My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark - MFM Minisode 345

Episode Date: August 21, 2023

This week’s hometowns include a superhero dad and searching for missing jewelry.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Infamous International, The Pink Panther's story takes you into the world of Serbia's most infamous jewel thieves. Infamous International, The Pink Panther's story premieres Thursday, September 14 on exactly right. Listen on Amazon Music, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Mike Williams set off on a hunting trip into the swamps of North Florida, where it was thought he met his fate by a group of hungry alligators, except that's not what happened. And after the uncovering of a secret love triangle, the truth would finally be revealed. Listen to over my dead body, gone hunting early and ad-free, unwondery-plus. I'm not saying hello. Hello! And welcome to my favorite murder, the mini-sode.

That's right. That's correct. That's, you've never been more right in your life. Nope. That was affirmative. Good job pressing play. We're gonna make you happy you personally. And I'm gonna make it worth your while. You want to go first? You want me to go first.

Go for it. Okay. This one's called first responder trick-or-treat story. Hi ladies and all-known associates. Let me tell you the story of one of the craziest Halloween nights of my dad's life. He's a retired firefighter from Colorado and just the best guy I know. Of all the things he has seen and done in his career,

this particular day must have been one of the more stressful days of his life as he had to save my mom, my sister, and myself from choking all in one day. What? Yes. I was probably about six in my sister and myself from choking all in one day. What? Yes. I was probably about six and my sister was eight on this particular Halloween. It all started at lunch and my mom choked on a tomato

and the salad she was eating. We were all at the kitchen table and my dad calmly got up and came over and gave her the Heimlich maneuver and saved her from peril. We were all a little freaked out, but went about our lunch as if it hadn't happened. We then all got ready to go trick or treating later in the evening. I think my sister and I were clowns this year. Before we went out to solicit the neighborhood for candy, we decided on a dinner of leftover

pizza. My sister is a freak and likes to heat hers up in the microwave. So do I. Do you? I got a little mushy the second day. Is that weird? No, no, I think it's pretty common. But I do like to take the time to do in the oven because then it crisps up any kind of questionable

area. It does do that. Okay. Let us know. What do you like to do? Listener. Get, let's get the vote going on. Social media.

I'm really let everybody weigh in. If she had eaten cold like a normal person, we could have avoided the next disaster. The pizza was some bargain chain variety and the cheese became extremely stretchy and weird in the microwave. When she went to eat it, she choked on the plasticky stringy cheese. Thank God for my superhero dad who reached into her mouth and grabbed the stringy cheese from the back of her throat saving her life. It was highly dramatic and scary. We all regrouped and decided to hit the streets for some Halloween fun. When we got home from our trick-or-treat trip, my sister and I dumped out our candy buckets to take a look at all the goods and decide which five pieces we wanted to have before bed.

the goods and decide which five pieces we wanted to have before bed. Mm. Now it was my turn to make a weird choice. For one of my pieces of candy I decided on a root beer flavored hard candy. Root beer barrels. That's right. It has a barrel shape and was the exact size of a six year old esophagus. I love those candies. They're so good.

Those are good ones. Those are good ones. So I accidentally swallow it as soon as I put it in my mouth and begin to choke. Here comes my father, the choking savior. He calmly laid me flat on the living room floor on my stomach. Down to spot he was looking for on my back

and gave me a forceful smack with his hand. Out popped the barrel and sweet relief I could breathe again. After that, he looked at the three of us and just said, that's it, nobody eats anything the rest of tonight. You're all going to bed. You're including mom. I don't know how he stayed as calm as he did while we were all trying to choke to death in front of him on one day, but I know we wouldn't be here without his level head. He's the best person and I'm so proud of his 30 year career as a first responder. Hope you all enjoyed that crazy Halloween story, Miriam.

What a great name. That's my middle name. That's right. That's your grandma's name, right? No, just a random second name. Full credit to you then and no credit to your grandma. But also I think that's the thing no one understands about first responders is that three choking family members in one day is small potatoes compared to what they actually deal

with when they show up somewhere and someone's house is on fire and there's people inside or someone's having a heart attack or just had a heart. I mean, like, that's the thing is my dad would come home from the firehouse and he would need to take a nap because he they would do runs the meld tonight. Yeah, so he didn't get a full night sleep and you get really mad if you woke him up Like you had to really tip toe around But he would also nap on the front room couch. So it's like come on. Thanks work with us a little bit But also I have the like like, memory of a nat, so I would be quiet for four minutes,

and then I'd be like, Laura, you check my thing. Whatever, but, like, I was like, God, why does dad get so mad when he wakes us up? And then my mom one time was just like, because they had to pull a family out of a house last night. And then I just went, Oh my God.

That's right, my dad's not going to an office and sitting in a chair. They think they really go through serious shit. And I just went, oh that's right, my dad's not going to an office and sitting in a chair. They really go through serious shit. Like emotional ups and downs and fucking constant shit. So no wonder he was writing three times to the fucking non-choke these people. Yeah, he's just like, oh, he's the guy.

He knew exactly how much time he had before that root beer barrel was, you know. I mean, it's so crazy. But also I feel like after the second choking, that's when you have the family meeting and start threatening people, like one more choking and I'm not saving you. Yeah, it's never gonna be.

It's just slow down now. This is the rule. Halloween is the day I would definitely choke though, because what an exciting day for eating. Truly. Okay, this one's great. I'm not going to read you the subject line. It just starts writing is not my strong suit. So thanks for taking the time to read this.

I've been listening to your show since it first dropped and I've wanted to share my family murder story that I learned way too young. I'm sure it contributed to my fascination with everything to crime. Well, that and the fact that my mom let me fall asleep to unsolved mysteries as a six-year-old. Oh my God. Hell yeah. Six. So soothing. Robert Stack telling you about missing children. The dulcet tones of Robert Stack asking you to please call in. I remember here the first time I heard the theme song like after the internet had come out like years after

I had actually watched the show. And the chills it immediately gave me like 10 years later. Yes, we're just as fucking hardcore as when I used to watch it. Because I think the genius of that show and maybe what we all learned from that show to do for podcasting is they were talking directly to the audience. Yeah, maybe you can help solve a mystery. Do you know a man who had a yellow van that he left on the side of the road? I know how this is. Is that our neighbor? It's my neighbor.

God, I wish. It's so exciting. Yeah, the dream of like, could you ask if you could go to school and like six grade and be like, guys I called in and solved and on cell mystery last night. Oh, oh, truly. There's the script we've been waiting to write. OK, sorry, we've completely side-barred this thing. My fault, yeah, go. No, anyhow, let's begin. My great aunt, Suzanne Suzanne married a real asshole.

Kenneth was an abusive SOB. Funny side note, Suzanne and my grandma Sandra had a double wedding. This was probably an attempt on my great-grandmother, a Polish immigrant, to save money. Fortunately, for our side of the family, grandma Sandra picked better men than her little sister. Just like, really get a chance to slump, to, I was going to say slump, Suzanne. I've never seen Suzanne spelled with an O before. Never heard it that way before. Suzanne. Sandra and Suzanne. Okay, anyway, Suzanne eventually divorced Kenneth and did everything she could to get this awful man out of her and their children's

lives. As many obsessive and violent people do, he couldn't let go. His plan was to get rid of her because of an impending court proceeding. So he did what people did back in the 60s, he took out an ad in the classifieds. He put out an ad saying that he'd pay big bucks for a small job. One individual who was broken out of work was intrigued, so he reached out to the number in the ad. Kenneth explained, I don't care how you do it, but I'll pay you to get rid of my ex-wife. Make it look like an accident. You can run her over by a car

or electric cuter in the bath, but just get it done. I'll give you a thousand dollars upfront and the remainder of your payment, three thousand dollars, we'll be waiting for you. In, wait for it, a nondescript bus locker. Oh, God. When this individual came to the realization that Kenneth was adamant in his plan,

he reached out to my aunt, Suzanne, to warn her. She contacted the authority, I know, so cool. She contacted the authorities and Kenneth was eventually sent to prison for attempted murder. This old newspaper article I found about this only mentioned the preliminary hearing so I'm not sure how much time he received upon sentencing. And then it says in parentheses LA Times, November 1, 1968. So it made it all the way to the LA Times.

Probably not long enough given the statutes at the time. I'm proud of the actions that this stranger took to warn Suzanne and even more proud for her getting Kenneth out of her and her kids' lives. Pay attention to red flags, trust your gut, and SSDGM, Shana. Wow, how terrifying. You get a knock at the door. Some fucking stranger there who's like, guess what? Yeah, that's awful. And if you went to her before calling the police, which is kind of funny. Well, which actually I think may have been the smartest move because before he lets the

red tape get, he's like, you need to know that you have to stay away from this guy, which is very cool. Also, Shauna, you need to know. That was a very well written email. So do not say writing is not your strong suit because I would argue that it is. Yes, absolutely. That was perfect. Yeah. This one's called Found Treasure Story in DC. Yay.

You all are wonderful and I have a tendency to ramble so I should really get started. In recent mini-saud number 342, you requested found money stories and mischievous pet stories. I have both, but I'm going to choose the found money story because the pet one involves a lot of pooping and vomiting, so I'll spare you. A couple years ago, I lived in DC and it was the first city I ever lived in. I am from and have lived in most places where it is necessary to drive everywhere. Anyway, this particular day, a friend and I were planning to go see and exhibit at the Japanese Cultural Center on the history of denim. Very cool, right? Yes. The location of denim? Like jeans? Yeah.

Denim. Okay. The location is very much in a section of DC where it would be a stupid idea to drive, but nevertheless, I made the call and got in my car. I picked up my friend and proceeded to navigate the busy city streets when my friend exclaimed, pull over. Without questioning, I pulled into the exit of a parking garage and turned on my hazards. My friend jumps out of the car and runs into the busy street and starts collecting when

I can only make out a small piece of paper blowing through the traffic and pedestrians walking on the sidewalk. When it gets back into the car, I'm able to see that he is holding a wad of $20 bills. Oh! Loose $20 bills were blowing down this very busy DC street and no one noticed except for my friend. It was a real-life money-grabbing booth. Ooh! And he was able to snatch about $240. Holy shit.

I know. It's a dream come true. Yeah. We argued about what cut I should receive from being the getaway driver. And I could only convince him to give me around 40 bucks. I cobble shit on that. She should've gotten more.

She definitely should've. And also, it's just like, as my friend used to say, you didn't pay for it, give me half. Like, you just went outside and grabbed some shit. So... Yeah. Whatever, I'm not still bitter about that or anything. Stay sexy and keep your eyes peeled

for loose twenties blowing down the street. Sam, she, her. Wait, Sam, did they know why? Like, did they figure that out? Oh, I can't imagine that. Maybe someone listening right now is talking about the time they lost $300 and 20s in DC. I like to imagine that like the US meant back door blew open and a bunch of 20s blew off the machine. Freshly minted 20s out in the street.

Okay, I'll just start it. Hi Georgia Karen and MFM crew. I know how much you guys love a good ghost story and a found treasure story. So here's one rolled together. About eight years ago, my wonderful mother passed away unexpectedly from a heart attack. She was at home alone at the time, but managed to call 911. Unfortunately, she was gone before the paramedics arrived. My sister and I grown adults living in separate states returned home to start the gut wrenching process of

planning her funeral. That's horrible. So sad. So sad. After a day or two of being home, our dad asked where her wedding rings that she wore every day were because he wanted to put them in a safe spot. It hadn't occurred to us to ask about the jewelry she was wearing when she was taken to the hospital, so I called the appropriate people, assuming I would just pick them up. Except I was told my mom wasn't wearing any jewelry when the paramedics arrived. Apparently this is all very well documented and no jewelry or rings were with her at the time. My mom loved jewelry and this seemed very odd, but I talked it up to it being earlier in the morning when she passed and she hadn't gotten her full look together for the day, Ellie W.K. I love it. This is when my sister and I both

remember something odd. Now I don't know if this was a common held belief by an older generation or just a strange family thing, but our grandparents, and assuming our mom by association, were convinced that if paramedics ever came to your house, you needed to hide all of your valuables to prevent them from being so poor. Poor first responders, like just immediately not trusted. I mean, I don't know. I feel like I'm on everybody's side on this one. Yeah. It's just a funny thing where it's just like, it could be any number. Is that an Italian thing? Is it an immigrant thing? Is it a certain part of town thing? It could be anything. I mean, it could be a legit thing back in the day that they actually stole shit. So who the

fuck knows? Yeah. Back when fire departments were private companies, where it was just like five dudes that would come into your house and do whatever they wanted. Right. Sure. And it must have been discussed multiple times during our childhoods because we both remembered it. Like grandma, these good people are here to help. And no one's trying to take your collection of glass ducks in the Curio cabinet. And who has the time or the right frame of mind to hide things in an emergency anyway?

Well, it turns out my mom's sharing. That's him. So my sister and I discreetly start to look around the house on this F-Dub Treasure Hunt, all while trying to not let our dad figure out what we're doing. We go through all the quickly accessible spots, some obvious like ring stands, bedside tables, jewelry drawers,

etc. and some not so obvious. We find every piece of jewelry we knew about and lots of questionable, but entertaining costume jewelry, but we cannot find her wedding rings. I'm trying not to panic, jumping between where the hell could she have put them and oh my god, my parents were right all along and they are stolen. And how the fuck are we gonna tell our dad, we can't find the rings. Now this is where the story gets good. We were maybe four days in at the house and I'm trying to take a nap in my teenage bedroom.

I haven't slept in days and I'm in a half awake, half asleep trance when I see my mom. In this dream, vision, whatever you want to call it, I see her standing in front of the closet in her bedroom, looking at me like she's making sure I'm paying attention. She shows me her hands with her perfectly manicured red nails, and then in parentheses, I did not inherit her skills itself manicures, by the way, a fact that I'm still very disappointed at.

And then with such vivid detail, she holds the precious rings in her hands, goes to the very back of the walking closet to a robe hidden behind all of her clothes and proceeds to put the rings in the right hand pocket of the robe. I wake up with a gas, sit up straight in bed, freaking out my husband who was sitting next to me, and

bolt out of bed saying, I know where the rings are. I run through the house to the opposite side to her room, to the walking closet, and guess what I find? In the very back hidden behind her clothes, is the robe exactly as I saw it in my dream, and in the right hand pocket of the robe are her wedding rings. Oh, my fucking God. I loved my funny sweet mom so much. Oh, no. Oh. I loved my funny sweet mom so much and I'm grateful that even in the afterlife, her organized

and thoughtful spirit made sure I found her hidden treasure. I just can't get over her vision where her mom is acting like her mom being like, look at me, I need you to follow me on this thing. What I'm doing. Don't look at your phone right now. This is important. Later on when the house was being sold

and we had to move everything out, I made sure to hang on to that robe just in case. My husband and I are often in the car, eight plus hours a week commuting, and love your podcast. Thank you for helping those long hours pass quickly. Stay sexy and make sure someone in your family knows your paranoid hiding spots.

XX, Jess. Oh my God, that's unbelievable. Also, just that Jess got to have one last moment with her mom. Yeah. Yeah, that you always hope for, right? Yeah. You just not having to kind of do it by yourself and be picturing it. Yeah, but to actually like she came to me in a dream and boss me around one last time. And it gives you that like hope that there is something more like after life. Yes. And their memory is still with you and maybe they're a part of them is with you too. And you know that she's making you focus on what's important, which is rings and valuables.

Jewelry. Jewelry. Well, this one is like, it was at your last one. Is it? No, I think of one more. Because this is like, that was such a heart-tugging one. I know, that would be a good ender, but this isn't heart-tugging at all. Well, it's my fault of his heart-tugging

because that was me having a moment. No, it could cut that part out. No, I loved it. This one is not heart-tugging, and it's called Reason for the Binocular Band of 1914, mentioned in episode 384. Oh, oh.

Hi, all. Love the Pod. And I thought I'd share this interesting old timey story from London. In episode 384, when telling the story of Billy Carlton, Georgia mentioned that there was a law in Britain in 1914 that forbid people from buying binoculars. I can tell you why.

Oh, nice. In 1914, the First World War was just starting, and it was the first war where the range of the ballistics and weaponry had become so long that a lot of the fighting was taking place from a really far distance. I hadn't thought about that. That means that one of the most important pieces of military equipment were high-quality binoculars as they helped the soldiers hit their targets. Now at that time, the UK was suffering from a huge shortage of glass.

If you want to learn more about why that was, you should read British journalist Ed Conway's book, The Material World, that's also where I got this story from. Germany, on the other hand, were the leaders in making all sorts of advanced telescopes and binoculars, which put them at a huge advantage. There were public campaigns in the UK that not only stopped people from buying binoculars, but also encouraged people to donate any that they had to the military, including things like opera glasses. Apparently, the king and queen donated some too.

What makes history really interesting is that Britain actually sent a spy to Switzerland to try and negotiate with the Germans to allow Britain to buy binoculars from them, so basically trying to buy equipment from Germany that would make it easier for them to kill Germans. What's crazy is that Germany accepted the offer and returned for rubber for tires and engine fan belts because the UK was controlling supply of rubber via its colonies. Jesus, I mean Jesus Christ, that's dark. Men and their wars. Fucking A and capitalism and colonialism. The exchange of goods never actually took place because the UK managed to start producing glass

domestically instead. Really not sure what the moral of the story is here, except for stay sexy and hold on to your opera binoculars. You never know when they may become handy, question mark? Heidi she her. I love that Heidi was like in the midst of what sounds like a fascinating book. And then it's like she's listening to a true crime podcast. And she's like, I, I could tell you about this part.

I can help you with this world's collide. The book sounds good. Again, it's called the material world by Ed Conway. Yeah. Love it. I also like the idea of a soldier that's like shooting long distance and then holding up opera glasses all fancy. Yeah.

Okay, here's my last one. This subject line is my dad's adventure on the river. Hi there Karen and Georgia, I refuse to believe that Stephen is no longer there, but proud of him for doing what he needed to do, so I'm adding him in too. But really, hi everyone who works for MFM. Thanks for making this fun show that I've been listening to since its inception. I recently listened to the cruise ship near Death Experience, and I wanted to share my dads. My dad and his dad used to take their boat out on the Missouri River together to Water ski back in

the 60s. Wow. Nowadays, water skiing usually requires more than two people and for good reason. When the skier falls, someone else is usually in the boat and can alert the driver that, hey, the skier's down, turn the boat around and go get them. But on this particular day, it was just my dad and his dad, no spotter. So cue my dad falling.

It was inevitable. He was bound to fall. When he did, he just had to chill in the water until his dad figured out that he needed to turn around and go back to get him. Sometimes it would take a while for his dad to realize, meaning he'd be very far away down the river and then think, oh, I have to go back and get my kid. My dad tried his best to yell at his dad, but the boat motor was too loud and he watched his dad just keep going down the river, fought farther and farther,

until he was almost out of sight. My dad figured he'd be waiting a while, so he was just treading water and enjoying nature. When all of a sudden, he heard this sshhhhhh sucking sound. And it's literally like so long as he H-H-H-E-E-O-W. But But then it says kind of like that annoying noise that someone makes when they're trying to drink that last drop of drink out of a straw. So he thought to himself, hmm, this is probably not good. And then he looks over and realizes that the noise is coming from a giant water vortex. He tries his best to swim away from the noise, but the current became too strong. And he realized that he was just going to get pulled down into the vortex. Oh my God.

He looked for his dad again, but his dad still hadn't turned around, dude. Just every few seconds turn around. You're just like, can we have a pre-agreement that you're not just going to fuck off down the river? Because I mean, Jesus. Okay, he didn't want to waste precious energy yelling and waving for his dad since his dad was too far away

to possibly see or hear him. My dad has always struck me as a very calm and collected guy. And I think that's the thing that saved his life that day. Before he got too close to the vortex, he took off his ski belt and kicked off his skis. He just let the current from the vortex suck him in, imagine how fucking scary this would be. And then he took a deep breath when it pulled him down under the water. My dad is a pretty smart guy, and he knew that the only way out of the current would be to

angle away from it. So he tucked himself into a cannonball position, and when his feet hit the floor of the river, he sprang feet hit the floor of the river, he sprang up from the bottom of the floor to the surface of the water at an angle, pointing his body upward and straight like a pencil, and then swam away with all his might. I think he told me that the river must have only been 10 or 15 feet deep at this spot, thankfully. Once he reached the surface and his popped his head out of the water,

he had made it far enough away from the vortex. His dad had just happened to be waiting in the boat close to the spot where my dad had materialized and said to him, where the fuck did you go? This story has always been one of my favorites to listen to my dad tell because I never ceased to be amazed at how he just accepted the situation, came up with a plan, and stuck to it in order to get out. I recall this story often when I'm faced

with a strange situation, and remind myself that sometimes you just have to accept what's gonna happen to you, but you don't have to accept that it's going to hurt you. I think that's the reason that survivor stories are so cool. There's this grit to those survivors. Like these were the cards they were dealt, but somehow they figured out a way to change the game and win anyway.

Stay sexy and tell your dad when you get sucked into a water vortex next time for goodness sake, Megan. Oh, like what a freak thing. I mean, I'm not familiar with rivers, but that doesn't sound like something that happens all the time. No, and you know it's super weird. The reason I got excited when I started reading this email is because I watched a TikTok the other day

where it just said at the top, watch till the end, and it just looked like a very calm, still river with some trees in it. Did you see that one? I saw that. And the trees just start going underwater. Totally. And then something starts. And then something starts sucking everything down and around. That is the craziest video. And I bet it happens more often and people who've seen it, but they don't survive it.

So they can't talk about it, right? Yeah, they can't report back. Yeah, only if you're standing on the riverbank and only if you have a phone ready, but like in the time before cell phones, it have a phone ready, but like, right. In the time before cell phones, it was just people going, okay, so I'm standing there and all of a sudden, all the trees disappear on the other side of the riverbank. Yeah, and no one believes you.

This happened to me once in Hawaii where I was trying to get out of the ocean and I was mistiming it, how the waves were coming. And I basically got yanked back in. And so it was real weird. It was like the sand went out from under my, I thought I could kind of walk in. I could rip tie, yeah. So the sand just falls away from under my feet.

I get pulled backwards. And I had the same thing where I was just like, do not panic. Right. Take it, like as I was going, I was just like take the biggest breath you can, get into a ball and understand that you have to wait this out. And it's probably not gonna be as quick as you want,

so just calm down. Yeah, panicking is the worst possible thing you could do in so many situations. Yeah. In those, you have to go like, help me, lizard brain, like that you have to go into that part of your brain where it's like, this is the survival part of my brain where no talking, no yelling.

No, there isn't like a tick-tock how-to about surviving fucking nature. Tell us about, write us in your freak of nature survival stories. Please, or your parents, or your grandparents, we don't care who's there. Any, or just if you've heard one, you love those. Right, right.

And thanks for listening and hanging out with us for a little bit. And sharing your stories, that was a excellent batch of stories. Definitely. Stay sexy. And don't get murdered. Good night. Elvis, do you want a cookie? Ah!

This has been an exactly right production. Our senior producer is Alejandra Keck. Our editor is Aristotle Acevedo. This episode was mixed by Leonis Kulachi. Email your hometowns to my favorite murder at gmail.com. And follow the show on Instagram and Facebook at my favorite murder and on Twitter at my fave murder. Goodbye!

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