never invests in any of their businesses. Instead, he begins to let on that he's got a highly exclusive business opportunity that promises to be even more profitable for them to invest in. His first pitch is for a fuel trading platform

that could earn his investors a 14.5% return. And then his second pitch is early access to shares of the Saudi oil giant when the IPO goes public, right? Or before. And that's when the real money starts rolling in. So he basically starts acting like a prince doing business, investment business, and then builds up to that IPO scale. And he has legitimate people working for him

that those people would try, like people, the banker that they got on, her clients, trust her. They believe in her. And so she comes along and says this thing, of course you believe it. She becomes one more piece of identifying believable proof that this is a real Saudi prince. Totally.

It's like, you know, you sometimes accidentally drive up the one and you get stuck in Malibu. And all of a sudden, you're in Malibu and you're just like, oh, I got to get out of here you're in Malibu and you're just like, oh, I gotta get out of here. It's so specific and you're just like, oh no. Like, this is a person who moves onto Fisher Island, which is an exclusive enclave, like the guts to move there

and move in and among all of these people, alone would make a person be like, oh yeah, he must be a Saudi prince. And he's one of us too. Yeah, from this scam alone, Anthony pulls in around $8 million, but he wants more, we're not resting there. And that's about to come to him

in the form of Miami Beach's famed hotel, the Fontainebleau. Have you heard of it, the Fontainebleau? It's one of Miami Beach's most opulent luxury hotels. And it's historic, but by the 2010s, it's becoming a little passe in the eyes of the social elite. So needing a refresh to stay current, the owners dump hundreds of millions of dollars

into the renovation of the hotel. And they did that, now they need more cash in exchange for 20 to 30% ownership in the hotel. Heading their negotiations is billionaire real estate financier, Jeffrey Soffer, who you may know him from his riches or his marriage to supermodel, Elle McPherson. Or neither. Carl's investment banker back in London gets

wind of this investment opportunity, runs it by the prince who is Anthony. Anthony jumps right onto it offering $400 million for 30% ownership in the hotel. The valuation is nuts and the Fontainebleau team immediately accepts this offer. So as they get into the details, Anthony again has to prove his wealth. So he shows off his Fisher Island home, his luxury car collection to the hotel reps. He hands them bank documents that seem to be from the Bank of Dubai saying that he has $600 million in a sovereign fund ready for investment. But Anthony Gignac isn't dealing with local car salesmen anymore. These are real billionaire businessmen. They always do their due diligence. There's no question. Nothing is going on anybody's

word. They check everything to be sure that this prince really is who he says he is. And at this point, any experienced con man would be sweating. But instead, Anthony explodes with rage at the idea that they are checking him. He takes their due diligence as an insult. He is furious that Jeffrey and the rest of the hotel team don't trust that he has the means to see the deal through. It's a kind of a brilliant move.

He's playing the part of what a Saudi prince would act like if somebody was like, you don't have the money and be like, how dare you? Plus rage intimidates people for sure. Sure. And it's like, that is the language of the elite. How dare you? I will confront you instead of like,

what do you mean, he's not gonna back down. So Anthony sends his London investment banker to meet with Soffer. She explains the only way they can save this deal now is for him, Jeffrey, to apologize to the prince by giving him an expensive gift. A gift, she says, worth no less than $50,000. Damn, me too. Me too. Right? That's the only way you can save your this deal. So, software obliges and gives the prince a Cartier bracelet worth $50,000.

That's how, now we know how you get your bill up at that high that quickly. After that gift is given, software and the Prince, who is just Anthony, I keep calling him the Prince, they resume talks. Soffer pulls out the red carpet for all of their meetings. And at one point he even flies Anthony out to Aspen on his private jet, puts him up at one of Aspen's finest hotels and invites him over to his own

$29.5 million home that was once owned by a real Saudi prince named Prince Bandar. So it all is going great and this all is happening. And Anthony Gignac as this Saudi prince is living like the elite life, like truly the rarest air until one night at dinner. Uses the wrong fork and gets caught. Kind of, like on par with that, Anthony and Soffer are in a very elite Aspen restaurant.

Soffer hears the prince order an appetizer with prosciutto in it. He doesn't react, he doesn't say anything. in a gasp in restaurant, Soffer hears the prince order an appetizer with prosciutto in it. He doesn't react, he doesn't say anything, but of course, he's wondering how is this devout Muslim man of the Saudi royal family eating pork? Yeah, sure. So, Soffer doesn't give anything away in the moment.

He has the hotel, higher private investigators to investigate Prince Khalid, and soon after those investigators contact the State Department, who in turn plan a raid on the Prince's Fisher Island penthouse in September of 2017. So this is where it all comes truly crumbling down. So the jig is up and they know this guy is a fraud. But what else happened in September of 2017? A little thing called Hurricane Irma. So that raid is put on hold a month later in October of 2017, the prince who is actually Anthony, goes on an international trip using a fake passport. He goes to Paris, Hong Kong, London, and Dubai, indulging in all of his most lavish desires

with the millions of dollars that he stole from those investors for the RM IPO scheme. But little does he know as he's living it up, and truly I'm sure living his best life, a reckoning awaits him back in the States. I bet he knew and that's why he fucking did that a little bit, right? I think so. I mean, wouldn't you always be living like this was your last blank

because you were doing that shit? Which there's something to be said for that kind of like risky behavior. Like fuck it, who cares? Yeah, said for that kind of like risky behavior like, fuck it, who cares? Yeah, adrenaline, that adrenaline of like, this might be it, let's not like, yeah. Yeah. So when Anthony Gigknock flies back to JFK from London on November 19th, 2017, he's met by federal agents and placed under arrest. He immediately resorts to his rant of I'm a diplomat and with diplomatic status and how dare you and I'm a royal.

But the federal agents aren't buying it this time. And this time, Anthony is getting the book thrown at him. With Anthony Gignac and custody, authorities set their sights on their next target, which is Carl Williamson. On the morning of December 14th, 2017, a team of eight federal agents raid Carl's North Carolina home with guns drawn, and his family is there.

After a thorough search, confiscation of evidence and six hours of interrogation, the agents finally leave. Carl assures his wife that he had no idea Prince Khalid was a fake, not true though. And that night, knowing the case against him is airtight and dreading the thought of spending the rest of his life behind bars. Carl writes a suicide note and takes his own life.

Holy shit. Yeah. In March of 2019, Anthony Gignac, now 48 years old, pleads guilty to four charges, impersonating a foreign diplomat, aggravated identity theft, wire fraud, and conspiracy to commit wire fraud. He is sentenced to just over 18 years in federal prison, which he is currently serving.

Wow. And in looking at Anthony's life of crime, it's a miracle he was ever able to pull any of it off. He came from nothing, but actually those circumstances gave him the drive to survive at all costs and the audacity to dress extravagantly, even in the most modest of situations. He posted all of his exploits on Instagram, making his frauds so bold and so in your face that it seemed impossible that it was fake. It's almost like he believed it himself.

Completely, you know. Yeah, he knew how to switch into, whether he believed it or he just wanted it so bad, he demanded to have that money and that security. As one anonymous lawyer duped into helping Anthony puts it, he could convince you that he was a green toad instead of a human being. I feel like a damn fool for ever listening to this guy.

I had Khalid derangement syndrome. I cross-examined liars for a living and I could not trip him up." Wow. End quote. And that is the whole story of the fake Saudi prince who fooled them all, Anthony Gignac. I did not know that story at all. I didn't either at all. That's wild. Great job. Thank you.

Oh my god. Wow, that was deep and complicated and expensive. And the end of the day, pork took him down. I mean, he deserved that one. Do basic research. Also, I just, I wanna talk about Kahn-Men and scammers forever because I feel like it's just going to happen more and more these days. It's like that kind of thing where all it takes is a little bit of gumption and the ability to

just lie as you stare into people's eyes and they get away with it. It's wild. It is. And people like us who think like, well, why, who would do such a thing and why and how? That's crazy. You gotta have your ears perked up. Come on, guys, get with it. Yeah. Don't trust anyone, especially people who eat pork. Oh, shit, that's me. All right.

Well, it's another great one on the books. We've done it. Thank you guys for listening. We appreciate you so much as always. You're some of our favorite podcast listeners out there Truly say sexy and don't get murdered Elvis do you want a cookie? This has been an exactly right production our Our senior producer is Alejandra Keck.

Our managing producer is Hannah Kyle Creighton. Our editor is Aristotle Acevedo. This episode was mixed by Liana Squalache. Our researchers are Maren McClashen and Ali Elkin. Email your hometowns to myfavoritmurder at gmail.com. Follow the show on Instagram and Facebook at myfavoritmurder and Twitter at myfavemurder. Goodbye!