Rotten Mango - #72: The Body In The FBI Agent’s Trunk (Case of Mark Putnam & Susan Smith)

Episode Date: June 14, 2021

The hardworking FBI agent was on his way to a meeting when he noticed the large crack on the passenger window of his car. How is he going to explain that? He had a lie for the large wound on his hand. What about the deep scratches all over his neck? Surely he could come up with something.  Now the only thing left to take care of - was the decomposing body in his trunk.  Nothing an FBI agent can’t handle. Source Notes: rottenmangopodcast.com To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Boom. It's a mini-sode. This week's mini-sode is going to stress you out because there's so many different players in this one. There's so many different crimes. It's just complex, it's confusing, and it involves, yes you guessed it, an FBI agent, but not in the way that you think, not in the investigative way, just you wait. So an FBI agent, he wakes up in a motel in Kentucky. He's got this important meeting with a district attorney for a case that he helped solve. I mean, this case put him on the map. He was a rookie FBI agent until he proved himself to the bureau to be good at his job with this particular case. So he gets into the car from the motel. Now it's a rental car because he doesn't live here.

He actually lives in Miami, Florida. So he's driving and he notices that there's just this long crack on the passenger window. And he starts freaking out like, God, how am I going to explain that to the rental car agency? That's so annoying, that's so stressful. He walks into the office, the DA asks him, hey, what's wrong with your hand? Why is it all bandaged up? Oh, I was at home taking care of the mess in the garage,

and I ripped it on an nail. I know, it's so dumb. Oh, okay, well, hope you feel better. Now, if the other FBI agents notice, the scratch is on his neck, they didn't mention it, and the meeting ended late, so they get released at about 4 p. and he's super anxious, this agent's anxious, he's like, well I'm going to get back to my car, what if there's just a crowd surrounding the rental car?

But when he gets there, nobody else is around, so he walks to the back side of his car, and the sun was hot that day, and he's really surprised, huh, there's no smell. He briefly thought about opening it to double check, but what if there's a passerby? What if someone walked by? It would be pretty shocking to see a dead woman in the trunk of an FBI agent's car. This is a real story, it sounds like a movie. It actually was made into a movie. A mealie a Clark plays the lead role. What's a movie? So the movie is called Above Suspicion, which is actually after a book written by Joe Sharkey.

This book is amazing. It's about, well, I can't read you the title, but it's just called Above Suspicion. It's so good. I'm going to link it with my source note. You're like, how did we get here? I'm going to tell you how we got here. It starts with a woman by the name of Kathy Putnam. Now her dad was the second generation Italian-American and Kathy's entire childhood.

She was pretty much raised in this super strict house growing up She did everything right and then slowly in high school. She's like, I want to have fun I want to experience things. She starts smuggling joints into her school. She starts smoking cigarettes She loved it. She loved breaking the rules But at the same time she still had these very intense main character vibes So she's reading Ketchar in the bride. She always has a book with her, she gets good grades though, so she's a very intellectual, smart, but also a rule-breaking type of gal.

Now by the time she's 18 years old, she drops out of high school. There's just really nothing for her. Didn't excite her, she didn't know what she wanted to do with her life, moves into a rundown apartment, her parents are super pissed, they're super shocked like what are you doing? She starts bartending at a go-go dancer club and she hated it. She was like I mean I'm not even dancing and I hate this. The men here are horrible like it's her brandess here. A person comes up to her and is like we'll have you tried like a massage parlour.

Now Kathy is young, she's impressionable, she understands like a massage parlour, you're probably going to be doing some shady stuff okay? Maybe, maybe you're going to be wearing like a skimpy sexy outfit and you're gonna massage the Nasty shoulders of a sweaty dude and you're gonna say, whoa, you're so handsome But maybe that's it. So she gets the job at this massage parlor And she didn't realize until her first client walked in that he expected her to give him a hand job So she starts freaking out. I mean she she's like, I can't do that. So she tells all of her clients, like, you can do it.

And look at me, I guess, but I can't do it. I'm not touching you. This went on for a couple of weeks. Now, one day when she's out of work, she decides to go shopping for a pair of jeans. Very specific, I know. She goes to the mall. And she sees this guy following her around.

Just through the mall, through the stores. He's so creepy, but like, where do I know him from? Oh my God, is that Joe from the massage parlour? Like, she knew his first name, she knew his last name. This is a client that comes in all the time. Start freaking out a little bit. But she's thinking to herself, if he does follow me all the way to my apartment, I'm gonna give him a piece

of my mind. I'm gonna tell him, you're such a freaking creep. Did you follow me here because I didn't give you a hand job at work? She had this whole script in her mind. She drives all the way home And this was a huge mistake That's how she described it because he barged into her apartment after she unlocked it and he raped her So she runs to this massage place. She tells her bosses everything

Remember that client that you guys constantly let in? Well, he's a rapist. He just raped me. I need to call the cops. They told her, well, you can't because this is an illegally run massage parlour. So get your ass out of here and you're f**king fired. Like they were that root her. They just threw her out onto the street, completely distraught. She does try to tell the police and they just told her, well, it's your word against his word. And just left this huge bad taste in her mouth.

Now, this is when Kathy starts breaking the law. She starts doing something called a dry hustle, which is exactly what you would expect. She goes to a busy part of town with her boyfriend, and she's like, okay, you boyfriend, you wait in the car. I'm gonna approach these young groups of guys and tell them that I've got five sex workers in a hotel, and they are just salivating for five young, men like you and I can direct you to them I can

like tell you where they are I can go bring you to the party we can have some fun but I need some money up front because you know I can't just like tell you the location because what if you try to go in there barge in there and try to do something so just like give me a couple hundred bucks and I'll show you the way so she'd get the money and she'd just run it. Dip, just book it to the car. She'd tell her boyfriend you gotta go, go, go, go, go. Now this is where it got really messed up.

The first time that she ever did this, she's 18 years old. And one of the men turned out to be an undercover policeman. So she was immediately arrested and they kept trying to pry information out of her. Where are the sex workers? What hotel room? What kind of operation is this? How many women are involved? Because you know, that's gonna save the world. Arrest all the sex workers. That's the only way we can get crime off the streets. That makes sense police officers. But then they slowly realized that they were none.

This was all a dry hustle. This was a complete scam. This was a lie. So at this point, she's like, I need to get my life together. I can't be. I mean, I'm 18. This is gonna stay on my record. I'm no longer a juvenile. So she goes to this bar and she's drinking. She's having fun, letting off steam until she's gonna maybe go to school again. She's thinking about all these things when there's an older woman at the bar. And this woman approaches her and says, well, you're really pretty. I have a son. You know where this is going. I have a son. You know where this is going.

I have a son. You should meet him. He just graduated college. Have you heard of University of Tampa? Nice school, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. He's going to be an FBI agent one day. Mm-hmm.

That's what he's going to do. He's going to go to the academy. Cally's in there. I was like, what kind of guy? What kind of guy can't even get his own date? That his mom is at the bar trying to Get a date for him on a Friday night like not even on a Tuesday on a freaking Friday night, you know And she's also thinking to herself what kind of guy wants to be an FBI agent?

She just wasn't into it. She's like, I don't know what kind of guy that is. I don't think that's the kind of guy that I want to date Sounds like a weirdo sounds like a by the books type of dude not fun not cool but the woman is persistent this old lady is like no you got to meet him he's so handsome she's like okay yeah your son is really handsome I get it so she starts calling her son on the phone and just throws the phone at Kathy to pick it up and she's like hello and his voice she has a boyfriend no well they broke up they were on and off very very shaky relationships So his voice is super calm and he just very low almost Velvety and he apologizes for his embarrassing mom and

Kathy instantly is intrigued. She's like wow, this is a hot guy voice I don't know how else to describe it, but like he sounds sounds hot So she's like well, why don't don't you come down over to the bar and say hi. And so he does. 20 minutes later, he shows up, and they instantly fall in love. By the end of the night, I mean, they were inseparable. They loved each other.

So Mark Putnam is the guy that she was introduced to. And he had always wanted to be an FBI agent. I mean, that's pretty much what his childhood was. He was really close with both of his parents, particularly his dad. I know very strange. We never talk about good relationships anymore.. He was really close with both of his parents, particularly his dad. I know very strange. We never talk about good relationships anymore, so he's really close to them. And he believed in honesty and justice.

This sounds really corny, right? And anytime Mark would go around telling people, they would laugh in his face. Like, you want to be an FBI agent because honesty? People are FBI agents because it sounds cool. Okay. No one, you want to be an FBI agents because it sounds cool. Okay, no one, you wanna be an FBI agent because of justice? People wanna be FBI agents because it's a powerful position.

What, you've got it all wrong, okay? You don't understand the world. That's what they would tell Mark, but he was obsessed with this idea. His dad was the only one that wouldn't laugh in his face. His dad was like, you need to do it, but the only way to be an FBI agent is if you get good grades. So he studied hard all through middle school, high school,

did sports in high school, did sports in college. I mean, he was really good at all of these things, very, very athletic, and then his dad passed away of lung cancer. And it only pushed Mark more. I mean, this is how loving of a household it was. At his dad's funeral, he looked his mom in the eye and said, Mom, if I can be half the man that my dad was, I will be happy. Wow. And Mark really liked Kathy. He liked women with strong personalities.

Like, people who are independent, assertive. Someone like a woman that can keep him laughing at himself. That isn't just like, oh my god, Mark, you're so funny. But it's like, Mark, you look funny. Like, he liked women like that. So they start dating like two teenagers. He actually, they move in together. They start saving up money.

This is how like, future focus they were. They start saving up money to get married and have children. Right, when they start dating, they're not trying to like mess around. They're just madly in love. He gets a job as a clerk at an FBI office, and she gets a job as a paralegal for an insurance Company just saving up all this money and so after they saved up enough money

They get married in New York City and everyone. I mean everyone was so happy for them People knew Mark's biggest dream was to be an FBI agent and if anyone if anyone could be an FBI agent's wife It was Kathy. She did this like realism about her. She was very practical, she was good with money, she was good with managing schedules, tasks, all of these things. She was also really good as a homemaker, really good at cooking and cleaning,

which sounds really misogynistic, but it's very positive attribute. And he was seen as just ambitious, overly ambitious, and she had this ability to like reignited and to everyone They were perfect just absolutely perfect. So after they get married, they give birth to their first kid by the name of Danielle a daughter Now if you were to have a poster child for an FBI family recruitment center like you know those brochures It would be the putnam family Like this is exactly what they would look like. Mark had this dark hair, dark eyes, super muscular guy.

I mean, played sports his entire life, super fit, star athlete in college, the type of guy that will go running after a long day at work. Like he loves jogging by himself, like a 10 mile jog. Kathy, she's got this light brown hair, she's delicate looking, she's very petite, she's got this beautiful smile, and then now they have this tiny little baby, I mean this is straight up an ad for the FBI.

And he nervously applies for the Academy, and he gets in. And Kathy sure enough was the perfect partner. She printed out six of the FBI's most wanted posters and framed them up in their house as like a congratulations, now go catch these these guys and he just thought it was hilarious He just thought it was so cute. So he graduates from the Academy now once you graduate your placed in an office Like it could be all over the nation. You've got to be very Moveable you can't be like well, I was born in rainston, you know, California I got to stay in California. No, they will place you wherever they need you. That's part of the drill

So he got placed in a random location in Kentucky. Fresh out of the academy, it's a place called Pikeville, Kentucky. It's in the mountains. Apparently, it's nothing like it now, but back in the day, maybe in the 80s, it was the type of place where if you had three people from Pikeville, two of them, their biggest dreams on life, were to leave Pikeville. Like they were just constantly losing their population. Okay? Like two thirds of the graduating high school class would be like,

buy I'm not going to college here. Like I'm gonna leave, I can't do this. It was one of those places. And he's stationed out of there? Yeah. And what makes it even weirder is that it's a three-agent office. So there's not many mentors for this new agent. I mean, he's pretty much gonna be, there's a heavy dose of crime there too. It's not like a retirement central

where there's no crime and that's why there's three agents, but there's a lot of bank robberies, there's a lot of drug usage, corruption, yeah, bad cops, dirty cops. So it's like the worst, he got the worst look. Yeah, and then you're in this like really heavy mining, coal mining, mountain situation, but don't think like beautiful skiing mountain, think like harsh mountain situation where like the sun is shaded all the time because of these

towering mountains. I mean, they're both 27 years old and he's like, well babe, I gotta do what I gotta do. We gotta go to Kentucky. I mean, hopefully we'll just be here for like three, four years and then I can get transferred out to a busier location. His big thing was I just want to be mentored by good agents so that I can be a good agent. Like he was really ambitious about all of this, but the FBI told him, think about it like this. We put you there because you're really promising rookie

because you don't need constant supervision. I mean every other FBI agent, right, that's going to be in Los Angeles, San Francisco. They're going to be doing paperwork for three months, at least. And then for the next year, they're doing ride-alongs with other FBI agents. But you, you get to go to Pikeville, Kentucky, and just hit the ground running. No supervision. Just,, just your thing. So they move. Sounds like a scam. Yeah, so they move their entire family,

their young daughter Danielle to Pikeville. And he's so excited. Like this guy runs into his first day at this FBI office, which they said that it looks like, you know, when you go to a car dealership, it's so fancy, but then when you go to the office where you start negotiating, it's like the most cramped office with like the chairs, with the leather's peeling off.

It was one of those. Like, it looks like that. So he's without the car. Without the car. Without the dealership. Without the fancy part. Just a room. Yeah, just a room.

Yeah. So he's just got this room. But Mike is motivated. And he goes up to his boss and he says hi I'm Mark Putman and I'm gonna bust my ass for you guys here don't freaking worry I'm gonna bust my ass and the boss looks at him straight in the eye and says You don't have to bust your ass, okay, just do your case load. He's like what? No, I'm ready to work overnight 24 hour shifts Stakes out in my car. I'm gonna sleep in my car watching, surveilling people.

Yeah, yeah, just do your case, so you're gonna be fine, okay? Jesus, okay calm down. He's like, what? And yes, first, they work, he starts realizing this location is an absolute mess. There's no secretaries, there's no clerks. Now this is fascinating because the FBI is known, is known for being just the king of paperwork. That's what they call themselves sometimes.

They think that paperwork is as important as investigating. Without the paperwork, you're screwed. It's so important. That's what the academy just drills into work. Paperwork is everything. Paperwork, paperwork, paperwork, paperwork. But there's no clerk. So there's just paperwork everywhere.

There's just overdue paperwork everywhere. How am I going to do this? But if I'm investigating, usually most offices have secretaries that do the paperwork so that I can be investigating the crimes, what? So he's getting stressed. Now Kathy, she's at home and she's like, don't worry, Mark, I got you. I'm going to be your secretary. Obviously, she's not getting paid by the FBI, but she says, you know, I'm going to start fielding your calls because you're going to be out on the run, you know,

out fighting crime. I don't even know if that's illegal. Yeah, just a random citizen starting to work for FBI. So she's like, give all your contacts the house number again. Are you kidding me? So she's, she give all your contacts the house number. Again, very illegal. So she's literally watching the baby cleaning the house and then she picks up the phone. Mark Patman's office FBI. Oh my god. And she's like, oh yeah, he'll definitely return your call by 2 p.m. She writes it down.

Tell us Mark, you got to call this person by 2 p.m. This person wants this. Just fielding all of his calls, calls taking his messages working on his schedule Super legal very shady stuff, but can you really blame this young couple? They're just trying to make do it's almost kind of cute in a comical legal way And he just starts overdoing Immediately upon getting there his other agent keeps telling him non-stop relax Relax, okay? You don't need to be pulling these double shifts, okay?

You're on salary, dude Relax You've got a big long Career ahead of you. You don't have to go overboard right now. You don't have to do all of this right now We just like to keep a chill stop just calm down He didn't care he starts working these like 20 hours shifts. On Saturdays, he would bring little Dan Yellen to the office. Why is he working so much? He just wanted to make a name for himself. He wanted to be like the head of the FBI one

day. He was super ambitious. So he would bring his little daughter into the office. She would sit there and color with crayons and he would go through all of his mail and organize every single Saturday, even the cops like him, which is crazy. Usually, I mean, it's stressed that the cops, state, and local, and the feds, you know, like federal entities like the FBI, they should have a good relationship, right? That makes sense. But then you realize the FBI and the CIA probably even hate each other. They all just don't like each other.

So both parties find each other completely lazy and incompetent. The cops think that the FBI are glorified office workers. They just have the deep pockets. They use money and all these little cute, because you know, the FBI, they're always running around in business casual, not like a uniform. Oh, that's true. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

They think they're so much better than us. But all they freaking do is have money that we don't have. If we had that money, we would solve the cases too, okay Always coming up in our jurisdiction Trying to do and then the FBI think state and local cops are just lazy and competent and just want to eat donuts You know like if they just have usually the FBI is a lot more physically fit than state and local cops too So that I just adds to the whole stigma of them hating each other, you know This is a whole thing.

There's a whole hierarchy. It's fascinating. We should dive deep into it one day. But Mark worked really hard to have the local cops like him, like really hard. He would offer to go on these ride-alongs and would willingly give them information that he didn't need to. Just make their lives easier. Help him out.

Smart dude. Smart dude. And while he was doing that, he's essentially just begging for cases. That's, he just wants cases. More cases. So he's doing all of this. Kathy at home, she's a secretary, she's a homemaker, she's a wife, but she's also having a hard time adjusting.

She's cleaning, taking care of the kids, secretary work, just, it's a lot. And Pikeville is not a glamorous place. She has no friends. It's a really depressing place. It's also not so they're from the East Coast like Connecticut, New York City and now Pikeville is very okay in the book. They kept calling it the H word. Is that a slurry yet? I feel like it's gonna be a slur. The hill, you know, yeah, yeah, that's slur. So maybe it was just also a culture shock for her to be there. now this next part of the story

You have to understand FBI informants. Did you know informants are paid money to tell the FBI juicy details? For whatever reason I thought that they were just Given the opportunity did not go jail not go to jail and they take it They're like yeah, I don't want to go to jail, but the FBI would actually pay them a ton of money You get paid to snitch on people essentially. How much money? Oh, let me tell you. So the FBI initially is given $10,000 to form a bond with an informant. They say, hey, this person is connected to blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Crime. The FBI field office will send them $10,000. I don't know if this, you know, amount has increased since like the 80s or 90s or decreased probably Increased probably increased right so they give them money now. It's the FBI agents at their discretion to pass this money slowly Like a trickle to form this bond with the informant the informant gives them a little so then you give them a little money Mm-hmm And then a little and then it runs out you ask the FBI for more but there's not really a cap on this. So some informants could be making a ton of money. And then once you testify a trial,

depending on how big this case is, your testimony could earn you like $30,000. Suddenly everyone's like, who can I snitch on in my life right now? I'm calling the FBI and I'm testifying. Yeah, $30,000. I mean, the FBI had deep, deep pockets. They do still.

Incredibly, I can't even fathom. Now, the informants and the general population of Pikeville in Kentucky, they knew about this. They knew that if you inform the FBI about a crime, you get a little bit of money on the side. So a lot of these criminals, they would snitch on their criminal friends because, you know, rent is due, life is hard, you gotta do some, okay okay that's exactly what would happen but the Pikeville FBA agents they

would skim some off the top if they were going to be 500 they would probably keep 300 give you 200 and tell the FBI field office I gave them the whole thing the informant took it all but Mike never did that real and the word around town is that mark is good for the money mark is really good for the money So this is when all the the crimes just start coming to him non-stop I mean the phones were off the rockers just non-stop people saying I need to talk to Mark I've got a crazy crime. I need to talk to Mark. I've got a crazy crime Just to bank robberies drug bus political corruption this is working overtime yeah not making money not asking for more work begging for more work begging for more work giving away more money yeah yeah

precisely I mean like in the initial part of this story you're thinking this is whatever FBI agent should do, right? Just wait. Just wait. So within a few months, he's living his FBI dreams. The rest of his graduating class, they're still processing paperwork in these big offices. But he's going, you know, he's going, solving these crimes. He's being independent. Nobody's really supervising him.

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America. Why did I want to say Walgreens? Wells Fargo is the one I'm thinking of, but not not in Pikeville. It was mom and pop, not a lot of security. Bank robberies are a federal crime, so he would be delegated to go to solve all of these bank robberies in Pikeville. And there was a lot, and at this particular moment there was a serial bank robber that was on the loose, and a lot of people speculated in town that it was a man by the name of Cat Eyes. That's his nickname.

That's his street name, Cat Eyes. You might think it's because he's got these bright green eyes, and it is, but it's also because, if you're his friend, he will tell you all of his bank robbery secrets. So his main secret is to cut two tiny little holes in a ski mask when you rob a bank with a shotgun. But the holes are so small that in the middle of bank robberies, his ski mask would start moving around in the middle of the ball of this and he would have to constantly move it back. I mean there would be times where

he'd be robbing a bank completely blind. So they just called him cat eyes. Like he just just got this fifth sense, sixth sense, I guess, to rob these banks. So he went to jail multiple times for robbing banks with sawdoth, shot guns, with his little ski mask. He was recently released and suspiciously, banks started getting robbed again. And coincidentally, these banks were being robbed in the same manner that he, cat eyes, used to rob banks. I'm thinking I could be an FBI agent at this point. I'm putting two and two together, are you? So Mark Putman has a relatively easy case on this one.

I mean, this guy's a legend. Last time he went to jail, he robbed a bunch of banks, stocked up on $650,000 in cash. Bought a Cadillac, drove around the neighboring states blowing it on gambling. Then came back completely broke, got arrested, now he's released again. This is not a mastermind criminal.

This is gonna be pretty easy to catch this guy in the act, right? Now that he's out shopping, probably planning his next bank robberies, let's look out for shotgun sales You know, let's do all of this and he was staying with a friend by the name of Kenneth Smith Now Kat ice. Okay, so Kenneth Smith is bad news He was on probation for drug possession and he was living with his girlfriend Susan Smith and their two kids And it's just not a good household There was just a lot of crime going on a lot of pills a lot of drug usage and they had two kids in the house

So he's thinking when I'm thinking mark is like I'm gonna I'm gonna make Kenneth Smith an Informant they live together a holy cow that but that's the easiest informant and Kenneth Smith He's not an upstanding guy. He's got a criminal record. He's money hungry. It's perfect. Now, he didn't know exactly how perfect it was, because if you were in this Smith household, and you heard the conversations between cat eyes and people who were just in and out of this house, it's gnarly. They would just sit around the dinner table talking about bank robberies. Cat eyes love to talk about it. That was his favorite dinner topic.

It's all about the strategy he would tell them, you know? Even though he's been caught multiple times. It's all in the strategy. You got to think what time do they open? You know what time does the bank close? Is the construction of the bank brick? Is it, you know, what is it? Is it drywall?

Where are the alarms? How many employees? What days do they get the cash delivered? What days do they get the cash delivered? What days do they get the welfare checks delivered? Because check day. Oh, that's a good one. That's a good bust Meanwhile, he's completely broke living in the Smith House and he would give them financial advice He'd be like, you know, I know I'm living off of you, but you should buy some trailers Just stock up on some trailers, sit back, collect rent forever. That's what we would tell them, okay?

Now the FBI, they bring in greedy little Kenneth, and they try to see if he wants to be an informant. And this guy's super demanding, Kenneth sitting there, and he's like, yeah, I know I'm on probation for drug possession, but I want a weekly salary, I want bonuses for specific information against cat eyes, and maybe I want some special privileges Maybe if you catch me doing drugs look the other way

Tell like we're not okay. We'll give us a little tease give us some information the more that they talked to him They realize Kenneth is completely unreliable like he is the worst memory ever He can't even remember what he ate for breakfast this morning and we expect him to remember details that he's got a recount in trial as a testimony or no that's not gonna work the only reason Kenneth remembered to do things like shower is because his girlfriend Susan would remind him now one of the agents his name's Bert he's like oh I miss I know Susie I've known Susie oh my god all her life Susan why don't we use her as an informant I mean I okay well this one, oh my god, all her life, Susan. Why don't we use her as an informant? I mean, okay, well this one did fail, so I guess we'll work on Susan.

Now what did the FBI Academy teach Mark about, you know, forming a connection with informants because his first one failed, Kenneth failed, Kenneth sucks. So they teach you how they academy that you don't personally get involved with these informants. But that's kind of bulls- I mean, how do you have these people, usually seasoned criminals who are very skeptical and cynical of law enforcement? How do you have them trust you?

It's easier said than done, don't get personal. It seems like you have to get a little bit personal. Now, what are the motivations of informants? Some of them just want money, you know? Some of them are just greedy for more money. Some of them want revenge against the criminals that they're snitching on. And sometimes very rarely, it's a sense of duty.

At least people are like, I got a fight crime, you know? I know that I like murdered five people, but there's a guy out there that's Jay walking. It's just so dangerous. Now, Susan Smith is going to be a huge part of this story, so I'm going to give you the run down on her. She was the 25-year-old girlfriend of Kenneth, and she was notorious in this town. She was actually a family member of the Hatfield old girlfriend of Kenneth and she was notorious in this town. She was actually a family member of the Hatfield McCoy War. Do you guys know about this? It's recognized as an American folklore. So the McCoy family, which is Susan's family, is from Kentucky, and the Hatfield family is from West Virginia. Now this is your prime appellation, mountains, you know, American two families fighting over land, fighting over

coal. They were also both in the business of making a legal moonshine. And so they were just, I mean, this was a perfect dynasty feud, if you could, but make it super American. The McCoys were of a lower middle class. They had fields where a lot more affluent and they were just constantly fighting. There were so many disputes about land, moonshine. There was a deadly dispute where one of the family members died over a pig. Over which family owned that pig? And it caused a death. Then two people in both parts, a McCoy girl and a hat-filled boy, they fall in love.

Oh yeah, it's one of those stories, okay? This is a few that went on for decades by the way. So these kids are like- Famous. Yeah, these kids are like why are our grandpa's hiding each other? Let's get married. So she runs off the McCoy girl leaves Kentucky, moves to West Virginia with the Hatfields. She falls in love, she gets pregnant and then her family the McCoys convinced her to come back to Kentucky. Are you crazy? She gets back to Kentucky. She's completely pregnant and the Hatfield boy is like, well,

yeah, I don't want to marry you anyway and ends up marrying her cousin. Another McCoy girl. Now, all of this caused a huge full-on war between the families and that peaked with more than 12 people killed from both sides of the family and nine hot feels went to prison. Wow. So this is a really intense feud. Like a very famous one if you're into old American history. Very wild. Now Susan's childhood was incredibly rough. She did not enjoy a lot of privilege. She didn't really come from like a good background. She grew up sharing a room with four sisters and two beds. She didn't have shoes, so she hated going to school growing up because they'd be like,

why don't you have shoes? And they would just laugh at her, which is so rude. She would have to fetch water in a well because they lived on the mountain side. That was like her every day. Breakfast was always just a piece of bread and milk, and by the time she was 15, she was over it. She didn't want to go to school and be ashamed of how poor she was. She was the fifth out of nine children and they were all struggling. And her life dream was to become a secretary.

Because she would watch TV and all the respectable women and movies were secretaries, which by the way, amazing job, but we need better movies sometimes, you know? Because if that's the only job that women have in movies, you start to be like, oh, I guess I gotta be a secretary. In the movies, they were considered helpers, like assistants, they were dressed beautifully, they lived in these big cities, and it's just her dream, and she's like, well, I'm good at helping. And people agreed with her if you wanted help, Susan was always there. But she had a temper, Like, she was very interesting.

And I think what makes this case interesting is that no one really sugarcoats things. They say, she's a stray kitten with a temper. That's how they describe her. She was considered just like a young girl that fought her way through life. Nothing was given to her. I mean, she struggled to even get shoes.

She struggled in a world where she had to fight for everything. And her biggest ambition in life was to become a secretary so that she can get married and have children. That was it. So when she's 15, she finds her way out. She meets 22-year-old Kenneth Smith. And she's like, wow, you're old, you've got your life together. What do you do for a living? It looks at her and you say, zomi.

I'm a gambler. In reality, he was a drug dealer. I don't know which one's better. I don't know why he chose that one as his profession reality, he was a drug dealer. I don't know which one's better. I don't know why he chose that one as his profession, but he was a drug dealer. And she immediately turned it on. I mean, she became his assistant immediately. She was good with numbers.

She helped with these drug deals. She had a great personality. She would be friend and build rapport with clients, drug clients, and she would go around telling herself, oh, I'm Kenneth's executive assistant. She had no idea what that meant. She just had seen it on TV somewhere. She had heard it and it sounded fancy.

So she's like, I'm Kenneth's executive assistant. Within two years, Kenneth was in jail for drug possession. So she was jobless and she had no money. So she starts working at these fast food restaurants. But that's just not enough money to live. So she starts resorting to sex work. And when he returned, they got pregnant. He gets out of jail and they get pregnant. So she starts you know resorting to sex work and when he returned they got pregnant. He gets out of jail and they get pregnant so she's thinking okay this guy's

gonna get his life together. He's gonna go from drug dealing to gambling. Like we're gonna we're gonna move up the ladder. They move into this trailer to start their family but Susan I mean it's crazy. She tried so hard to decorate it with pillows and throws and just make it like a family friendly place. Even though it was just far far from cozy, not that trailers can't be but this one was bad. Now Kenneth becomes super abusive, just hitting our non-stop. Like his main go to would to drink due drugs at night, beat Susan and in the morning he'd get on his knees and say, I'm gonna change.

Today I'm gonna change. And then he would do drugs, get drunk, and hit her again. And they were just in this vicious cycle and then she had another child, which is another big reason to stay. And they just weren't happy at all. Sometimes they were roommates, sometimes they were dating,

but he was constantly abusive regardless. Now this is when the FBI agent Mark Putnam comes into our life and he's about to destroy it all. So she's probably not the best informant, but she has a better memory than Kenneth, you know? She remembers things. She wasn't known for being honest though. She also wasn't known for keeping things on the loa, like she talked a lot, like she

would tell everyone that she's an FBI informant. Which is something that you don't want to do. Yeah, yeah. Everyone in Kentucky pretty much knew that Susan Smith was working for the FBI. But the upside is, she's living with cat eyes and she has provided information at one point in time that was accurate, and at once did lead to an arrest.

She wasn't paid for it, but she did tell her FBI agent friend, you know, Bert. Oh, I know about this. And then he arrested people. And she knew all the right people. She knew all the bad people. So maybe, maybe know about this. And then he arrested people. And she knew all the right people. She knew all the bad people. So maybe, maybe it could work. So Mark and Bert decided to meet up with Kenneth and Susan at a local restaurant, broad

daylight. And they're all eating. Kenneth is very possessive, very skeptical, doesn't like these FBI agents. He's like, why not use me? Give me the money. Why are you trying to give it to my girlfriend? Like saying all these things. And as they're chatting mark

You know looks at Susan and says can we talk in private? So Bert is left with Kenneth and they walk out into the parking lot broad daylight and as they're talking you know Mark sizing her up turns out she's incredibly street smart She's got this attitude about her and it's something that he likes in women, you know women that can't be pushed around Just one of those girls. And she wasn't necessarily attractive. I love that these were like the first thing on this guy's mind, not like solving crime. But she was fairly pretty. She's got this petite figure, and she's

got this very engaging smile. And he asks her straight up, do you want to be an informant for me? Do you want to work for me? Like, I'll pay you. And she's just avoiding the subject. She's like, well, I don't know. Anyway, are you married? She asked them? Yeah. She's like, well, I don't know, you know. Anyway, are you married?

She asked them? Yeah. He's like, yeah. Oh, well, is your wife pretty? Yeah? She's pretty. Oh, but does she have a nice body? Yeah, okay. What does this have anything to do with it? I'm asking you. Do you want to be an informant and snitch on cat eyes? My wife's not an FBI agent. My wife's not a bank robber. Yes or no. And she said, I'll think about it.

And she just pranced right into the restaurant again, ate her food that the FBI paid for, and just left. So he's like, what? I mean, I'm so confused. Like, she is the type of person that will feed you just enough information. She's really smart about it. She doesn't play all her cards at once.

So before you knew it, they were meeting two to three times a week until she was murdered. What? Just constantly meeting. And Susan was right. We're meeting for what though. Just like, oh, can I set this today? So she is an enforcement. Yeah. So she's slowly giving him information. He's slowly paying her. And Susan was really into Mark right off the bat.

Everyone knew this. I mean, Mark was handsome. He's motivated, polished, polite. Somebody that treats all women like ladies, I guess. And she just acted like a woman in love. It didn't look like a woman trying to get money from the FBI or trying to, you know, a sense of duty. A woman in love is more how people would describe Susan Smith. But for Mark, it was all work. It's always been about all work.

So Susan tells him that Kat eyes is trying to plan another robbery. He had brought back to their place two sawdoth shotguns and a bunch of ski masks. So the FBI alerts all the local banks and then it happened.. Caddys robbed a first national bank 15-mile south of Pikeville. He walked up in there, showed the teller the shotgun, he's wearing this homemade ski mask, and said put the money on the pillowcase. A pillowcase. He's trick-or-treating, okay? So then she slips in a die pack, you know, the things that would explode, this big red

die the minute that it leaves the property, it's like location-based, and then it makes the rest of the bills just soaked and readying and then his clothes usually gets soaked it's easier to catch them right then he wanted to go to the vault they stuffed it with more money he left with a total of thirty thousand dollars and he told them hey can you guys stay in the vault till I leave so he leaves and some of the bank employees crawl out because they're trying to get that license plate number and they see him rushed to the getaway car but he's doing these small victory laps

like a football player just like hopping up and down, fisting the air, like yeah! And they're like what? And then the die pack explodes in the middle of the parking lot and Kat ice freaks out, everyone said he looked like he genuinely thought he had been shot like he's looking at his body like, oh my god, because his red dye everywhere and it was really loud. But then once he realized he hadn't been shot, he bucks it to the car and they drive off.

But it was too late because a bank employee had already written down the license plate number. So with that they called the police. But the police were busy. So a week later, another branch calls the FBI and says, hey I don't know if this is like a crime but there was a nervous man in here and he had these green eyes. He looked like this and he was asking to make an exchange and this exchange was very odd. Okay well what was it? You know those two dollar bills? He wanted to get them exchanged for different tender. You know like he wanted some vibes, he wanted some tents, some 20s, but he came in here with $182 bills.

I was thinking, well who has that many two dollar bills? And then I noticed that all of them were stained at the edge with some sort of ready ink. I just thought that was strange, but he left already. So like, oh my god, it's cat eyes. The green eyes, these bills, it's cat eyes. Susan told us. Now, at this point, Mark had been out of town doing an arrest warrant, right? So Bert is like, Susan, tell me where he is.

And she says, nope, I'm not telling you. Finally, Mark comes back and she tells Mark, well, I didn't want to tell anyone else because then they would take credit for your hard work. So anyways, cat eyes is at his mom's house in West Virginia. I'll give you the address. So they go bust and arrest Kat ises. Now Susan informs him all of this.

He was caught, Mark paid Susan $3,200 for all this information and she tried to give him some money of it, some of that money back. And he's refusing. He's like, no, I don't do that. Don't worry about it. And she just dropped it on his desk and rushed out of there. Damn she really likes him huh? Yeah and he was so dumb that he was so concerned is she trying to set me up for something like why is she leaving me money?

He likes trying to set me up. No you idiot she likes you. Don't be dumb. So then he agreed to pay her another $8,600 to testify in the trial against cat eyes. Now, the town is really confused because Susan is now going around telling everyone that she is Mark's new executive assistant. Yes, she's bragging about it. She's saying, I work for the FBI, I am federally protected by the FBI. She would say things like this. I don't know if it works like that.

Does the FBI really protect anyone? Federally speaking. I don't know if it works like that. Does the FBI really protect anyone? federally speaking, I don't even know what that means. Okay, this sentence is too complex. So she would tell all these people these things and the only person that seemed to realize what was going on was Kathy Kathy Putman, Mark's wife. She thought, well, I think the reason maybe Susie's going around telling all these people this is because she at least this offers her some protection. Maybe if people believe that she's working that closely with the FBI, even though she's a snitch, even though she's an informant, maybe they won't hurt her because how dumb would that be? Susan was a regular caller at the Putnam House to talk to Mark because, you know,

Kathy as the secretary, his wife would pick up, and she immediately took a liking to Susie to Susan, just in an empathetic way. She claimed Susan's like a cloud, just aimlessly traveling around, trying to find a purpose in life, and Kathy could relate to that, you know, she had a time in her life before she met Mark when she was doing that dry house, so got arrested, doing all these things. She was also floating around like a cloud, and Susan would call non-stop. She took her job as an informant seriously She believed that it was a full-time gig. She would call in to just report like hey today

I'm gonna be trying to do this. It's like well Yes, Susie, but just call us when you have information Informant information. You don't have to call me to tell me you know your schedule for the day But she would do it. She was like, but I think you just need to know that I'm working hard Okay, like she was really dedicated to this and Kathy would be there to field these calls and they would slowly start talking about other things Now Kathy had already heard everything about Susan from Mark, you know He's just like this my first informant it led to an arrest There was also some strange things that happened with Susan. Mark told her, Mark told Kathy,

that after meeting Susan at the restaurant, Kenneth, Susan's boyfriend, went around telling everyone in town that an FBI agent forked the shit out of Susan in the parking lot in broad daylight in an FBI car. What? You super pissed about it, you know? Just like, bizarre, right?

Just like, what kind of guy does that? That's strange. Is that gonna put your job on the line? Like, that's, no, no one even believes them. Trust me, it's fine. But she just thought, wow, what a weird couple. So the two women, they start bonding, you know? Kathleen, like I said, she's lonely, she's unhappy and pikeville.

Susan is almost like a, like a little sister to her. She's like this kind of person who needs help and Kathy needed company. Now Kathy's not done. She realized that Susan had an obsession with Mark. I wouldn't maybe say obsession, maybe a liking, but she saw it as like a cute, eager female student with a crush on the professor.

Do you know what I'm talking about? Yeah, of course. Kind of like, oh, it's nothing serious, just like one of those little girl crushes almost, even though they're both a age, and it could be very dangerous. Yeah. But that's how she saw it.

And Susan would constantly ask like, hey, Kathy, what's your advice on grooming? What's your advice on etiquette? And then would slowly start asking personal information about Mark, like, what does he like to eat? Does he like to read? So one time she asked Kathy, does he like to read? And ever since then, Mark would come home and be like, so strange as think, and Susan's just coming up to every meeting with like a stack of books with her.

Like, what are you doing with a stack of books lady? Let's bizarre, I've never seen you with a stack of books. And he started noticing some odd changes when a Kathy would cut her hair. Susan would then cut her hair. Susan stopped talking the way that she used to. So she would always say things like, oh, I hear to them say that, like I hear to them. And then she would say, oh, sorry, I'm at her. So she was very focused on coming off as like this polite, I guess, quote, polite person now. Now that she's talking to Kathy. And then from Susan's perspective, she just felt like she was living a glamorous life, helping me FBI.

An executive secretary to an agent, I mean, that's a crazy job. But at the same time, she had this confliction in her head. On one point, she sees herself as an informant, an executive secretary, but at the same time, she sees herself as, you know, she sees herself in Mark as a Bonnie and Clyde of sorts. There's just a lot of unprofessional emotions going on. There's just the communication wasn't clear. She showed up to the courthouse every single day looking for Mark to the point where she would actually imply to all these government employees that her and Mark, the FBI agent in town, are very in a very personal relationship.

People thought it was shady. She just talked nonstop about all the men she was also in bed with. She was known to overshare her. She was also known to lie about a lot of these things. It just seems like for me the way that I interpreted it is a girl living in a small town just wanting some attention. It's kind of sad. And Kathy knew this side about her.

Susan would tell her, I hate my relationship. I have all these money problems. I hate the way would tell her, I hate my relationship. I have all these money problems. I hate the way that I look. I hate the way that I talk. I sound like a, you know, a hill, you know, finish the sentence. I want to do big things, but every time I try to do something, every time I try to move, something goes wrong, and then I end up back here, and I just, I hate it.

I feel stupid. And Kathy related to this, and she would say things like, no, I was there with you. Like, I was just like you. But you can have what I have, you know You can you can have a happy life one day. You can have a wonderful beautiful family one day I'm a different person now and you could do it too Susan you're young you're beautiful. You're competent. You're worth it If I can do it, you can do it.

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Stamps.com, never go to the post office again! And Kathy would confine in her as well, and she would say things like, you know, we're trying to get pregnant. It's our life plan to have two children. It's on the schedule right now, to have another one. But we're not making a lot of money yet. We don't go on date nights anymore. We just eat at home, spend time with Danielle, their daughter. Every week he'll come home and dress up Danielle and her prettiest dress and we take her to McDonald's. That's like the highlight of our

week. So it's been rough. I don't know how we're going to afford another kid, but it's on our timeline. Meanwhile, Mark cared, but not really. You know, he was done with the information that Susan gave on. He was moving on to the next thing. Operation chop shop. This was going to be the biggest bus ever. It was a bunch of stolen equipment. Like I am talking trucks. Not personal trucks. Commercial trucks were being stolen. And picked apart and the parts were being sold, like a Sears catalog for criminals. There was like millions and millions of dollars.

I think like in one bus they found four million dollars worth of parts. This is a huge organization and a guy named Charlie was the informant on it. And he was just upset because he was supposed to get paid like a couple thousand dollars per truck but they were underballing him, and he was annoyed with it. So he's ratting them out. And what's crazy is all the FBI agents were like, Mark, don't even mess with it. He's like, why are they that scary of an organization?

No, because can you imagine the paperwork? Each piece of stolen item from one truck. You gotta do a separate piece of paperwork for that. You gotta get the serial number. You gotta track down what truck it belonged to, find out who that truck belong to. Find the owner of that one piece and tell them, hey, I've got your f*** entire here. You know, I mean, that's a clerical nightmare. Is it worth it? What are they doing? Just selling parts and not killing anybody. They're not selling drugs. Selling women and children. They're selling trucks, okay? It's fine. But he was like, no, this is groundbreaking. I'm so sick of these bank highs.

I'm so sick of these drug busts. I need to do this. So he starts working with Charlie and he's so busy that he's like, I don't care about Susan. Like she doesn't have this type of information. Meanwhile, the borough, the FBI is telling him, keep Susan because she has to testify. Or the whole thing falls apart.

So there's just a lot of balance. He's balancing operation, chop, chop, he's balancing Susan to keep her happy enough so that when the trial does come, she is going to testify. Now Kathy gets pregnant and she becomes five months pregnant eventually and now she's going away to Connecticut for a few weeks to have the baby. I mean, Mark is losing his mind. He's losing his assistant. He's going to be alone for a few weeks. He was supposed to travel to Connecticut to see his new baby, but there was just so much on his plate. And then it got worse because Charlie, the informant for this big chop shop, came in and he showed the agent something. He took off his shirt and he had this giant X carved on

his back from shoulder to hip. It was bad. Fresh. Fresh. So Kathy gives birth to a baby son. And now they have two kids. And when they get back from... Wait, he didn't say how? What happened? Yeah, they pulled him aside. The leaders of the chop shop and they were pissed.

Oh, wow. And they carved it to mark him as a mole, a rat. And when the family gets back from Connecticut, this is when Susan is waiting at the office with a Christmas present. And he's like, oh my god, Susan, I am so in over my head right now. What do you need? And she says, Merry Christmas.

And she plops down a pair of expensive Nike running shoes and a new Nike T-shirt. And he's like, I can't take these. And she says, well, your wife mentioned that you're going to run every single night. So I just wanted you to have something to jog in. And he's like, no, I cannot. And she said, well, I will be insulted if you don't take it. And she ran out of the office. So what does he do?

He gets on the phone with his supervisor. He says, listen, I don't know what to do. This girl just left me on these things for Christmas. I mean, she's an informant. You don't think that's crazy? Eh, don't worry about it. You know, that's crazy. Eh. Don't worry about it. You know, write a memo, put the stuff in the safe in the office. Just don't take it home, my guess. But is there anything else going on with her? Like, you're really calling me because she gave you

some sneakers for Christmas? Well, truth is boss. I kind of know that she's like, she's, you know, she's made it clear that she likes me. If's what she means. Yeah well what happens okay just be careful do your work make sure she testifies that's it then you cut her loose okay. So he's like okay so just make it through the trial that's all I need and then I'll cut her loose but I was just getting difficult to be around her. Every time they would meet up she would just do very uncomfortable things. She would say, did you notice I lost 10 pounds? Oh wow, Susan, you look terrific. I started running every night just like you in case you're interested. Interested in what, Susan? A little fling. Jesus, Susan! Yeah, I'm a

main man. I have children. I can't be doing stuff like that, but she persisted. And he was like, what about Kathy? What about my wife? You guys are even friends now? Are you kidding? I can never do that to Kathy. And Susan would just say, well, why did she have to know? So they would just have these conversations.

And again, I think even Mark in the beginning treated it as, this is like a little girl crush maybe. She's just saying both, maybe she's just sand bowl she maybe she's bored of this town so she's like yeah let's do it and he's like oh god get out of here besides he had other things to worry about there was a new transfer a 37 year old FBI agent by the name of Ronald Jean Poole and he had worked in Chicago he was known to be a very good undercover agent for drug bus transferring in so they would be new partners

And when Ron when Ron pool got there mark was shocked He was quite overweight. He was constantly sweating Mark said he looked like a school crossing guard And he thought well, maybe maybe this is why he does also the body shaming and that is intense But Mark said well, maybe this is why he does really good undercover work because nobody would suspect that he's an FBI agent, not one person. And so he invited Ron.

He said, well, let me be a good partner. Why don't you come on over for dinner with me and my wife, Kathy. We'd love to host you. He comes on over. Now, it's clear that Ron pool did not like Mark. Just don't like him. Because Ron is used to being the best in his office.

And he thought it would be even better in a place like Pikeville. But now, now there's this new rookie agent who's just going around doing the frickin' most. And now I gotta do the frickin' most. Because all these supervisors are gonna be calling in like, well, why does Mark solve 25 cases and you solve, let's see, 10? But if everyone's solving seven cases and I solve 10, doing the same work, but I'm getting praised for it. So he's a little pissed off about it. He shows up to dinner and he starts immediately, I am Kathy. His new partner's wife.

So Ron is just drooling over Kathy, talks about how he's an agent that quote unquote, I deliver the goods. Drug dealers are terrified of him. So he leaves now because of Ron Poole's attraction to Kathy, he becomes another addition to her calls on a daily basis, just constantly calling the house. What is going on with these people?

Yeah. Why are... What's going on in here? Why is it not? Nobody can keep this professional, huh? Yeah. It's got that pike fill, very small town vibes, maybe. Where everyone knows each other and there's, it's blurred lines, maybe?

I don't know. So he's just calling the house constantly. And it's very uncomfortable. Ron Pool is known to be a creeper towards women. And Kathy is incredibly uncomfortable. Like she would pick up after, you know, she's busy. She's exercising. She's got the kids. She's a new mom. And she'd pick up after you know she's busy she's exercising she's got the kids she's a new mom and She'd pick up in the middle of an exercise and he'd be like oh why are you happy breathing?

Exorcism you weirdo 911 911 wait no who'd like call for this like it's it's a complex right? It's just super creepy for this, like it's complex, right? So it's just super creepy. And then Ron meets Susan. And he gets extra stoked. She's like, wow, two hot women out. One sister's crazy. Mark, how do you know so many hot women? And he starts trying to get with her too. You know, he starts trying to be like, oh, well, Mark, what do you think of I work with Susan? And Mark was freaking excited. Because he was like, I don't want to work with Susan. You work with Susan and Mark was freaking excited because she was like I don't want to work with Susan you work with Susan this is perfect and Susan was miserable. Ron was creepy. His intentions were clear. She wanted to work with Mark. She loved Mark but she couldn't turn down Ron because she needed the money. So she's working with Ron creeped out. The person she wants to work with

Mark is married and has children but she's like infatuated with him. So you're telling me this is a love story. Yeah, but then things get more bizarre and it started happening in the house. Kathy gets an anonymous call of a man breathing into the phone saying, your old man is fooling around with the girl named Susan Smith. That's all. And they hang up. Is it wrong? She doesn't know. So she approaches Mark that night and she's like, hey, I got this call. It's weird, right? He's like, don't be ridiculous. Listen, you already know that I'm so stressed that Susan is implying that we're in a personal relationship. I mean, that jeopardizes my job, right? And she's got this big mouth blabbing on and on about how she's an executive assistant. God, Jesus Christ, do you believe anything that comes out of that woman's mouth, Kathy,

what's wrong with you? So she's like, I mean, I guess that makes sense. And Mark starts feeling overwhelmed. He hates his new partner, difficult to work with. Ron also keeps calling the house to hit on his wife. That's a big problem. They have two small kids to take care of. Kathy's constantly miserable.

He would come home from work. Kathy's just sobbing. And he has no patience to deal with it anymore, because he's dealing with Charlie, who's sobbing all the time, Susan's sobbing. All he hears at work is just people crying on and on and on and on and now he comes home from work and his wife is fucking crying. He's so over it. He's done. Everything's falling apart. The chop chop operation isn't going well. Susan's telling everyone that would listen that FBI agent Mark is in love with her. But then something strange started happening to Mark.

The more that Kathy wanted to transfer, wanted him to transfer out of Pikeville. The more that Kathy wanted to move, the more that she was tired of taking care of the kids. The more that Mark seemed to be entwining his time with Susan. He realized that he started looking for her smile and her flirtatiousness, and just kind of the invitation from Susan

was lingering in his mind. He'd just be driving around. He barely had sex with his wife now, because she just had kids, and she's miserable working all the time. She stays at home, takes care of two kids. One of them is a newborn and she's your secretary. You don't pay her for it and you show her no love and affection.

But anyways, that doesn't matter because they're not having sex anymore. And that bothers him. And he just wanted to relax and Mark couldn't help but think that if he did hook up with Susan, he could do whatever he wanted. That's kind of how she implied it. Like she'd be down for whatever. Be so easy. And around this time, Susie and Kathy's relationship started spiraling. Susie would call Kathy to let her know, I like to feel him near me. Talking about Mark. Why is she doing that? I don't know. And so Kathy's like,

oh my god, that's weird. Again, is this like some sort of drug-induced fantasy? Now I really do think that Kathy was on the belief that Susan was a woman in trouble, a woman that her husband would never even looked twice at on a sexual or a companionship level. I think that that's what was going on. Like she was just so compared to Kathy, she really didn't have things put together. Maybe it was just a... So she was like, maybe that's like some drug-induced fantasy. Susan's always on drugs, maybe it's that.

But she still told Mark, and she gave him one morning. I know you're not thinking about it, but don't you ever do anything with that woman, because she's gonna ruin you. She's gonna get pregnant. That was the vibe she was getting from Susan, you know? And he would just say, Jesus Christ, Kathy, I'm not stupid, which wrong with you? But then the calls from Susan started getting weirder. One day, according to Kathy, Susan called and said, I know Mark just wants to forget about me. He thinks I can't do anything for him anymore. I know he does. It doesn't matter to him the danger that I was in.

It doesn't matter if I could have gotten killed from being an informant, just as long as he's got his stupid little reputation and his big government job, that's all he cares about. It's a stupid job. He doesn't care about me getting hurt. And he doesn't care about you stuck in home with the babies. You know what Kathy, you're the stupid one, and she hung up. It was just out of nowhere.

It's just out of nowhere She's like, okay really bizarre, but again. She's just a troubled girl. She's probably on drugs So Kathy is still pleading with Mark to help Susan. You know, she's in a rough start. She needs she's in a rough spot She needs money to get away from Kenneth's abuse take the children out of the house So he gave her $8,000 in federal funds Because Kathy helped him to help her out. She also knew about another potential bank robber, so that also kind of had to do with it. And Susan starts telling her sister

and the rest of her family other things. She would say things like, Mark is deeply in love with me. You know, we got pregnant already, but I had a miscarriage. But we're gonna keep trying. Yeah, he's gonna leave his wife for me once I get pregnant. Susan talked about how they had all the sex until the sun came up.

They even had sex in their house. Well, when would you do that? Kathy is a stay-at-home mom. Well, Kathy went to Connecticut to have her second child. And he invited me over to the house. And we just had sex until the sun came up. I mean, it was marvelous. Everyone who heard this felt like, okay, well it was marvelous. Everyone who heard this felt like,

okay, well, everyone who knew Susan and heard this felt like, maybe I believe 25% of the things that she's saying, but you can't help it. Maybe there's some truth to it. No, like this is such a bizarre lie. Maybe she's making up some of it, but can she really make up all of it? And out of nowhere, Susan's hospitalized.

It's suspected that it was from drug use. But either way, she called Mark to the hospital and she claimed it was from stress. You know, all these bad guys are out to get her. Why don't you come into bed with me? It'll help. And he says, Susan, what are you doing? And she flipped open the hospital bed blanket

and she was completely nude. So she was like, oh my god, I'm gonna go home. He gets into the car, but he can't stop thinking about it. Mima, Kathy at home, her wife, I mean, she's going through a show. The safety line between work and home had been completely erased because one day she woke up, went into the driveway, and every single tire on their car was slashed. This was a warning. Sometimes she would be looking out her kitchen window

and there would be men standing on the street staring at her through the window. She had a gun in the house and a lot of the days she would literally stand in front of the front door with a gun in her hand because she was terrified of her little children. What if something happened to them? To make matters worse, Mark didn't care. Okay, Mark just didn't care. She would say say we need to move. This is dangerous. Our life is in danger Just tell them and they will relocate you not a big deal. And he says no, I'm not a quitter But it was all escalating and something terrible was gonna happen soon. Everyone knew it everyone felt it And it started getting weird for Kathy because sometimes she would hear Mark at home on the phone with Susan and because sometimes she would hear Mark at home on the phone with Susan. And it's confusing because the way that they would talk, it's almost like how it has

been talks to their wife in a very intimate tone. I know, I know, Susan. Don't say that, Susan. Come on, Susan. You know I didn't mean that. You know that's not true, Susan. Susan, it's okay. And then Kathy would overhear it. She would step into the room and Mark would see her and say, Susan, if's okay. And then Kathy would overhear it.

She would step into the room and Mark would see her and say, Susan, if you don't want to work with Ron, just tell him that. It's simple, okay? I gotta go. So she's like, okay, that's a little weird. So a week before the next Christmas,

Susan wants to meet up and they do. And then he drives up to the mountain where he usually takes her away from everyone about 20 minutes out of town. They've been coming here for like the past months and months, right? Who, who, and who? Susan and Mark. So, they've been sleeping for months now?

No. Just coming up here to talk about information. And this time he was really stressed about his home life, about Kathy and so Susan noticed that he seemed tense and said, is there something wrong Mark? You know, just problems, everybody's got problems. I know that there's problems at home. Kathy tells me. Okay, well, it's fine, it's not that big of a problem.

Well, you know, there's nothing you can do about it right now, but don't you think that you need somebody mark. And so he claims that this point Susan kept going on about how she could be the right person for him. We can just do things to make you feel better and it doesn't really mean anything else, you know. And I care about you. You just have to take care of yourself.

Sometimes you have to be selfish and put yourself first. And then they started kissing and eventually they did it for the first time on that mountain top. And he drove her back home and for the next few days he avoided her. I mean, he tried to reason with himself. He was like, it's just a fling. It's a one-time thing, it'll never happen again. Susan knows that. She's gonna get over it too, but he knew that that was very unlikely in the back of his mind that Susan would never get over it. And just like a little horny teenager, guess what he did a couple days later.

He met her at that mountain again and they would continue to do this. A full-blown sexual affair. It's bad that he's an FBI agent. It's bad that he's married, but it's worse that she's also an informant for the FBI. I mean, this is the worst case situation. Because even a married FBI agent having an affair could, you know, raise a couple eyebrows. But this, this is, this is illegal and horrendous on so many different levels. And then a couple months later, he decides,

I don't want to have sex with Susan anymore. So what does he do? Instead of telling her, instead of having an adult conversation, like the FBI agent he should be, he just starts ignoring her. And of course, this causes Susan to become incredibly agitated, and she becomes energized with these fantasies, and she started telling everyone, Nero, we're working things out! He's really leaving his wife, trust me.

We're gonna have a happy ending. Besides, I'm trying to get pregnant. During all of this, Kathy never suspected it. I mean, Mark didn't seem to change. Susan, however, seemed to change. Susan would call the house and she seemed so happy and confident. She would never even ask about Mark anymore. They never talked about Mark. Maybe all of Kathy's coaching really did help. And she would always tell Susan, go after what she want. You can have a happy ending. And then one day Kenneth calls the house. This is the first time Kathy's ever talked to Susan's boyfriend.

I mean, she's heard a lot about him, the abuse, and all these other things from Susan and from Mark. Still together? Yeah, still living together. And he's super drunk and tells Kathy, hey, Susan, my girlfriend, a screwing around with your husband. And she's pregnant with his baby. And she's like, what? Susan rushes to the phone and she's like, oh my god, Kathy, don't worry, he's just mad that we haven't been having sex recently and he thinks that, oh god,

he thinks I'm like doing something with Mark, but trust me, it's all work, you know I take my work seriously, and then they're screaming in the background and their sounds with sounds like hitting in the background and it hangs up. So Kathy tells Mark about it and she's just really stressed like, oh god, I bet she's like getting abused right now. We should do something and Mark seems incredibly agitated. And he says, well, I'm sure Susan kind of deserved it. You know, she's got this thing for pushing people's buttons. Kathy's like, how could you say that?

You're an FBI agent and you're my husband. You're insinuating that this woman deserves domestic abuse. She's like, can you blame him? You know, she just instigates everything. And Kathy just never felt further from her husband. But she still didn't believe that there was an affair. She just felt like who is this man? How could he say that? And then Kathy would be on the phone with Susan and Susan would say things like oh, I got to go Guess who pulled up to the front of my house call you later and you'd hang up Kathy was like mark mark at her house again

But when she would call the FBI field office almost immediately after he would pick up and say hey, babe, what's going on? So it's not Mark. Why was Susan kind of implying that it's Mark? Yeah, just bizarre right? Yeah So after enough begging Kathy got Mark to request a transfer and They approved it. They even wrote in the report that Mark was a wonderful agent helped a lot in Pike They'll put it on the map and now he will be relocating to FBI Miami Vice. This is a huge division agent helped a lot in Pike they'll put it on the map and now he will be relocating to FBI Miami Vice. This is a huge division huge. Yeah, so galley is ecstatic. She's packing our bags

The FBI is even paying for the move the whole move. I mean, this is the best thing I've been working for. Yeah, finally, so she's so busy packing the the deal was that she was going to move with the kids first and then Mark would stay behind to clean up the rest of the house, put it on the market. That would take about a week and then join the family, right? So for the next week, he's adamant on keeping a low profile. Now Susan's devastated. She knew that in order to make money now, now that Mark's gone, she'd be forced to hang out with Ron, who so obviously wanted to have sex with her and it wasn't just it wasn't just, it was the fact that she would try to grab her butt, and she would slap it away, and he would call her a whiny, hill, blank, shh. So Mark asked her before he left, you know, what can I do to help with Ron, because I get

it, he's a creep, he did that to my wife too, and she just lashed out like, fuck you, you don't give a shit about me, Go be happy and Florida with your family." He's like, oh, jeez of weas. So he moves. Now Susan moves out of Kenneth's house finally and moves in with her sister and people started noticing a change. I mean, overactive Susan. Would now constantly lay on the couch and just cry and watch Miami TV cop shows that she was never interested in, but suddenly it's the only thing that she wanted to watch. And she told everyone that Marcus flying back to Miami to divorce his wife. He's going to clean things up there, but he's going to get back, you know, he's going

to come back for me because I'm pregnant. And we even picked out names, you know, if it's a boy, I'm gonna name him Mark Jr. If it's a girl, we're gonna name her Markella, and she's just so excited. She would go to these hair salons and the woman just after she would leave the other woman, would talk about how much she'd changed. Susan used to love her kids, and now she would just slap them for interrupting her. She seemed on edge. Something seemed very wrong. Something tumultuous was happening in her life and A lot of people found her sleeping in her car. She wanted pills for her addiction her drug addiction But everyone she talked to knew that she was working for the FBI

So nobody wanted to sell her pills because they're like I am gonna give you pills I'm gonna take your money and the feds are gonna show up right now. They're hiding in the Goodmushes. I swear to God No one wanted to sell her these pills, so she's having withdrawal. She allegedly was back in sex work at a motel. I mean, life was falling apart. She was constantly leaving messages in the Florida house. You know, the Florida house phone, but Kathy, I mean, in Pikeville, she was so lonely in

Florida. She's meeting all these women who think like her, dress like her, talk like her, and she's having fun. She's unpacking. I mean, this was her dream. So, Susan just feels like a distant memory. she's not responding, she's not picking up these calls anymore, she's so busy. But Mark would be back for two hearings for the chop chop case.

So the first time, he completely avoided Susan. She didn't even know he was in town until he left. I mean, it was super stealthy, but the second time it would be harder because he'd be there for a couple of weeks and Ron Poole knew about it and told Susan the exact date that Mark was in town. Not only did he tell Susan the exact date that Mark was in town, he put her in the same motel, paid for it on FBI Agent Money. What's wrong with that dude? Yeah, the same motel that Mark would be staying in.

He said I was just trying to help. It seems like he was jealous of Mark's career. You know, because anyone who knew Mark and the FBI, all of the superior agents, like the head, bitches, and charge, I guess, right? The HBICs, they would constantly say, I'm telling you, this one's got potential. That's what they say about Mark, you know, and Ron Pool, he's in his late 30s, he's not fit.

His career is kind of tapped out. And he's also kind of lazy about it. So he just hated him. And he probably hated him for the fact that he had a beautiful wife, and he also hated him for the fact that Susan was obsessed with him. And he wanted to sleep with Susan. And Susan confides in Ron that she had a pregnancy test, and it came out positive. She gives a copy to him, and she tells him that she thinks it's marks.

So you think this is perfect? I'm gonna take him down. Because that's gonna fire this guy. You know, he's probably not gonna get jail time, but he's gonna get freaking fired and his wife's probably gonna leave him. Ah, jobless, wifeless...perfect. I feel like when I was a bit younger, I would just use any perfume. That just smells nice. I would have someone walk by me and I'd be like, what is that sent you wearing? It smells so good! And then I would go and buy this expensive full-size bottle of it, pour it all over my body,

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My recommendation right now is bloom by Gucci. I am just spraying that all over the place. So go try it out for $11. So he's just like a little reality TV show producer put Susan in that motel, pays for it. The first few days Susan would just call Mark non stop and she was just getting more and more aggressive. Like we need to talk. Like I'm telling you, I'm pregnant. Like, we need to talk. Don't avoid me. Ron Poole would come over to the motel and just slip Mark the pregnancy report. And Mark was just terrified. I mean, terrified. The more avoiding Mark did, the more Susan would push and she would say things like, allegedly say things like, I'm gonna be a thorn in your ass, Mark.

I'm gonna come down to Florida and I'm gonna make sure that you don't forget about me. And what did Mark do about this? I mean, should he hate himself? Yeah, but instead he hated her. He hated that he recruited her, used her, paid her, encouraged her, comforted her, and ultimately had sex with her and now she's pregnant. He just had this rage against Susan. And finally, when they were together, he didn't know she even looked pregnant.

But also at the same time Mark doesn't know when women start showing. He doesn't remember, because he was so busy with work when his wife was pregnant. But maybe it's also the drug usage, maybe she shows a little bit later he's thinking of all these things, so he starts trying to talk sense and turn in the motel room like listen. If the baby is mine. And this was a bad way to start it. Because she starts screaming, what do you mean if the baby is, are you just think I'm going around sleeping with everyone and Pikeville?

Of course the baby is yours. Are you calling me a whore like what's wrong with you? He's like, okay, shh. People are gonna hear you. Okay, okay. I'm sorry. The baby's mine. But I can raise it with Kathy, you know? I know you're busy.

You've got a lot going on, you've got two kids. I can take the baby. I will confess to Kathy and we will raise that baby with so much love in a stable house. And she's just screaming and screaming because this is also another horrible thing to do is insinuate that you are not a fit mother and say, I'm gonna take it to my wife that you're insanely jealous of and we're gonna raise the baby, right? So she's pissed, she's screaming and he's like, okay, why do we go for a drive? People are gonna hear us.

So she, he drags her to the car and on 11 p.m. they start driving up the mountain where they usually go. And Susan, the whole ride, I mean, she's just saying, you're going to get fired. Honestly, I understand the anchor, right? You're going to get freaking fired. He claims that she was slapping him through the entirety of the drive. And finally, they get to the top and they park. And she's just sobbing at this point. And he's like, let's just try to figure it out. From now on, we really only have Mark said of the story, but he claims that she was threatening him. She things like I'll be damned if you just get to go to Florida with your little wife and your little In-spoiled kids and resume your wonderful. No, you owe me buddy You know what I'm gonna do? I'm gonna have Mark Jr

And we're gonna come down to Florida and I'm gonna place Mark Jr. My little baby hour little baby Right into your kids arms. How are you gonna explain that to your kids, huh? What would they think? Well, what if I walk Mark Jr. down to the FBI Miami Vice Office and show off your co-workers? The new baby that you just had?

What if I do that? So he's just like, what do you want? We're gonna have this baby. You will be here when it's born and sign the birth certificate as its daddy. Second, you will leave that whore wife Kathy and those spoiled kids and marry me. If you don't, I will ruin your life. That's what he claims she said. And he claims that he got angry and he said, don't call my wife a whore, do what it get and I'll smack the sh** out of you Susan. And his side of the story is that she act them on, like you don't have the balls to hit me, try it, you don't have the balls to hit me.

I'm sure some of this is incredibly biased. And they started hitting each other. She tried to poke out his eyes with her long nails, just digging them, like gouging out his eyes, he tried to punch her, but she ducked, and he punched the passenger side window window and his knuckles were all bloody So he's shaking off the blood and his blood is splattering everywhere and now he's like, oh my god And that is when Susan decides to go in and start biting his bloody knuckles Which is incredibly painful and she's screaming while she's doing this and he just wanted her to shut up That's what he claims so he grabs her and starts shaking her by the neck.

But when he looks back down, he claims that he didn't know how much time passed. Was it 10 seconds? Was it 10 minutes? And he tried to nudge Susan, but she wouldn't get up. And then she slumped forward and her neck was bent at a grotesque angle. So he starts freaking out, tries to give her CPR, but he knew. He knew. He knew that he had just killed Susan, and that she was dead. OK, thank you, Mr. FBI.

What do we do? What do we do? Do I say that we got into an accident? She was giving me information. No, but who gets strangled in a car accident? Also, nobody just breaks the passenger window, and that's it. Oh, god.

Oh, my god. I got to throw it up. So he goes outside the car. He throws up. Then he tries lifting her body out of the car and he drops her. Her head hits on a rock so he's like, oh my god, oh my god. So he manages to put her body into the trunk and decides to go back to the motel and see what happens. His knuckles were bleeding, he bandages it up, there's long scratches all over his neck and jaw. It looked like he had been in a brutal bar fight. So he looks at the clock, it's 3 a.m.

He decides to take a shower, like, bar fight. So he looks at the clock, it's 3 a.m. He decides to take a shower, go to the convenience store, buy more band-aids, buy some antiseptic, and no matter, you know, he had no idea what to do with the body. The next morning, he wakes up and he's still an FBI agent, and he has this important meeting in the morning with the DA's office about the chop-shop operation,

forces himself out of bed, get stressed, walks into the car, suesens in the trunk, dead in the trunk, and he drives to the courthouse. The whole time he's sweating, nobody points out the scratches all over him. He told them that he had to hit himself on a nail in his garage when they pointed out his bandaged hand, and he was so terrified, I mean it it's getting so hot what if they smell something in that trunk. He gets out of the late meeting, no one was around his car, nobody had smelled anything, and he finishes up his work, drives to the mountainside, and throws her naked body into a ravine. So he finishes up all his work, calls his wife, and leaves back for Florida.

He had actually fixed the rental car, you know. He had told the window thing was with a coal on the highway, had smashed into it. He had gotten rid of all the mats in the car, thrown them away in a very, very isolated trash can. He had given a very discreet car wash on the inside. He was sure that there was nothing that could link to him. No DNA in the trunk or the car. But before he left, you know a couple people did ask, have you seen Susan? Ron Poole was one of them. Susan's sister Shelby was one of them.

Shelby knew. Susan kept saying that Mark got her pregnant and didn't want the baby and all these things, so she's very skeptical of Mark. But he said, no, I have no idea. I was just here for the chop shop stuff. And he gets into the plane and he leaves for Miami. Now when he gets to Miami, he tries to get back to work. In his new job, this is his dream job, but he was acting a little bit different.

He was still good at his job. He was still very valued at the FBI agent's office, but he started losing weight. He had this new habit of scratching himself on the chest until he blood. They would actually have to go to the doctor and get prescription medicine to help with it. He had explosive diarrhea all the time. And Kathy just saw it and everyone around him just saw it. It's from the stress. You know, you go from a rural location to competing with like

200 different agents. It's very stressful. Meanwhile, Susan Cistern-Kinducky is looking for Susan. And she was highly suspicious of both the FBI agents that were always involved. So she goes to the local police and she says, well this is what's going on in my sister. And they say, well Susan, we know Susan. And we know that Susan had a ton of enemies. I mean too many to count. Also, she is an adult and we have no evidence that she disappeared. But Officer Ray from the local police decided to talk to Mark anyway. Calls him up.

And that's when the alarm bells go off. Mark puttnam FBI agent law enforcement federal agent just with two cooperatives. Two cooperatives. Wouldn't shut the fuck up to be honest. Just non stop blabbering. Hours, blah blah blah blah. This is what I did on Saturday of that day, blah blah blah blah. I didn't ask that.

That's weird. Why are you overcompensating right blah. I didn't ask that. That's weird. Why are you overcompensating right now? Everyone in law enforcement knows that's all weird. The hell is he making that mistake? Because that's what guilt, shame, nerves does to people, right? So he's just blabbing on and on and off surveys like, okay, that's weird. But when he starts interviewing everyone else in town, nobody had seen the two together. Nobody had placed Susan with Mark the day before she went

missing or anything. And everyone would say the same thing. Officer Ray, that Susan girl is wild, okay? Her entire life, she has been surrounded by bad people. And things just kept getting worse. So maybe she did run off finally. Just I don't really think some FBI agent did anything. I don't think anyone maybe killed her even. And just think some FBI agent did anything. I don't think anyone

maybe killed her even. I just think some sh** is going down. So meanwhile, a year passes. And anytime officer Ray had any free time, he would try to work on this case, but there wasn't much he could do. The most suspicious he was was of Ron Poole, the man who got her the motel room when she disappeared disappeared and Mark Putman, Putnam. But when he goes to the FBI to talk about it, the bureau is like, that's it. You want to investigate two federal agents because you, a local cop, have a sneaking suspicion, get the f*** out of here, okay? This is why you're a police officer and not enough B.I. agent. Nope. Wow.

Now, Mark's trying to get back with life. You know, works fine. He's not making friends, but he did his job. He even turned down a promotion. And Kathy thought that all again, were these, these are signs of anxiety because he has competition. He wants to prove himself.

Some in the FBI, they nearly knew about Mark's involvement with Susan, who is now a missing person, but they also knew that informants are inevitably very disgruntled people. You cut them off, you stop giving them money, they get frustrated. Most of them are criminals, some of them have drug addictions. They're just kind of volatile people. You turn them off and suddenly false accusations could be thrown at any FBI agent. So they didn't take it seriously, none of his peers did, but Mark wasn't okay with it.

He offered multiple times to his bosses that he wanted to take a polygraph just to get Kentucky law enforcement off his back. And they just told him, are you freaking crazy? No, they turned him down multiple times. What? Because that means technically, on paper, there would be an open investigation on Mark.

And that's just not what they wanted. The bureau didn't want an open investigation on mark let's just not what they wanted did the bureau didn't want and market so corp like he wants to be out so there's speculation is that the guilt that's getting to miss you a good person well let's not say good person does he have is the moral compass kicking in all of a sudden or do you think that he is genuinely cocky enough that he thinks that he can get away with it and i'm not right you can kind of see it from both sides. And one of the FBI agents, Higgins, FBI agent Higgins,

which if that's not an agent name, agent Higgins, I feel like I'm watching a Marvel movie. So agent Higgins decides to take a map on it and is like, okay, well, let me just get them off my back because they keep calling me to interview you because he's like his superior. So I'll just ask you a couple of questions, clear you out, and then we're done. Okay, first question, how old is Susan? She was 28. And they all froze. How does he know that? No. She was 28. Oh my god, are you kidding me right now?

Are you kidding me? This is real? Yeah. And again, that's not indication of a crime, but they all felt something. Everyone in that room kind of froze for a moment. Did he know he fucked up at that moment? Yeah. But again, you know, you can't get arrested for that.

You can't get arrested for using past tense. So they continued on. Well, what about the last issue of scene? What were you doing that day? I was cleaning the old house garage before the move, and I had to hurt my hand on a nail. So I get so mad that my hand is all bleeding that I go to my rental car and I kicked the passenger window. I was so pissed, but I didn't

want to pay for it, so I told the rental car agency that a piece of rock hit it on the highway. That's what you did, huh? For six hours, they talked. An hour by hour, the other agents in the room were getting more and more sad, because they knew for sure he was guilty now. And at the end of that, they sent him home and they said, okay, in a couple days we'll fly to DC to FBI headquarters because that's the only place FBI agents get polygraphed. It's by the FBI technically in most situations. So when he gets home, Kathy knows something's wrong.

You know, she starts freaking out and she's like, tell me, tell me, what is it, what's going on? And he's like, well, you remember Susan, she's missing. Okay, so what does that have anything to do with it? I mean, she had so many enemies. They're cu- Are you saying they're accusing you? Because she went around lying to the whole time.

That bitch, and she's like, you know what? You give your life to the FBI. And they believe some little girls bullying about you from... Oh, no. So Kathy, she marches down to the FBI office to give them a piece of her mind. She went off on Agent Higgins. And she's like, he's the finest in the bureau.

He's got a great career. You know whose fault this is? Ron Poole. Ron Poole tried to sleep with me. He tried to sleep with Susan. If you really want to catch guilty person, I bet it's him I bet he tried to do something with Susan, you better go look at Ron Poole My husband is too honest, okay?

So get off his back, he gave his life to the FBI So he gets home and Mark still told her, I think I should take the polygraph And I kind of made sense to her because yeah, I mean just get it over with, you know? Get it over with, I know that this is a bump in your career, but it's fine. But that night when she's laying in bed, it hit her. There you slowly. It's like poisons slipping into her body. Why is he acting like this if he's not guilty?

Oh my god. This forker had an affair within informant. Okay, if this is true, this polygraph is going to end him. So she wakes up, shakes him. She's like, okay, whatever it is, babe, you tell me, okay? Because we're going to work it out, right? The past eight years. All we've ever done is work it out, right? So you would tell me if you and Susan did something together,

right, you would tell me, tell me, tell me, because if there's something that you're hiding, when you take that polygraph, they're gonna know, and it's gonna make you look guilty, so just tell me. And he kept telling her, I'm gonna take the polygraph tomorrow, and I promise I'll tell you everything after. And the next morning, he left for the airport,

but Kathy couldn't stop thinking, you know? The rental car window. The bandage on his hand. The affair happened, she knew it. But then again, this donned on her. She helps Susan steal her husband. She was on the phone with Susan saying, like things like, you're intelligent,

you're wonderful, blah, blah, blah, blah. And of course she took Mark, of course, only an idiot wouldn't see that I'm a freaking idiot. I would tell her things like don't sell yourself short. You can have what I can have Susan. Disgusting. But if that's true, what was the other rumor that Susan was pregnant with Mark's kid? Oh my God. If that's, oh my God.

They probably snuck around his car having sex disgusting. Do you think they broke the past? So when he went back to Kentucky, remember the passenger window was yeah, crack. Was he continuing the affair? He went back to sleep with her and maybe during this rough sex in the car the window broke but that just makes sense who who who breaks a window like that or maybe she she got hurt maybe maybe she got hurt with that window okay but if if Susan got hurt he would

try to cover it up right because he would be scared he'd get fired I mean this is his entire life, is the FBI. No, he wouldn't leave her like that. But would it, okay, maybe they got into a car accident and then she died. But he didn't want people to know that he was having sex with her. Maybe he left her body, her dead butt. No, but then the car would be ruined. Oh my God.

I think my husband killed Susan. So slowly, she starts like piecing these things together. I mean, it's been like a freaking year. And she realizes, holy s- at the same time, Mark is rushed into the FBI headquarters, sits down to take the polygraph, and after four questions, the main ones, did you have anything to do with Susan's disappearance? Did you kill Susan, and he said no to all of them. The polygraph examiner stopped the test and said,

okay, you need to calm down first because you're off the charts. I don't even know what to do with you. And he says, well, before I get started again, can I call my wife, Kathy? Any calls her and now she had come to the realization that her husband might have killed Susan. Just freaking out, okay? Don't say anything right now. Don't say anything to them. Don't say anything on the phone. Can you do me a favor?

Are you arrested? He asked the agents. No, he's not. Okay. Get a lawyer. Then you come home right now. Don't say a word, you come home. So he gets back on a plane with agent agents

and comes straight home. The most uncomfortable plane ride because they both knew that he was guilty. And Mark told Susan everything during which she slapped him multiple times and he was sobbing like a literal child. That's how she described it, like a sobbing three-year-old, very disgusted the way that she said it, but she was frustrated. And what's even sad is that at the end of this conversation, Kathy blamed herself. She felt like if she knew there were all these warning signs of Susan being in love with

Mark and the affair. If she could have stopped the affair, then she could have put an end to it before Susan was murdered. And Kathy called up every single family member, her mom, her dad, and her sister. Her sister started taking care of the kids. Her parents came to cook and take care of everything. They were told everything. That Marquette, well, they were told that Marquette accidentally killed a woman.

We don't know if it was accidental. We don't know if maybe this was his way of trying to get away with it, right? Because he wanted to stay with the FBI. They get an attorney and they get a child psychologist. And they asked the child psychologist, how to tell kids how daddy's going to prison for killing a woman that he had in a fair with. And the attorney was confident. This attorney used to be a prosecutor.

So most cops, they will get defense attorneys who also used to be prosecutors, because typically they're cops lawyers. That's what they're called. They like cops. They don't hate cops. So he gets a cops lawyer and they say, well, they don't have a body. Failing a lie detector isn't a crime. Nor is it an indication of a crime. There's no confession. They believe you killed Susan, but they don't have proof.

They don't even have proof that she's dead. Do you know how many people would have motive to kill Susan? A lot. So why don't we try to work up a plea deal? Man slaughter. Man slaughter with a twist. You want to be in federal prison, OK? Not Kentucky. Here's something I learned from all these cases.

If you're going to commit crimes, commit federal crimes, because apparently, federal prison is much kosher. I don't know if this is true. That's what all these criminals are saying, OK? That's what all these lawyers are trying to bargain for. Put him in federal prison. We don't want state prison. So, manslaughter charges federal prison. The defense bargain for 10 years, the prosecutors hit back with 18, and they settled on 16, but he will be eligible for parole at eight years, and probably won't do more than 12 in a federal facility The only extra rule was that if they find Susan's body and she was pregnant, they will not charge him for the death of a fetus So he goes in and he confesses

And he tells the feds where her body is and Sure enough, they found her skeletonized body there and he was taken into custody. Now in Kentucky everybody was super pissed off. Susan's family were upset because he just got away with it. How did the FBI let this happen? You know how does that doesn't make sense? The book is called above suspicion. When you're an agent, maybe no one thinks you're suspicious. You're above it all. The FBI needs to check its agents. What if what if people in Kentucky never tried to get to the bottom of it? He was just going around putting criminals away for over a year when he himself is a murderer that's disgusting. So he's in prison, Kathy stayed by his side

and died at the age of 38 before he ever came out. What? She was found dead by her 13 year old daughter of heart attack. Oh my God! Before her death, she did reach out to Susan's sister, and even though the two women never met, they became friends, and they would talk on the phone a lot. Mike Putnam was released in 2000, and he remained close to Kathy's parents, raising the kids. Everyone in his life believes it's a crime of passion and that he's a wonderful man. He's really stuffed around the 10 years for good behavior.

I think what's fascinating about this case is how people remember Susan. So here's a quote from one of her friends that knew her. She was just likeable. She was so convincing. No matter what bulls**t she was saying. You know, her personality was that good. People liked her. Me included. But Susie always wanted more out of life than she was able to get. She just didn't know how to go about it. This case to me was very scary to research because I think we're so used to reading books and watching these documentaries where the victim is painted in a perfect light. Almost unrelatively perfect.

But Susie was so flawed, right? There's no way around it, and there's no way to tell this story in an accurate way without mentioning these parts, but I think that's how these stories should be told, because nobody's perfect, and you don't have to be perfect to be a victim of a horrendous crime. So that's the story of Susan, Smith, and Mark Putnam, the FBI agent, the rookie FBI agent with potential. Wow. Let me know, and you know, what are your thoughts on this case? Does this make you think differently of what's an FBI agent's trunks?

Me going round, pop that trunks, sir! Just kidding, don't get arrested! And I hope you guys enjoyed, and I'll see you guys on Wednesday for the main episode. Bye! Just kidding, don't get arrested and I hope you guys enjoyed and I'll see you guys on Wednesday for the main episode. Bye!