Small Town Murder - #508 - Stopping A Serial Killer - East Providence, Rhode Island

Episode Date: July 12, 2024

This week, in East Providence, Rhode Island, when one young mother disappears while shopping, it's a real problem. When another nearby woman is slaughtered in her own living room, it becomes ...a full out panic. When the murderer is figured out, it's not at all what anyone expected. There's a detailed confession, but that might not matter, because of how it was obtained. All we know is, if he wasn't caught, there would have been no end to the horrors that he could have inflicted!!Along the way, we find out that folk music can be quite varied, you have to really want to get rid of a body, to shove a corpse through 11 inches of ice, and that we could have very easily had another Ted Bundy on our hands!!Hosted by James Pietragallo and Jimmie WhismanNew episodes every Thursday!Donate at: patreon.com/crimeinsports or go to paypal.com and use our email: crimeinsports@gmail.comGo 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.

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Starting point is 00:00:00 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. I'm Dan Tuberski. In 2011, something strange began to happen at a high school in upstate New York. A mystery illness, bizarre symptoms, and spreading fast. What's the answer? And what do you do if they tell you it's all in your head? Hysterical, a new podcast from Wondery and Pineapple Street Studios. Follow Hysterical on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. Hello, everybody, and welcome back to Small Town Murder Express. Yay and choo choo.
Starting point is 00:00:50 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 episode of Small Town Murder Express where as we always do we are going to pack ten pounds of murder into a two pound bag and it's no exception today because we got a bunch of murder and a real weird mystery it's gonna be a lot of fun
Starting point is 00:01:14 we'll get to that though before we get to that though very quickly definitely head over to shutupandgivemurder.com tickets for live shows Minneapolis you are on deck September 20th. You sell out, you'll be our biggest show we've ever had. Come on down. It's at the State Theatre. It's a beautiful venue. It's lovely so we can't wait. We walked past it our last time in Minneapolis. We were looking for food and we said, wow, that looks gorgeous. I wish we could play there and here we are. So this is gonna be fun. Check that out. Shut up and give me murder.com. Also get tickets for the rest of the shows for the rest of the year as well.
Starting point is 00:01:48 Also get Patreon. If you want to hear more, patreon.com slash crime in sports is where you get all the bonus material tons of it. Anybody $5 a month or above, skip one cup of coffee. So we're asking for instead to get this. It's it's so much better. Hundreds of back episodes you's what we're asking for. Instead, get this. It's so much better. Hundreds of back episodes you've never heard. The bonus stuff, new episodes every other week.
Starting point is 00:02:10 This week is no different. What we have this week for crime and sports, which you have access to, of course. We're gonna talk about fireworks accidents in honor of the Fourth of July there. Which is, oh my god, they're so much fun too. Then for small town murder, we are gonna talk about the real tombstone. Oh boy. It's so much fun too. Then for small town murder. We're gonna talk about the real tombstone
Starting point is 00:02:25 Oh boy, it's so much dirtier than the movie the movie It's a real clean and in reality why it Earp's a pimp and this it's why an I Clanton's not dumb The whole thing's crazy He's not He threw an election. It's crazy. The guy like Ford. It's nuts. We'll talk all about it. That is patreon.com It's crazy the guy like Ford. It's nuts. We'll talk all about it. That is patreon.com Slash crime in sports is where you get all of that So and you get a shout out at the end of the regular show And while we're on this subject listen to the other two shows we make crime in sports and your stupid opinions as well
Starting point is 00:02:56 Oh boy check those out because there are a lot of fun very funny stuff here And if you can't get enough and that's where you can get it By the way, if you listen on Apple podcasts every time they do an update they screw this up so they ruin people's lives. They turn your auto download off so go on to our podcast page and your phone and your library thing the dot dot dot in the upper right hand corner and the ellipses click on that and turn your auto download back on. That said let's get into this. I think it's time everybody. Doesn't matter where you are. What are you a butcher
Starting point is 00:03:32 chopping a big side of beef right now? Watch your thumb. I want you to give it a left right left like you're Rocky and I want you to throw your arms up in the sky and shout, shut up and give me murder. Let's do this everybody. Okay. Let's go on a trip, shall we? Yeah, let's go. We are going to Rhode Island this week. It's a nice place.
Starting point is 00:03:55 It's a nice place, little tiny place. And if you're asking, the last Rhode Island episode was an express and we usually do express, regular, express, regular. Well, the state is the size of it's smaller than Disney World basically so it's good it's hard a lot of the murders are in Providence which is a bigger city so we can't do that it's a lot so you miss it so here we found East Providence Rhode Island which is there's water between Providence and East Providence so it's not just yeah it's not it's in its own little panhandle in northeastern Rhode Island here.
Starting point is 00:04:28 And it's about 10 minutes to Providence. You've got to cross the bridge. It's about 15 minutes to Pawtucket, our last Rhode Island episode. If you're going, well, that's very close. It's Rhode Island. Everything is 15 minutes away. It's not very far. It's really not. It's your neighborhood. It's also 15 minutes away. It's all 15 minutes away. It's Austin, I mean it's all 15 minutes away. That episode was called Horrors in the Graveyard, and I remember it, it was wild,
Starting point is 00:04:49 because they lured women into the graveyard. Terrible. It was awful. Topulation of East Providence, 47,171. It's a good amount of people. Good size, it's kind of broken into a few towns within the town, that's how it works here.
Starting point is 00:05:06 Median household income, pretty close to the national average, $65,016. Median home cost here, $356,300. So it's kind of around the average too. So it's kind of, income's about average, this is all kind of average. Little bit of history, in 1775, this area was home to a four cannon fort, which was used to protect the harbor in the event of a British attack.
Starting point is 00:05:34 So that's how this started, yeah. Do we know the name of the fort? I don't know, I'm not sure of the name of the fort here. But it was once part of, oh God, Rehoboth? How do you say that? Yeah, Rehoboth, how do you say that? Rehoboth. R-E-H-O-B-E-T-H? Yep, Seekonk also.
Starting point is 00:05:51 And first it was part of Rehoboth, then part of Seekonk, Massachusetts. Yeah, you're doing great so far. That's the area here. The Indian words, I can get them here. I'm from Wappinger's Falls, so I get it. My family's from Rehoboth Beach, Delaware. Oh, okay, well same shit then.
Starting point is 00:06:08 East Providence became an independent Rhode Island town in 1862. So I guess right now it has its five neighborhoods is kind of what it's broken into. Phillipsdale, Rumsford, Watchamoket, Watchamoket, Kent Heights, and Riverside. It's like the families in New York. Yeah, it's the five families over here.
Starting point is 00:06:28 You go watch out. The Kent Heights are always beefing with the Phillipsdales and the Rumsfords have to come in and fucking. And their sons. Make everything. The Rumford and Sons. So yeah, this is, I guess it's an important thing for. Sure. Back in the day, the water there helped and everything. So let's talk about reviews of this town. So, yeah, this is, I guess it's an important thing for,
Starting point is 00:06:45 back in the day, the water there helped and everything. So, let's talk about reviews of this town, because we've never been there before. Here's Five Stars, a lot of Five Star reviews, a lot of people like this place. I've lived in East Providence for my entire life. Tired, wow. Tired.
Starting point is 00:07:00 Privileged. We have a great public school district, good sports teams, and other programs for kids. We are also, never heard of your East Providence Raiders or whatever the fuck you have there. Haven't seen your jerseys as I wander through the mall. No. We are also very close to Providence and not too far from Boston, so you can definitely find things to do here.
Starting point is 00:07:20 People can drive to Boston from here. You can work in Boston. They sound the exact same. It's the exact same accent. In Rhode Island too, they get the Boston like news on TV and all that kind of shit. Yeah. That's, uh, they're all Red Sox fans. It's disturbing. So three stars, quiet, safe place to live, overactive police force with a large amount of extra funding from taxes going to the police, going to fund police force that makes way too much money off traffic stops and speeding tickets.
Starting point is 00:07:49 Sons of bitches. He's the same description for the traffic force as they do for a thyroid. Same shit, overactive. Overactive police force, making me fat. They're too fat, these old active fucks. Three stars, there have not been many incidents of criminal activity in this neighborhood,
Starting point is 00:08:06 and if there have been, the police in the area have responded quickly and effectively. That's because they're overactive. They're active as fuck, that's why. When they're giving you a ticket, it's a bad thing, but I guess we need help in another way. But guess what, if something goes down right there, they're already there.
Starting point is 00:08:20 I guess you want overactive. Three stars, mayor doesn't invest enough in the people the mayor we're talking about now Roads roads are terrible and priorities are in the wrong areas, but it's always been my home So the bad mayor has the complaint here and then finally two stars which wished there was more Light night dining places light night. I don't know what that means. Light night, I guess late, I don't know. We have unique restaurants, but the nightlife is dull. Is it?
Starting point is 00:08:52 Because it's a small town. Go to Boston, it's right, go to Boston, go to Providence. Providence is around the penance, babe. You could swim there, it's right there. Make a reservation. Bring a change of clothes, cop out soaking wet, change up and go do something. I don't know what to tell you. Things to do here, the Rhode Island Folk Festival. Oh, baby. Folk? Folk Festival. Folk music in Rhode Island. Is that popular?
Starting point is 00:09:15 That's exactly what I think of when I think of folk music. Just sitting in the middle of Rhode Island eating a lobster. In a white fucking cable knit sweater. That's why I picked this as the thing to do because I'm like, this doesn't seem to fit. It's crazy. It's a free music festival, which you know it's going to be good, featuring some of the finest folk acoustic and Americana singer songwriter acts in the Rhode Island area. So they're never... And local.
Starting point is 00:09:43 As I say, they're not even claiming national acts like the other one this week. That was right. National acts. We never heard of them here. So it is the festival will feature three stages of acoustic themed music. Jesus. The band fucking warp tour. It's it's Lollapalooza here. The band shell stage features national acts and Rhode Island's top bands. The Songbird stage on the other end of the park features the alternative side of the folk and gazebo stage. The alternative side. It's folk people but they wear flannel shirts. They're not wearing cable mitts. See their knees through their jeans. Oh my God. It's a great opportunity to get a good dose of the Rhode Island sound as well as some classic performances this year who will be here. Tell me. Lisa Kyoto and Melanie Moore.
Starting point is 00:10:30 That's an act. Lisa Kyoto? Lisa C-O-U-T-O. Kyoto? Kyoto? I don't know. It's not Kyoto. It says not Kyoto.
Starting point is 00:10:39 No, no. It says show up at noon to hear them play. Oh, one play. Lisa plays and watch Melanie Moore dance. One plays while the other dances. Oh boy. This is just a lesbian couple that's forcing you to watch what they like to do at night. We don't wanna watch you dance while you play a loop.
Starting point is 00:11:00 They seduce each other with their talents. Dan Lilly and the Keepers with Amy Bedard acoustic quartet. And the picture, the lead singer and guy playing guitar is just a bald 60-year-old man. I mean Homer Simpson bald. He's just the top there. And a mustache. And yeah, everybody's kind of old and hunched over.
Starting point is 00:11:21 Next up, Tom Rush. It says join us as we welcome the legendary Tom Rush. He's legendary. Is that a, hmm. I don't know. Matt Nakawa. He'll be sitting in with Tom Rush. Oh, Tom's got a guest appearance.
Starting point is 00:11:39 He's got a guest. Then there's Michelle Malone. The definition of Atlanta rock sound southern. Rock sound southern blues touched guitar driven and all about the song. She's touched, all right. A little touched. Poor Michelle's a little touched in that.
Starting point is 00:11:59 Chris Berardo. Yeah. Says a quarter century of music making has been a pure heartfelt emotional outpouring. It hasn't worked out. Creativity hasn't reached this genre of music yet to give your band name something clever. It's just your first and last name. That's all it is.
Starting point is 00:12:18 Chris Berardo. He couldn't even have given himself a better stage name than Chris Berardo. He's got a bad name to Again, I'm not one. I'm not one to talk when it comes to that but For a fucking comic. Yeah, I'm not trying to be cool Like a rock versus trying to be cool and tie and moon of boo city. Oh, I don't know what they do They we make time sexy. It says the whiskey flows like wine Fun is okay with us too. They're gonna fuck the whole audience. Calm down with whiskey flowing that much.
Starting point is 00:12:50 Flowing like wine. That's a lot. That seems like a lot. So that said, let's talk about some murder here because we got a bunch to get to. Let's start out. We're coming in hot. December 22nd, 1961. Now, you usually don't go back this far for cases, so you're going, why is it they going back that far? That's how insane this case is. It's like, I don't care how old it is, this is wild shit here.
Starting point is 00:13:15 So, and it goes, it's twisted, you'll see, don't worry. The newborn king is about to be here in 61. December 22nd, 61 right now. Nancy Anne Frenier, let's talk about her, F-R-E-N-I-E-R. She is 19 years old at this moment. She grew up with three brothers and she graduated from high school a year and a half ago from Attleboro High School in Massachusetts.
Starting point is 00:13:43 She has a husband named William, because it's 1961, so she already has a husband and a six month old son. Oh boy. 19. So, her husband's 22, and he's a vending machine salesman. Which. Right on the fucking cusp, brand new. In 61, that was like a cool thing to do.
Starting point is 00:14:02 Hell yeah. If you're a vending machine salesman now, that sounds like something Dennis Duffy on 30 Rock does you know what I mean? Like yeah dummy I got vending machines you want to buy one? You should buy a cigarette machine because that way the kids can buy them and nobody can see them doing it you know what I mean you make extra money. Those machines were like pulled you pulled something and something fell out. Something fell out. Or it's where you got the Mike and Ikes or your bubble gum at the beginning at the front entrance of the store You don't it's not the vending machines. They have today 61 minute vending machines were man
Starting point is 00:14:29 Those are prehistoric number those old cigarette machines. We were kids that were like old you pull the thing on Poof and it just sounds like a video game. Yeah a pack dropped out Yeah, it was like it was pinball like you're pulling it out. It's fun Maybe that's why we smoked, because we were. They made it fun. They made it so fun to get a pack of cigarettes when you were 16, at a pizza place while nobody cared. Isn't it wild?
Starting point is 00:14:53 It's fascinating to see somebody smoking in a car now. That's how far out smoking has gone, that seeing somebody driving down the road with a cigarette in their car, you're like, what time are you from? I just look at them. How did you get here? What car it is. Yeah, it's all like.
Starting point is 00:15:08 If it's a shit car, like yeah, who cares? It's never nice. No, my car, hey, don't smoke in my car. No, see, smoking a cigarette, no, Jesus. Yeah, so she was the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Walter Conroy of South Attleboro, and she worked up until her marriage. I guess she graduated early from high school. She graduated when she was 16 from high school.
Starting point is 00:15:30 Wow. Got a job and then worked until she got married and pregnant and then now she's a now she's a an old 19 year old housewife at this point in time, which is crazy. So this morning on November or December 22nd, she she drives her husband to work to his place of employment in the family car, which they had one car. She dropped him off. Then she was going to drop off the baby with her mother and then she was going to go to the laundromat to do the family laundry. And then her plan was to go Christmas shopping so she was going to get some presents for people while her husband was at work. So she goes but later that day he's waiting to be picked up from work and she never shows up.
Starting point is 00:16:16 So he reports her missing and he calls the mother and mother says no she never came to get the baby which this isn't like her so he calls the police and nobody can find her. Not a trace. The next day though, the 23rd, they do find her car. It was found, yeah, their car, it was found abandoned here in East Providence, which is where she was shopping too. It's found abandoned kind of in a wooded area in some gravel, like had a hard time getting out of it.
Starting point is 00:16:46 Inside, yeah, inside the car is a laundry basket with folded and washed clothes. All done, all done. All finished. A paper bag from the Mammoth Mart, which is a store. And it's a department store. And also wrapped Christmas presents are in the car as well. Like fully, like had the store wrap them and everything.
Starting point is 00:17:07 Oh, okay, yeah. Jesus, she's doing that while she's driving. She's wrapping in the car, yeah. She's real good. And a red light with the scotch tape. No, yeah, back then they would wrap shit for you. So that's what she's so, looks like she just walked away from the car
Starting point is 00:17:20 and got abducted by aliens or something. Shocking. Because if someone's going to steal her, you think they'd take this shit and like, you know, everybody likes a present. You don't know what's in there. Could be something great. Leave that car untouched, too.
Starting point is 00:17:31 Nobody rifles through it. And if you're taking somebody, you're taking shit, too. And there's no blood in the car or anything like that. It's very odd. Then they find out that a man and a girl were nearby within sight and hearing distance of this car the day before and they said that they heard, the car was by the way near a reservoir and they said they saw a man and a woman walking away from the car toward the reservoir and
Starting point is 00:18:01 they heard the woman cry out in distress. Did they catch what she said or just like a sound? Just that she was yelling a sound. Rather than, you know, do anything about it, they wait till the cops come talk to them the next day. You know, it's funny you're here. I saw and heard some shit. Yeah, I thought I saw murder yesterday.
Starting point is 00:18:19 That's interesting. So a police, they searched the whole area. There's a wooded area nearby. There's kind of like a lover's lane, make out point area nearby that they've searched. Oh by the lake, fuck yeah. By the reservoir, they search the woods, they kinda look around, they don't see anything,
Starting point is 00:18:34 they don't find her. So at this point, all the attention's going right on the husband here, William. William is a salesman for the vending machine firm, and they bring him in and they say, well you take a lie detector test there mister. A 1961 lie detector test. What is that? Electrodes hooked up to your balls.
Starting point is 00:18:54 Yeah. That's all it was. Battery cable. Yeah. Car battery and nuts. Now during this, he admitted that his real residence is not Sea Conk, as he had previously said in the missing persons report, but he actually lives in Pawtucket. He said that he used his mother's address in reporting his wife's disappearance because he knows cops in Sea
Starting point is 00:19:16 Conk and thought that they would take more interest in it if those cops were involved. Clever. All right. That's what he tried to do. So that's the big lie in the lie detector test they come up with. Otherwise, everything else he comes out clean. Yeah, and that's a good lie too, of lying to get more attention on the... That doesn't look bad for him. That looks better. He's trying to get more cops.
Starting point is 00:19:37 Yeah, he's trying to get more cops to find him. It looks better. I want you guys to investigate more thoroughly. I didn't realize you'd find my lie. Yeah, so he passes the lie detector test and he's got an alibi. He's at work all day too. So he didn't have the car.
Starting point is 00:19:49 That's it. So December 27th now we go to and they still don't find her. They still can't find her. Oh my God, five days. Yeah, they find a Massachusetts storekeeper positively identifies a photograph of her as a woman that came in on the 22nd and asked for directions to New Bedford.
Starting point is 00:20:14 So police say this owner told them she entered the store between 5 and 6 p.m., bought a pack of cigarettes and asked for the directions and then left in a two-toned automobile. So we don't know. Now after leaving her son with her mother, I guess she was going toward the shopping center in the mid-morning. That's where everybody saw her. She made another stop too, they found out here, that she used to live in New Bedford and I guess she has a grandmother who lives in New Bedford.
Starting point is 00:20:45 They established that she stopped about noon on Saturday at a house on Slocum Road in North Dartmouth, Massachusetts, not far from New Bedford, to use a telephone. And this wasn't a visit. She just stopped at a house and asked to use the telephone. Wow, yeah, the people used to do that. People used to do that, especially a 19-year-old girl. It's not like she's gonna come in here and fucking take over the house or anything.
Starting point is 00:21:08 It's not like- And she had family in New Bedford, but didn't know how to get there. Didn't know how to get there, which that's why the store owner, they're questioning whether he's, if he's just trying to get publicity for a store or not. That's what they thought.
Starting point is 00:21:19 Maybe he's just trying to get people to come to his store. Well, people only know how to get places today because they have apps and shit. There are tons, tons of people that still map how to get to their store. Well, look, people only know how to get places today because they have apps and shit. There are tons, tons of people that still map how to get to their fucking parents' houses. Yeah, they still don't remember. How do I do it? Yeah. How do I get there?
Starting point is 00:21:33 It's amazing. I need to be told by a computer voice how to go places. Yeah, people don't know Northeast Southwest anymore, Jesus. No, no, no, that's true, too. It's amazing. Yeah. Well, they've never had a job where you had to. Where you have to do it.
Starting point is 00:21:42 Yeah. You work for the electric company as a process server. You have to know. I knew everywhere I was going. Yeah. So the family who let her use the phone said that she appeared quite upset. That's what they said.
Starting point is 00:21:54 So this is all very odd here. She's upset. She's going places. She's shopping. She's doing laundry. At some point, she did the laundry, did the Christmas shopping, and then stopped. And a stranger recognized distress. Distress, yeah. That tells you she was certainly upset.
Starting point is 00:22:09 And then a woman was taken screaming from her car, crying out. December 28th, she's still missing. Police are, right from this newspaper article, they say police combed snow-covered woods and conducted a house-to-house check in two states. They did it in Massachusetts, too. Basically they made a big circle and anybody in that circle they went house-to-house looking for. Yeah, a young mother missing through Christmas is certainly a big deal.
Starting point is 00:22:37 The headline is, teenage mother is still missing. Right. I mean that's a- After Christmas. Christmas time. Yeah, she's sitting there over Christmas. She's gone So yeah, they said her car was found mired in soft sand near the reservoir and Her car was locked too and her purse was in there like we said presents
Starting point is 00:22:56 They also dragged the frozen water of the of the reservoir. There's 11 inch thick ice holy how do you drag that? They get power saws and cut big rectangles out of it and then they put shit in the water. Go from rectangle to rectangle and drag it down. They end up giving up because it's so time consuming and just work intensive. Yeah, you're going to kill somebody doing that. Yeah, they're not finding anything too and they don't exactly know where to look. You can't do it to the whole reservoir. So it's kind of difficult. They get a new lead here on December 28th when the police ended up searching
Starting point is 00:23:35 Massachusetts in a wooded area of Rumford and they got a new lead I guess here two ten-year-old boys Said they saw a man and a woman walking into the woods about 2 p.m. on December 22nd, two hours after she left her mother's house to drop the kid off in South Attleboro to go shopping. Police say that they're, you know, they're looking in these woods for that and they, so they don't find anything though. So they don't know if these boys saw what they thought they saw or if they just found saw somebody else walking in the woods because they were gonna go fuck in the woods We have no idea. So there's an article after that like a week later
Starting point is 00:24:15 They still haven't found her it's been two weeks and basically they're saying everything's progressing nicely. We're right where we want to be the cops are yeah The headline is Rhode Island Murder Probe Progress Encouraging. They said it's very encouraging, the murder. We haven't even found a body yet. Never mind who the fuck did this. We don't even know anything about this. Going great. We have a car.
Starting point is 00:24:42 Basically no new information since the first day she's been missing and going great. Yeah, but the new guy just brought in some crewlers and some dogs, so we're doing great. We are doing absolutely great. So they said, yeah, everything's going fine. Finally, March 19th, the reservoir thaws early March. Three months. Months. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:25:04 Oh my god the and then they end up finding her when she floats to the top and About three quarters or I'm sorry about a foot of water They found her floating and they like miss they missed her she well she floated in who knows where she was They always say in the spring. It's like an old joke cops in New York would say, you know spring because The first floaters come up, yeah. The first floaters hit the surface, that's how you know it's spring. Hey, there's some mafia guy that was killed in January,
Starting point is 00:25:35 great. And I guess I never even thought about it, but if somebody goes through the ice, or something goes through the ice, it probably freezes over pretty quick and there's no trace of it. Freezes over very quick, absolutely, especially when it's 11 inches of ice
Starting point is 00:25:49 and you wouldn't be able to see it. So, but then someone would have had to get her through 11 inches of ice, that's the thing. Right, you gotta cut that out. So they're like, did someone just dump her here now? But then once they look at her body, she's been in water, they say she's been like frozen practically for a long time
Starting point is 00:26:05 So yes, they do find her. She is by the way absolutely ravaged with Stab wounds she is a mess the night before she's found by the way Her mother told everybody that she had a premonition that Nancy was dead And the next day they found her. Solid guess, Ma, she's been gone since Christmas. Yeah, no shit. So they do a press release here,
Starting point is 00:26:34 and the police are quoted as saying, what kind of a fiend would do this? Why don't you find out for us? Yeah. That's your job, you tell us. That's not really, we don't know. They say that she was a victim of a sex murderer, they're calling it. Oh no.
Starting point is 00:26:47 She was definitely sexually assaulted before death. They don't get into the details of the exact sexual assault because it's 1961. But they say that it's a poor world when something like this happens and it's not getting any better. That's what the father said. So they had to, her husband had to go identify
Starting point is 00:27:08 the body. Yeah, he said, I don't want to go in. She's never hurt anyone in her whole life. Ah, god damn it. The worst. And Detective Captain Theodore C. Hilton described the case as a quote, sex perverted murder. Yeah. Sex perverted murder. In the next few days they find her clothes because they find her scantily clad. They find her, she was wearing nothing, they find her slacks, underwear and bra and her shoes found several feet away
Starting point is 00:27:39 from the body in the water. Her torn slacks ripped, she had ripped bra and underwear were found about five feet from the body in the water. Her torn slacks ripped, she had ripped bra and underwear, were found about five feet from the body. She was identified through her Attleboro, Massachusetts, high school class of 1959 ring and a diamond ring and a wedding band and a hairpin engraved with her name. So, we know it's her.
Starting point is 00:28:00 There is a good reason to get that high school ring, huh? That's, I guess so. If you wash up three months after you disappear in a reservoir, they'll find you Hey, I'm Michelle Beatle and I'm Peter Rosenberg. Hey Peter. Tell the people about our new podcast, right? It's called over the top and we cover the biggest topics in sports and pop culture using royal rumble rules That means we'll start with two stories toss one out out on its ass, and dive into the other stories with ruthless aggression. Oh, but it never stops, because every 90 seconds after that.
Starting point is 00:28:32 ["Sand in the Fire"] My god, whose music is that? Another story comes down to the ring. Rinse and repeat until we arrive at the one most important thing on planet Earth that week. Follow Over The Top on the Wondry app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to Over The Top ad free right now by joining Wondry Plus.
Starting point is 00:28:56 For the record, this is not a wrestling podcast. No, no, but it is inspired by wrestling. Isn't everything inspired by wrestling, Beatle? Fair point. Yeah! From Wondery, I'm Indra Varma, and this is The Spy Who. This season, we open the file on Oleg Penkovsky, the spy who defused the missile crisis.
Starting point is 00:29:21 It's 1960, and the world's on the brink of nuclear war. However, one man in Moscow is about to emerge from the shadows with an offer for the CIA. His name is Oleg Penkovsky. As a Cold War double agent, Penkovsky wants to supply the US with the Soviet Union's greatest nuclear secrets. But is this man putting his life on the line to save the world, or is he part of an elaborate trap? Follow the Spy Who on the Wondry app, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Or you can binge the full season of the Spy Who
Starting point is 00:29:58 defused the missile crisis early and ad free with Wondry+. So they said they're really searching for the weapon, the knife that slashed her neck, breast and groin. He went after sexual organs, whoever did this, and slashed her throat pretty bad. And they're also looking for a billfold, some money that she might have been carrying as well. Because if they find that, then it's not a robbery. So that's what they're looking for here. You find both and if you don't find it and that person has it, then that ups the crime.
Starting point is 00:30:37 Exactly. That's exactly it. At least they know a motive at that point. So they sent an automobile seat cushion to the Rhode Island crime lab to be tested for blood in connection with the knife slaying here. And the cushion was found near the East Providence Reservoir, so it wasn't in the car. It was found now. But it's been sitting out in the weather for three months. So who the fuck knows?
Starting point is 00:31:02 So technology, we're going to find blood on that? That's going to be tough. They say two persons were released from police custody the day before after taking a lie detector test in connection with the killing. They're bringing people in for questioning all the time and polygraphing them. That's how they're doing. Now they say police in Vermont, actually in Bar-Bear, Vermont, are, they said that they have a similar murder and they are, a woman named Doris Baker was murdered and so they're checking for similarities to see if this might be the same person. So they keep searching for the weapon here and they can't find the weapon. They will never recover the knife that this happened.
Starting point is 00:31:41 They got skin divers, dragging crews, and all this type of shit, and they said they searched and combed the whole reservoir and never found it. They said, at this point, Captain Theodore Hilton said that there are, quote, no clues and no suspects in her murder. It's going great. Going great, in other words.
Starting point is 00:32:02 Progressing, ah, perfectly. So, that's March of 62. Going great, in other words. Progressing perfectly. So that's March of 62. January 26th, 1963. Okay. Let's talk about Elaine Martin. She's 15 years old. She comes home from school.
Starting point is 00:32:20 She's a sophomore in high school. Comes home from school around 2.30 PM. This is in South Attleboro, I believe Massachusetts about 2 30 p.m. Walks in the house and finds her mother 38 year old Edith Martin in a pool of blood on the kitchen floor. Oh Jesus. Yeah, so Elaine started screaming and ran next door and Other neighbors came over and called the cops and firemen and it was a big deal. So Edith Martin's 38, her husband's name is John Martin. He was notified of this as he made his rounds as a milk truck driver for his father who operates a dairy.
Starting point is 00:32:57 There's a job that's gone. Her dad's the, her husband, the milk, the two husbands are a milkman and a vending machine salesman. That's wild. Two men that had no idea. No clue that that was not gonna be a thing soon. That's not gonna be viable, very quick. Man, so they said, Edith Martin's five feet tall and thin,
Starting point is 00:33:16 so she's small. They said though, it looks like she put up a huge battle here. They said the interior of the home was fucking destroyed, chairs overturned, lamps smashed, pictures knocked off the wall, and blood everywhere. All over the fucking walls.
Starting point is 00:33:32 I mean, it looked like five people were murdered in there, somebody said. It looked horrible here. So the body was face down in the living room, between the living room and the kitchen, clad in a blouse and a slip. Thing you wear under your skirt there. Yeah, my mom had them.
Starting point is 00:33:49 Oh, that's an older lady thing, the slip. Put your slip on there. She used to soak them in the sink with her fucking leg. Remember the legs, the tights that would take you out of the eggs? Oh yeah, they came in the eggs. They came in the egg, yeah. Soak that shit in my sink and I go to brush my, yeah, what is this? Yeah, Jesus Christ. God damn it.
Starting point is 00:34:07 The water's miscolored from the dye leaking out of the legs. I'm fucking horrified. I think these are one use, I think you throw them out after that. You throw these away, Ma, while you're cycling the shit. I remember that shit. Oh, we're broke, that's why.
Starting point is 00:34:20 Oh yeah, that's right. These are like $4. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, yeah, that's right. These are like four dollars. Yeah So her clothes her skirt and jacket were neatly folded on the bed in her neck in her bedroom in the next room So she took them off doesn't look like Usually people don't ravage someone rip their clothes off murder them and then neatly fold their shit and put them on on their bed They said there's no evidence of a sexual attack in this one though
Starting point is 00:34:44 Oh, and also nothing to show that robbery was the motive on the bed. They said there's no evidence of a sexual attack in this one though. And also nothing to show that robbery was the motive. Now the destruction of a small meek woman. Yes. Now for Nancy, they ended up finding money in her jacket when they found that in the reservoir. So they said not robbery on that one either. And here nothing's been stolen. They said there is valuables out in the open, nothing stolen. She, Edith Martin, was a bookkeeper at the Allied Anodizing Company in Pawtucket,
Starting point is 00:35:13 which is only a 10 minute drive from her house, so she would come home for lunch every day. That's what this is. So they say they're looking for a savage killer. There was five, there was seven knives around her body She was stabbed over 30 times So this that looks very personal when some someone stabbed that much five of the knives were broken This person's another this person stabbed her used her whole knife block on her like yeah
Starting point is 00:35:47 Literally there was ones with broken handles, ones with broken blades. When from going into her skull, they broke. So he got more. So there's five broken knives that she was stabbed with, with all of them. And then two other knives that were successful in not being broken while the stabbing was taking place. It's gotta be a guy that's cut to fuck all over his hands, right?
Starting point is 00:36:07 You would imagine so. Yeah. Because kitchen knives too aren't meant for that. Yeah, right. So they're gonna slide right off when you've got blood all over them. If you've ever broken a knife, holy shit, you back up so fast because you're afraid of where the fuck that blade's gonna go. Pop, oh Jesus.
Starting point is 00:36:21 Yeah. So the medical examiner said 31 stab wounds in the head, chest, stomach and back. Yeah. Which is just a horrible vicious attack. Yeah. Aiming for yeah, they said it was unusually extra unusually extreme ferocity is how they medical examiner put it. It's really a someone would have to be strong to have some of these stab wounds. They said she'd been stabbed in the head, heart, lungs, liver, breast, and back. Everywhere that matters.
Starting point is 00:36:51 Everywhere that, yeah, that would hurt somebody bad. So they said, it seems apparent that her assailant just walked into the house a few minutes behind her. She put up a tremendous struggle. There were signs of it in every room of the house. So this went around the house. She chased her all over. Yeah, she was fighting.
Starting point is 00:37:08 Neighbors though, they report that they saw a man leaving the house by a side door. Was he perhaps covered in fucking blood? Covered in fucking head to toe blood. Golly. His car was parked in the driveway behind her car. And they said they never saw him before. They never saw him or the car. Mrs. Martin here, Edith, is described as a wonderful mother in person.
Starting point is 00:37:34 She'd been working at her job for about three months and she would return the three miles to her home usually between 12 and 1230 for lunch, but today she didn't get here to one for whatever reason. She just returned here and they this attacker is described as 30 years old and heavy set. Heavy set 30 year old drove up to the house 15 minutes later went into the house so they said he drove up and sat there for a little bit then went into the home leaving his car engine running. Is that right? Like he's gonna be right back. But yeah, like he's fucking going in quick for Snickers bar. He they called
Starting point is 00:38:14 him about six feet tall, heavy set about 30 dressed in a green woolen car coat, whatever that is a car coat. I don't know. He emerged from the kitchen door at about 1.30 and drove away in the car which had Rhode Island license plates and were in Massachusetts. So the car we'll talk about in a second here. By the way, one of the neighbors said they were an ideal couple, well liked by everyone, the Martins. They led an extremely tranquil home life. That's one way of saying boring. Saying the milkman didn't do this.
Starting point is 00:38:45 Right, nothing outrageous happens there. At least his vehicle would have been easily identifiable out in front of the house, you know what I mean? Newman's dairy or whatever the fuck. So several hours later they find a man dead apparently from an intentional overdose of narcotics in a gas station bathroom in Pawtucket. And immediately they were like, maybe this is the killer, but there's no blood on him, no signs of cuts on his hands, no anything. So they say, fuck, nevermind.
Starting point is 00:39:14 Probably not. Then, as this makes the rounds with the cops this day, the East Providence people go, this sounds a lot like the one we got minus the sexual attack. But if she put up a big enough fight, that might have been out of the question at that point. He might have had to get out of there.
Starting point is 00:39:31 You know what I mean? So they're like the the frenzied attack with the knife, all this shit. This sounds a little bit like Nancy Frannier. So let's keep an eye on that. Now neighbors have a description of the car. It's a it's a blue 1958 Chevrolet. Okay. So they got a real good look at that shit.
Starting point is 00:39:50 Yeah. They didn't get a look at the plate number just that it was Rhode Island. So through a, what they call it at the time, quote, IBM processing, which means through a computer. Yeah. But that computer was the size of a fucking warehouse, by the way.
Starting point is 00:40:08 Of 1,144 blue Chevrolets that year, it was learned that 117 belonged to people who lived in the Attleboro Pawtucket area. So these officers here began a check of each of the 117 owners. The third name that came up is a name that they recognize. It's a young man who has a juvenile record and some psychiatric problems. His last thing that he got in trouble for, which was the year before he got arrested for assaulting a 17 year old
Starting point is 00:40:45 girl. He jumped into the girl's car after she left church on January 14th 1962 so three weeks after the attack here pressed a knife to her throat okay and ordered her to drive him to Slater Park, which is a rural area The girl screamed for help and freaked out So he took off and just jumped out of the car because she was by church and people started turning around So he took off and ran away But the cops picked him up and then he underwent underwent several weeks of mental examination At Charles B. Chapin Hospital and then was placed. That's a pretty fucking serious crime. That's a lot and then was placed on probation
Starting point is 00:41:27 by family court. Oh my. About a week after that though, before all this happened because he was taken in and then later on they did the psychiatric stuff with him, he was arrested by police in Pawtucket after he forced a woman at Knife Point to drive him to a park.
Starting point is 00:41:45 She jumped from the car and took off. So then he was caught after a short chase by a patrolman. So that's two in a week that he got arrested for. He was undergo ordered to undergo psychiatric testing. He was held for observation for six months before he was released on probation. for six months before he was released on probation. And also the Wound Socket Police said they wanted to talk to him as well in connection with a 1961 abduction of Mrs. Jean Roberts, a 21 year old nurse. This one they said a youth jumped into her car when she stopped at a mailbox, forced her to drive through several communities, then robbed her of $2 and let her go.
Starting point is 00:42:29 So they end up finding this car. They find it in Pawtucket. They find the car, the blue Chevrolet that is connected to this kid. And they keep a watch over it. It's outside of a movie theater. So they sit there for about two hours and watch this car until a family comes out.
Starting point is 00:42:49 A mother, a father, and a teenage son come out and go to get in the car. That is when they come up and they arrest Mr. Thomas Richard Knott Jr. Tommy Dicknott. Yeah. Tommy Dicknott, he is. He's 17 years old. Wow. Yeah. At this time at this time in 63 he's 17 which means in 61 he was 15. Yeah. His dad's a steam fitter.
Starting point is 00:43:18 He's got an older brother and a younger sister. He's a big stocky kid. They keep calling him husky in all these articles. That was a fun word. That's a fun one. They live in Pawtucket. He's the captain of the Tullman High football team currently. The biggest kid on the team. The captain of the team. He's a fullback, which back then, now fullback is a blocker. Back then, fullback meant the guy who ran the ball. Right. That's the guy that, and he's the size of the, of Richard Perry when that's the reason they used him because he's that big. Yeah, exactly.
Starting point is 00:43:49 And he's also one of the best youth sprinters in Rhode Island too. He's also a track star. Fast as shit. Captain of the football team, track star, and he's a big heavy kid too, so he's a good athlete. His coach, Anthony Parasau, said that he's a fierce competitor who always
Starting point is 00:44:06 insisted on going back to play even if he was hurt. He said one time his nose was broken and he still wanted to go back and he didn't care. He's playing anyway. That's a tough kid. Yep he works part-time as a gas station attendant. He's also a strong kid that could break knife blades. That's what they're thinking. They said that he was very polite. They said he's very polite, very well-spoken. He was neatly dressed when he was arrested Saturday night, but both his green jacket
Starting point is 00:44:33 and his shoes were stained with blood. What? That's not good. That's his going outfit? He went to the movies with his parents with bloodstained shirt and shoes, jacket and shoes. So they sit him down and they bring him into the station. Here's the interrogation of tommy dicknot. Let's do it. Um, After a few minutes of questioning he said I don't want to do this again
Starting point is 00:44:57 Again, and so the police went up to pippa pardon. What do you mean again? Uh, they said what are you talking about? And he said, I killed her. And they said, who? And he said, the woman in Attleboro, which is Edith Martin. And they were like, holy shit, what the, that was easy.
Starting point is 00:45:17 That was easy. Fuck. Why are we good at this? It wasn't our face. Tell me what we did, son. Tell me, tell me what we did. I wanna duplicate this. Write he said, tell me what we did son. Tell me, tell me what we did. I want to duplicate this. Write this down, yeah. Shit, there's no video cameras, god damn it. Then
Starting point is 00:45:30 he said something that really blew them away because they're only looking at him for Edith Martin. He said, I wish I had been caught before I killed this other woman. I'm glad you caught me. Oh my. Now they're like, other woman? What do you know? There's more so They said they looked the cops looked at each other. He started weeping and crying and He said that yes, he's also responsible for the murder of Nancy and frenier Which she didn't even ask me about but right it is so he's not given a Miranda warning by the way here This is 1963 64 is the Miranda case So that was the one where but that's retro warning by the way here this is 1963. 64 is the Miranda case so that was the one where but that's retroactive by the way so anybody wasn't Mirandized before that also applies to that. So he blurted that out
Starting point is 00:46:17 now they questioned him a little bit more and they said that the frenier homicide the cop said was the quote the furthest thing from my mind that night the guy said I never even thought about that we were trying to solve this one here they also see that he has a bandaid on his finger they questioned him how did you cut your finger and he said that I don't know and they said you have a scratch on your neck a big old scratch there looks like a finger finger scratch. How'd you get that? And he said, I can't remember. Didn't your parents ask you these questions?
Starting point is 00:46:48 What the fuck is going on? Why are you covered in blood and all beat up? What the fuck's going on? You cut your finger and you got your coat and shoes all wet? So then they directed him to strip to the waist and they observed scratches on his shoulder and asked about that. And he removed his shoes and they said look at your shoes there's blood all over them can you explain that and he said I don't know.
Starting point is 00:47:10 Can't explain that. Yep he gave an answer he just said yeah that's when he blurted out the thing about Nancy they end up giving him over to the Nancy and fair friendier cops to talk to also here. He's going to end up with the guy who said everything was going fine earlier. And the one, the Hilton guy who said, I have no clues, I don't know anything. So they sit him down.
Starting point is 00:47:32 Now Hilton will later say he Mirandized the kid, but there's some squishy shit, and he already admitted to everything to the other cop. So he said he got out of school at 11 a.m. that day, an early release schedule because of exams on December 22nd. He went home, his parents were out, or not on December 22nd, on the day he killed Edith there
Starting point is 00:47:54 in March of 63. Edith, so he said that he went home, his parents were out, he took his father's car, he said, quote, I knew I had to kill someone. I knew. I knew I knew. Yeah. He said that he had been reading girly magazines and like a playboy. Yeah. Just hanging out and doing that. Yeah. Who knows or an L which one are you reading? So they say said I knew I had to kill someone. He drove to Attleboro and entered the Martin house.
Starting point is 00:48:25 He said, I told her all I wanted to do was rob her. She began to scream and holler. I grabbed some knives from the drawer. He said, everything went black. He said, she screamed. I went berserk when she told me to leave. I ran to the kitchen and pulled knives from a steak set. So from her fucking block. There was a terrible struggle. She broke free, but I dragged her back into the kitchen again.
Starting point is 00:48:51 I blacked out. I got scared and ran out. I hate that word. Oh man. You didn't, man. You didn't black out. And they, a little more probing, he said, I remember stabbing her several times. It's not so black out here. She ran from the kitchen into the living room and to the front door. I grabbed her and dragged her back to the kitchen. I just kept stabbing her. She wouldn't die. She's tough man. She kept, she was getting stabbed and she got up and ran away. She's tough. So he said that he just kept doing it and doing it and then once he was sitting there and was finished he got scared and he said I ran out the car stalled I just learned
Starting point is 00:49:30 how to drive. He just got his license. Pop the clutch. He did fucked up stalled it. He said that he drove to a wooded area in Pawtucket and through several bloodstained articles of clothing into the woods of his and two saturated towels that he took from the home to wipe himself off. So he stole two towels. That was all that was missing. He said-
Starting point is 00:49:53 And the neighbors saw this big ass kid and thought he was 30. Thought he was 30 because he's big. Wow. Yeah. And I don't know if they got a good view of his face or if he had his head down or whatever. So he said he drove back home, talked to a neighbor, and then went into his house and watched TV. Watched the three channels that was available in 1963.
Starting point is 00:50:14 So he said later he was picked up when he returned to his father's car with his parents after attending a movie. He said, then I'm here. Unbelievable. He said, why did you stop at that home? Why'd you pick that one? And he said, I don't know. Just felt good.
Starting point is 00:50:31 He said, did you know the woman? And the kid said, never saw her in my life. Unreal. Random as fuck. So they said, let's go back to December 22nd, 1961. What happened there? He said, I was walking through the parking lot at Mammoth
Starting point is 00:50:45 Mart off Newport Ave in East Providence. I saw a lady sitting in a car. I got in beside her. He just popped in. Same thing. Same thing he did with those other two women. That's his gig here. Divorced beheaded died, divorced beheaded survived. We know the six wives of Henry VIII as pawns in his hunt for a son, but their lives were so much more than just being the king's wives. I'm Arisha Skidmore Williams. And I'm Brooke Zifrin.
Starting point is 00:51:11 And we're the hosts of Wondry's podcast, Even the Royals. In each episode, we'll pull back the curtain on royal families, past and present, from all over the world to show you the darker side of what it means to be royalty. We rarely see Henry VIII's wives in their own light as women who use the tools available to them to hold on to power. Some women won the game, others lost, but they were all unexpected agents in their own stories.
Starting point is 00:51:35 Being a part of a royal family might seem enticing, but more often than not, it comes at the expense of everything else, like your freedom, your privacy, and sometimes even your head. Follow even the Royals on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. Go deeper and get more to the story with Wondery's top history podcasts, including American Scandal, Legacy, and Black History for Real.
Starting point is 00:51:57 He said that, yeah, he left school. He said, I just had the urge to kill. He said, I saw the woman drive past and I just followed her. And he said, that was that. So yeah, wow. Anyway, he said that, back to the other one, he said that he forced his way into Nancy Frontier's car, took her to the reservoir. He said he picked up a log,
Starting point is 00:52:25 because he said he had gone to the shopping center to look for a girl That's why he was there because again girly magazines He was reading went there to look for as he put it girly mags And that's what they say in the paper went to the shopping center to look for a girl And then he said that he took her to the reservoir got her out of the car brought her over to the reservoir Picked up a log and hit her twice in the back of the head. He said then he rolled her over and cut her throat. So yeah, which is I guess this was to the reservoir section and back of the Regis paper company off Ferris Avenue. He said the car got stuck in gravel, that's why they
Starting point is 00:53:05 left it. I forced her to walk into the woods. I walked behind her. By the way, at some point in here he rapes this poor woman. He had to. He does. It's an attack. He just leaves that part out. He said, when we reached the pond, I walked onto the ice. She started to walk back to the road. She was like, I'll just go back. Yeah. He's on the ice. I'm out of here. Yep. He said, I hit her over the head with a log and she was like I'll just go back yeah he's on the ice I'm out of here yep he said I hit her over the head with a log and she fell I thought I had killed her I struck I struck her with the knife then he said he knocked a hole he cut her throat then he said he knocked a hole through the ice using the log god he's strong he bashed a hole in the ice then that's a big fucking log think about that that he hit her with
Starting point is 00:53:44 and then stuffed her body into the hole and shoved her in there. Oh my! He said he shoved the log through the hole as well, and hurled the knife as far out as he could into the water, so the knife's somewhere in the reservoir. Yeah, it's gotta be. It was sitting there. A week later, you wanna hear something fucked up, here's some Ted Bundy shit, a week later he returned to the scene yeah broke through the ice again and pulled
Starting point is 00:54:10 the body back out of the water and undressed her oh my god yes so they think he probably also sexually assaulted again fucking weak old corpse as well unbelievable which is some Ted Bundy shit here. They said why did you pull her back out of the water and he said that he wanted to see what the body looked like. Jesus he's so dangerous. He said he took his knife and cut off her clothes at that point. After all of it. And then pushed her back into the water. Oh my god man. Then he quote, I'm glad you caught me because I would have done it again.
Starting point is 00:54:48 We know. We know. You would have done this shit forever. You're so dangerous. He said, all I hope is that they put me away for life. I hope so, too. Me, too. He had an uncontrollable urge to kill.
Starting point is 00:55:03 And he said that both the women are just women he saw on the street. That was it. He saw Edith on the street, followed her to her house, and the car saw her drive by, and he said, Nancy, I just saw her there and popped in her car. How is Ed Gein more popular than this man? That's what I mean. How do people not know who this is?
Starting point is 00:55:18 And it gets crazier, by the way. The end of this episode's wild. So he would sometimes be weird and cold and calculating and showed no emotions And in other times he'd be hysterically crying while he told these stories So the cops just said they said after he was done He sat there silently and without moving for a period of about five hours. He just sat there catatonic He got it all out and then just Sat there like he's been
Starting point is 00:55:45 drained of everything. So the fucked up part is he had been questioned in the disappearance of Nancy Vernier. He was questioned and talked his way out of it. They questioned a ton of people. He was one of them. So throughout the night there, several times he said, thank God they caught me, thank God they caught me. He kept saying it over and over again, which is wild. He spends the next day down at the reservoir with the police reenacting the crime, showing them where everything happened. Then I walked her here, then we went here,
Starting point is 00:56:19 doing all of that. So it's one thing for someone to confess to something, but when they act it out, like whenever I see people in these confession videos Acting it out. I'm like, oh you're fucked. That's disturbing. You can't say oh, I didn't do it. You acted it out It looks even if you made it up. It looks way more. Yeah. Yeah, your defense and trial is gonna be real tough now Yeah, when the jury looks at a video of you going then I was like this, you know Like I'm just like really hacking away at like, that looks bad. They can see you doing it. Right. And they always, it seems like I don't think I've ever seen it not happen, but every
Starting point is 00:56:52 time they do the motion in which the person died, like you can stab in all kinds of different directions away, but they, when they show how they did it, it's like really fucked up, especially when the corner goes and that stab motion is exactly what that body sustained. That's the wound that they had. So the Massachusetts cops say they will file fugitive from justice warrants for not, N-O-T-T is his name by the way, which will enable them to arrest him immediately for the killing of Edith Martin if he should be released in connection with this for any reason. Oh, so're not even gonna charge him until this thing's settled. No so now they have more questions. Newport, Rhode Island police
Starting point is 00:57:31 also questioned him in the slaying of Daisy Hopwood who's 60 years old and whose body was found in November 19th. He was also interrogated by Providence police about the unsolved death of Stephanie Stillwell, a college student who was found stabbed 15 times in a wooded area on February 28th 1961. Oh no. Which is yeah that's that's crazy. That's a 15 year old kid man. That's what I mean this this motherfucker is dangerous. The most. He's real dangerous I think he only killed the two because he came out with them without even being asked So who knows unless he was embarrassed of other ones. So the Hilton guy the cop said that he
Starting point is 00:58:12 He said that the this kid has undergone psychiatric treatment And he said that this kid doesn't want to talk too much about it But still seems to want to get it off his chest He breaks up every once in a while and cries and shakes his head, so he told the police. So January 29th, 1963 here, he is going to be taken to like family court because they're going to see if they can try him as an adult. And they, after some delay, they finally decide that yes, they can try him as an adult. So he enters a plea of not guilty, adult here. So he enters a plea of not guilty, which is interesting. They enter innocent and innocent by reason of insanity. They both they enter. Because he has been put in an institution for a while here. They said that he's been given psychiatric tests to see if he's fit
Starting point is 00:58:59 to stand trial. He ends up being sent to a mental hospital at this point, to an institution. He is declared mentally ill, schizophrenic, and admitted to the criminally insane ward at the Rhode Island Medical Center in Cranston, Rhode Island. Until he's fit to stand trial, which isn't until 1966. So he goes to trial for Nancy and it's a jury of seven men, five women, surprised any women were on the jury back then. Keep the skirts out of here. They're just going to feel bad for them and let them go. So if we have a few women on, they can keep the drinks full for everybody. That would help get like one or two just to make sandwiches.
Starting point is 00:59:43 You know what I mean? Surprise. That wasn't how it went. So the trial justice here found that all of the incriminatory statements, all the inculpatory shit is attributed to him were voluntarily and spontaneously made at a time when he was not under custodial interrogation as a suspect in the Frenier case. Oh. They're saying the other shit he said when they questioned him for it, that has nothing to do with this case. He just blurted this shit out. Right. So they're saying whether he, they rule whether he was
Starting point is 01:00:12 Mirandized or not, it's fine. Yeah, it doesn't matter. It's in there. So that's not good. The detectives all testify, by the way, that three detectives testify that he was told of his constitutional rights to obtain a lawyer or to remain silent and then
Starting point is 01:00:29 confessed also which that's I don't know what they're testifying to because there's no question that he wasn't read his rights and that's like a thing so March 3rd 1966 is the verdict on this and the headline is KNOTT guilty which is funny. That's not how his name spelt. No it is KNOTT. Oh I thought you said it was just N-O-T-T. No no no KNOTT. I'm sorry I thought you asked that. KNOTT yeah Don Knotts exactly. So not guilty is the thing but he is guilty because he's found guilty as fuck. A lot of people in society are looking at him going is he or is he not? because he's found guilty as fuck a lot of people Use is he or is he not is he not? No, I guess we got to read so he the jury deliberated for 12 hours and
Starting point is 01:01:13 there he's given seven days to appeal before his Sentencing comes and he appeal doesn't happen you sir may fuck off life in prison. Okay Yeah, that's life in prison. Okay, so he got what he wanted. So that's what he got. Okay, 1967 in July, that's when all the shit comes up. The Supreme Court ruled that the State Family Court failed to give sufficient legal reasons for waiving jurisdiction over him in his hearing in 1963 for why they didn't give good enough reasons for why he was being tried as an adult. So that's something. Then it goes to the state Supreme Court in 1969 and they set aside the
Starting point is 01:01:50 conviction and life sentence ruling that a confession should not or should have been excluded in the trial because of a lack of evidence that police told him he had a right to remain silence. They say they're not sure he got his rights read. So, okay, his conviction is set aside. That's not good, but he's still got the Massachusetts one sitting over his head. So they extradite him to Massachusetts in June of 1969. Well, if you're done with him, we'll take him in the Edith Martin murder. On October 28th, 1969, the charges are dropped. Why? Because the judge granted a defense motion
Starting point is 01:02:29 to suppress the confession, and then they had nothing else. So. Oh no. Yep, because knives, it's really hard to get fingerprints off of knife blades that have been used in stabbings. They get washed, they get smeared with the blood. And off the handle. Off the handle, so off the handle, that's what used in stabbings. They get washed, they get smeared with the blood. And off the handle. Off the handle. So off the handle. That's what I meant. The handle. So this case is dropped.
Starting point is 01:02:50 So by January 1970, he's still sitting in prison in Rhode Island. He petitions to get let out. Yeah, I've got no charges. He said, what the fuck, man? He said, get me out of here. I'm here. I'm not convicted of anything. But the assistant attorney general opposed the release saying that the state will be ready to try him again in a matter of months. Okay. So let's hang on to him.
Starting point is 01:03:11 So they do, they try him again in April of 1970 and he is found guilty of murder in the first degree. Okay. Yes, again. So both, by the way, all of his statements were again admitted into evidence. The statements that got the case thrown out to begin with are led in again. So that's not going to end well for him. February 6th, 1974, he and two other inmates break out of prison. Okay. Well, we've been on escape now.
Starting point is 01:03:49 This is the last guy you want fucking out of escaping from prison. Yeah, I don't want that guy just willy-nilly unwatched. Oh, it's him, Lucian Page, a 60-year-old who are both serving life sentences for murder, and Gerald Kelly, a 27-year-old who's serving a three-year sentence for possession of burglary tools. What the fuck are you doing? Just do your time. They break out, they steal three 38 caliber revolvers and ammunition out of the barracks there at the jail. Then they steal one of the prison guards cars. Where are they going to go?
Starting point is 01:04:23 And they also stole $100 in cash. I need $100 cash. That'll get us for the rest of our lives. Rest of everything. We'll get to Mexico from the deputy warden's desk. That's wild. The other guy, by the way, the murderer that he's with, Lucian was convicted of a 1960 hammer murder of a school teacher.
Starting point is 01:04:43 Good Christ! He beat a woman to a woman school teacher to death with a hammer. Oh my god. These are dangerous people He's a yeah robbery tools guy the guy that had a screwdriver. Yeah, he's like fuck Why am I with you to murdering fucks? This is crazy So the warden said that the three pulled a handgun on a lieutenant Lieutenant Albert Gardner about 1 a.m. in their open dormitory room and took his car keys. So they said another guard came upon the scene and was also confronted by the handgun, which was held by Lucian Page. Both guards
Starting point is 01:05:15 were locked in an adjacent room and they said the escapees broke into a locked closet in the front hall of the minimum security building and stole three 38 caliber revolvers. We've got murderers in minimum security. Minimum. Perfect. Why are they in there? They shouldn't be anywhere near minimum here.
Starting point is 01:05:35 So they said they're still searching. It's a 1974 Hornet with Rhode Island registration BA 109. Dodge Hornet. A Hornet. I haven't heard a Hornet in a long time. It's a bad car. It's a bad car. It's a bulky car. Yeah, the warden said the car had enough gas
Starting point is 01:05:49 to go about 175 miles. It's got longevity on it. It can go, it's got a range. Neither guard was injured and they were released by other prisoners once everybody had fled. So once the three had fled, the other prisoners were like, we're not gonna escape too, we're not going to escape too. We're going to...
Starting point is 01:06:06 No. Yeah. I guess Paige had an unsupervised job driving a tractor on the prison grounds and could have smuggled in the handgun to be able to steal the other handguns. All three escapees had limited privileges and could have just easily walked away from the prison anytime. They all had... They didn't have to do this.
Starting point is 01:06:23 Oh my God. All of them at any point could have walked away from their job and just took off. from the prison anytime. They all had, they didn't have to do this. Oh my God. All of them at any point could have walked away from their job and just took off. So there's politicians calling other people incompetent. It's fucking the mayor, the Cranston mayor calls for the ouster of the state corrections director as a result of this year, um, which is pretty interesting. They say the incompetence of the Knoll administration.
Starting point is 01:06:46 He questioned why two convicted murderers would be kept in the minimum security section under no supervision. Yeah. I'm pretty interested in that too. Now one of the people, Lucian Page, the 60 year old, they're going to end up finding him first in Boston because he blew his fucking brains out Really? He committed suicide while he was being chased by the cops. Way to go Lou. Yeah, he went out He's like, I'm not going back. I will not go back to prison
Starting point is 01:07:16 then February 14th 1974 Gerald Kelly burglary tool guy is caught in Salt Lake City, Utah Really? Yeah, that's a Salt Lake City, Utah. Really? Yeah, that's a lot farther than 175 miles. You made it. Yeah, so he is- He didn't go in that Hornet, I'm sure, right? No, I don't think so.
Starting point is 01:07:34 I guess he was arrested while hitchhiking outside Salt Lake City. That Hornet was a piece of shit car. It probably broke down on the way. I'm sure they had to. Before the gas ran out. I think it was made by AMC that's a bad car. They found it in Boston on the next day. Yeah in a Boston parking lot somewhere. They parked it. They were like get some antifreeze fuck this thing.
Starting point is 01:08:00 This car sucks. The car yielded no clues to the whereabouts and was returned to the prison guard. Finally, February 21st, 1974, Tommy Dicknott gets caught. Oh, where? He is in New Orleans. I was just gonna guess that. He's in fucking New Orleans. And he's, they only find him because he's arrested in New Orleans on an armed robbery charge. Robbing shit in New Orleans. Yeah, he'll if I give you you might have guessed New Orleans
Starting point is 01:08:29 I'll give you a thousand guesses. You'll never guess what the fuck he was robbing not a bourbon street bar, huh? Nope Nope, he robbed a lingerie store is what he was trying to rob He's for the money or for the product a little of both probably And I'll take this to jerk off to. He held up the lingerie shop with one of the guns taken from the prison. Still had it. The cop down there said, quote,
Starting point is 01:08:54 about the guy at the lingerie shop, this guy was the real victim of Mardi Gras. I don't know what that means. What the fuck are you talking about, man? Oh, no, he means the gunman here. He means our guy, Tommy Dicknott. He said, this guy was really the victim of Mardi Gras. We had some patrolmen on parade duty
Starting point is 01:09:10 who happened to be in the neighborhood when the robbery occurred. We hyped up security presence, and we caught him. He ran out with a gun and a bag of money, and the cops were like, hey! Stop right there! Aren't you a murderer? So he's being held in New Orleans on a $200,000 bond,
Starting point is 01:09:26 which is huge back then, charged with two counts of armed robbery. The district attorney said down there said, I mean, Rhode Island could have him back if they want to extradite him, but if they want to just give him to us, armed robbery charges down here, it says in Louisiana, armed robbery carries a maximum penalty of 99 years in prison with no chance of parole
Starting point is 01:09:46 99 to life that's where that comes from. Yeah, that's no chance of parole So right, but they end up bringing him back there in a related development By the way, the state police have to do a huge investigation because while they were looking for one of the One of the people that escaped they beat the shit out of two people while questioning them about it. What? Yeah, they beat up a 19-year-old named John and a 27-year-old named Joseph who were brothers. Their mother made the complaint and I guess they thought that they knew they were...
Starting point is 01:10:21 One of his friends or something? They beat them. I don't know, they beat them I don't know they beat them it's very weird so they said he goes back to court and they said that he alleges that he is now imprisoned restrained of his liberty and detained under the color of authority of the state of Rhode Island in the custody of the warden of Rhode Island correctional institutions and that this imprisonment is under the claim and authority of a judgment of the Superior Court and he said it shouldn't be that way. He says this imprisonment is illegal and in violation of his
Starting point is 01:10:53 rights secured by the Constitution and that his confessions that he's again convicted on have him admitting all this shit. Anyway they said that he said that he was in a catatonic state that night. He's going all the way back to that. They said in a superior or Supreme Court, state Supreme Court said, I find and conclude that the petitioner was not deprived of his constitutional rights during the retrial and that he's not being unlawfully detained. They already released him once because... Because of this claim. Then they
Starting point is 01:11:28 use the same exact statements in the second trial and now it's fine. And now everything's okay. It's enough to make you go crazy, honestly. He's a bad enough guy. Oh, he's bad. You don't even feel bad for him, but for the precedent that it sets, it fucks things up. We could always give him to Louisiana. Yeah, and Harry Connick's dad's there. He'll fucking murder him tomorrow. He'll fire his ass. So he'll just hit him with his car, probably.
Starting point is 01:11:53 Just run him over a couple of times. Leave him out in the street. I'll get him. Don't worry about it. My shift ends at six. Harry Connick's dad is prolific for being more or less a murderer. So many people killed down there. So Tommy Dicknott must have lost his fucking mind because on July 1st, 1975, he kills himself
Starting point is 01:12:12 in prison. Done. So it doesn't matter. 30 years old, dead as a fucking doornail. Wow. 29, whatever. Dead as shit in a Rhode Island state prison. Lost it, couldn't take it anymore.
Starting point is 01:12:24 Killed himself. I mean, thank God that he finally did it for us because Jesus Christ, he's so dangerous and he's right. He's so dangerous, yes. And that's so scary. He's absolutely right. That's the fucked up part. He could've skated and won and holy fuck.
Starting point is 01:12:39 We're lucky he was robbing lingerie stores because that would've been something to put him in on. Otherwise, what the fuck is... I think nobody got hurt down there It's dude imagine how dangerous this guy is someone who will Dig up who will fucking pull a woman out of the ice to cut her clothes off and and probably do worse Yeah, probably do worse and then stuff her back in Jesus sick fuck man. No kidding and these are brutal attacks He stabbed her across repeatedly like this and had had an MO that was like he tried several times and he was going to do this a lot. He's Ted Bundy without the charm offensive.
Starting point is 01:13:13 Yeah. Ted Bundy would half of his thing was getting you to go with him voluntarily. He liked that. He thought that was I think that was part of his game. Whereas this guy didn't have that game yet he's 17 years old, 15, 16, especially with an older woman. So he's just got to do it this way, which is a baby Bundy, baby Bundy. Man, that is disturbing shit.
Starting point is 01:13:35 So there you go, everybody. There's Rhode Island, East Providence, Rhode Island, a little bit safer. That's a crazy. It's like, I don't care how old it is. It's a fucked story. So hope you like that. We didn because we didn't get justice on him. That's the only reason it's not near as famous as anything else. He took, he got his own justice.
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