48 Hours - 48Hours Interview: The Bugs Bunny Defense

Episode Date: October 29, 2015

Could the Bugs Bunny defense be an excuse for murder?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 this podcast ad-free right now. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app today. Even if you love the thrill of true crime stories as much as I do, there are times when you want to mix it up. And that's where Audible comes in, with all the genres you love and new ones to discover. Explore thousands of audiobooks, podcasts, and originals, with more added all the time. thousands of audiobooks, podcasts, and originals, with more added all the time. Listening to Audible can lead to positive change in your mood, your habits,

and even your overall well-being. And you can enjoy Audible anytime, while doing household chores, exercising, commuting, you name it. There's more to imagine when you listen. Sign up for a free 30-day Audible trial and your first audiobook is free. Visit audible.ca. In 2014, Laura Heavlin was in her home in Tennessee when she received a call from California. Her daughter, Erin Corwin, was missing. The young wife of a Marine had moved to the California desert

to a remote base near Joshua Tree National Park. They have to alert the military. And when they do, the NCIS gets involved. From CBS Studios and CBS News, this is 48 Hours NCIS. Listen to 48 Hours NCIS ad-free starting October 29th on Amazon Music. I'm Richard Schlesinger. In this week's 48 Hours interview podcast, a case unlike anything I've ever covered before. Prosecutors and police believe Linda Duffy murdered her husband Patrick in cold blood after he was found shot to death in their L.A. area living room.

The mother of two admits to the shooting, but she claims it was a horrible accident. And here's the amazing part. She explains what she did, in part, by using a cartoon, a Bugs Bunny cartoon. It's a case where death may imitate art truth may be stranger than fiction and where one veteran homicide investigator concluded linda duffy's story was so bizarre it might just be true veteran la homicide detective sean mccarthy interviewed interviewed Linda Duffy on April 26, 2007, just hours after her husband's death. He told me he knew right away this case would not involve the usual cast of characters. Well, what story did she tell you that first time? Well, she said that we have this thing that we always do. We

morph into cartoon characters. And we talk to each other. I'm sorry, they what? They morph into cartoon characters. What's up, Jack? They morph into what cartoon characters? Well, she said that this particular time she morphed into

Elmer Fudd. Now I got you, you... you wabbit! And she said she began to talk to him in her Elmer Fudd voice. And she pointed to the nightstand where the gun was in the box of ammunition, and she claimed she said to him, no more bullets, like no more bullets in Elmer Fudd's voice. Hey, you! come back here. Well, what do you know? No more bullets.

And she said his response, and he's sitting on the north end of the couch, his response was no more bullets. And she said she took that statement as meaning the gun's unloaded. No. Keep in mind... Can I just ask you, I mean, this is a tragedy. It's a homicide. There's a dead person. But Elmer Fudd, have you ever had anybody say that they morphed into Elmer Fudd as an explanation for how a shooting took place? The answer to your question is no. From the start, Detective McCarthy thought Linda Duffy was so quirky and eccentric that she deserved the benefit of the doubt.

His partner, Shannon Lahren, disagreed, and it wasn't the first time. So you were telling me about your partnership. So how long have you guys been partners? Well, on and off since 1987. We worked together at a station called Firestone Station in South Central. Worked together for, I don't know, until the station closed for the most part. You know, we weren't constant partners, but we worked together. So you guys like each other or what?

Eh, we work together. So you guys like each other or what? We get along. Actually, we've been very successful in our investigative careers together. We both have opposite views a lot of times of things, and we usually come to a happy meeting and meet in the middle, and it works out well. So what's the relationship like? I mean, when you disagree. We yell.

Yeah. Call each other names. Yeah. They laugh and call us husband and wife arguing all the time it's an interesting dynamic because when you are a new deputy and you come to a station and you're trained by a senior office deputy if you will you you the dynamic is it's very subservient you're very subservient because you're being trained you're very respectful um and then and then you you become a real deputy if you will once your training is over but there's always that connection of trainee and training officer and he's always given me my respect, and there's times when, in fact, this is a case

where he had a definite stronger feeling about her innocence or guilt in this case long before I did, but because of his respect for me over that training officer dynamic, he could have been a little bit more forceful, but out of respect for me, I think he wasn't. How soon did you begin thinking that Linda Duffy was not what she appeared? There were some red flags, but of course this came out as an accident, an accidental shooting, and we just took the information in as it came. There were some red flags that came up, but nothing to say that this was a murder.

When you first went into that house, do you remember what you saw and what you thought? It was very surreal. Do you remember what you saw and what you thought? It was very surreal. It was a very calm, peaceful-looking crime scene, which is completely abnormal. Usually a shooting death, in most cases, is pretty bloody. And it was bloody, but it was very contained. Why is that unusual? Well, usually, especially in this case, husband and wife, she was alleging that he was her best friend,

their marriage was very good, and it just looked to me that if somebody really cared that much about somebody, they would have been all over them trying to stop the bleeding. And in the process of that, you're going to have blood transfer smears. It's going to be on your hands, on your clothes, smeared on furniture, in the blood. The bloody puddle would have been smeared all over the floor. It would have been in your shoes. Do you see any of that? No.

Linda Duffy have any blood on her? Very little. Very, very little. I remember she had her wedding band on, and what was really unusual is there was no blood in it. I would expect that her hands would have had blood on them. There would have been blood within the diamond in the ring. It just didn't look right. But once again, I wasn't jumping to conclusions.

It just didn't look right. It was a red flag wasn't jumping to conclusions. It just didn't look right. It was red flag. Did you tell your partner? Yes. What did you think? I was leaning, as I told you earlier, to wanting to believe based on all of those things that this was an accident. And another dynamic that probably needs to be told here is that when we go to a homicide scene, we split up responsibilities. One homicide, it might be his responsibility to process the crime scene, at least for the most part.

I mean, I'm going to be there to assist him, and we flip-flop. And in this case, it was his turn to do the crime scene. In fact, most of the cases he did the crime scene. And he is very thorough, much, probably much more thorough than I am. And not that I'm, I don't try to be thorough, but he is extremely thorough. I never, ever in a case had to worry about if everything was done and done properly. And if truth were to be told, that's why I wanted him to do the crime scenes. And because I knew things would be done and done right. Well, I'm just wondering what the conversation was like

between the two of you when you said, I'm thinking this is an accident, and you're saying, I'm not so sure. Do you remember that? Did you have that day? We did, but I think it led up to that. It took some time because we initially went to the scene, looked at it.

Very calm, kind of a very peaceful kind of scene. The guy looked like he'd been sleeping on the couch. That's what it looked like. It looked like he'd been sleeping on the couch, and somebody walked up and shot him in his sleep. That's how it appeared to me. Well, that's not an accident. Didn't look like an accident.

That was kind of a red flag to me. You listened to the 911 tape. Eventually I did, yes. What did you make of it? I think it was, for the most part, very truthful as far as emotion, but I don't think he was alive when she made the call. I think he was already dead. Well, that's a... I think there was some acting going on.

I mean, she made a statement that, where's the gun? She tells the dispatcher, it's on the floor, it's covered in blood. Well, I didn't know that even through processing the crime scene until after it was all said and done. Then I listened to the tape and actually could spend time to actually transcribe it and hear every word she said. And the dropping the gun, it's on the floor, it's covered in blood, that was a, that didn't happen. covered in blood, that didn't happen. Exactly what did happen to Patrick Duffy? Does the answer lie in a cartoon with a mischievous rabbit?

Hey, laughing boy, no more bullets. A short guy with a shotgun? Aw, shucks. And an irreverent duck? No more blips? Join us on 48 Hours this Saturday at 10 p.m. Eastern for The Bug's Bunny Defense. Shh, be very, very quiet. We're hunting elmas.

Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. You can take it from me, you haven't heard this story before. If you like this podcast, you can listen ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app. Before you go, tell us about yourself by filling out a quick survey at wondery.com slash survey. Have you ever wondered who created that bottle of sriracha that's living in your fridge? Or why nearly every house in America has at least one game of Monopoly. Introducing the best idea yet. A brand new podcast from Wondery and T-Boy.

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