Small Town Murder - #493 - Burning Your BFF - Horn Lake, Mississippi

Episode Date: May 23, 2024

This week, in Horn Lake, Mississippi, the neighborhood is woken up by a series of explosions, in a house. The fire causes the terrible & painful death of a woman. It's ruled an accident, but some investigation reveals a sinister plot, from the most trusted person in the victim's life. From there, detectives find even more murder plots, and a web of lies, involving everyone from crackheads, to the murderer's children!!Along the way, we find out that rivers can change course at will, that you REALLY need to trust someone before you make them your insurance beneficiary, and that once you start one fire, you apparently just can't stop!!Hosted by James Pietragallo and Jimmie WhismanNew episodes every Thursday!Donate at: patreon.com/crimeinsports or go to paypal.com and use our email: [e-mail] to shutupandgivememurder.com for all things Small Town Murder & Crime In Sports!Follow us on...twitter.com/@murdersmallfacebook.com/smalltownpodinstagram.com/smalltownmurderAlso, check out James & Jimmie's other show, Crime In Sports! On Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, Wondery, Wondery+, Stitcher, or wherever you listen to podcasts!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can listen to Small Town Murder early and ad free right now. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. We've all turned to the internet to self-diagnose when some random ailment pops up in our lives. Even though our minds often go to a worst-case scenario when we experience these things, most times it's nothing to worry about. However, for an unlucky few, their weird symptoms are just the start of a terrifying medical mystery. Listen to Mr. Boland's Medical Mysteries wherever you get your podcasts. This week in Horn Lake, Mississippi, explosions ring out in the night,

leaving a house destroyed and a woman horribly killed. Ruled an accident, investigators then uncover a heartless plot and even more planned murders. Welcome to Small Town Murder. Hello everybody and welcome back to Small Town Murder. Yay! Oh yay indeed Jimmy. Yay indeed. My name is James Petragallo. I! Oh, yay indeed, Jimmy. Yay indeed. My name is James Petragallo. I'm here with my co-host. I'm Jimmy Wissman.

Thank you folks so much for joining us today on another absolutely crazy episode of Small Town Murder. Hope you enjoyed last week in Michigan. We had two serial killer brothers, a chimpanzee. That was a, that's a, I had messages going. Did you make that up like It's that's how crazy that story was it sounded like someone made it up And if they never heard of it, I never heard of it if you saw a movie of that story you'd go. That's ridiculous What a ridiculous story. That's how crazy that was and this week crazy also

We'll get to that before we do shut head over to shut up and give me murder.com is where they do that for tickets to live shows especially Durham North Carolina May 31st you are up next still a few tickets left almost sold out it's so close you're out next night Nashville is sold out so Durham let's clean it up and get in there that'll be a good time and also get your tickets for later in the year because a lot of dates are already Sold out places like Phoenix are sold out. You know, they're selling out fast. So get in there We opened up some new ones for Kansas City. So Kansas City gets your tickets right now do that also Get your merch there too. There's new merch up murder bird shirt all sorts of stuff there

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Or hundreds of back episodes of this show that you've never heard before of bonus stuff and new bonus stuff every other week. One crime in sports, one small town murder, of which you get all of, so you can't go wrong. I'll tell you what, this week, which you're gonna get for crime in sports bonus, which you have access to We're gonna talk about the OJ trial. Oh J Simpson just the trial

We've talked about other things had to happen because people always go they had DNA I don't understand how he got off where the jury were they brain damaged these people or what? No I've watched all 496 parts of this trial on YouTube. That's not an exaggeration either That's how many parts there are. And I'll tell you exactly what happened because it's the perfect storm and it unfolded this way and it would have never happened again. So it's wild stuff.

Then for Small Town Murder, we are going to go, this will be fun, we're going to go very specific inside Ed Gaines' house. Let's do a house tour. Let's find out how Ed Gaines lives his his everyday life lived and what's in there? What's he got in store for us? What's in weird jars and coffee cans and stuff all around? We'll find out all about that patreon.com Slash crime in sports and you get a shout out at the end of the show You know Jimmy will mess your name up for you. So don't worry about that

That said I think it's time. Oh before get to that, listen to our other two shows, Crying In Sports, which is hilarious, and you don't have to like sports to listen to it, and then also Your Stupid Opinions, which is the funniest damn hour in podcasting, so get in there and check that out. That said, disclaimer, it's a comedy show, everybody. It is.

We're comedians. We are. People are gonna die, and there will be jokes, but the thing is, is how you mix those two things things and we do it tastefully is how we do it I like to say yeah, we we go out of our way not to make fun of the victims Yeah, are the victims families why because we're assholes. Yeah, but but we're not scumbags There's the deal. There you go. And that's the that's the spirit of the whole show and Yeah, so it might not be as bad as you think it is.

If you go, oh God, what are they doing? Making jokes while people are being beheaded? No, that's not when we're making jokes. We're making jokes when someone's sitting there with a beheaded body afterwards going, I can get away with this. This is going to be fine. Nobody's going to know. That's ridiculous.

That's when we're making jokes. So that said, I think it's time everybody. Let's do this. Oh, by the way, yeah, if you think true crime and comedy should never go together. You might not like it get out of here, but you might But probably take a hike but give it a try Yeah, give it a try for the rest of us that want to hear an insane story and have a good time somehow Intermixing those together sure dancing tastefully we I think it's time. Let's all shout. Let's- deep breaths. And let's all shout. Shut up and give me murder.

Let's do this everybody. What do you say? Let's go on a trip, shall we? We shall. We shall. We are going to Horn Lake, Mississippi. Mmm. H-O-R-N, Horn Lake, Mississippi. Lake with horns in it. This is in the severe northwestern part of Mississippi. This is, it's a suburb of Memphis is really what it is.

Is that right? Yeah, it's one of those. Almost Tennessee. Almost, it's like in Kentucky, they're suburbs of Cincinnati. It's that sort of deal here, yeah. It's about 25 minutes to Memphis, and it's about five and a half hours down

to Biloxi which is our last Mississippi episode. It's been a while since episode 438, An Officer and Three Maniacs was the name of that one. And like always, Mississippi delivers the crazy also. They do. We say that about most states but they really do. Mississippi brings it, West Virginia brings it, Ohio brings it, Pennsylvania brings it hard. I panicked when I was dating a girl and told her that I was in the service when they asked me where, I panicked and said Biloxi. He wasn't in the service, by the way.

Never was. That's the funny part here. So this is in DeSoto County. It is, because the explorer DeSoto came through here back in the day. Oh, is that? Yeah. Huh. I wonder if he's the reason for the name of the DeSoto cars. Probably not. He's a Spanish explorer that came in like the 1600s. I don't think he had

a car. If he had a car, it would have made it easier. Yeah. But he had stuff that he had stuff that was horses involved. So maybe I'm not sure but it's probably just some guy named Bob DeSoto The area code is 662 motto here is doorway to Mississippi This is it. Huh sweep off the way. Come on in this story wipe your feet on the mat. That's it This is where the doorbell is So yeah a little bit of history horn Lake received its name from an Oxbow Lake,

which was three miles west, which was a former riverbed of the Mississippi River. The river changed course in the late 18th century. That must have pissed the people off who were living on it, and like, where the fuck did the river go? Shit. It changed it on its own,

like during a storm or something, yeah. Yeah, back then, I don't know a storm or something. Yeah, you back then They I don't know how they could change the course of the Mississippi I don't know if we could probably I mean far as I'm dig enough to do it Yeah, as far as I know the Chicago River is the only one they've ever done it with Yeah, the Mississippi's goddamn huge to that that'd be that'd be an undertaking They call it the mighty one Yeah

So I guess this when it when the Mississippi changed course, it left a stranded body of water just sitting there. It's now a lake. It used to be part of the river. And that, it looked like a cow horn and became known as Horn Lake. So, there you go. Sure, because that's probably like a leg of the river,

and now it's not. Yep, and they think that this happened basically in like 1765, between 1765 and 1795 is when the river changed. Sometime in that 30 years. In that 30 years, they don't fucking know. The records aren't good. Wouldn't you wanna know exactly when that happened? You would imagine they would have records,

but people were just writing shit down willy-nilly. In this last century, this happened, and then they were like, well, when? Somebody dropped that diary in the river Yeah, this is they basically found this from using old maps and they were like well Okay, the rivers here and before 1765 and all the maps have just a lake here after 1795 So sometime in there we think they would have noted river change course wrote that down somewhere Not a river any longer

It's just standing still weird used to be in a river now. It's dry land lots of mosquitoes now Yeah, that's gonna happen. Yeah settlers that moved into the area cleared the wilderness and started Cultivating just shitty subsistence living stuff for farming then cotton became the major crash as we know The the railroad ended up coming in and that you know that popped the area pretty good here once the railroad comes in Then people want to be here. I guess freight marked Horn Lake intended for the families who lived in the region Were dropped off like just they would have they didn't have like a post office So they just dropped it off in the road, on Goodman Road. If you ordered stuff, they just drop off

everybody's shit in the road in a pile. Just leave it there. Like all your Amazon packages, like an apartment building basically in a city, like you have to go into the mail room and it's a giant pile of Amazon packages to sift through. They used to just dump the shit in the road, which is pretty goddamn amazing.

Eventually they built stores and a stockyard and cotton gins and blacksmith and all that stuff there The first post office opened in 1853 Wow, so that's when it became official There are several historic sites here. One is the Circle G Ranch Which was owned by Elvis. That's why it's a big deal. It's known as the Graceland Honeymoon Cabin, basically. Yeah, it's his involvement. He bought it in 1967. He was on a trip to the country to buy horses.

Because he found this ranch. He just came across the ranch. It was named Twinkle Town Farm, and he just liked it, and it had a big giant white cross on it, which I hope was not on fire, but it wasn't. So he's- Or soaked in kerosene. Soaked in kerosene.

So he saw that, and he caught his attention. He bought the property for $437,000 back then, which is like, you know, four million bucks now. Sure. A good chunk. He wanted to name the ranch Circle G, but he tried to register it under that and discovered another ranch already. Use that name. Circle. Any letter is already done, man.

Yep. So he registered under it the Flying Circle G Ranch. Yeah, that's what he's doing here. So he then purchased a bunch of trailers so that his friends could stay on the ranch with him He just made it like a party spot basically bought a bunch of trailers he brought a bunch of vehicles and agricultural equipment a bunch of cattle and Wow, he really invested. Yeah, he built a big fence around the place I mean he didn't he paid people to and then it became It became his country retreat basically fascinating and when he married Priscilla Presley when she was a child in May of 1967, they spent

a few days in Palm Springs and then came home to the ranch on May 4th. And ever since then it's been known as Elvis's Honeymoon Cottage. Gross. Yep. This is where he bangs kids. This is where he bangs kids and rides horses I wonder if he uses a trailer just to make it seem Elvis's Neverland. Oh gross Let's hope let's hope the same things weren't going on in Neverland. Show me your butthole

I hope that wasn't saying that to her at least he wouldn't have sounded like that. So that's good Look at the cutouts of me. Oh man, he liked to fool around on the farm equipment and all that kind of shit. Not fool around, he liked to ride around. He liked to fuck around and act like a rancher. Come here, let me finger you while I ranch. Finger you on this deer.

He sold the ranch in 1969, so he only had it for two years. He had it for two years and they're still touting it. Everywhere Elvis took a shit though they do that. Elvis is like George Washington and Elvis anything they did there's a sign and a plaque and like we all have to remember it. So his DNA is probably still there somewhere. I'm sure it's somewhere at least in the floorboards. Yeah sure he's dropped a few loads on the ground. So there's also the octagonal house which is another one of these, which we thought like, what is that? And then people once we did that episode.

Evidently there's hundreds of them. Evidently every town in America has octagonal houses and we just somehow have never run into one like idiots in our 80 years between us. So built in 1844, as for some doctor as a gift to his bride, it's a weird three level eight sided house. Three levels. Three levels, eight sided located on Horn Lake Road, just south of Nail Road. And I guess it's a people come and look at the fucking place because it's different. So reviews of this town, here we go. Five stars, okay. Horn Lake is a nice place to live,

however, a Whole Foods grocery is needed. Well, it's Northwestern Mississippi. I need almond milk. Yeah, it's, you know what? They're like, pork? And you're like, almond milk. Pork bellies, almond milk. Back bacon like almond milk pork bellies almond milk Back bacon almond milk have you heard of kale?

Pork It's not working. I don't think Also it appears that there are too many warehouses going up well Well, yeah, that's everywhere. So here's four stars. I moved to Horn Lake my ninth grade year. This sounds like it's gonna be a memoir. Who says it like that? It's the first line of a memoir. I moved to Horn Lake my ninth grade year. I've been here since I was 14.

I'm currently 24 years old and so far, I haven't had any problems living here. It's a fairly small town and everything's a great commute. A great commute makes it awesome. This is an old timey person. This is like a Civil War soldier who's been transported into modern times. Mom, I'm going to set out on my great commute. There's a great commute.

I'll see everyone in the spring. I'm going to Target. Are the oxen, are the oxen saddled? Excellent. Walmart, which is fairly new, Kroger, hospital, shopping malls. There's a Walmart at Kroger hospital, not a hospital, just hospital, shopping malls, et cetera. It is a good location thus far. You've been there for 10 years. It's not just thus far. What do you mean thus far? You're thriving, man.

Thus far on my great commute. Who temporarily survives for 10 years? And I do like my neighborhood. We stay in a cove, which I'll tell you what a cove is in a minute here, which eliminates traffic a lot. And my child. Plural. Plural. And my child can go outside and play without a big risk

of traffic flow. I don't know how old the kid is. You're 24. The kid's running around. Good luck. Now, a cove is a cul-de-sac, by the way, in Mississippi Talk. OK. In the Ole Miss.

That's what they call a cove down there. Yeah, I read that in the newspaper. So here we go. Four stars. Memphis is foreverve down there. Yeah, I read that in the newspaper. So here we go. Four stars. Memphis is forever my first love. Oh, wonderful. I love the highest murder rate in the country. That place is terrific.

If you've seen the first 48, stay away from Memphis and Tulsa. Just stay the fuck away. They're both terrifying. Bad places. Bad places. You will be murdered. It's full of love and pride. The city of Memphis is like no other. You would have to be from here to really know the feeling. Okay, but

that's not... You're reviewing this town, not the city that's 25 minutes away from here. Boy, do you long for Memphis. Wow, just I love Memphis. Three stars in Horn Lake, not a lot of sense of quote community, in quotes for some reason. You didn't need to put that in quotes. Not a lot of sense of community, we get it. Two stars, the crime in the city of Memphis has never been classified with a low level.

Murders and violence are what all Memphis, Memphians, not even Memphinsians, Memphians, are used to and try to stay clear of with race wars across America Cities have started to divide. What are you talking? What? What are you? Are you writing a fiction novel now? What is going on here? Yes, you got to meet up with I moved to Horn Lake in my ninth grade year and get you two together to write some kind of dystopian post-apocalyptic memoir What is this fucking escape from LA? It happened in my ninth grade year.

The race wars broke out. Memphis, however, has not. The crime rate has dropped, and police have even talked to the people of the city to decrease the violence and increase the support, love, and connection throughout different communities. Again, you're reviewing a small town near here, and you're talking about Memphis, and wow, okay.

People in this town, 26,623. And it's grown dramatically lately, too. It's really spiked up because it's a suburb, so that happens. Way more females than males, 53% female. Median age is lower than normal, it's about 33 1⁄2, about four years under the average. Less people married here, more people married three times the single with

children rate here also. So yeah, people will be, it's a horny town. Good for you everybody. Awesome, sounds good. And difficult to get along with, evidently for long periods of time apparently Race of this town forty nine point five percent white forty one point three percent black point eight percent Asian six point one percent Hispanic so there's that religion fifty five percent of the people here are religious. Yeah, you know to be expected It's a little high and we're not gonna be surprised here Yeah to be expected. It's a little high and we're not going to be surprised here. Yeah. 32.7% of the people here are Baptists. As we know, Baptists are the Catholics of the South. Jesus. It's dominating the Western or the Southern bracket of the religion, final four here.

So the unemployment rate here is about 5.3, which is slightly higher than the national average. It's about 4 right now. Median household income here is a little lower than the national average. It's $54,783. It's about $15,000 low. Yep, median home cost here, though the cost of living, if 100 is average, here it's 92. So pretty close, but the housing is way low. Median home cost here $171,300. So pretty affordable compared to a lot of places. So if we've convinced you,

you want all the barbecue of Memphis without all the gunplay we have for you without being on the first 48. The Horn Lake, Mississippi real estate report. Your average two-bedroom rental here goes for $1,070, which is a couple hundred below the national average. Here's a two-bedroom, two-bath, 1,049 square foot house. So little house. Little guy, yeah. There's only like one picture of the inside, which is frightening, and there's a big four post bed in the living room.

So I don't know what's happening in this house at all. I don't understand it. Bedroom's uninhabitable. Either that or they were trying to take it out of the place and realized nothing would fit through the door and they just left it there. I don't know what's going on here. We gotta take it apart Lou fuck that it doesn't look great $150,000 for that very little plot of land to here's a four-bedroom three bath

2068 square foot this is your it's brick on the outside kind of but like the faux brick stuck to your oh Yeah, brick face not made of of one of those facade there you go Standard kind of nice house. It's boring very boring It says though quote nestled in a quiet neighborhood it offers harmonious fusion of style There's no it's just a house. It's the most basic plain fucking house. You're gonna find. There's no harmonious shit It's just fine. Nothing welded together. And it says perfect for the pickiest buyer.

Oh. So are you the pickiest buyer? You might wanna get here. Evidently. And move to Corn Lake. And here is a five bedroom, four bath, 2928 square foot house. There we go.

On 1.1 acres too. Shit yeah. Nice house, nice acreage. It is somebody's grandma who went to church six days a week lived here. Really? It's just all religious stuff. Oh Yeah, but like old lady religious stuff. I'm like doilies and shit You know what I mean? Like Jesus said this on a doily, you know, very old It's this person who lived here so old that in the bedroom There's the bed with all the pillows and the nice pillowcase and all that kind of stuff. Next to the bed is a god damn china cabinet. Nobody under 80

has a china cabinet in their bedroom I don't think. Especially in their bedroom. I've never seen that before. That house is $429,500 there. Very affordable. Not bad for what you get there. It's actually not terrible. Did I say how much the second house was I don't think I did it was to to to 335 Oh, we didn't say we got 335 for that second house so things to do here here. We go the Magnolia fest No, yeah, probably about 6,000 of those in the south. I think right yeah, I know Leah fests Fucking South Carolina all the way to the Miss Sit. All the way down through the Gulf there, yeah. It features carnival rides, games, a rodeo, arts and crafts.

It's the festival that every Hallmark movie, where the lady who moved there because she was hurt and opened a cupcake shop, finally, she's been cold to that guy, the local guy who owns his own little business and he does okay. She's been kind of cold to him, but this is the night where she comes here and he wins her like a teddy bear

and she gets some cotton candy and everything kind of comes together and once the fucking Ferris wheels get stuck up there, they're making out with a view of the city when the fireworks start. We know that fucking movie. That's the movie. Starring Bridget Fonda.

Starring, and her bid for a comeback. So they say the DeSoto County City of Horn Lake again this year, holding the Magnolia Festival. They say there's a rodeo which included cowboys from all over the south who travel to attend

and participate. Many of them seasoned riders. I hope all of them are. It's a rodeo. They fucking better be. They're gonna die otherwise. Yeah literally if this is your first rodeo try somewhere else. No shit that's literally an idiom. It's not my first rodeo. I'm not a moron is what that means. You don't want to do that. No it's not only a hobby but in some cases a business on the national circuit. Entrance paid a fee to ride the bulls and Broncos in some cases a thousand dollars plus to get a chance at winning Wow, that's a gamble man. You are yeah, this is like this is like fan duel for yeah for people Who are kicked in the head with a horn by a horse?

That's the point like you could you're gonna lose a grand and lose your teeth. Like what the fuck? What a gamble man. They talk about last year's prior to the first event of the evening, a children's scavenger hunt in the arena allowed kids 10 years old and under to search for an unknown item that held a $20 bill. It didn't take long for a young boy to find it, grinning with glee at the reward of his effort and showing the audience the $20. With bullshit all over it. Wow. Just covered in, yeah. It's going to cost way more than that. Actual bullshit. For new shoes.

Because he's been traipsing around in cow shit for the last fucking hour trying to find it. Digging in it. Oh my god. They say they had a, after that they had the US flag carried by a young cowboy on horseback. He stopped midfield for the national anthem as the audience of spectators and cowboys all rose to their feet. As the national flag exited the arena, the announcer introduced the first event of the

evening, peronco busting, and the first cowboy 28-year-old Paxton Ray of Alabama, of Calera, Alabama, which we did an episode on, riding pal. He said, quote, yeah, I'm a full-time electrician in Calera, but rodeo is my passion. I'm going to break my back tonight. I'm going to forget everything I know about circuits and voltage and all that shit. So when I learned about the Horn Lake event, that was the first time a rodeo was happening here. I knew I had to be a part of it, so here I am. Wow.

Well here you are, mister, there you go. I guess he said he'd only been riding eight months. Oh, he's about to die. He lasted eight seconds on pal, and then was. Oh, that's not bad. That's not, he wasn't. That's what you want. Earned him 70 points for whatever that's worth. Yeah The guy said they asked him if he liked bulls and he said like riding bulls

I like the horses and prefer get prefer them to getting stomped on by a 1,500 pound bull Yeah, and they've got a longer they got a longer ride like the the yeah Oh of a horse is a much bigger much bigger teeter-totter than a bull just a fucking it's up and down it's it's a whiplash machine that's all those fucking things are it's hard on your neck so the bands that they have here before flying oysters will be there oh the flying oh the flying on a Thursday so you know they're in demand when they're playing the rodeo festival on a Thursday. And then on Friday, you know, this band is hard to come by the free band.

Oh, we don't. Does that mean you just don't charge? We'll show up with our instruments and shit. I mean, you're never getting paid for this if that's what you call yourself. The free band crime rate in this town. We are interested in here property crime right at average So right there, which is surprising I don't know seems like it's a lot of coves going on here all sorts of doesn't make sense And then violent crime murder rape robbery and of course assault here the amount rush more of crime is about one-third of the national average That's way low. It makes no sense. What's going on here? I don't know so far from Memphis kids are vandalizing your car or some shit

Maybe that's it, but they won't hurt you if you catch them. I don't know either way that said Let's talk about some murder shall we let's do it. Let's talk about this crazy stuff before we get into the murder I also want to say stick around to the end of the episode because we are going to give an update on One of just the sickest people we've ever had as a small town murder, criminal murder, who may be on a street near you very, very soon. Put it that way. It's a little disturbing and we got that for you at the end of the show. Careful what strangers you interact with.

No shit, a nice update here So okay here. We go. Let's talk about some murder December 19th 1994 Okay, loud explosive bangs ring out in the early morning hours several Several a couple and we're talking five o'clock in the morning 530 in the morning-ish. And it ain't the air whistle telling everybody it's time to wake up.

Nope, it's not the church bell, it's none of that shit. It is, it's not the cotton bell and nothing. So it's, and it's December, so that's very dark out at 5.30 in the morning in December, so it feels like the middle of the night, the whole neighborhood's, holy shit, what the fuck is that? And from next door comes Linda Liedem, L-E-E-D-O-M. She, at this point, is 40 years old,

and she's the next door neighbor. She runs over there. The fire department is called by several different neighbors. The fireman said, we received the call at 657, and the fire was coming through the roof when we arrived at 601. Oh, it's over. So that's that is an aggressively fast fire. It was the biggest scandal in pop music.

The stars of Milli Vanilli, the Grammy winning multi-platinum R&B phenomenon, were exposed as frauds. But none of this was their idea. So whose idea was it? Enter German music producer Frank Farian. He saw the success of acts like Michael Jackson and Prince, and he wanted in, no matter the cost. So he devised the perfect pop heist. Two once-in-a-lifetime talents who were charismatic,

full of sex appeal, and phenomenal dancers. The only problem? They couldn't sing. But Frank knew just how to fix that. Wondery's new podcast, Blame It On The Fame, dives into one of pop music's greatest controversies and takes a never before heard look at the exploitation of two young black artists. Milli Vanilli set the world on fire,

but when the truth came out, Rob and Fab were the only ones who got burned. Looking back now, it's hard not to wonder, why did everyone blame them and not the man pulling the strings? Follow Blame It On The Fame, Millie Vanille on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can binge all episodes of Blame It On The Fame early

and ad free right now by joining Wondery+. Welcome to the small town of Chinook, where faith runs deep and secrets run deeper. In this new thriller, available exclusively on Wondery+, religion and crime collide when a gruesome murder rocks the isolated Montana community. Everyone is quick to point their fingers at a drug addicted teenager, but local deputy Ruth Vogel isn't convinced. She suspects connections to a powerful religious group. Enter federal agent V.B. Loro,

who has been investigating a local church for possible criminal activity. The pair form an unlikely partnership to catch the killer, unearthing secrets that leave Ruth torn between her duty to the law, her religious convictions, and her very own family. But something more sinister than murder is afoot, and someone is watching Ruth.

With an all-star cast led by Emmy nominee Sanaa Lathan and Star Wars Kelly Marie Tran, Shnook is available exclusively and ad-free on Wondry+. Join Wondry Plus in the Wondry app or on Apple podcasts. And you're not fighting that. No, right after the... Everything's on fire. Right after the explosions, they called the fire department and yeah I mean there was by four minutes the thing is engulfed which is a very fast moving fire. That's not a it's a dry house

That's not a smolder there. Yeah, that's a that's there in the inside the house. They find one person in the house Oh, and it is a woman Here she is 47 years old. She is Lula Ann Welch Young. Welch is her maiden name. She's married and she does Welch Young later on. So Lula Welch Young here. She is found dead inside the house. She has died of smoke inhalation and we'll talk about her wounds a little later. She's found between the foot of her bed and the wall. They said quote as if she was trying to get out. That's what the firefighters said when they found her. She was found unconscious but alive. She was pulled out by firefighters with first

and second degree burns on her chest and stomach and died of smoke inhalation before the ambulance even could arrive. So this woman, yeah, horrible. One of the reporters said she died from breathing in the smoke. I can't imagine the horrors she went through in her last moments of life, which yeah, this is bad. You know what it is and it's awful. It's the worst.

Yeah. It's when you see that scene in a movie where they're trapped in a room with flames. And you got that panic. It's the panic. Oh no. It's the panic of water rising in a fucking boat, in the Titanic, you know, those couple laying in the bed waiting for the water to come.

It's that same kind of panic. Fucking anxiety's horrific. It's horrible. They said an autopsy had been requested anyway, just in case. So right away, just from the initial look through, the firemen and arson investigators are trying to determine a source of the fire. And they say, quote, this is the fire investigator. As far as we have been able to determine, the fire probably began from a faulty extension cord.

Oh no. They found a frayed extension cord on a space heater that was on. Why is it always a goddamn space heater? Dude, it seems like if you buy a space heater, it's 50-50, it's gonna kill you. Right? Yeah, and you're required to plug that

into a really shitty outlet. Your worst extension cord and your most overloaded outlet is what it is not plugged into the wall But no no no price sake you can't an extension cord plugged into a splitter plugged into like a six way some sort of power strip That's fucked up And that's fucked up and has like your TV and all your stuff and lamps and like you know any other high voltage high voltage things you might have is plugged into that. And then all of that goes into one plug in the wall. It's not even a grounded one. It's one of the two prongers. So yeah, perfect. That's that's that's the only I believe that's code for a space heater, right? It says it in the instruction manual. Yeah, you plug it into the wall, they'll arrest you. I've seen the diagram of it. It's it shows many, many plots going into one extension cord,

going into an ancient outlet, I believe. So yeah, that's horrible, man. Her son, her son's name is Mike, he said the term we got that they told the family was that the house literally exploded. Your mom's house exploded. From a freight extension cord? If that's true, I'm throwing out all my extension cords.

We'll find out if that will catch fire and other things that are explodable will then explode. That's the problem, is if that catches something else. He said, it literally exploded, so I was trying to figure out how the house could blow up. Nothing in the house was gas, so how could the house explode? She was scared of fire. That was her biggest fear.

Oh, Jesus, and she knew it was going to happen? Which she is a brave lady, as we'll find out, and a fucking tough lady we're going to find out in her life here. Absolute fucking, she's a savage in terms of toughness. She is really, really tough. She knew. She knew, James. She knew. Someone in the neighborhood said everybody knew, everybody that knew Ms. Young thought she was a good person. People were really, really sad that she had died. A good

neighbor literally gone. Well, yeah, in the ground now. You could just say gone. You don't have to say literally, literally gone. We get it. She's not here anymore. Now, Linda lead him who was the fireman found crying in the front yard and you know, was while they were doing this, she just stayed in the front and was staying out the whole time. She is Lula's best friend. Yeah, for years, for over 15 years, they've been best friends like sisters. So a few days later Linda writes a little editorial in the local paper saying, quote, I lost a sister, companion, best friend and confidant. All was lost due to an accident that could have been preventable but wasn't. So yeah. Now relatives said that, you know, this is the biggest shame because Lula had pretty aggressive

cancer a few years back. Oh. As we'll talk about, we'll go through. She got a terminal diagnosis and then a few months before this fire was just declared cancer free. What? She beat her cancer and at least it went into remission for now. Unbelievable.

And so they were saying, you know, at the time they were saying, yeah, I mean, she was in remission, but maybe it would have come back. And her relatives were trying to say, maybe this was better this way that she didn't like suffer through a long cancer. But it's like, Jesus, she could have lived another 20 years for Christ's sake too at the same time. She burned to death you guys yeah she's that saying that's worse dying in a fuck when you really hate somebody yeah someone on the road do the shittiest fucking maneuver possible and cut you off and almost

fucking cause an accident with three other people you go die in a fire motherfucker out the window because that's the worst thing you could think of. You don't scream die of lung cancer. You say die painfully on fire. And terrified by the way. As you watch the blood come through your skin die in a fire motherfucker. Watch the flames creep toward you as you sit in terror and huddle in the corner of the room with your children. It's so much pain.

That's what it's about, yeah. That's fucking crazy. So your skin blisters and the life comes out of those blisters, you bastard. But they were like, you know, they'd watched her suffer for years. So they were like, I don't know. I mean, I think they were just trying to find.

They're finding closure. Any kind of closure. A little bit about Lula here. She grew up in Arkansas and Mississippi. Her family moved around a lot, from what I understand here. She moved around quite a bit. Her parents' names were Oscar and Flora. Oscar's going to die in 1990, we'll talk about. And Flora will live a long time. We'll talk about that too. She'll live until 2019, Flora.

Jesus. She lived, I think she was in her 90s when she died. Almost 30 years without Oscar. Yeah, oh absolutely. That extended her life. Oscar might have been a pain in the ass, we don't know. That's what happens to a lot of these old ladies. They lose a husband.

Both my grandmothers did that. Yeah, that's a good point. Grandfathers died early, another 30 years they went on, just fine. Had a whole other life after that. It's rare that a guy outlives his one and only for 30 years. Women do it all the time. All the time. I think part of it was back then all these guys were in wars.

I think that, who knows what the shit kind of chemicals they were exposed to. Like both my grandfathers were in World War II. Imagine the horrible chemicals they were exposed to. Like both my grandfathers were World War II. Imagine the horrible things they were exposed to. The amount of lead alone is crazy. Yeah, what was going on. So I feel like that's part of it also. They all died early. Well, there's something right now that exists

that we're exposed to that in 20 years they're going to say, it's going to lead to the conclusion that we all had cancer. I'm sure. Cancers are on the rise in young people and it's probably from these god damn computers. We don't know. Yeah, that was the oldest thing you've ever said. Cancers on the rise among the young people and I think it's because of these damn computers. That's what's going on.

It's a fad, I tell you. They put them in their pockets right next to the penises and what do you expect's going to happen? Of course, they're gonna have cancer Check the rates of penile cancer that through the roof. I'm sure of it To do with all the Wi-Fi it's got to this this wefie I don't know what they even have a lot with this but that's what all the kids want. We feel ify I don't even know what that is. What's the chemical that makes this wefie happen? I don't know where it is. I said I don't have wefie. Can I get a bottle of it?

This is like a two liter of wefie. What do you want from me? It's gotta be fuckin' patented by DuPont, right? I think it's bad. I think it's bad and it hurts us. That's all I'm gonna say. It's patented by Roundup. That's what it was. Monsanto makes Weefy, and I know they do. It's poison. It's GMO Weefy, it's a problem. Blackfish Weefy.

Weefy. So, the Lula, back to her here, growing up with Oscar and Flora, traveling around Arkansas and Mississippi, she has two brothers and a sister. Her brothers are Randy and Bobby, which sound like guys from Arkansas and Mississippi. They sure do, yeah.

Randy and Bobby Welch, you know? That's great, and Nettie is her sister. Oh, that's another, yeah. Nettie. That's another cowgirl name. Absolutely. Lula married her high school sweetheart, so she's born in 1947.

In the mid-60s, she marries her high school sweetheart. Just at the time, that's the typical. She's doing it. She's doing a John Cougar Mellon Camp song all over again Problem is well, they'll have two kids which are good. They have Stacey who's the daughter She's the younger the younger of the two and Michael who we talked about before it's the son. He's the older child problem is they're going to break up though. Yeah, Lula and her husband here are going to break up and he's going to kind of take off and leave her as a single mom with two kids here. Oh, that a boy.

In the late 80s, or the late 70s, I'm sorry. Like 1978, they break up. 1981-ish, they get a divorce. So, you know, she's got to figure out what to do here She's got to get a career going and all this kind of thing She works for a while a little while as a secretary on the oncology floor of a hospital. Oh Which whoof man that is people watching that People who can do that man hats off to you cuz that is good You know that might be why she was able to beat cancer, because the woman's... Maybe, yeah, she's seen people do it.

She's seen it. She knows what it is. She's not scared of that. Yeah, some people that would make them 10 times more scared, and some people that would make them a little braver, because it's not this black cloud mystery. They kind of see it a little bit. She's seen people with terminal diagnosis, so she's, yeah. And she's seen them die, and she's seen them live, probably.

So she's seen it all here, so. I mean anybody that can do that that would I? My I'm bad with like I'm pretty empathetic when it comes to shit Like if I had to work in an oncology Florida hospital four days, I would kill myself afterwards rally I wouldn't be able it would make me so fucking you think you'd make it to your first page I don't think I would no, I don't think I would. No, I don't think I would, dude. I really don't. Yeah, I don't know, man. There's a nest on my porch, a bird's nest.

And every year for the last three years, birds have laid eggs in the nest. I show them to you. I send you pictures. I get all excited. And then at some point, the eggs fall out, or the birds just abandon the eggs, and they never hatch, and that's that.

This has happened every year. This year I finally have these fucking eggs, right? And the bird keeps on them and even when we go outside the bird will sit on them and look at us like, don't come near me mother fucker. Oh, that's great. It's just this little sparrow. So finally eggs hatched and- Unbelievable.

One of them's adorable and you look at it and it puts its little mouth up and tries to eat worms and shit. they're cute one of them fell out of the oh no one of them fell out of the nest so we there was two now there's only one and somehow we couldn't find the little bird body because we were like where'd it go but Oscar found it my dog oh he's a bird dog and yeah he came in the house with a look on his face like I'm not holding anything in my mouth I shouldn't have. No, I don't want to lick you right now.

And he had a baby bird corpse in his mouth. Oh, God. And I got to tell you, I'm sad about it. Like, I feel terrible. It's a fucking, it's a house sparrow on my porch. Like, if you go outside my house, there's what, eight million birds? Yeah.

I'm just like, aw, that poor little, I have thought about that bird way more than I probably should. So I could not deal with human beings in a cancer ward. I would be horrible. Birds are awesome though. Yeah, I like them, I'm happy they're there. I just like the little ones,

the ones that seem like vulnerable. I got a hummingbird when I water my lawn. Ah, they're adorable. It flies up the stream of my nozzle, I guess, and it bathes in the fucking mist, James. And I love this. I see it every morning and it tickles me. I love it so much. They're awesome.

Yeah. But some people, I think you'd be surprised. I think that there'd be some jerk that gets cancer and comes in there and you gotta treat him and you're like, just die, I don't wanna treat you. If you're a big enough dick, I don't feel bad for you. Whatever you have. At one point I'll go, that's why you have cancer,

you fucking asshole. Yeah, you never learn how to fucking treat people. That's what happens. Yeah, I guess that's the equivalent of the bird that shits on your freshly washed car. Exactly. I like birds right up until they shit all over my stuff. Oh, then it's the worst.

Then it's, hey, you motherfucker. Yeah. So Lula ends up also, after she's a secretary, I guess she's interested in the medical field, and she trains as an EMT. So okay. And she gets her license and all that and she'll end up getting her nursing license and everything like that.

So that's the path she's going to take. And her friend is Linda that we know from next door here. Now Linda Liedem, she will talk about her family. She's got a husband. They stayed. They were married here. His name is Gary lead him. He drives a truck in Memphis and quote operates a gun shop out of their garage. That's not a, that's not a gun shop. He sells, he sells guns out of their garage.

That's a dangerous man. That's what that is. He operates a drugstore out of their fucking living room. No, he doesn't he just sells Bad stuff that's interesting just in their little ranch style one-story home you pull in and you can just buy some guns Jesus I pictured like a big fucking oh, there's a legal plywood With red paint just scribble Gary's gun shop on it Gary's guns. Yeah, it's crooked. You know, it's all fucked up. He's just like that sign makes it legal That's the then the rules buddy So that's her husband. Yeah, they have daughters

they have a daughter two daughters here to Jennifer who's born in 1971 and Melanie who's born in 1973 and these two women meet as neighbors in the 1970s, 77-78 and they're two young mothers they both have two kids and they're in the ballpark of the same age so their friendship is just immediately struck right here. It's all about their kids they both take care of their kids during the day. When they needed to go shopping, like when the kids were little, one would keep the kids while the other would go shopping for both of them. Just give the other one the list and she would shop for them.

And they'd take turns doing it. They were really trying to help each other out here. It really grows. And they became best friends. After the divorce, after Lula's divorce, they both entered training to be nurses because they, she was like, well I'll do it with you. You need a career and you know, a little extra money wouldn't help me either. I don't know how the Glocks are selling this week, so I

don't know, you know, how that's gonna go. So I could use a little extra income. And they decide to do that there. Eventually, Linda will move into a house on the other side of town, which is still five minutes away or 10 minutes away. But they still remain close, and then they end up living next to each other again after that. But for years, they lived on the same cove, which is a cul-de-sac,

again, in Mississippi. And Linda ended up moving into a bigger house is why she moved. But it's mainly about their children and then the work and everything like that. Lula would often take care of Linda's daughters in the morning when Linda worked late at night on various projects,

which included a tax preparation business with her father. And Linda was in the management of a dozen rental properties as well. She worked for somebody. Yeah, so she's trying to put it together. I think that's why she wants to be a nurse to try to just do one thing. Do one thing, yeah. Put her in 40 and go home.

And she's doing things like where she'll do all the tax prep stuff and all that kind of shit. She does that after the kids go to bed. Oh, gosh. So that's what I mean. She'll be up late at night working on the tax prep till two o'clock in the morning, and then the kids gotta get up for school

and have breakfast and all that at six a.m. So Lula helps out by taking the kids in the morning and taking them to school and doing all that shit and letting Linda get some sleep. So these two just really lean on each other and it's handy to have somebody that can fill in your weak spots You know what I mean? That's really really handy actually so

One of the relatives said Linda and Lula Well, Linda and Lula was two people if you seen one of them you seen both of them Do they mean one person? Was two people if you seen one of them you seen both of them Linda one person? Was two people. If you've seen one of them, you've seen both of them. Linda and Lula was two people. Yeah. If you've seen one of that, you can hear the accent in that. You bet. It's hard. You know who said that. Yeah. That guy fights at Waffle House's late at night. And mixes up sayings all the time all the time yeah so Lula's son said that they were inseparable especially after after the divorce Mike the guy Lula son Lula son said Linda was somebody mom

confided in Which makes sense us the daughter here Stacey? She said that you know they've been friends for a long time And she said that the way she looked at Linda as like another mother, like it was, like they were sisters basically, the two ladies. She said, I just go in her house just like I would mama's. Meaning Linda, she just walked right in her house

like it was her house. No problem, that's how, that's the arrangement though. Yeah, if that's the arrangement, that's fine, but. That's, yeah. Don't just, because you like mean, that's the arrangement though. Yeah, if that's the arrangement, that's fine, but that's yeah Don't just because you like me just walk in my shit This is the kid would just be able to kids were both welcome to come and go from the other houses Like they were their kids, which is amazing. I mean, wow, that's I'm not I don't want anybody's kids in my house that fucking often Yeah, I just don't want them doing that

Imagine just you have two kids and then you go to the that. You imagine just, you have two kids and then you go to the bathroom and come back and now you have four kids. No! Right. Ah! I didn't, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. You back home.

You just put a 12 pack of beer in the fridge and go to take a shit. Yeah. And then you come out and somebody's drinking your beers. Who are you? Why are you in my house? What the fuck is going on? Hey, dad, no!

Oh my God. You got it, Dad. Get out. Get the fuck out. So Stacy says, I have had to maintain contact with her, meaning Linda, ever since mama died. She was the executor of my mother's estate. Anything either Michael or I needed, we went to Ms. Liedem. We went to Linda for it.

It's just the way it was. She said that mom, Flora Welch, said they were very close, those two. Lula kept her children while Linda worked and Lula treated her like part of the family. Linda had come to our family reunions also, says Lula. Like even when there's a family reunion, Linda's there. It's they are like family. She said that Lula told me repeatedly that Linda was her best friend. Linda came to the funeral. She spent the night at a motel in Grenada, Mississippi, and came to the house and visited with the relatives and she cried her eyes out at the service. So member of the family here, there.

So now she ended up, Lula ended up being a medical transcriber at Memphis Baptist Hospital. And also she did nursing stuff on the side as they're gonna start like their own little business, like a little home healthcare business where they'll come and check your blood pressure or do some nurse shit like that. Yeah, traveling nurses, yeah. Yeah, that sort of deal here.

So she has that and she has the medical transcribing at the hospital. And first Lula began working as an LPN, licensed practical nurse, and then started volunteering also with the Horn Lake Fire Department as a bookkeeper before getting her EMT license. So they're very active, these two ladies. Who knew the fire department needed bookkeepers? I didn't know.

I guess you would though. Yeah, I mean, I guess if you have to buy a new hose, someone's gotta write that down. You gotta know, yeah. Dog food. You gotta know if you can, yeah. Yeah, they gotta, how much wax do they go through for those fucking things?

Yeah. Honestly, there's a firehouse by my house and I can see the yearly breakdown of what I pay in taxes directly to the firehouse. Really? Yeah, yeah, it's a, dude, I could fucking, the amount of. They tell you where everything goes? the amount of turtle wax that fucking I I swear all they do is wax every time

I pass by they're waxing the fucking trucks. It's like listen. I Think you don't wax it so much half the money if you just have some spots on the truck And I don't care if you show up in my house is on fire. I'm not gonna go Hey, that truck isn't shiny enough fucking put my house out. I don't. What are we doing? Oh, I mean can't you wax paint off eventually? Maybe God can't be good can't wax in it too much be bad. Well, then you got to pay for it to get repainted, too That's my point. Yeah, now you're gonna pay for a clear coat. What are we doing? Yeah, are we wrapping these things help? Help me And firemen are fucking jacked Those guys are gonna really strip that paint. They're eating good too in there. That's the other thing. What's that?

Costing what years this fire I was the fire was in 94 Yeah, yeah 47 that's way too young. Oh Jesus Christ way too young to die of either fire or cancer really Yeah, either way too young so way too either fire or cancer really yeah either way too young So way too alert and like with it. Oh, yeah, what's happening? She wasn't like 90 and riddled with dementia going as someone here is Someone's door as the flames engulf her and catch her nightgown on fire. No, right. She's she's crawling to escape When she's fucking burned alive crawling to escape when she's fucking burned alive. God damn it.

Oh my God. So Lula worked for the ambulance corps for the fire department as a volunteer. And they said she did this strictly volunteer. We're a paid department now, but we still run volunteers. And she was on the volunteer role. She was a very nice person, very easy going. Lula. So everybody likes Lula.

I think it was 89 she is diagnosed with breast cancer and Linda's the first person she tells and the thing is, is they told her that it had already progressed pretty good and 1990 is not 2024 in terms of cancer treatment at all. That doesn't seem like it but that's years ago. And it's a, there's been a lot of advancement. My friend's dad across the street was diagnosed with leukemia and within like six months that man was dead. Yeah, yeah. I mean, and people, I'm sure they got, just got also a lot of late stage diagnosis.

That's just, you kind of fucked after that, but still it's, there's a lot better, more effective cancer treatments now than there was in 1990 and so yeah she told her that you know she has cancer it's the first person she entrusted that to when Lula had gallbladder surgery Linda stayed overnight with her at the hospital and everything and slept in her room and everything like that she ends up Lula ends up having a radical mastectomy in April of 1990. Breast cancer.

She is fighting it. Absolutely. The cancer then returned and when it returned, they told her that it's terminal. You're done, basically. And that was in 1990, 1991. But she said, not happening. Wow. Lula said, I don't really care what you're saying right now. I've seen people beat this before my eyes and I'm gonna fucking do it too. And I think the attitude is a good part of this.

You know what I mean? That's a big thing from what I've seen here from my anecdotal experience in the field of cancer with all of our relatives having cancer all the time, you and me. It seems that no family member is fucking safe. It's really just popping up like crazy and it's depressing. Too much.

Lula had multiple chemotherapy and radiation treatments after the surgery. And yeah, her friends said they were very painful and caused her to be sick. And when they'd have to take Lula back to the hospital, we'd hear it first from Linda, and she'd be at the hospital to meet us when the family arrived. So she is right there with her all the time. She would she was the mouthpiece. She was telling everybody where to go.

Yeah, because she was the one who took her to the hospital. Yeah, that's why because Lula would have called Linda to say I need to go to the hospital. Linda would have said, I got you, be there in five minutes. You know, let's go. So, um, yeah, her sister here, uh, Lula's sister said that the, um, the family dealt with the condition kind of on a day to day basis. They said she had been down sick for so long. She had times when she just couldn't get up and go, but then her good days she wanted to go out shopping she wanted to sit up at night and play cards we knew it was coming but we didn't expect it this way right right you know it was weird so Linda always has Lula's back though I guess

they talked all the time her sister said Lula sister said they shopped together they went out to eat together meaning Linda and Lula she said I'm sure Lula told Linda things She'd never tell mama or any of us for one thing She didn't want to tell mama how much she hurt how bad the cancer was because she didn't want mama to worry Meaning her mom, you know, she didn't want her. I mean while her mom lived another 30 years Yeah, just wild So that her mom was also dealing with dad just died in 1990 so Oscar dies

She's got terminal cancer at the time. That's that's tough on floor. You know the mom So she said the kid they said that even Linda would come through for Lula in difficult times when the family didn't even know Lula was having tough times She said quote when Lula's light bill was too high, I like how by the way in the south electric bill is the light bill. There's several, it's not even just the south, there's several parts of the country where it's the light bill.

That's funny, yeah. When Lula's light bill was too high, Linda had bought her groceries. When the cancer made it difficult for Lula to get around, Linda took her places in her van, allowing Lula to lie down in the back. So she chauffeured her around, bought her groceries for her, did all these nice things. Lula's sister said that Lula was a very giving person.

She said quote, she didn't want to take more than she could give. Her neighbors went grocery shopping for her after she got sick and cleaned her house and painted a room for her. And they were doing it to pay her back for all she'd done for them. It was mainly just Linda doing all that by the way, not just neighbors, it was neighbor. So the sister also said that Lula had taken children in who needed help from time to time. She said she was one of a kind. We were a hundred miles away because she was in Horn Lake and we were down here in Grenada

County but it was nice to know they thought that much of her to brighten up her room when she came home from the hospital It's nice to know that she's loved so they said nobody ever looked after her the way her friend Linda Liedem had though nobody An ambulance driver said because of Ms. Young's illness with the cancer. We had to take a number of runs to her home I met her I met Linda Lied, we had to take a number of runs to her home. I met her, I met Linda, lead them at the home on a number of occasions. Linda introduced her as her best friend. I would say they were very close. So no doubt. Nancy's love story could have been ripped right out of the pages of one of her own novels. She was a romance mystery writer who happens to be married to a chef. But this story didn't end with a happily ever after. When I stepped into the kitchen

I could see that chef Brophy was on the ground and I heard somebody say call 911. As writers we'd written our share of murder mysteries so when suspicion turned to Dan's wife Nancy we weren't that surprised. The first person they look at would be the spouse. We understand that's usually the way they do it. But we began to wonder, had Nancy gotten so wrapped up in her own novels... There are murders in all of the books. ...that she was playing them out in real life?

You can listen to Happily Never After, Dan & Nancy, early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple podcasts. If you're listening to this podcast, then chances are good you are a fan of the Strange, Dark and Mysterious. And if that's the case, then I've got some good news. We just launched a brand new Strange, Dark and Myster mysterious podcast called Mr. Bolland's Medical Mysteries. And as the name suggests, it's a show about medical mysteries, a genre that many fans have been asking us to dive into for years. And we finally decided to take the plunge and the

show is awesome. In this free weekly show, we explore bizarre, unheard of diseases, strange medical mishaps, unexplainable deaths, and everything in between. Each story is totally true and totally terrifying. Go follow Mr. Bolland's Medical Mysteries wherever you get your podcasts, and if you're a Prime member, you can listen early and ad-free on Amazon Music. If you're listening to this podcast, then chances are good you are a fan of the strange, dark, and mysterious. And if that's the case, then chances are good you are a fan of the Strange Dark and Mysterious. And if that's the case, then I've got some good news. We just launched a brand new

Strange Dark and Mysterious podcast called Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries. And as the name suggests, it's a show about medical mysteries, a genre that many fans have been asking us to dive into for years. And we finally decided to take the plunge and the show is awesome. In this free weekly show, we explore bizarre unheard of diseases, strange medical mishaps, unexplainable deaths, and everything in between. Each story is totally true and totally terrifying. Go follow Mr. Bolland's Medical Mysteries wherever you get your podcasts, and if you're a Prime member, you can listen early and ad free on Amazon Music. Yeah, by the way during the gallbladder surgery not only did Linda stay overnight with her, she also planned with her family to throw a surprise birthday party for her in the hospital

because she had to have the surgery and was still recovering on her birthday. On her birthday, wow. Yeah, which is really cool. Now, Lula and Linda also started a home healthcare business together. Right, the drug and the nurse thing, yeah. Yeah, and it was a legitimate business that they started, you know, LLC and all that kind of thing. So they had life insurance policies on each other, which is funny because so do we, you know what I mean?

We just did that, yeah. If you hear a podcast that's been around a while and there's commercials on it, those motherfuckers have life insurance policies on each other. They're protecting each other, yeah. They're protecting, like Jimmy is worth way more dead than alive to me. Exactly.

But here's how I know that I love him. I still don't want him dead. I would still rather he lives. I'd rather make less money and have you live. That's how I know I like you. You know what I'm saying? So that's how it works though. You have to have that.

So as her illness worsened though, I guess she knew basically Lula said her, Flora did not want life insurance from Lula. She didn't wanna be Lula's beneficiary because she said she didn't like profiting from a death that made her feel bad. Linda didn't? No, no, Lula's mother.

Lula didn't want Linda. Oh, Lula's mother, got it. Lula's mom Flora didn't wanna be a beneficiary because she said, I don't wanna profit from somebody's death, that would feel weird. And asked her if she would mind changing the beneficiary. Can you not make, because at first she just made her mom the beneficiary.

Flora. Flora said, please, Lula, make somebody else. So they made a trip to Memphis to sign a document that changed the beneficiary. That policy's only worth like $5,000. It was just a, you know, kind of a bridge thing. Safe in that, yeah. Couple of months of, months of profits or whatever.

And that was to be paid to Linda. So that's what they did here. 1994 in September, they had a big family reunion. The Welches did. And Lula attended the reunion. Linda was there. All of her sisters were there. And she had her two brothers

and her sisters and everybody there. And you know, the whole family was there. They all saw Linda, everybody's hanging out. That's September. Now right after that is when she gets the word from her doctor that her cancer is in a full remission and she's cancer free at the moment here. So to go from you're gonna die for sure,

for real, for real, you're gonna die to, we have nothing for you. Fuck, you're good right now. Enjoy yourself. A miracle, yeah. And if she had four years, she turned this, wow, your spirit and your will to live here has gotta have something to do with that a little bit.

You would like to think so anyway. Maybe that's just a person trying, hoping we have more control over shit than we actually do. I don't think we have any control. She's just got a good roll of the dice, I guess, here. Well, and then a bad roll of the dice happens. You know what I mean? She's nice.

Yeah, she's a good person. Sometimes those good things happen to good people and you're like, good for them, that's awesome. And I think that's another thing that people tell themselves that we all tell ourselves, well, I'm gonna do good things and good things will happen. That person's a dick and karma will catch up to him. Probably not, they'll probably be fine.

They're probably gonna be rich and happy and just be a dick to everybody. I know people who have been dicks for years and they're just fine. Decades of dictum and they're fine. It happens all the time. So then December 1994, December 19th is the fire. Like I said, reported at 5.57 a.m.

And it's a shame, like we said, because she just got told she was cancer free and she presumably could have had another at least 20 years ahead of her here if everything stayed good. So, the daughter, her daughter, Lula's daughter, Stacey, was there. She's 20 years old at the time, or I think she was 18 at the time. She said she was surprised to see Linda at the fire

that morning, because it was so early. She said, quote, as long as I've known Ms. Leedom, she never wanted to get out of bed before noon. Really? And now it's pre 7 a.m. and she's out there. Yeah, that's seven hours early. Acting or five at least. So one of, somebody here who had been taking care of one of, taking care of one of the

kids said when she arrived at the house, she heard Linda accusing Lula's husband of being responsible for the fire. Saying it's her ex-husband that did this. So later, Linda lit a cigarette and said, I feel so guilty, I put that propane gas tank in there, but I know he did it. Why would she? Okay, she's telling people, she said that she bought

a Christmas present, a grill, for her daughter and her daughter's husband or whatever, and was hiding it in Linda's house to hide it. So that they didn't see it. There's a propane tank in it, and that's where the explosion came from. Oh. That's the issue, yeah.

So the fireman who found her body, by the way, his name is Michael Casey, he had visited her several times in the three years they worked together. So he knew her well, and he had to find her, which is tough, finding a... It's brutal. Hard enough if it's a stranger, but if it's someone you know, that's fucking brutal top

Yeah, that's that's terrible. So he said he found her on the floor next to the bed He called for help. It was hard to get her because she had been taking they put her on a ton of steroids So they got her on a bunch of steroids for the cancer. Yeah, so it was a cancer thing So she's a lot heavier now. So she's hard to get up because she's over 200 pounds now, which she was never that big before. This was from the steroids. So they said he, with two of the other firemen, had to strap her body to a board

and carry her to the backyard, but it was too late. So part of it was it took them a minute to get her out of there because he had to call for help to be able to pull her out because he couldn't do it by himself because you know it's dead weight. So that's hard and he said quote once we got Miss Lula out I just went off by myself for a long time. That's what the fireman said. He's a 30 year old lieutenant fireman. He's just heard him that bad because everybody loved her. She's so nice. Gary who was Linda's husband said you know

it was very sad he said they were friends there ain't no ifs ands or buts about it. Tell you what we got to sell on Smith and Wesson in the garage today. Anybody want to look at a Ruger I got a large collection here he definitely pronounces the H's in his what's for sure. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. There's a lot of what? And the word vehicle. Yeah, vehicle. It's a vehicle. It's a vehicle right there. A lot of syllables. Yeah. So this guy said, quote, we've known the young family a long, long time. And they said, are the women like sisters? And he'd say, he said, I'd say closer than that. What's closer than sisters? Unless they fucked each other, which they didn't.

Were their heads connected? Yeah, co-joined, you dumb fuck. Jesus Christ. What a dumb thing to say. Now I can show you, I got a 40 caliber sale this week. He said, I guess he answered the phone shortly after 6 a.m. on the day of the fire and woke his wife up with the news because I guess one of the neighbors called him and said,

holy shit, Lula's house is on fire. So Linda, you know, was woken up and the husband, Gary, said she went right over there when she heard ran over there. Now Eddie Riles, who was a neighbor of Lula, said that he talked to Linda as she was sobbing on his lawn while the firefighters put out the blaze here. This guy said, he's the guy who heard the explosions and told everybody about it. He's the town crier of fire here. The crier of fire, fire crier.

He said that he heard two explosions at the house and recalled a sorrowful Linda telling him that she had stored a Christmas present for her daughter, a gas grill in one of the bedrooms along with a bottle of propane that was full. A full bottle. You put propane in the house. And Eddie said, quote, nobody in their right mind would keep propane in a house. Yeah, right. That's fucking crazy.

Generally, outside of the house is where the propane goes. Yeah. Usually like that's a very heavy gas. It'll settle on the floor if it gets out and you don't know it's there because you can't smell it till you fucking ignite it. You want to keep as many gases as you can out of the house. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. From an outside source. There's generally pucks on the wall that will alert you when there are gases in the house. Yeah, things like that. Yeah, you generally don't want your gas source to be on premises indoors. Indoors, yeah.

Indoors, outdoors, fine. A lot of propane tanks outdoors. Yeah, sure. Very common. Indoors, a little less common. It's crazy. She said, that's crazy. The fire chief also, the Horn Lake deputy fire chief Mike Moore said quote, I can tell

you there was no charcoal grill in that house. Charcoal grill. Remember she said, well I guess it would be a gas grill and he's just an idiot that thinks all grills are charcoal grills. He could use some king of the hill. Jesus Christ. You're the fire chief bro. You got to know the difference between grill fires, right? Half the fires that are started in houses are probably from grill accidents

Does he know there's several different kinds of fire extinguishers? I'll bet he doesn't know he just Sprays the hose on it put water on it. Y'all. It's out of control I mean, it's grease, but if you put enough water, it should overwhelm the grease, I think. It's an electrical fire, sir. It's all right. It's all right. Enough water will overwhelm anything. Don't worry about it.

It's kind of like meat. If you have meat and it's bad, if you cook it long enough, it ain't bad no more. Everything's dead. There were fires on the Titanic. It went down. They're out, right? See what I'm saying?

Fire went out. Those are big fires too. Those are 80 ton engines apiece. Huge coal fires. Extinguished them. You don't see little glowing orbs in the bottom of the ocean, do you? Nope. Why? Water puts fire out. Rest my case now, go ahead and spray that on that circuit breaker. Go ahead and spray that water on the circuit breaker. So, and then go buy a gun from Gary. For some reason, the fact that he runs a gun shop out of his garage is pretty funny, but

the fact that his name is Gary and he runs a gun shop out of his garage, I don't know why that's so much funnier. And it's one of the top three most funny names to have a garage gun shop. I think Gary's garage gun. I don't know why Gary Ricky and who else? Who else do we have? Terry, I guess. Terry's pretty good too. Terry, Gary, Ricky. Those guys have garage gun stores. So, but he's saying there was no, the firefighters didn't find a grill in the house, they're saying. No, no propane grill. No grill. They said, yeah, there was a tank, but we didn't find a grill. We just found a tank. So what's up with that? Linda's saying I had to put the grill in there. So like,

that's weird. They also found, in addition to the propane tank several oxygen bottles that she had from when she was sick and needed oxygen. And those are fucking rockets. Oh man so that's why there was multiple explosions because it was they think it was the propane tank and then bang bang bang with fucking the oxygen tanks. They also said upon closer inspection, it appears the propane tank's release valve was vented out and opened up a fourth of the way. So it was like open with propane leaking out, which you can smell very strongly. That's a... And like natural gas smells like eggs, but propane smells like

dick. Like it's so bad. It's like it's rancid. It's rancid. You know, it smells terrible. So there's no way it was like put in her house the night before and she didn't notice it was open a quarter of the way. Like there'd be no possible way that's screaming out. That's what I mean. There's no way. And also it would have been by the middle by five o'clock in the morning the tank would have probably been empty, but the house would have been full of propane, so either way they Investigators attribute the cause of the intensity of the fire to the combination of propane and oxygen in the house So they said small fire from the extension cord

It's so much propane off boom boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. And then now you got some serious fuel for the fire. Now Linda disagrees with the death certificate here. She's got some issues with it. Linda, lead him, calls the DeSoto County coroner, Jeff Pounders. That's my man Jeff Pounders right there. That sounds like a frat boy nickname. That's my man Jeff Pounders right there. That sounds like a frat boy nickname.

It's my man Jeff Pounders, like pounds away with his propane dick. There's a few sores on them, but they're almost healed up. We're going to get them out there. It's party time for old Jeff Pounders. I'm not letting Jeff Pounders look over my deceased relatives. So I lead him, called him a few days after Lula's death to learn the ruling on the cause of death and then called him a little later for a copy of the autopsy report I'd like to consult with you on this

Now she is a nurse. It might be medical interest You know, she might have an interest in those things or whatever, but it's still weird and nobody else was calling for that She's not a fucking coroner to determine cause of death nor know anything about it. Some medical interest, anyway. Now, Lula's daughter, Stacey, said that she couldn't understand why, number one, Linda was at the house, because she doesn't live next door anymore,

she came over there, she's not up that early. She also said she didn't understand why Linda quote, pitched such a fit when there was a reference to Lula's bout with cancer on the death certificate. So Stacey Stacey said quote, she said repeatedly that there was no reason to list the cancer that mama that mama had died from smoke inhalation. Now some of the pieces of the puzzle seem to be falling into place. The only problem is that Michael and I are having to go through all of this again now. So yeah, yeah, there she's trying to stir up some shit going why do you even put cancer as a as a because I think they put it as a contributing

cause which is ridiculous because she was in remission. So that's what I mean. I don't know if Linda's arguing because she thinks she's got some medical expertise because she's a practical nurse or I don't understand it, but that's what's going on. Now the thing that they find though, just 28 days before the fire, Linda had bought a $38,000, well, Lula had bought a $38,000 policy from the JMIC Insurance Company, it was $38,601, which would pay off a loan on Lula's pickup truck in the event of her death. So what ends up happening, Linda is the beneficiary of this. So Linda collected $8,907 of that amount with the rest of it going to pay off the truck

loan. Because she was lower than the truck loan. Because they took it out at full loan cost. Right, took it out at the time of the purchase. Yeah, yeah. So now four months before the fire, Nationwide Insurance Company sold a half million dollar policy on Lula's life here to Lula and carried an additional $200,000 accidental death benefit all to be paid to Linda upon Lula's death.

$700,000? $700,000. Indeed, they are on her side. I would say so. But nationwide won't pay that. They don't pay it. They invoke a standard clause that allows insurers to withhold payment on what they deem suspicious claims filed within two years of an insurance of a policy.

So because it was so close to the death, they have a standard thing in the clause, a standard clause that says if it happens that close to the death, they have a standard clause that says if it happens that close to the death, we can hold it for two years while we investigate to make sure it's not suspicious. So that's just accusatory as fuck. Sure is. So Gary Liedem, Gary is Linda's husband, he collects, because he's a beneficiary on one of these, he collects $200,000 and his wife cashed a $75,000 check on two Met

Life Insurance policies as well. That's so much life insurance on this woman. On all these different sources. So Lula's mother said that Lula took out her own insurance policy through her employment as a nursing assistant when she worked for Baptist Memorial Hospital. She said, quote, Lula listed Linda as the first beneficiary of that policy. Linda was listed because Lula wanted to ensure

that her children would have the money for their education. She listed me as the second beneficiary, meaning Flora, the mom. She did not want to do anything that could hurt me with my social security, that's why. You know if you receive too much money that they want to cut your payments. that could hurt me with my social security, that's why. You know if you receive too much money that they wanna cut your payments.

Okay, so Lula's sister said there was never any doubt in Lula's mind that Linda would do the right thing about the policy and that Linda would ensure that Lula's children receive the money. But she said that they were kinda young and would probably piss it away, so kinda, be a trustee basically, be the trustee of this account. Oversee this and make sure it doesn't get wasted.

Yeah, kind of the arbiter of the whole thing here. So Linda does not delay in claiming the insurance proceeds. There's different companies. She's getting it from Florida, Ohio, Rhode Island. One of the MetLife offices here, the insurance checks started to roll in from MetLife first. That's the one where she got the $200,000 one. I guess she, altogether it's like $975,000 in life insurance.

Good Lord. From all these different places. Now the cops start to say that Lula could not have obtained these policies because of her illness. Who the fuck would insure somebody? With yeah for a million dollars those cancer terminal cancer for a million dollars that just doesn't make any sense You don't have to put up a million dollars to get that million dollars No, it would yeah would be like betting on a 16 and O team against an O and 16 team in the NFL They probably so much you got about a hundred to 100 to win 101, you know what I mean?

Like it's just the way it is. It's kind of one of those. So she said that it's strange because also Linda, and according to these policies, Linda could not have collected on these policies if Lula had died of cancer or natural causes. Oh, she had to be murdered, huh? Anything natural. It had to be an accidental death, a murder, an explosion of her house.

Right. Fell off a boat and drowned, things like that. Something like that. Yeah, so Gary and Linda collect about $285,000 before these insurance companies start looking into this a little bit. By the way, the firemen who tried to rescue her, the three who pulled her out, brought her out in the backyard, they end up getting a big fireman award here

for their attempts to rescue her. Yeah. They said they did a courageous. The mayor said they did a courageous job in trying to save her. And they're still deeply troubled by this case. Lula Young was a popular volunteer with the ambulance crews. And her death was extremely upsetting Yeah, and the damage to her body probably was so extensive and severe like they they probably they've seen her like yeah I mean in two different situations Yes, and one of them will they'll never forget seeing a woman like burned in her nightgown. Yeah The things that happen in a fire is fucking crazy. Oh, fuck your body up.

Gasp for breath too. Yeah. She wasn't, she wasn't horrible. Still alive though. Yeah, it's fucking horrible. It's horrific. The pain that she's in and everything else, it's horrible. So shortly after this, the initial, like we said, investigation showed that the fire started

because of the frayed extension cord on the space heater. Now they said though the investigators started thinking that the fire just spread too quick and it had to be some kind of accelerant. It couldn't have happened like that. Fire doesn't move like that. Yeah, it's a little weird. One of the guys said, we had questions because too many things seemed wrong. The fire had started too hot too quickly, and it was too hot still when our people arrived. It's normally a fire will either blaze up at first

and kind of calm down a little or get hotter, but they were like, it was hot and stayed hot, which is just weird. Then they found the propane bottle, and at first they said, well, where'd this come from? And then Linda said, oh, she was holding the grill for me there. The cause of death was carbon monoxide poisoning

and smoke inhalation. So, and it was ruled an accidental death, which is what the insurance needed to pay off. So, they said the weird thing, and what the firefighters didn't like, is that the heater, the space heater, and the propane tank were found very close together inside the house, which usually, things you wouldn't keep close together.

Something that's going to be red hot next to a gas. Next to a gas contained in a container like that. And especially if it was on, which is strange too. And the fire chief said the valve had been turned on and left cracked. That means your gas is coming That means your gas is coming out. That means your gas is coming out That's your standard Ford Taurus right there for doors The valve was cracked. That means it's opened. Yeah

This is the guy selling Clark the family truckster in vacation You know the metallic pee? Yeah, exactly. He said, so they put a key indicator right there that something strange was going on. They also, when they did the autopsy, they found sleeping pills in her system. Like more sleeping pills than she would have taken to get to sleep. Yeah, more than you take for a normal dosage. So now they started to question, was this suicide?

Did she crack the fucking tank open and take a bunch of sleeping pills because maybe she got a medical news she didn't like, but that wouldn't make sense because she's been fighting this for years. When she was at her lowest saying you're dead Yeah, right. She fought it and got to this point. She would just give up now So she had a mastectomy for Christ's sake she yeah these off

she's a fighter, but they didn't know though they there's no way to know the district attorney and He said one has to wonder did did Lula take these herself? You know the sleeping pills and did she actually set the fire herself, or did someone give them to her? What happened? So her son insisted that his mother would never commit suicide. Mike said she wasn't depressed at all.

This was a lady that was looking forward to life the next day. She's a badass, yeah. Which it just doesn't seem like you'd beat cancer and then off yourself. No reason. I've got a feeling that's a rare, I'll bet that's happened six times.

It's so rare, yeah. It's so rare. And they were all based on somebody leaving that person, being like, I thought you were gonna die of cancer, I'm leaving. That there's rarer than a lesbian abortion, I'll tell you what. Rare.

So the insurance here, they go to the young family and the Welch family there and they're saying how Linda's the executor here, which is weird. A postal inspector came to talk to Linda's family or L's family, and asked them questions about her insurance. He asked if Lula had a sister named Linda. And Flora, the mom, said no, and he said, are you sure? I'm her mom. She said, quote, I told him no, I surely know my own children.

I'm not that old, chief. So he asked then if the family knew that Lula had taken out a large amount of insurance, and they didn't, because they didn't know about all these insurance policies that Lula had out all over the place. She said, Flora said, I don't believe in life insurance profiting from someone's death.

I have just enough to cover my burial. So she doesn't want anybody to get any money from her. So an investigator for the DA's office suspected that the fire was murder. And after 18 months, he still couldn't prove it, as we'll talk about here. Really? So he, I guess, turned over his files to a postal inspector

when he got another job. And that postal inspector merged the state's case with the federal information about, because the feds are involved, because if it's any kind of insurance fraud, it is done in different states. So now it's a federal affair. So that's what they're thinking about.

So they're looking for mail fraud type of things, but they don't have, they said Lula seemed to take them out on herself. It just doesn't make any fucking sense at all. Then they get a break. Okay. Brenda driver. She's a nationwide insurance agent who is absolutely not on Linda's side here. No, we'll just say no. She had sold the half million dollar policy to Lula. Yeah

Then she heard talk at a gas station because it's a small town Wow, so she found out about the fire while people were chit-chatting around the pump here at the come-and-go At the come-and-go just getting some night crawlers and filling up She's talking to her about this. A couple nightcrawlers and a PB&J. That's right. Oh, that's good stuff right there. And she heard talk about a house fire that killed a woman named Lula Young who lived in the DeSoto Village subdivision. She recognized the name immediately here. She said, but the woman whom I sold the policy to

lives in another part of town. That wasn't her address. Uh oh. Then, this is fucking crazy. The same Brenda Driver. This is how small this town is, apparently at the time, back then. Because I think there was less than 10,000 people

here at the time. She's at Walmart. Okay, Brenda, the nationwide insurance agent is at Walmart and she said she looked up and saw what she described as a quote, dead woman walking. That's her. She saw a customer who she heard died in a house fire. The customer was fucking Linda. Oh my God, Linda's been out.

Linda. Taking out her own policies on herself in Proti's. As Lula. As Lula. Yes. What the fuck, Linda? Because Lula couldn't have gotten these policies because they would have known about her surgeries

for her mastectomy, so they would have known she had cancer, they would have been a totally different thing. They said, holy shit, that's the, what the fuck? So she was real confused. Yeah. Real confused. Probably pretty mad that she's been taken. Yeah, well, I mean, shit's a nationwide insurance, it's not out of her pocket.

Well, so they've been taken a lot. This happens. Somebody's taken them before. When you're giving out money for murder, you're going to get people that are going to fucking try to take advantage of that. You know what I mean? Yeah. When you're giving out money for deaths, people are going to make that as best they can make that death look accidental. Been happening for a long time now. So they, at that point, um, she went to her, you know, to her office and said, holy shit, the woman who I just sold this to who's dead,

I just saw on Walmart. This is fucked up. She's kicking ass, yeah. And so they went, well, I guess she's not dead then, and scratched that off and said that the one guy, the nationwide agent said, we just saved the company $700,000. Great work, I'm glad you needed an Instapod.

Oh my God, yeah, thank fuck for that. Glad that glad you needed an Instapod. Oh my God. Yeah, thank fuck for that. Glad that you like to peruse. That's great. You don't just go in and get what you need and go out. I like that. You stick around a while. You were looking at those lint chocolate things.

You really wanted some fancy chocolates tonight and you picked right. You're getting the fucking impulse buys and we like that about you. Good job. So the detectives determined that Linda must have bought the policies behind Lula's back, paid the monthly premiums on them, and then just stood by and wait to wait for the benefit from her death. She had, that's, they don't know, that's what it had to be. Now the thing is, they also don't know if if this was if Lula was in on this. Right.

Is there like was Lula in on this? Not with the murder but with the with the insurance because that would pay out more and if she sent Linda in her place that she could get a bigger policy to pay to help her kids later. Great point. So they were like did she send Linda in her place because she doesn't have any of the physical maladies that she has. She can take blood tests and nothing shows up. Exactly. Is there that or or what? So that's what they were wondering about here. But either way, she didn't do

it so she would be murdered in her house. That was, yeah, that was a little extra stank on it. I don't think she had, this was in case the cancer came back, I feel like she was doing, because the extra 200 grand was accidental death benefit. So yeah, at that point, a retired federal investigator who specialized in handwriting identification and forgery detection determined that Linda forged Lula's signature on the policies. He said it was obvious that these were fraudulent policies

So they go talk to Linda and Linda said look. I'm her best friend You know they also they asked her about the fire. They said where were you that night? Right, and she said I was at home with my family which is ten minutes away Yeah, I was 10 minutes away because she moved away out of the neighborhood. And she said, you know, God, I don't know. I wasn't here. So she has a solid alibi anyway.

But then when, so we know she wasn't physically there, then she was questioned. She said that Lula was in on the insurance policy scam. They asked her about that. And first she denied it. And then they went, look, this lady saw you in Walmart and it's you and she said okay Linda knew about it this was part of a scam to get her kids more money and she didn't think anybody would find out and they said quote Linda says that Lula had

asked her to do this and asked her to take the medical exams because she'd had cancer and she knew she couldn't complete those exams and obtain those policies for that value. The intention was to defraud the insurance company about the cancer and for Linda to take care of Lula's kids with that money. That's what Linda said. The intention was to commit insurance fraud. Yeah, that's what it was. I was trying to help my cancer-ridden friend commit insurance fraud. That's all. I was just down for my friend. Which is a crime, but no one goes, you fucking scumbag. You fucking... It's not killing your friend. So many people are hurt because of you.

Jesus. I mean, insurance in the first place is a fucking Ponzi scheme. Well, the whole thing is... It's Robin Peter to pay Paul the whole time. You're trying to scam them, they're trying to scam you, it's all relative. We're all trying to scam each other. It's all relative. There's money involved. Yeah, of course. It's not like this isn't out of the goodness of our heart transactions that we're doing

back and forth. There's zero insurance that is just fucking sainthood. Stop paying your premiums and see how fast they're on someone else's side after that. See if you're in good hands then. You're not going to be such a good neighbor then. So that's what they said, that the insurance companies required these exams and Linda said, she just said, you take the exams in my place, we're close in the same age, we're only seven years apart.

You know, it looks like we could pass for the same age and they said with all of this she took out all these insurance forms and that's what it was. She said she passed her medical exams with flying colors, signed the applications, Lula Young, and that's that. She also, Linda made her daughter Jennifer the second beneficiary just in case Linda died before Lula. That way it would go to her and she could take care of it. So. That is wild. She could just do this with just words.

But then she was told that she's in remission now. And now that this was with Linda. They thought she was gonna die in the next year. And then they told her, oh no, you're good actually. We're all right. And so then there her, oh no, you're good actually. And so then there's a propane tank next to a space heater a couple of weeks later. That's not good. So January 1997, a friend of Lula and Linda's comes forward and they said, quote, he confided

that Linda had actually approached him on two different occasions asking him to basically kill Lula as a mercy killing. She had cancer and she was dying so would you I just want to put her out of her misery I can't watch her wither away. Whoa. They go on to say he was friends with several police officers so she asked him about how to burn a house down without getting caught. Not good. You know cops. I love that too.

Who should I ask for advice about this murder? How about I ask a guy who's friends with a bunch of cops? He won't tell on me. That'll never come up in their fucking... I guess I assume the closest friends of cops, they're friends with them because they do bad shit. That's probably why. But they're're gonna tell the cop it's not their bad shit. They're gonna tell the cop, hey this lady wants me to kill this other lady. That's pretty fucked up, right? You believe this dipshit asked me how to start a fire?

Wow, didn't that lady die in a fire? Uh oh. She did, yeah. So the cops who he's friends with asked him to wear a wire and get a confession out of Linda get her to say it again But it didn't work couldn't get her to do it So two weeks later another informant approaches the police. There's people coming out of the woodwork for this shit This is a guy named David Vincent and he was in jail at the time currently a resident of a guest of the county

at the time, currently a resident of, a guest of the county. He was trying to get a deal on, I believe, his drug charges, if I'm not mistaken, by giving the police some information. I'll tell you anything. I learned some shit since I've been in there. He revealed some information he'd learned from a fellow inmate who's a landscaper on the outside, a landscaper slash crack addict on the outside named Charles Wayne Dunn, who sounds like a guy who you'd go to if you need something done, done. It's a bad guy, yeah. Yeah, Charles Wayne.

Middle name of Wayne, done right there. You're out, you're out, you're out, you're out. You and John Wayne Gacy, same thing. So they said they'd been working together here. That's what this guy said. A guy, Charles Wayne Dunn, confided in me one day that he had something he regretted. He just told him there's something I regret. And he said Charles Wayne Dunn told David Vincent that he had killed Lula Young and

that Linda Leighdom had paid him to do it. Really? Yes. So Vincent said that Dunn also had information that police never made public. He said that Charles Wayne Dunn told David Vincent that he had to make it look like an accident because if she died from cancer, the policies may not pay as much. What the fuck, man? No way this man would know this unless this was true.

That's what that says. Yeah, unless he was told that, yeah. Who the fuck knows what policies people have and all that kind of shit. He said, quote, when he was telling the story, what was running through my head was, we got her. I mean, this was the break we'd been looking for on Linda, that's the cop talking.

So police put a wire on Vincent now. Send him into jail in a second sting operation to try to get a confession from done But that doesn't work either because none of these people are skilled like investigators. They're just morons They just go in like you do and put their chest up to somebody's face and start asking real incriminating questions You grab them around the head and you pull them close to your chest, you know what I mean? Like you're really getting close to him. Smell my new cologne. It's curve.

You go, tell me about that murder plot again, big guy. And then you tussle his hair. That's how it works. That's how you do in jail. You know what I mean? So the police said, why are we doing this? Let's just go talk to Dunn. He's probably a fucking idiot and he's in jail on crack charges.

He'll probably want to get off on those. He's probably a fucking idiot, and he's in jail on crack charges. He'll probably wanna get off on those. Maybe he can help us. He'd probably love to just say some shit. Yep, he's also, in addition to his, I guess that would be considered a vocation, being a crack addict. In addition to that, he's also a handyman who sometimes works for Linda,

and that's how they know each other. She said, hey. You're dumb and fucking poor. Do you want help? Thanks for fixing that drywall. Now, you a murderer by chance? How are you at setting fires to cancer-ridden women's houses? Are you good at that or no? This guy's only 28 too. He's a younger guy. Nice mud work. Are you a murderer? Oh, man.

How are you at being a death merchant? Any good? You patch tongue and groove real nice. Real nice. How's your death merchant work? How do you deliver murder? Any good at it? You got like a mercenary price list or no? So he said that Dunn did odd jobs for Linda and at the time was dating Linda's daughter. Get out of here.

So he was a crackhead dating Linda's daughter who was like 20, maybe 18, 19 at the time. So a 10 years older crackhead who you know is a crackhead and does landscaping work for you, that's who you're letting date your daughter. And then, I guess she was an adult at the time. But he also, done because of he was close to the family, he had known Lula and spent time with her. Wow. He knew her. He'd been to her house. He knew her. I mean, that's fucked up. He wasn't even just a stranger.

And he's willing to, wow. Yeah. And he said his drug habit was just getting out of control and he needed money. And so only so many recessed lights you can put in somebody's house. That's all you can do. I mean, shit, that doesn't buy it. Sometimes you gotta murder people for them. Doesn't buy enough crack. It really doesn't.

So they said that the, oh, by the way, that Vincent guy had been in for burglary, not drugs. Charles Wayne Dunn was in for drugs. So they said, hey look, we got a jailhouse possession here. Dunn had previous cocaine possession charges and all that kind of shit. He's just a general scumbag. A general idiot, yep. The guy you want dating your 18 year old daughter,

you know, that kind of thing. At the time of the investigation, he was on probation and meeting regularly with his probation officer. So investigators devised a plan to try to get the informant and Dunn in a room together. Do they think he's such a master criminal that he won't crack? I feel like all you got to do is be like, we'll give you a cigarette if you tell us. A dude told us that you told him this and he'll go oh shit I told somebody that and he'll be like a pack of fucking cools or American spirits across the table

He's gonna tell you everything an extra value meal will buy this guy's fucking loyalty. I have a feel right yeah I think so you have decent meal if he's been in County for a while Yeah, get him some fucking Bojangyes. That's a biggie size pal. Yeah. Get him some fucking Bojangles. He's gonna shit his pants. That one comes with okra my friend. Oh baby, those biscuits.

So he wants some churches. So they definitely want to talk to him. That's their plan though. Yeah. Okay. It's because he had confessed while he was in jail here and they're like, maybe we could get him in here and have his crackhead self do that. So the DA said we had the office wired.

Yeah. They wired up the office. This is their third wiring of this idiot. He said Dunn was hesitant at first, but then what he said told us that he was guilty. What he said was, yes, I did what you fucking think I did. Then he confessed, which, you know. Yeah. He said, so he said, quote, I had Dunn's probation officer call him into the local probation office for a meeting and a drug test.

So and the informant would be there also. Once the probation officer was out of the room and him and the informant were there together, the informant asked Wayne Dunn about the fire and Dunn didn't deny it at all. He basically said, well you can't shake your past. You've done what you've done and you can't wash it away. Other statements he made were you know saying that he probably killed her but it wasn't enough to make an arrest. It was like alluding to shit like, well, yep, things get hot on the inside when you're killing a cancer lady, but like not.

I went there and killed her. Just like not enough to really nail her down. More than one way to roast a duck. Know what I mean? Yeah. You know what I'm saying? So they were like, damn it, what do we do? So they said, what are we, let's just bring him in.

This is ridiculous. Let's just ask him questions. Let's just ask him. Yeah, so they said quote I told him I knew that he'd been on drugs and that he felt bad about killing somebody He initially denied the situation, but then the investigator brought up the heater and the propane tank next to each other He told done that they believed the fire had been set intentionally and that this was arson and murder. So he said, all right, let me tell you everything that happened. Apparently, Linda had met Charles shortly after Charles moved in with her daughter and son-in-law there somehow. So he was dating the daughter, but also the daughter was married. I don't know what's going on here, but

We're not here to parse the love life Yeah, she has one daughter. I guess now she might have to do oh she has two daughters You're right because one and one is Lula doc. Okay. She has two daughters. Okay, that makes way more sense I was like this is fucking weird That was in December of 93 that he had she had met and within a year he's killing people for her which is she's got to be awfully convincing. That's very, yeah. Dunn says that Linda approached him with the idea to kill Lula explaining that Lula was her best friend and that she was dying of

cancer. Linda said that Lula asked Linda to kill her, but she didn't have the heart to do it, so she offered Dunn $5,000 to do it for her. She presented it as a total mercy killing. But then the prosecutor says, quote, he confided that Linda had actually approached him on two different occasions, asking him to basically kill Lula as a mercy killing. She had cancer, she was dying. He was friends with several police officers so she asked him about how to burn a house down without getting caught. That's the first guy who came forward.

The most fucked up mercy killing of all time. That's fucked up. But then Dunn said he'd given Lula medicine to make her fall asleep so that she wouldn't suffer during the fire. He forced her to take sleeping pills first. Wow. That's fucked up. So on the night before the fire, Charles Wayne Dunn parked his car in

Lula's driveway and entered the house. He's not real slick. No. He's going over to murder her and he parks in the driveway. Yeah. He falls right up in. This guy's a fucking dummy. I mean he's a dummy. He's a crackhead. Turn on the lights man, make some phone calls. Yeah, make yourself a sandwich while you're at it. Why don't you get fingerprints on as many things as possible. Jerk off in the sink or something. Oh do that, you want to leave good DNA behind. Real, just whole swimmers. Just jerk off into a wad of paper towels and toss that in the trash. Make sure to put the plug in in the sink there and that way you don't want to lose any of

it down the drain. So he had parked in there, he entered the house, he retrieved the heater from his truck and crushed up some newspaper nearby next to the heater. Kindling, exactly. Then opened the valve on the propane tank tank turned on the heater and left the house Heater plus this plus that equals boom does he think all that's gonna burn up like what a dumb fucking plant It is but it worked. That's the thing. Yeah, it works. I mean kinda yeah, I mean for his purposes anyway They said he said to them that he waited on her to go to sleep before he set the fire

He told it in a way that you got the feeling he was telling the truth. That's the prosecutor said The next day he went to Linda's home and collected $1,000 from her with the balance the next four thousand to be paid out in smaller amounts over time a couple hundred bucks here And they're five grand on layaway? Layaway. That's how you- But do it now? That's why you hire a crackhead to kill somebody. The problem is that a crackhead will always get in trouble

for being a crackhead and they're gonna tell on you. He'll do crackhead work. He's good at that. You pay crackhead prices, you get crackhead work. I think that's the slogan. I mean, murder, you get what you pay for for sure no shit so he said I did that on her orders started the house they then he's he surprises them with something else he said that's not the only fire I set on Linda's orders by the way what they

said huh he said yeah I started her daughter's house on fire with her daughters wanted this to happen as an insurance scheme. Oh, what would he say that? Yeah, they said that house belonged to Ms. Leedom's daughter. That was two years after the initial fire in Ms. Lula's house.

So it's two years later. They figure we got away with one, we get away with the other. They just evidently decided the best thing to do was set it on fire and then get the insurance money for that also. Okay. That's just her thing.

So it's five grand, that was it. At first, the fire wasn't the first thing she suggested to Mr. Dunn here. At first, he said that she suggested, why don't we take Lula to a lake and you can push her into the water? Which seems horrible. That's even worse. Yeah. The two worst things. Yeah. Drowning in fire. This is terrible. You guys are dicks. Jesus. What the fuck, man? Actual dicks.

Yeah. And he said that, but? Actual dicks. Yeah. And he said that, but he said he couldn't do that. He's like, I can't physically do that. And they said, okay. Later, she decided on arson and purchased a propane gas tank that she stashed in the house in there. So the officials learned that she said, well, you hide this in your house because it's a gift for my husband.

And Lula said, okay. And then he came in with the heater. They learned that Linda was, you know, had done this before, by the way, the fire for the daughter's house, that was a $500 fee. 500 bucks to the 500. Yeah. No bodies. Yeah. No murder. It's just, they were, everybody was gone. Um, so wow, I can't believe that. He said that after she went to bed, Lula, that night, he put the propane tank in, in a room, opened the valve, space heater nearby, and also tampered with

the heater cord. He said he fucked with the heater cord as well. Opened it up. Yeah. Frayed it up a bit. He said he did that in order to make it look more like an accident. They said the wire would cut so it would appear, it was cut so it would appear that it would be a short in the wire that caused the fire. That's what he did. So I mean he was trying to think ahead. He almost worked. They said that Dunn said that he got some money. Linda had given him the money to purchase the heater and that was part of the plan. She had brought the propane tank, he bought the heater and this is fucked. So apparently he was convinced, Linda told him, look, this will start, the propane tank will blow up and it will blow her up and she will die instantly

so she won't suffer. She is my best friend, I don't want her to suffer and I know you don't want her to suffer because you feel bad so let's just best friend. I don't want her to suffer and I know you don't want her to suffer because you feel bad So I just explode her to most painful ways to die, but please try this Let's see. Yeah, it's not like they put the propane tank like, you know So they said that nothing went according to plan. She suffered a slow, painful death by fire, is what they said. Just an absolute, horrible, awful death. They said that, awful. So they said that the prosecutors were exploring a plea bargain for Dunne, under which he would

testify that he was hired by Linda, because she's the mastermind here. So they put a wire now on undone. Enough with the wire. None of these wires have worked by the way. None of them have worked. They want to look real important. Yeah, they're like, well, you're wearing a wire. Yeah. They just like, man, that's how they got John Gotti. That's how we're going to get her. Like it's guys. You get all the best criminals. Oh man So in the audio she told him that she was giving him money so that he could disappear But that's about all they got out of it That's it. So am I gonna disappear because of that shit you did. What did I do? What'd you do?

I gotta disappear. So take this money anyway, and you go here Fuck so during this investigation the police search Linda's So take this money anyway and you go here. Say what I did. You tell them what I did. Fuck. So during this investigation, the police search Linda's and in the search of her home, they find this is 1997, March of 97, they find two life insurance policies on Lula's life in the amounts of $75,000 and $500,000, designating Linda as the primary beneficiary, along with a third policy designating Gary, Linda's husband, as the beneficiary in the amount of 200,000, which paid off, as we know. That's the MetLife one.

A partnership agreement was also discovered between Linda and Lula with power of attorney granted to Linda from Lula. Now, they said that investigation of the fire, they said the insurance question sort of fell in our laps and pushed this investigation along. Because they were on the fence whether it was suicide, accident, on purpose, but this says well now it was probably on purpose. If there's money involved, Jesus Christ. Yeah, the cop said, quote, the insurance question sort of fell in our laps.

That was an unexpected bonus, a weird way to put it We tried to get the insurance companies to work with us, but they were making inquiries on their own. They're like, yeah We don't care about murder. We're trying to get money back. Fuck you people. That's how shitty insurance companies are They're working a murder case a fucking there's a murderer And they're like listen, no, we got to recover our fucking 200 grand Wow She had bought four policies. They said 75 grand through MetLife acquired May 21st 1992 That's the original one 200 grand through MetLife on November 15th 1992 500 grand through nationwide August 22nd 1994 and then November 21st

94 less than a month before the fire was a 38,000 that was the truck one there so Only the MetLife once said they've been paid that they paid out They're the only ones that paid out so they said the investigation was underway before they learned of the insurance policies and They said yeah, this is great here. So the insurance purchased on Lula's life, they said according to the federal indictment that's going to be handed down here, they say that Linda posed as her friend for physical examinations and all this kind of shit. They said that insurance agents testified about Linda making inquiries in 1992 about making a claim on her sister's insurance,

which she said was Lula Young. She listed herself as the owner of the $75,000 policy and her address as Lula's address. One insurance agent even said that he saw a family tree displayed openly at Linda's home depicting Lula as her sister. She had artwork made. Yeah. She did crafts for this shit. Wow. You don't expect crafty insurance fraudsters, right? It's different.

I think it was. Yeah. It's like a head with like branches coming off of it. So another agent testified Linda made a request for an additional $200,000 policy when he went to Linda's home to issue the policy. Linda introduced herself as Lula Young. Wow, that is fucking amazing. On this policy, Gary, who is Linda's husband, was listed as Young's brother-in-law and listed Linda as her sister. Holy shit, so. Gary of Gary's Garage Gats, sitting right there,

lying his balls off. Lying, just collecting money for not having to do shit. He's like, what are you up to? I get money, sure. I can replenish the stock in my fucking shop here. Buy more American Eagle. Oh my god, so the district attorney here said he ran into some problems though because they wanted the federal government to do a parallel federal investigation for wire fraud to put pressure

on her basically. So they had problems with some of the admissibility of the evidence in the murder case. That's the problem. Really? Which was illegally seized beyond the scope of his state of search warrant. So they went into drawers and shit when they just had a look around or they went into something when they couldn't look into documents. You fucking idiots. Search warrants are so fucking specific and you have to follow them or else you end up with this shit. So also the undercover tape recordings of him also looked admissible inadmissible as well. So they weren't good either. So they asked So they asked would you prosecute her on federal federal fraud charges while we sort through this murder shit?

That way it'll keep her at least locked up and all that kind of thing So yeah, that's how it works. And they said that the approved, this is from a book here, the approved way to keep our case clean was to erect what is called a Chinese wall. Let's erect a Chinese wall, Jimmy. What do you say? What is that? It's after the famed Great Wall built to keep out barbarian invaders. The way a legal Chinese wall works is that taint teams, taint teams,

taint teams. Are you kidding me? This feels really shit. They come in and just tickle it on up boy. Act as cutout men who examine possibly tainted materials before only before giving only the admissible items to the trial prosecutors. In this case, they assigned a separate prosecutor to handle the case and received all the evidence and that's how they screened out the evidence that they don't think is good evidence, basically. So, then they find out, holy shit,

when we're looking through her stuff, there are more murder plots afoot here. Apparently, there are more murder plots afoot here. Apparently. She wants other people dead? There was life insurance policies on a man named Robert Stovall, who isn't related to Linda, but he is apparently a ward of Linda's mother, listed as his caregiver, even though he's an adult,

but he's like mentally challenged. So they have policies. So she's getting SSI for him or whatever? No, she's trying to, she's getting life insurance on him. No, I mean her mom is getting SSI stuff because he's a ward. Yeah, and she's just assisting him, helping him get through day to day.

And she's got life insurance on this man. They found a policy from Kansas City Life Insurance Company dated November 13, 1995 on the life of Robert Stovall and the amount of $250,000 with Linda named as second beneficiary. An insurance policy and the life of Robert Stovall and the amount of $200,000 where Linda is the primary and her husband is the secondary beneficiary. $450. where Linda is the primary and her husband is the secondary beneficiary. 450. An application for life insurance in the life on the life of Stovall in the amount of $200,000 along with an accidental death rider for even more. Oh my god. Yes, Melanie Wright's signature, one of the daughters that

appears as the owner and beneficiary, so she's got her kids involved in this now. An identification card with a picture of Charles Wayne Dunn appearing over the name of Robert Stovall along with Linda's address. Oh my God. Linda's address, Dunn's name, Robert's picture. How fucked up is that? That way Dunn can get policies in his name for Linda because she has the ID. All day.

All fucking day. Wow. Two wills also purported to be those of Lula Young they found. One dated October 7th, 1994, the other not dated. An insurance identity card in the name of Robert Stovall, an invoice reflecting the sale of a 1995 Nissan to Melanie Wright and Stovall, and an installment or an installment sales contract bearing the date of August 4th 1995 with these names appearing as purchasers, an application for credit life insurance and disability

insurance for Melanie Wright and Stovall, him, her beneficiary, dated August 4th, 95. Three typewriters, different typewriters, that can type different, because this is before aerial standard fucking typefonds. Before fonts could change, yep. Yep, and three checkbooks from total accounts from MetLife Insurance Company indicating Linda

as the owner of two policies and her husband as the other of Robert Stovall's shit. So finding that the name is creepy, the driver's license with another picture and a different address, that is fucked up. They said, we found out she was trying to make arrangements to do him in just like Ms. Young for insurance purposes. She had already talked to somebody to actually take care of Robert as far as taking him out. She was looking for other hit men. Looking for other hit men. That is fucking ridiculous. So wow. And she was listing her daughter as beneficiary, her as son to keep it all off of her. One agent said that she, I guess, Robert Stovall was listed on the application

as her son-in-law in other ones too. So she had all these different policies and was telling everybody different shit. Which is fucking, yeah. What a web. Dunn, well later on, testified that after Lula's death, Linda approached him with a request that, hey, why don't you kill this guy now too? She didn't give him a reason she wanted him killed, but offered him 10 grand to commit

the murder. And he said, fuck yeah, that's a shitload of crack. That's so much crack. That's twice as much as both the other things I did. That's like two full days worth. I'm going to be great. Yeah. So that's when he got a fraudulent identification card with his name and the photograph and all that.

With money given to him by Linda, he purchased a 1979 Toyota Celica to be used in a car wreck with Stovall and testified that Linda took him to Stovall's hometown to commit the murder. He's gonna run into him with a fucking car? They are diabolical, man. He's gonna drive with him in the car

and get into an accident, that's the plan. In the passenger seat, like, oh my God. Yeah, so they have that Vermont lady with her husband and that deal. At the last second, you know you're gonna crash, you unclick his seatbelt, and you fucking plow into a brick wall and you fly through it. He flies through it, I think that's the this is fucked man it's

she's a vicious people this is horrible yeah these are some of the more vicious people we've heard about even though they're not like you know dismembering anybody it's still horrible December 1996 Linda is charged with federal mail fraud so that's what they do ten counts of mail fraud fraud as a matter of fact. They said they got a major lead file. And then the murder people said, we got a major lead following the indictment. Just because they wanted it all to line up.

They said the scheme, talked about the whole scheme, credit life payments were made based on a claim filed by Linda and other people here and they said one of the charges is a check made out for $8,907 that was paid to her estate, which she was the executor and all that, the truck one. That's the initial one. Now the MetLife who paid out 200 grand, they said that there was nothing to suspect when the company paid off the policies in 95. He said that Lula's death certificate said that she died accidentally in a house fire of carbon monoxide poisoning

Resulting from smoke inhalation since being notified of the fraud charges though. He said we are pursuing recovery efforts This is part of a trend. We're seeing more and more instances of murder for death benefits and fake disappearances Yeah, really? Yes, there's hundreds of thousands of dollars at stake We're seeing more and more instances of murder for death benefits and fake disappearances. Yeah. Really? Yeah. There's hundreds of thousands of dollars at stake. That's why. More and more of it, huh?

As the population grows and more people become more greedy? And more people become just kind of hip to what you can do? Like oh shit, you can get away with that. Reading a fucking story on the internet or in the paper back then. So Lula's daughter said we never knew she was under investigation about mama's death, meaning Linda. They didn't tell us. She said she had told us she was going to court because of the insurance companies have failed to pay off. So she made it seem like she was going to court fighting for her share. Fighting like taking them to court not

she's under federal indictment. I'm going to court about insurance stuff. They won't pay. They won't pay. So they said, well, did you get any money from your mother's anything? And she said, well, me and my brother Michael split about $500 from the old policy at the Baptist Hospital. We didn't know about the federal charges until I talked to my father in Texas when the story first came out.

One of the hardest things I've ever had to do was tell Michael what was going on. They got $500 for their mother's death. For their mother's death. And this lady's got hundreds of thousands of dollars. That's insane. Unbelievable, what a scumbag. That is wild.

Lula's sister said she was stunned in October, the news hit that Linda was under investigation because of these life insurance policies. She said I had gone beyond shock. I had not heard that she was under investigation on the murder charge until the indictments were returned. But I can't say it surprised me by that point. The mail fraud charges here conviction on all counts could result in a maximum of a two and a half million dollar fine and 50 years in prison don't do that which is more than more than fucking like you know oh by far 50 years holy shit fucking years that's what happens when you are an insurance company and 20% of your

budget is in lobbying that's what you get you are an insurance company and 20% of your budget is in lobbying. That's what you get. You get hardcore penalties for fucking you over. They also know when the penalties are that stiff for fucking them over, they know how hard they're fucking you over and they know that somebody's going to be fed up with this shit soon. Someone's going to try it even under that kind of penalty. Yeah, it's worth it.

Yeah. playing chicken. So the murder investigation, the Flora, the mom here, Lula's mom, said she first learned there was an investigation into her daughter's death when a postal inspector visited her, like we said before. She said, I never knew there were four policies or the amounts of these policies until I read about them

in the commercial appeal, in the newspaper Oh the fucking investigators didn't even tell her Wow, she said I didn't I don't know how anyone could be so cold Maybe when people start getting ahead they just want more and more Maybe or she's just a greedy twice. I just an asshole After the indictments, I don't know that I could see Linda again, is what she said. So now the cop said we knew as early as January of 95 that Linda was responsible for the death, but we didn't know who the torch was. That's what the guy says. The torch, the torch. We were looking for the flamer. Just so you know, we didn't know

who the torch was. I had to say it like that because it's so douchey. That's district attorney champion of DeSoto County. DA champion. The guy's a crack head and you couldn't find him. We didn't know who the torch was until he literally came to you, you fucking morons. You couldn't even use a wire correctly. The torch. Jesus Christ. Who's the flamer here? Fuck. Linda's attorney is a good attorney actually. He's a former US attorney named Bob Whitwell and he's now does criminal defense here.

He I guess originally only handled civil litigation and he said he in this book They say he swore when he left the US Attorney's office. He'd never handle a criminal case, but he was He said his friend said that Bob the attorney was a very religious and kind-hearted man And when Linda came to him with a sob story about how the DA John Champion was persecuting her Yeah While she was still in mourning the death of her best friend. This guy thought that was beyond the pale of egregious and agreed to take the case for nothing. Pro bono. Oh my god. I'm going to stick it right up champion's ass.

Yeah, they're doing you wrong. Stick it in and break it off sister. Oh man. So there he is. They said that he challenged the admissibility of the evidence and when that failed he asked for and received a federal mental exam for Linda, but they said she's just regular fucked up. She's got some mental problems but nothing that would cause her to have hallucinations or anything that would be. A normal dickhead. She's not a legally crazy person, she's just a bit of a dickhead. Yeah, a bit of an asshole.

So Lula's daughter here said that she had maintained contact with Lula's mother here. Linda had maintained contact with Lula's mother, Flora. Really? Yeah, she said, oh, this is the sister. I'm sorry, Lula's sister said this. She said, she had called mama from time to time just to check to see how she was doing from the day of the funeral until last fall.

And she said how could any woman look you in the eye if she had taken your child and killed her? Oh because she's a piece of shit. She's a cold-blooded motherfucker, that's why, that's rough. Lula's mom here said she was good to Lula or so we thought. I met Linda a number of times, but I guess I'm not a very, I guess I'm just not a very good judge of folks. I took Lula's word.

That's so sad. Or you've just got a good heart and you're a normal lady. And she snowed everybody. Yeah. I mean, she snowed her fucking lawyer who should know better. The lawyer who was a fucking US attorney. He shouldn't trust a soul. No, she snowed all these insurance people that she was a different person. This lady's a fucking liar period, a professional liar. So man, she said that she recalled that Linda was one of the mourners there at the funeral and she said at the wake Linda told me my feelings are hurt.

You didn't put me down as a sister in the death notice. That's what she was worried about. Wow. So March 1997, everybody gets arrested here. Round them up. That includes Linda. Charles is already arrested, but now we're gonna have Gary be arrested as well. Oh yeah! Close your shop down, Gare Bear.

Come on down, Gary! Yeah. Is he also on federal gun charges as well? Is this just the mail from a city? Are you allowed to just sell guns out of your garage? Because it shouldn't be able to. And it just says Gary's Gun Show out there, and like, it's a show. I don't like this. I think you have to be licensed and have like a certain you should have to have some sort of tax stamp of something Also a garage is not secure enough place to know armaments gun shops are secure, right? They're very secure

They generally have windows and those accordion things that come out. Yeah, you know, I mean, there's stealable fucking usable weapons of the structure Holy shit. So anyway, they not only indict Linda and Gary, they also Jennifer 26 year old daughter. Come on down. What did that bitch do? She let them burn her house down for insurance. Also 24 year old Melanie, come on down. Listen yourself on the stove wall affair. It's wire fraud. Uh oh. The entire nuclear family is in the pokey together. Mom, dad, and kids, you rarely see them all arrested in any case.

How many cases have we done where an entire nuclear family goes to jail? They ought to have Steve Harvey ask them questions while they're in there. If they have another jailed family? Yeah. It's the prison family feud! Across the cells. Here they come. Yeah, Steve's wearing his big square suits. And they're all dragging heavy iron balls behind them that are attached to their ankle. That's the difference. Hold on, Steve, almost there. Wait a second.

Wow. The three, Gary, Jennifer, and Melanie are freed on bond, like $50,000 bond, where Linda is held without bond because she's in on capital murder. That's a little different. Yeah, she's in trouble. She's in deep shit. Gary was indicted on a charge of obtaining money under false pretenses. The two daughters were indicted on identical charges

of conspiracy to commit arson, arson, and conspiracy to commit false pretense, which I didn't know was a crime. Gary and the two daughters were being held under 50,000 and they got released. Charges against them stemmed from the fire at Jennifer's home, obviously. So, this is a fucking disaster. Clearly.

Then, she's indicted for murder, as we say, and they said Linda has, this is the prosecutor, Linda Liedem has gone from this person that everybody knew and liked to basically a criminal mastermind. Yeah. I would say. So she's pretty fucked. Now the only thing is, in her federal mail fraud trial, the government agreed to not make cross references to murder or other frauds related or unrelated.

Only the charges they've charged. Just focusing on the mail stuff. So don't, yeah, don't focus in on the fact that she used that mail fraud to murder a woman and try to get money off of it. Just that she posed as someone else to get money. So they said it's not to be considered as relevant offense conduct in this case.

So she's fucked. I mean, she got paid out more than $300,000. There's paperwork and checks and deposits. I mean, there's no way to say, I don't know what you're talking about here. So she is going to enter a guilty plea before US District Judge Glenn Davidson to three counts of a 10-count indictment. Sentencing they make a deal with her.

Sentencing is going to be a maximum of 15 years in prison. That's what she could get and a $750,000 fine. Her daughter began, also guilty pleas here, and she agreed to a sentence of two years for conviction on one count of mail fraud. That's the daughter. Following that, Linda enters the courtroom bound in chains and wearing her orange prison pants and shirt.

Yeah. She made no statements to the judge, just yes sir, no sir type shit. They asked her if she was on medication for depression. Oh, she said she was on medication for depression and for diabetes, but everybody said she's fine and competent to plead guilty. So they said she collected 275 grand for MetLife on two different policies, but sued nationwide when the firm balked at paying a claim on 500 grand. She tried to sue them. That's the balls of this lady. Wow, man. I mean, you have to though, because otherwise

if they don't pay, you got to go, yeah, I know, I shouldn't get the money. That's crazy. She is sentenced to you, ma'am, may fuck off 27 months in prison for the federal shit, for the fraud. Three years of supervised release and assessed $150 $50 for each count is a fine and ordered that they make restitution of $275,000 so she owes 275 thousand and 150 dollars so October 2nd 98 Charles Wayne Dunn pleads guilty to murder conspiracy to commit murder and arson He is going to receive you sir may fuck off two concurrent

20-year sentences, so that's 20 years and then life with no parole And that's a deal. That's a deal. He made oh my the death penalty was on the table for him Yeah, yeah, and it was on the table for him. Yeah, yeah. And it was on the table for her. Yeah. But he's the actual murderer. So they were going to, they threatened him with that. He's the torch. Yeah, he's the torch, baby.

Gary's a big, Charles is a big flamer. We know that. So the insurance fraud thing, that's how that works. Now August 1999, the trial, Linda's murder trial. The state elected to try Linda for conspiracy to commit capital murder and capital murder and prior to the trial, moved to amend the indictment to charge her as a habitual offender

because now she is convicted federally, so no habitual offender, which makes her sentencing worse. It's a seven woman, five man jury, and opening statements here, prosecutor, this is John Champion, he said that Young, meaning Lula, had been diagnosed with terminal breast cancer and had a radical mastectomy,

but that the medical examinations for the insurance policies showed no evidence of the diagnosis. So he said Linda told insurance agencies she was Lula, posing as Linda, did the examinations at her house. They said these policies were issued by fraudulent statements and medical exams. Linda stood to gain $975,000 in the case of an accidental death of Lula Young. They said that Dunn confessed to the thing, the thing got five thousand dollars said he killed her

Done said quote Lula wants this done. She wants to be put out of her misery. That's what Linda had told done That's what they tell an opening statements the defense on the other hand They go come on. I mean, you know, I don't know. Who would do that? Who would put somebody out of their misery by lighting them on fire? That's something, not your friend. Yeah. Your friend? Come on, nobody kills their friend.

Nobody would do that. So he says, listen, his client and the victim concocted this scheme together. The victim was ill and wanted the insurance benefits for when she died for her children and that's what it's all about. So this is ridiculous. She would never have killed her for that money then. So she said, this is the her lawyer told the jury that Liedem had schemed with Young to get the insurance money for her young children. On one policy, they said the beneficiaries were changed from Lula's children to Linda's children because her children weren't responsible enough at that point.

So they said, this is a quote from one of the prosecutors, Linda's defense was she was doing what Lula wanted, entertaining those policies fraudulently. The plan was for her to be the recipient of the money because the kids supposedly couldn't handle money. Charles Dunn testifies. They get Brenda Driver in there to go, I saw her at fucking Walmart after I heard she was dead. It was crazy. That's not even the lady that's dead. I mean, imagine on the big, cause they put it up on like the big thing so the jury can see it, like a big projection of all the policies

they found. Imagine that. That is fucking insanity. So in closing arguments, the prosecution here, district attorney Bobby Williams said it's a clear convincing case. What are we doing? He said it's a mountain of evidence was found at her desk in her own desk when a search warrant was served. That shows all the insurance frauds approves this and look who's collecting the money. It's her. So you don't have to connect a lot of dots here. The defense here in their closing arguments, William Mas and look who's collecting the money it's her so you don't have to connect a lot of dots here the defense here and their closing arguments William Massey who's got to do some tap dance in here yep he is gonna be the like a metropolitan ballerina when he's fucking done with this he's

gonna be he's your wedding and yeah wow he said that I don't challenge the insurance fraud aspects of the case that we don't challenge That was a scheme that they can not concocted together So there's only one person to take the fall for that and that's Linda and she already did so that's fine Okay, but the murder it's all that done guy. It's all everything. Yeah, he did everything He doesn't get any benefit for it. He just wanted to kill an old Not an old just wanted to kill a lady who just beat cancer. Thought it would be fun, apparently. Yeah. She said, he said, Dunn is the murderer. He is an arsonist and he's a liar. That's it. He said he didn't get paid $5,000 from Linda. That's bullshit.

That's their thing there. They said his motive, the motive for Dunn's testimony was a deal with the district attorney through which Dunn avoided the death penalty So he had to say those things Okay, so the verdict comes in she is found guilty of Capital murder and conspiracy to commit capital murder Not good the yeah Not good at all now sentencing comes around Lula's younger brother here

He's pissed off, rightfully so. Yeah, he said she's taken a lot out of our lives, meaning Linda, and spoke of Lula and said she wasn't ready to die when she did. Now we don't even have her here. Makes sense. And he was asking for the maximum sentence. Oh really? Linda, that's what he's asking for. was asking for the maximum sentence. Oh really? Linda, that's what

he's asking for. Please give Linda the maximum sentence. The judge, oh boy, he is good, this one. He spoke of their long-term friendship. This woman trusted you for almost 20 years. You were each other's, like sisters together. He said, quote, I know you must have cared for her, but her death was planned for a long time. That's the cruelest part of this whole thing. Yeah. Quote, you are a cruel person. You don't deserve to ever walk the streets of Mississippi

or anywhere else, and you won't. You will die in prison. You, ma'am, may fuck off. Life in prison, no no parole dicks eating the dick eating buffet is that way fuck off you don't even buy serve to walk in Mississippi not even in Mississippi not even through one of like the soft marshy shit not even that oh by the way another 20 years for conspiracy oh shits and giggles why why not? And guess what?

We're gonna run those consecutively, by the way. So that's, when you're dead, another 20. We want out of you. Which is pretty fucking awesome. Oh, boy. So they said that she will serve her sentence at Rankin County Prison near Jackson, where women are sentenced there.

They said, as, that's what they told her, and then as two bailiffs lead Linda from the courtroom, hands and feet shackled, out of nowhere, she begins cackling out loud laughing. What? That's a sick bitch. That is sick. She laughed?

Just, ha ha ha ha ha ha ha, like De Niro in Cape Fear, just cigar in her mouth. That is crazy. Think about how many people have been sentenced to life without parole plus 20 and cackled on their way out. It is funny because she was about to murder somebody else, James. That's fucking hilarious.

I don't even think John Gotti did that. That's crazy. Cack don't even think John Gotti did that. That's crazy. Cackling. Cackling. So her reactions here. Lula's son said this, Mike, Linda Liedem was the greediest, most selfish, cold-hearted person that I ever met. Linda Liedem is exactly where she needs to be.

My mom looked at the good in everyone. My mom tried to help anyone that she can with whatever she could. Lula's brother said, what I never understood though is how you can go from friendship to that. Good question. He said, you know, it just, that's, that's the part I just never understood. He's just, he doesn't even know what to say. I mean, the guys, how, how, how do you understand? They were, they were best friends. They were supposed to do, yeah. Lula's younger sister, Margaret, said that, quote, I'm satisfied that it came out the way it should. She'll be there until she dies.

She's going to have a long, long time to think about what she's done and all the pain she's caused. Then they go, hey, what about Stovall there? What about him? Remember him, Robert Stovall? Well, the DA said the state is not going to prosecute her further. Really?

Yep, they remanded three forgery counts against her for trial, but they said those would not be prosecuted, and neither will the Stovall affair at that point. Yeah, they said that that's for the fraud on Stovall, but then they said they dismissed a charge of conspiracy to commit murder against her as well, because for Stovall, because they had another charge locked and loaded,

but she got life without plus 20, so they said fuck it. Which they can always do it later, they can always charge her, in case she got off on appeal on the other one, they could charge her with this one, so they just kinda keep it in the back pocket there. So I guess her family serves as her guardian at their home.

Oh, that's the, okay, yeah, on Stovall, that's right. So 2001, Linda appeals. She appeals, protesting evidence presented at her trial that she and Dunn had planned similar murder for insurance conspiracies involving Robert Stovall. Her testimony about that conspiracy says that had nothing to do with this case. Oh. Because it's other bad acts. It's future bad acts. It's not a prior, even. It's future.

Some other time. Linda argues, or her defense does, that Stovall's plan cannot demonstrate anything meaningful regarding motive, opportunity, intent, preparation, plan, knowledge, identity, or absence of mistake. So basically, you can't introduce that. That doesn't mean anything. And they said, no. The state said, defendants on trial for bank larceny objected to the state introducing

evidence that they committed a second bank larceny the next day. We concluded that the evidence that the defendants went into a second bank, reenacting essentially the same manner of theft that had occurred the day before, showed they had acted according to a premeditated plan in the larceny charged with more probable than without such evidence. So they said this is the same thing. The fact that there is other crime evidence showing that she had essentially the same plan in preparation to kill Robert Stovall has a tendency to make the fact that she and Dunne were acting according to a premeditated plan or agreement pretty fucking obvious

what we're doing here basically. So they say that that's part of that. And the judge though disagreed and upheld the conviction. Says, no, I don't think so. Get the fuck in there. Citing the other crime evidence as proof that they conspired together. He said there's also testimony that Linda posed as Robert Stovall's relative in order to take out insurance policies, much as she had done with Young. Same thing. Right. He said the policies on Stovall to whom she's

not related were found in a search. And this is crazy. He said, quote, the Stovall, to whom she's not related, were found in a search and this is crazy. He said, quote, the Stovall evidence clearly demonstrates that Leda may have acted according to a predetermined plan to kill Young, and that's admissible. Also said the trial judge properly instructed the jury on how to consider the evidence presented on him as well. So there you go. Yeah. So she tries also certain very legalistic things she's trying to. They said that in terms of different counts of the insurance, they said one, count nine of that indictment

alleged that on January 30th, 95, Liedem committed mail fraud, referring to her use of the mail to send a claim to on Lula's life. Even assuming that two counts relating to MetLife were a single incident, count nine involving an entirely different insurance company is a separate incident, an attempt made by Linda to commit insurance fraud. So no error. So that's the type of, they're getting real tiki-taki with all this shit. Also the jury instruction, she said that the jury should have been instructed on Camille's conspiracy to commit manslaughter and manslaughter instructions because the indictment Insufficiently identified the type of felony she was charged with she argues the indictment failed to specifically assert felony arson

So she could have been charged with misdemeanor arson under that code the judge could have said that so that that's a person who recklessly or with gross malice causes a fire to be communicated to any woods meadow marsh field or prairie not his own that's misdemeanor arson if you accidentally set a fire in the woods. Somebody else's shit. That's very sensitive. Yeah, that's not even a house. That's a whole separate charge. So they say, fuck off, back to prison with you. Now Lula's daughter, the whole thing, she said, this is a good wrap up, I felt the ultimate betrayal. My mother trusted Linda Liedem with her life and that's what it cost her.

So very good. That was a really succinct way to wrap that up. Beautiful. She's been thinking about it for a while. Yeah, that's what it cost her. So, very good, that was a really succinct way to wrap that up. Beautiful, she's been thinking about it for a while. Yeah, that's a good quote. Now, Lula is buried at the LaFleur Cemetery in Grenada County, Mississippi. She was 47 when she died. Jesus.

TV shows, the story was profiled on several, a couple of them here. One is Stolen Voices Bur voices buried secrets out of the ashes Yeah, that's can't do that Wow stolen voices buried secrets out of the you can't do out of the ashes when the woman was burned Alive, I think that's why they did that the name of the episode or is that the that's the name of the episode out of the ashes Yeah, and there's also I killed my BFF. That's a show I And there's also I killed my BFF. That's a show that was on. I killed my BFF was a show. An actual show. What a... Jesus Christ. OMG I killed my BFF. Wow. OMG I killed my BFF. LOL. Sad face emoji. That's what it's called.

Where are we? And the episode name is Mississippi moms Yeah, now under the trailer for that on YouTube is a weird exchange of comments Oh One says I'm using a friend's account. I'm the granddaughter of Linda lead him My grandmother is innocent my friend even agrees that this is false Okay, well your grandma's a fucking nightmare lady. Well it's replied to by Stacy Young, which is Lula's daughter. She said, I'm the daughter

of the victim. If she was innocent, the state wouldn't have convicted her. That's all she says. Fuck off. Enjoy Christmas in the clink, you dickhead. Don't mean to be mean to you, but fuck you. Your grandpa's a piece of shit too. No shit. I would like to say here because we normally will do this on Crime and Sports, we do the not nearly as sorry as and we do people with the same name. There are people in walks of life that definitely don't want to share the name with an arsonist murderer here. One is Linda Leedom. She's a nurse in Nashville. Oh no. Linda was a nurse too. That's rough at the

Centennial Surgery Center. Hey don't be afraid of her. She won't take out insurance policies and burn you to alive in your own house. She's fine. I'm sure she does a fantastic job. Also this is the worst one because it's on signs everywhere. Linda Liedem, a real estate agent in Pennsylvania. Oh no. That's rough, man. And also I found Charles Wayne Dunn PhD, professor emeritus at Regent University who has a PhD, has written like 10 fucking books, and a distinguished career in government service and academia, serving at one point as Dean

of the Robertson School of Government and Distinguished Professor of Government. He's the author of 19 books. Wow. Charles, not the same idiot, I don't think, a crackhead who killed people. Now, now that we got that crazy fucking bat shit story over with,

do wanna do a quick update here for you. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Otisco, New York, I believe it was episode number eight. Eight, nine. I think it was eight. It was nine. Might have been nine, eight or nine. It's the one from Otisco, New York.

So whichever one that is. Way, way long time ago. Yeah, the first fucking shit three, two months of our show, of this show, there's a woman named Shirley Winters, who was one of the sickest people we've ever talked about. She was pleaded guilty to manslaughter in 2008 in the death of a two-year-old, who she drowned in a bathtub where she was staying.

That led to her admitting that she also caused the 1980 death of her son, but also exhumations and autopsies showed that two of her other children, Colleen and Johnny, who'd been found dead after a 1979 fire, suffered blunt trauma to the head before the fire. She killed all her kids. A monster.

She was responsible for 18 fires that they know of. Right. 18 including ones where her people were fucking charred and she killed her fucking children. She's a sick fucking lady. Sick bitch. She was up for parole here and she was granted parole. Say again? Two weeks ago. What? Was granted parole. Yes. 20 years. That is not, yeah, she'll be on parole. The district attorney, Bill Fitzpatrick believes that she's not done by the way. No. He straight up said in the newspaper on the internet, we initially tried to see if we could have her have her civilly committed. And my law people tell me that can't be done. I will insist that wherever she is, anybody with a child, anybody who's not physically

able to take care of themselves, elderly or child, be notified of her existence in the community. She lives to kill. She is the torch. She is a fucking, yeah, lives to kill. What a thing to say. My God, she's like a demon She will she was released from prison and was placed in a secure psychiatric

Facility for the foreseeable future apparently they have to make sure she's not loony here Her own daughter warns that her mom who killed two kids and maybe more will commit more crimes She survived the woman? She said quote, I'm absolutely terrified. This is her own daughter. There is absolutely no way a serial arsonist and serial child murderer should be able to earn good time in prison

because of course she's good in jail. It's her perfect environment. She has medicine, it's controlled, she has care, and her favorite victims aren't present. Right. Exactly. Her daughter Joy is working with the DA It's controlled. She has care and her favorite victims aren't present right exactly Her daughter joy is working with the DA and an Anan arson investigator And a state senator to make changes that wouldn't allow repeat violent offenders to earn good time

She said and so I still want to pursue the mission of addressing the problems with the law and changing it because not only is she A problem, but there's also lots of other people who should be evaluated the same way. She said she's using her story to show how this law affected people just like her. She said I think that showing my face and expressing my concern in this way make people feel like they should be more concerned and more people will get involved in making the change and maybe even vote for it if it's put up for a vote. Okay she said she feels some relief that her mom's gonna be putting up home, but not a lot and she still needs answers.

She said, I'm hopeful that maybe they've done some kind of assessment or something's happened that makes them believe she needs to be committed for a longer period of time, and we're just unaware what that time could mean. Yeah, because this horrible lady is about to be. I'm hoping they'll keep her locked up. How old is she?

I think 68. That's not old enough. Not old enough. Plenty of energy left. They said, my dad's that age, he hops on a Harley. Fuck that. She's got plenty of energy. Very easily head on down to the Diamond Shamrock

and pick up a Bic lighter. Oh, boy. I would say so. She also says she's going to be released into the public and she's going to move in next to somebody From everybody that everything that I know about her if you make her angry, she's coming after you So if she doesn't like the way her neighbor looks at her What's going to happen to their children or their home because not only does she murder children? She burns down people's homes and businesses

Wow joy said her mother people's homes and businesses. Wow. Joy said her mother, her mother fits the same profile as other prolific serial killers who appeared normal. She said she never shows you who she truly is until she's standing outside your house with a can of gas or standing over the soaking wet body of your child. And by then it's too late. Holy shit. She's far too close. I am terrified of this woman. Please keep her away. We're in the same state and she is definitely gonna be mad at us because we laughed our asses off

at what a fucking idiot she is. She's a dick. Yeah. She's gonna hate our guts. So everybody, I'm gonna be putting around a large gate around my house. So please donate to our Patreon, my gate fund, to keep Shirley Winters from murdering me

in my own house. She's a bad woman. And she has nothing to lose. Burning into the fucking ground. She lost everything. So that was, I figure this episode's the perfect one to put the update on. Sure. Because it doesn't get any better.

So if you like this episode or any of the episodes, tell the world about it. Get on whatever app you're on. There's always a place you can do reviews. If you kind of scroll down, there's always you'll see stars click on them Give us five stars. Tell us anything. It doesn't matter say you could say something nice about the show You could tell us what your favorite size of radial tire is my shit. Yeah, what's great? Well, we'll agree with you, but definitely do that give a review. It helps out a lot Also head to shut up and give me murder comm get your tickets now Durham May 31st, it's on baby.

We can't wait. Let's get there. There's a few tickets left so get them. Next night in Nashville is sold out. Let's see what you guys can bring because every year we do amongst ourselves a little contest where we say who is the loudest ShutUpAndGiveMeMurder yellers there are when we do it. Who are they? So far I think Sacramento

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you can either have a cup of coffee or new episodes every other week and hundreds of back episodes to binge on. What would you rather have? I think you want that. And those are bonus episodes, not ones that have been published. So get in there and do that. This week, which you're going to get, which you get all of this for Crime and Sports,

we're going to talk about the OJ Simpson trial. What went wrong? How the fuck do you go from having DNA and all this evidence to not guilty? I'll tell you exactly how it happened. And it's not what you think it is. Most of it is pure unmitigated incompetence. That's most of it. All right.

That's most of it. And they've been tried to put on different things over the years, but when you watch it, you go, oh, I see exactly what's happening here. Terrific. There's people here who are terrible at their jobs. We have dum-dums here. And it's not even the people you think.

So we'll get into all that. Then for small town murder, something very creepy, gross, and just interesting. Inside Ed Gaines' house. Terrific. Let's have a day in the life of Ed Gaines. What's he up to? And then all of the things he has stored in his house, all the creepy shit. We'll do an inventory.

It is fucking gross. We'll talk all about it. Can't wait to do that. Patreon.com slash crime in sports and you're up for a shout out which happens right fucking now. Jimmy, hit me with those names but please, please don't take out any extra insurance on me. Hit me with them now. This week's executive producer Jordan Bennett and Erica Norris who is a rock star. Congratulations, Erica. Hang in there. You're doing great. Thank you so much. Other producers this week, James, are Peyton Meadows,

John DeLong, Andrew Snow, Janice Hill, Kim W., Anthony Reddick, Anne Somerville, Kayla with no last name, Angela Anderson, Dave Barstel, Kristen with no last name, Brax with no last name, Allison Barnhill, Audrey Burch, Kick with no last name, Craig Jex, Alexis M., Sheila Croucher, Landon would know last name Adarious King senior JV Zoe Cowan Crystal Tyler Allison Prince Brandon LeClaire Anna Marie Maria pops a cue pop a skew pop Carla would know last name

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last name, Amanda Land, Drew Bittner, Lynn Little, Heather Roach, Mackenzie Ranslow, me too, Marissa Yates, Zach Delaney, Zoe Doering, Gus Erickson, Sarah Warbus, Warbus, Warbus, Samantha DeJesus, Karen with no last name see dragons Jimmy Jimmy Roach Victoria Thompson Jim Landrum Patty with no last name Jado Hughes Lee Macklin we in the spirit world asshole I don't know what that means but we are there we there we are Carl's the soft skillsavov Zufovsky, Ian Pape, Pappy maybe, Catherine Forrester, Priest Corinne Priest maybe, I don't know, Lee Boyd, Natalie Yulvin, oh she's fantastic, Angela Goober, Joel Assiner, Owen Eads, Kara would know last name, Alinda Reninger, Dawn the male lady,

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