My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark - MFM Minisode 315

Episode Date: January 23, 2023

This week’s hometowns include kids who watch Jerry Springer and a sweet Siamese cat.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This is actually happening is a podcast that features extraordinary true stories of life-changing events told by the people who live them. In a special five-part series called Point Blank, this is actually happening sheds a light on the forgotten spree killings of Rancho Tejama. So this is actually happening wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to my favorite murder, did you forget your line? Yeah. Well, I was like, how do we do the mini-soad?

Do we just do it? We say that after we say the title. And I say my favorite murder, and then you go the mini-soad, right? You hear something? I don't listen to this podcast. You shouldn't. I think that's a rule. Don't listen to your own bullshit.

Yeah, that's right. Don't go all the way up there. The mini-soad. There we go. That sounds familiar. You did it. Cool. Yeah.

We read you your stories. This is our first recording of 2023, so clearly we're both a little rusty. We've been on vacation for, it really feels like it. I've been vacationing for two weeks, right? Yeah, totally. 10 days? Yeah. 14 days.

What day is it? It's the day to get back into recording mini-soads. And I'm ready for it. I love it. Let's do it. You want to go first? Sure. The subject line of this email is satisfying sting operation.

And it says, hello, fellow humans. It was 2016, and I was a 17-year-old working college student. I volunteered at my church and was the youth ministry leader at the time. I led full weekend retreats and really gave all my free time to my former church. I'd just gotten off work at 3 a.m. to 12 p.m. shift. That's graveyard. That's rough. Oh.

And I was walking in my car when I saw my male church leader, who was about 37. I was just about to drive to the church to prep for our meeting, and I did not expect him to show up at my work unannounced. I asked him what he was doing there, and I wondered how he knew when I was working. He offered to drive me to McDonald's to eat before the meeting, but my gut said, hell no. I was young and too nice, so I politely said we can walk there since it's only across the street.

He said driving would be easier. But I was insistent, and we ended up walking. He offered to pay, and I was so freaked out by the situation that I started to call everyone that was preparing for the meeting to see if they also wanted some free McDonald's. Nice. Let me bribe you to get involved in this problem. To my horror, no one answered. We got the food and walked back where we got into our separate cars.

This situation felt so uncomfortable, but when I told people, they seemed to brush it off as a nice gesture since he bought breakfast. I never felt the same around him after that. A little over a year later, in October 2017, he and nine other men were arrested in a police sting operation for, quote, traveling to meet a minor for lewd or lascivious behavior. Holy shit. I felt very validated after hearing that, and always wondered what his true motive was visiting a 17-year-old alone in her work parking lot.

Yes, we can all guess. You knew. You knew what knew, and your brain knew, and you knew. Our church tried to keep everything a secret. Oh, God. Damn. That has to stop. Sitting us down and saying we should pray for him.

My mom was the one who did the research to find the details of why he was arrested. A few months later, our elder church leader said, he misses us, and I was disgusted. I told her how I felt, and she said, only God can judge. That's not true. That's not true at all. Try it. It's fun. It gets me through my day.

I left the church soon afterwards, and now I'm on a spiritual journey, staying away from organized religions since they feel culty to me. I am a longtime listener and a new fan cult member. You too are the only cult leaders I will follow. Thank you. Great, because we'll never show up at your work. We promise. Stay sexy and fuck politeness.

Vee from Long Beach. She-her. No. I was picturing this in the south or something. I don't know why. That's a stereotype, but Long Beach. We are thinking maybe people who are used to living kind of cultural church-based lives. That's right.

I mean, I guess Long Beach. Is that the OC? No. It's Long Beach. Oh, okay. I know they love their religion down in the OC. Yeah, they sure do. But it's light.

L-I-T. Yeah. Wow, that was a good one. Yeah. Trust your gut. Yes. Please do. Please listen to yourself always.

Okay. This one's called, Thank Cocaine with an exclamation mark. Come on with this title. This story has to get picked up. It started. Karen and Georgia and all amazing MFMT members. You asked for it, literally anything at this point. So here we go.

I'm a bank manager and I could share all the many stories of fraud, dumb questions, etc. In fact, I did, maybe one day you'll read that email, but this one is officially better. Okay. I was in the back of the bank doing paperwork, trying to catch up on emails and going to enjoy a cookie when my new hire Andy came in with a folded up $20 bill. I was instantly irritated because while it wouldn't seem like money at the bank would be an issue, when we find money, it means a hell of a lot of paperwork for 20 stupid dollars, sometimes even just a penny.

Andy told me a customer had found it and turned it in. He had asked around, but no one claimed it. Being new, he didn't know what to do, so he came back to me. Yeah, yeah. I'll handle it. I say as I take it. I go to unfold the bill to see how much there actually is. When the tightly folded bill pops open and white dust flies everywhere, it must have been

like a little bindle. You know, you can fold them origami style and cook cocaine and you know how you do that. It's also the dirtiest way to interact with cocaine is just like why not wipe it on the ground and then pick it back up. Totally. Rub it on a doorknob and then lick it off. And then it says all over me and the uneaten cookie on my desk. Andy looks like he's about to cry because he thinks he's just accidentally poisoned

me or something, but I calmly and firmly tell him to call the police while I call the bank security team to get directions. With the police on their way, Andy and I put the bill and what is left of the white powder in a plastic bag and Google how to safely remove cocaine from your clothes and body. Thankfully, a coke addict to come and snort it off. Thankfully this was during COVID and wearing masks was required by my employer, so no one inhaled anything. Great.

The police showed up and take statements and I told them this might surprise you, but I don't have a lot of experience around cocaine and wasn't sure what to do. The officer laughed and said, well, it could be cocaine or it could be meth. I must have looked a little concerned because he followed with, don't worry, if it was meth, you would feel it already. Gee, thanks. They later called and confirmed it was cocaine and if they needed any more information, they would call me.

We cleaned up the remaining cocaine and threw away my cookie. Devastating. But Andy felt so bad that he could have drugged me that he bought me a replacement the next day. Classy. Hope this story was right up your alley. Thanks for all you've done and do stay sexy and don't unfold mystery money around food. Taylor.

She. Her. It's very specific. It's so specific and it's also kind of like that funny thing. You're at a bank and then it's like, did someone drop a $20 bill? It's like, my drugs, like, oh, I left my drugs at the bank. God. Get it together.

Get it together. Drug addict. Come on. Life is short and it's full of a lot of interesting questions. What does happiness really mean? How do I get the most out of my time here on earth? What really is the best cereal? These are the questions I seek to resolve on my weekly podcast, Life is Short with Justin Long.

If you're looking for the answer to deep philosophical questions like, what is the meaning of life? I can't really help you, but I do believe that we really enrich our experience here by learning from others. That's why in each episode, I like to talk with actors, musicians, artists, scientists, and many more types of people about how they get the most out of life. We explore how they felt during the highs and sometimes more importantly, the lows of their careers. We discuss how they've been able to stay happy during some of the harder times, but if I'm

being honest, it's mostly just fun chats between friends about the important stuff. If you had a sandwich named after you, what would be on it? Follow Life is Short wherever you get your podcasts. You can also listen ad-free on the Amazon Music or Wondery app. I like this one a lot. I'm not going to read you the subject line. Okay. So it just starts, today I heard the mini-soad where the Mormon mom on Ambien bought a bunch

of R-rated DVDs and it reminded me of this story. Oh, so toxic. God, we've done so much. So many, so many topics. So this happened the first time my boyfriend, now husband, met my parents. It was winter, we had dinner, things went great. We planned to stay for the weekend and it was getting pretty late, so my dad, unbeknownst to us, took some Ambien.

We were all in the living room chatting and getting to know one another when my dad asked my husband, then boyfriend, if he wanted to take a look at his yellow 1964 MG. My dad is obsessed with this car. They go out into the garage and my dad asks if my then boyfriend would like to take it around the block. Oh no. Now I have to pause and say that my sister's husband, who has been around for a year or so at that point, was not allowed to drive this car.

It was not allowed to drive this car. So when my dad asked my husband if he wanted to drive, he figured he had made the very best of impressions and immediately said yes. So here's where it gets weird. First, my husband can drive a stick, but in British cars, the gear shift is backwards or something. So he goes to clarify with my dad which way to move it and my dad fully has no idea how this car works.

Then my dad encourages him to rev the engine really hard and rip it down the block so that quote the ladies inside can hear the tires screeching. Oh my God. Finally, they make it around the block and come back inside where my very introverted, very conservative dad announces to the room, now don't go telling them about how we went topless bowling by this time. It's clear that something's up. My dad goes to make a platter of mozzarella sticks, it's 10.45 p.m.

Yes. Your dad is high and he arranges them into a face with a partially beard so that it looks like my husband. This guy is a fucking party animal and I love it. This is his real personality. Yeah, that's right. I love that. To top it off, he picks up my ukulele.

Oh no. I'm a kindergarten teacher and Sarah nades the room with a very off-tune Christmas carol. My mom is slowly realizing what's happening and she asks my dad if he's taken any Ambien yet. It turns out he took his usual half a pill, forgot, and then took another full pill. So three times his normal dose. He was high as a kite and that's the story of how my husband met my parents. Wow.

And it's just signed Jess. Oh, Jess. Oh my God. Well, how come nothing fun like that ever happened to me when I was on Ambien? All I did was sleep really well. Did you never have any kind of experience where you were like waking up, driving or any of the scary Ambien stories? Nothing.

Not that I know of. I know. Well, then it's the drug for you. It was the drug for me. That's funny. Okay. Hi all. So I'm working on catching up and there was a hometown about a five-year-old burning

the dining room carpet and it just reminded me of a story of my very own. Me and my twin sister were about three years old. We decided we really wanted to go camping. Mom was asleep on the couch with our tiny baby sister and dad was out, so we were pretty much unsupervised. This was the early 90s, so not unusual. Please note, number one, we lived in a small trailer and number two, up until this point, our only idea of camping was a campfire.

Oh. Well, like I said, we really wanted to camp, so we proceeded to pile up all of our toys in the middle of the dining room. Next, our kindling needed a light. I grabbed a lighter, not child-proof, from the TV stand and shoved it in my sister's toddler hand. She flicks the starter and whoosh, fire. At this point, we were super proud, so of course we had to wake my mom.

Obviously, this did not go well. She immediately jumped up at the site of the smoke and flames and rushed us out the door yelling, get your dad. Fast forward a couple hours, there's a huge fire truck putting out the last of the flames of the completely destroyed trailer. Obviously no one was hurt, but me and my sister got a walk away with a pretty wild story. Yeah. Sorry for the long story, but I had to share, stay sexy, and maybe keep an eye on the fire-loving

children and then there's no name. I mean, the name is Arsonist, is really the name on that one. Thank God for child-proofing. Yeah. I mean, I guess it really did take that long, what, into the late 90s, 2000s. Yeah. I guess they just made lighters harder. I think it was an optional thing, like with pill bottles, like if you asked for child-proofing,

you could get that kind. Hmm. Right? Well, I guess those parents learned their lesson. They sure did. Also, they really wanted to camp because they burned their own toys. Yeah. Totalless dedication.

All right. Here's my last one. There's no subject line. It just says, hey Karen, Georgia, and friends. Last week, a listener shared a story on how her older sister laid a cookie dough turd on her pillow. Well, it got me thinking of all the shit I put my siblings and my younger cousins through. I have 17 first cousins, and I am the second oldest girl.

So growing up, us older cousins would call our younger cousins the babies. So in the 90s, when Jerry Springer was in its prime, my cousins and I loved watching Jerry Springer and Laura, who was like Jerry only the Latino version and much more dramatic. Have you ever heard of Laura? No. I haven't either. I want to see that. Probably about 10, and I had no business watching these shows, but our Latin parents were always

too busy amongst themselves to notice. We relate. My cousin had a giant trampoline in their backyard, and the older cousins would round up all the babies, aged four to seven probably, and make them act out Jerry scenes. Yes. One of the older cousins would act as Jerry. Oh my God. I was usually the security guard.

Oh my God. This is so good. Imagine if you were the neighbor just looking out your window to this backyard being like those kids. Okay. I was usually the security guard, and we would assign roles to the babies as cast members. My poor little brother would always be the cheating husband, and my two little girl cousins would always be the wife and the girlfriend.

Oh my God. We'd give them each a storyline and then bring them all on stage, quote unquote, and then a parenthesis that says the trampoline, and crack up as they argued and fought as if they were on the real show. Holy shit. I'm not proud of this, and my cousins to this day loved to remind us of the evil things we would do to them as kids. My cousins are now my best friends, and I couldn't imagine life without them.

I tell them at least a built character, and that they have us to thank for being the tough badasses that they are today. Love you guys, stay sexy, and don't forget to check on the kids once in a while. You never know what they could be watching, Nat. That is so delightful. I love it. So classic, like so classic, of like, yeah, you're going to make your own TV show. Yeah.

You're going, of course you are. Like this is what is influencing you, so you're going to do it, and you happen to have no supervision, so you watch Jerry Springer, and this is what happens next. But the idea that you're making the little kids fight and act, it seems that is, that is, whether you're cousins, siblings, that is the dynamic, that power dynamic of childhood. It's so hilarious. I love it. Love it.

Okay, I'm not going to read you the title of this one, my last one. It just starts, hey, MFM crew, hello from Canada. I don't know if that was on purpose, but it says Canadian. Nice. Firstly, if either of you, Karen or Georgia, are ever having a bad day, please contact me so I can remind you of all the ways you are just so fantastic and made such a huge difference to all your listeners. Let me count the ways.

Secondly, Buried Bones is so good, Kate and Paul are a fantastic pair, they're both extremely interesting, tell great stories, and unravel a crime scene like no other. Nice plug, you're right, it's such a good podcast if you haven't heard Buried Bones. It is my new second favorite podcast, listen, next to MFM, of course. Nice. That's right. A few decades ago, a now-elderly friend of mine was manning the front desk of a small motel by herself in the middle of nowhere, Ontario.

She had her sweet little Siamese for company. One evening, a nice-looking, well-kept man walked in and asked to rent a room. So she sorted it and gave him the key. He left and a short time later came back into the reception area asking if he could use the phone. My friend didn't feel suspicious and was about to say yes when the sweet little Siamese went crazy, arching her back and going up on her tippy toes while hissing and snarling. Intimidated by this now-angry cat, the man backed out of the reception area and never

came back. This confused my friend as she had never seen the cat act like that before. But then a month goes by and as she's watching the news, she saw that same man being arrested. It was none other than Paul Bernardo, the Scarborough rapist or schoolgirl killer that Karen covered in an episode. The normally friendly yet very in tune cat saved a life that night. So now we all know to never man the front desk of a motel in the middle of nowhere by yourself without your normally sweet cat by your side.

Stay saved and do God's missions. M. And then it says, P.S., a shout out to Elvis, who I'm sure would have saved Georgia in the same circumstance. It makes me want to cry. Is that like a Siamese thing where they're kind of like protective like that? M. Yeah. They pick one person and that's their person for life kind of a thing. M. Oh.

That's, I mean, Paul Bernardo is the scariest. M. The scariest. Because he looks so normal and acted so normal. M. Yeah. He is the classic shark level predator where it's like, oh, I'm going to blend into your surroundings and be like, oh yeah, I don't get bad vibes from this guy. He's actually kind of cute. M. Totally.

M. But the very smart animal in the room is seeing it for what it is. Oh, what a story. M. Great one, M. Thank you so much. Good job structuring that email where you're like complimenting us. You plug one of our podcasts is really well done. Really well done. M. Yeah. For anyone who's going to write in, in the future, that's a great format.

Just try it. M. Yeah. That's right. Do a little commercial at the top for one of our podcasts. M. That's right. M. Thank you, everyone. Please send in your emails at my favorite murder at Gmail and thank you guys so much for listening.

We hope you had a lovely holiday break. If you got a break, we hope you did and have fun New Year's, which is almost impossible, but maybe you're the one that did it and stay sexy. And don't get murdered. Goodbye. Elvis, do you want a cookie? This has been an exactly right production. Our senior producer is Hannah Kyle Creighton.

Our producer is Alejandra Keck. This episode was engineered and mixed by Stephen Ray Morris. Our researchers are Maren McClasham and Sarah Blair Jenkins. Email your hometowns and fucking hurrays to myfavoritmurder at gmail.com. Follow the show on Instagram and Facebook at my favorite murder and Twitter at myfavemurder. Goodbye. You've been listening ad free on Wondery Plus.