And That's Why We Drink - E249 The Devil's Timeshare and Sleepwalking Mouths

Episode Date: November 14, 2021

Welcome, Leona! It's Christine's parental leave, so we're inviting people close to her on the show to guest host until she's back. This week we welcome Inspector Gross... we mean Eva! Em covers the Haunting of Elizabeth Knapp, a wild tale of potential possession and witchcraft only 20 years before the Salem Witch Trials. Then Eva decides to extend Halloween with the Trick or Treat murder, also known as the "bizarre lesbian murder scandal that rocked 1950s LA". We also may be working on a demonic sleep app... and that's why we drink!

Okay, everybody. Hi. Welcome to the tentative future for you, where I bounce around nervously because Christine isn't here. As you can tell, it's already not going hot. So what we're doing while Christina's away, she had her lovely little baby. It's on Instagram now, so we can talk about it. Her name is Leona Renee. And I'll catch you up in a second with that. But Christina officially had Leona. The baby is now more of a priority than me.

It doesn't hurt at all. And how we are going to do this while Christine is on maternity leave is for the next several episodes, I will be having people from Christine's life join me in lieu of Christine. So who knows how this is going to go. But if it's clunky, it might be funny or else, you know, we'll see. We'll see. Starting off hot because this is the person I trust the most with this show because she is basically in charge of the show all the way through behind the scenes.

We have Eva on today. Hi. Yay. Yeah. Oh, my gosh. Thank you for coming on and keeping things from being so awkward for the rest of time. Oh, listen, I can't promise not awkward, but I can promise that I'm here. So Eva is going to be here for the first month of episodes while Christine's gone.

Yeah, I have four topics I'm already researching. Got one today. Yeah. Oh my gosh, I'm already researching. Got one today. Yeah. Oh my gosh, I'm excited to be here. But yeah, definitely. I have all of my like Christina Couture Mont. I have my headband. I lit a candle.

Also in very Christine form. It's like you have been welcomed into this. Today, this is like going to be old news by the time this comes out. But as we're recording right now eva just said like oh do you do you realize that i think they found out who the zodiac killer is so wild and obvious of course christina's not here to like catch us up on like to help us like we were trying to piece it together but our like in-house expert on this is not here to tell us what we should and shouldn't remember from the last time we talked about this. So our guess is as good as yours, folks.

Yeah, it was so wild. It was like as I was hitting like join the Zoom, I was just telling my friends to throw it back to like all the way back to when we first met. I think one of the first things I said in my interview was please hire me. I'm already part of a trial crew. And you guys were like, what the fuck is a trial crew? And I was like, it's my friends. Now tell everyone else what a trial crew is. Yes.

So trial crew is a few of my friends who they, together for a long time, had been watching, listening, talking to each other about true crime. And then I joined them when I moved back to L.A. each other about true crime. And then I joined them when I moved back to LA. And as I was clicking into the zoom, I saw my trial crew group chat just like blowing up and was like, Zodiac, Zodiac, Zodiac. And I was like, Oh, we got it. We got to look at this before we were literally like moments of as it was happening. It was a it was a wake up call of like, Oh, Christina's not here. So the best people are going to get in terms of true crime recollection is going to be me and whatever you can provide, which it sounds like you are already more up there than me with being part

of a crew. So I'm glad that you're, you're here. But like when other people start coming on, like, let's say like, cause we have some family members coming on to the show in lieu of Christine.

If on that day, the Zodiac killer is here, like there's news about that, we're in trouble. Is one of the guest hosts. Actually, that would be pretty groundbreaking. No offense, Eva, but if the Zodiac Killer were to rise from the dead and be a host, I would consider having to, you know, let you go for the day. Listen, I would, I would happily defer, happily, that's not the right word, but I would defer to the Zodiac Killer. Hesitantly. Hesitantly because of the murder. I would have you have your finger on the 911 button. Correct. Correct. So, okay. So let's talk about Christine

because she's not here. That's all I've ever wanted, a podcast where I can just say whatever I want and she's not here to stop me. This is the baby news. You're already aware of some of it, yes? Yes. So I'm not going to go into detail on the actual birth experience because all I'll say is it was rough and she's good now. We're all happy, but it was not like a, Oh, the baby fell out. Like it was like a, an experience. So I will let Christine tell that story if she chooses to,

but the baby is Leona Renee. Renee was Leona's named after her father-in-law, Blaze's dad. And Renee is a combo of her best friend, Renee and Renata. So cute. Gio, for the big update that everyone, including me, I was, I thought Gio was going to try to eat this baby. Do you remember when she brought home the cats for the first time, Eva? Oh yeah. Cause I, when I first started working for you, and I think it was like one of the first times that I went to Christine's house to record with you.

It was right when she had gotten Junie, right? And Junie was just like the tiniest little nugget. And he was in a specific room because Gio was like, well, and he was also like, I mean, he loved you, Junie. He was like on your back. Super sweet. This cat, I feel like we don't talk about it enough. But this cat almost was not here because Gio was so prepared to, like not in a cute way, like wanted to violently kill this cat. And so I was nervous seeing like her bring home a human baby. I was like, what is he going to do this time?

But apparently the second that Gio's eyes met this little baby, he has been so obsessed. Christine thinks that Gio thinks they brought him a baby. Wait, that's adorable. I'll show you a picture that I said I would show you the picture on when we were on the air. Oh, I love that. Oh my gosh. So I'll send it to you. But apparently he is like, and we'll put this out for, we'll put this on our Instagram. Yeah. Just so everyone can see how precious this picture is. Okay, I just sent it to you.

He apparently sleeps under her bassinet. He, anytime she moves at all, he freaks out because he wants to make sure she's okay. What? Sorry, I have to get my phone to look at this closer. I was like on my computer. I was like I need to zoom in on this. Yeah. It's the sweetest picture. So it's Gio. He literally has

it's like right at a lady in the tramp or something. There's like these little paws sticking over a bassinet and Gio looking in and just staring her down. He's obsessed with her. When I FaceTimed Christine with the baby, Gio kept in and just staring her down. He's obsessed with her. When I FaceTimed Christine with the baby, Gio kept licking her little feet. It was very sweet. Oh my gosh. And I don't think

this dog has ever been as in love with anything than with this baby. Oh my God. I'm like going to cry a little bit. It's like so adorable. It was very unexpected for everybody. I think he and Christine was like, we don't know how this is going to go. But he's also part pit bull. And so aren't they known as like the nanny dogs? They're supposed to be super protective of kids. That's what I thought too. Yeah, that they can be very protective. So there you have it.

So anyway, that's the update on the little baby. She's also, not that we need to be talking about, you know, her body weight or anything. But fun fact, she is 7 pounds 11 ounces, 7'11". So Christine said we hope that she's going to have free Slurpees for the rest of time. If that's not a rule, it definitely should be. And that's all we know about the baby so far. Christine said that she is currently, she has not lost any sleep yet because the baby sleeps forever. But apparently after like one or two weeks, the baby starts getting a little more like it becomes more problematic to your sleep schedule after a week or so of the baby.

So that's what we know. Oh, my gosh. Adorable. I love it so much. And I love that two of us that like don't know anything about babies are like, let's talk about baby steps. I know nothing about babies. Also, like that baby looks so much like Christina blows my mind. That's like a little carbon copy of her.

Okay, so there's the baby update for everybody. Okay, so there's the baby update for everybody. And for the millionth time, Eva, I thank you so much for coming on here and, like, taking over Christine's position. Because if I had to do this by myself, I think people would realize very quickly that I'm actually not very charming. Because there would be no one to, like, have a cute back and forth with. It would just be me talking. And it would be very uncomfortable for all of us. So thank you. Oh my gosh.

Well, I appreciate it, but I also disagree. I think you're a very charming and I'm just happy to be here and help out. Eva, I pay you. So like, you can't just walk around and tell me I'm charming. I know what this is about. I know. I know what this is about. I know. Eva, would you like to hear a spooky story?

I would. I would love nothing more. And a spooky story that you don't have to edit. You can just listen. My God, what a time. What a time to be alive. Okay, so this is um a possession case and this is the story of elizabeth nap oh okay um nap with a k not nap like what i do all the time

so yes yes yeah in so this is in the 1670s, and this is in Groton, Massachusetts. I can't believe I forgot to look up the pronunciation. It's either Groton or Groton. I think Groton. Someone will tell us. Someone will certainly tell us. It was like the Massachusetts Bay Colony during Puritan times. It's 32 miles from Boston.

And I want to emphasize that this is the 1670s because it was 20 years before the Salem Witch Trials. Oh my God. So just that will be useful later. So very old. Very old, yes, yes. So the story, the reason we know about it today is because it was very well documented for its time by one of the puritan preachers in the area named reverend samuel willard got it i'm picturing him as fred willard and nothing else now you know it would be wrong if

you didn't um his the story that he wrote, so his account of it, I think I talked about this a couple episodes ago, but it's so weird to me how, like, any account from the 1600s or any, like, story or headline, they're not trying to be flowery with a short headline. They just pretty much give you a log line. That's the headline. And so the, basically a log line. That's the headline. And so the, basically

a log line for this account that he wrote was called, a brief account of a strange and unusual providence of God befallen to Elizabeth Knapp of Groton, Massachusetts in the 1670s. They were like, TLDR up front, we've got to get it out there. That's exactly what it was. It was like, are you interested or are you not they were like life expectancy is shorter we got to get this out but if life expectancy is shorter then that should have literally been one fucking word and you just that's true you could see it from different there's different perspectives on that it's a good point uh so he went on he ended up uh after this account with the longest headline ever he ended up sending it to his friend,

another Puritan minister, Cotton Mather. Oh, I know that name, but I forget why. Same here. You'd think I would have looked that up. Isn't he, he was involved in the witch trials? I think so, right? Maybe that's why. I think that's why too.

I think that feels correct to me. What was he famous for? Pamphlets? One of the most, we are on the same Google documents because it says he's known for pamphlets. Oh, really? Yes. I just guessed.

I didn't look it up. Oh, you're a psychic. Hang on. It literally is like he is a Puritan minister and an author of pamphlets. Just knew. Whatever. I mean, you apparently, your heart knows more than I do with my own amount of knowledge. So, so we sent, he sent the notes over to Cotton Mather, who then later published the account a separate time, which I think is when it got really popular and people really heard about

the story. So the reason that Reverend Samuel slash Fred Willard was able to document this case is because the person that was possessed is one of his own servants. Oh, twist. I know. Oh, Freddie.

Love it. So her name is Elizabeth. She was 16 years old and she's so uh she was babe she's a little babe and fred willard slash samuel willard documented her case from october 30th 1671 to january 12th 1672 so it's only three months is, two and a half months of note-taking. And things officially, I'm pretty sure, started at Elizabeth Knapp's home. And I say I'm pretty sure because there were some versions of the story that made it seem like everything happened under his roof when she was working for him. But she did go home at night um she didn't live there so a few versions i saw

were that she is having most of the stuff happen in her own home and because he happened to know her since she worked for him but he was a preacher is why he was involved in this instead if that makes sense got it were they like like did she live on his property or did they live they lived separately she lived with her parents so i don't actually know the the distance of like the walk between the houses but it sounds like she had her own property she was going home to her got it got it he i guess was just writing everything down he was like this could be useful one day and uh podcast for a podcast you know he he was a sharp one back in the 1670s he uh the first uh event i guess that

he wrote down was like i said october 30th the day before halloween and uh she was sitting by the fire and out of nowhere she has a quote violent fit. Get ready to hear that phrase a lot because that's just all over the place. So she has this violent fit. She's screaming that her leg hurts and then her chest hurts. And as these body parts are hurting, she's grabbing them and like kind of thrashing around. And then she grabs her own throat and she says that she's being strangled. Oh, geez. So zero to 60.

Yeah. I don't love that it feels like it's moving throughout her body too, you know, like spreading. I hadn't even thought about that. Yeah. Feels scary. It feels like the opposite of like, you know, those like, like headspace, like go to sleep type things where they're like, imagine your body slowly falling asleep from your toes to your ankles to your find me on asmr.com instead of the gravity blanket starting at your toes and working up to your

shoulders imagine it's a demonic hand strangling you from beyond that's the spooky headspace of going to sleep it's like can you imagine a ghost clawing your body all the way up? Okay, but that is something I would at least listen to while I'm not trying to go to sleep, just out of curiosity. Oh my gosh, do we get a TM in this episode? A TMTM? No one to take that? We're going to do it? Sure, TMTM.

If your headspace or Calm or any of those apps and you want a complete opposite version of what you do as a Halloween special, we'll narrate it. So her eyes apparently also roll back into her head and she, I think, passes out. I think she like collapses. Oh, no. Even creepier. And one of the versions I read is when she came to she's now laughing oh giggling oh i don't love that and then she falls back asleep so like she only comes to just to giggle and then and then falls back away oh that's way worse i mean i guess it's kind of

like if you have like a sleep type. No, no, you're right. You're right. Let's not rationalize it. It's terrifying. I appreciate what you're trying to do, but it's wrong. So incorrect. It's terror. It is pure terror. So interesting enough, one of the things that freaks me out the most about Allison when she sleeps is that there are times where she will wake up out of nowhere just like have a quick interaction and then fall back asleep but it's always the it's like it's very sweet I think it could also be demonic I'm unsure it feels demonic when it's happening but in hindsight it's cute that I think she thinks it's not the middle of the night and like she like fell asleep watching a TV show or something.

Oh, interesting. Because she like, she clearly wakes up to like try to prove to me that she's still awake. Like no one's asking for her to be awake. But she, with not opening her eyes and checking the environment first that it like, it's pitch black, we're in the clear, you can be asleep. She'll all of a sudden try to sound like she is not sleeping oh it's very jarring because out of nowhere I'll be like lying next to her in bed and I'm just like on my phone minding my own business and all of a sudden I'll just hear hello oh that's no at first I was like oh that's cute because she clearly like wants to be with you and present with you

so much that she's trying to be like hi I'm still here but also to hear that in the dead the pitch black dead of night no thank you it's the worst it's the worst she really is like it's clear that she's trying to like prove like I'm awake and it's like you just outed yourself about not being awake because no one was talking to you and there are also times where like you could continually catch her in this because she'll just go, hi. And I'll look at her and go, hi, are you having a good dream right now? And she goes, yes, I am. It's like, okay. She's like, bye.

It's like you painted yourself into a corner here. Everyone knows you're actually asleep. Go back to bed. Does she ever remember that in the morning? No, she does not believe me. But it happens so rarely that it's not like I can film it and guarantee every night it's going to happen. But it's like almost like a sleepwalking, but with only her mouth,

like just sleep talking. Only her mouth sleepwalking. You know what I mean? Like it's not actually sleep talking where I get a full conversation out of her, but it's just like bursts of a conversation. And I'm just like, whoa, we were not doing that. Yeah, the energy of it is very like, bleh. It's very jarring when it's pitch black and you just hear, hello.

It's very awful. No, I would pee in the bed. Yeah, yeah. So a thousand percent. So anyway, so this girl, much like Allison, is just kind of like waking up to like laugh in your face and then go back to sleep. Also, if you are dating anyone that does that, my condolences.

She might also be possessed. So get ready. Just go through your options. There are a couple different things that might be happening. The next day after she like has this like convulsion and says that she's like being grabbed and stuff. convulsion and says that she's like being grabbed and stuff. Uh, the next day she is apparently acting super weird and her family's like trying to read her behavior,

but they're not totally sure what's going on. She goes down to the cellar and for some reason they hear her scream. She sprints upstairs and she says that she saw two men down there. Oh no. I like that less. I think than the laughing two men in a dark basement hmm i don't know how to compare them in my head but i hate both i'm correct yes they're correctly terrible they neither are what i want to watch um certainly not well so apparently the

family goes down to the basement and they try to see what it was and they see nobody there so this is like apparently the first version of her hallucinating or the first account of her hallucinating i saw from only one source that there was another time she hallucinated that one of these men was floating over her bed while she was sleeping while she was laughing i don't know actually i i feel like that's not a laughing matter but that's how you know there's a real problem if she was enjoying what was happening yeah yeah she was giggling to it um soon eventually these quote violent fits are like happening all the fizzucking time she's thrashing around and she's screaming which uh what reverend willard says her screams represented quote a dark semblance of

hellish torture oh so i guess she's screaming pretty awfully um and they were some of the things that she was screaming allegedly like were like made no sense apparently she would scream out like money or she would scream out sin and like it was like weird words which we'll talk about more in a little bit but as she's like screaming about her legs she's just like shouting out words like that question yeah do you think at the time she was just trying to prove that she was awake because those were words like sit like i feel like sin was thrown around a lot back there she's just like hi i'm here sin yeah you're talking about that that you know what actually that's a very like allison thing of like i'm trying to prove i am here so uh hmm puritan culture what were we talking about sin you know

i'm here it's like i have not left the conversation i'm still here uh during some of these fits apparently here's where she this differs she was so unnaturally strong that apparently three to four people couldn't hold her down oh okay yeah no now she's more than a part of the conversation she is the conversation she is part of you nailed it she's she is the log line now they're like oh no we were talking about general sin but now we're talking about your sin lol we were we were talking about like our groceries but like yeah we can talk about you so one of the times selfish of her honestly that's the sin you know um so one of the times that she was convulsing like this,

she seemingly was like throwing herself closer and closer to the fireplace as she was like, her body was twisting. It seemed like it was an intentional moving closer and closer to the fire and her parents had to like pull her away from hurting herself. Ooh. Okay. That's yeah. Taking a turn. That's awful. And, uh,

in either during her, like whatever these violent fits are or immediately after she is more frequently starting to laugh. And sometimes the laugh turns into hysterics where she like, can't even get off the floor. Oh, geez. Super creepy. So, uh, only three days later by the way that's it's really escalated very fast only three days later uh reverend willard hears about this and uh he i guess in one version i saw that like the dad had

gone to his house and said like oh she's sick and she's not going to come in for a while. And so then he came to check on her in a different version. I saw that like he knew earlier that it was like some sort of like I don't know if he thought it was a possession or I don't know what the deal is. But he found out in a different location and came to check on her um i guess to see if he could like pray over her or something and this is where elizabeth knapp she tells him by the way remember this is her boss and also the town preacher kind of like a man of authority here so like be careful with your words she says for the last three years she has been having run-ins with the devil. Oh,

okay. Three years, three years. Wow. And I guess he had, the devil had approached her in many forms. He, she had seen him as a little boy.

She'd seen him as a grown man. She had seen him as a black dog with its eyes on its back. Oh, on its back. Oh no. that's like hmm I don't know how to feel like if if Christine were here she'd go I don't love that no I don't either it almost reminds me of like one of the most like like I don't I love like the hocus pocus and like I don't get too too scary in terms of scary movies but one time I watched Pan's Labyrinth Pan's Labyrinth no the one in the

eyes the hands the hands got me like I still to this day will wake up that and twin certain scenes of Twin Peaks like there are certain things that just stuck it you know the things that stick in your mind and you're like I just sometimes will see the hand eyes and I'm like I can't Pan's Labyrinth eyes also really got me. It blew my mind the first time I ever saw it. Okay so anyway wow we have really where were we? The dog. Oh the dog. The black dog with eyes on his back. Which by the way does that mean like shoulders this way or his back like up to the sun? Like where are his eyes pointing? Oh yeah where the ew or like a fish that has him off to the side. Is that what you're saying? Yeah, like, I don't know.

It's all Ben. Wow. Look, I was worried we wouldn't find tangents, and I forgot I was hanging out with the person that I, like, have the most tangents with. Okay. So to catch everyone up, so not Fred Willard. You fucked me up on this.

Sam Willard, Samuel Willard, he decides that he's going to visit. She says she's had a run-in with the devil and he keeps showing up in multiple forms, including that creepy dog. Apparently the devil kept coming to her over these years, offering her, quote, money, youth, ease of labor, and the ability to see the world.

Oh, those are so specific. And yeah, I mean, I would want all of labor, and the ability to see the world. Oh, those are so like specific. And yeah, I mean, I would want all of those, I guess. It feels like someone offering me a timeshare, like try to sell me like a slot, you know, in the Bahamas. The devil's timeshare is just like... The devil's timeshare, there it is. So in return, if he were to give her all these things, what is expected of her for the devil?

Okay. She would be making a pact with him, and she would make it official, this deal, by signing in blood in a book that he showed her that apparently had other previous women's names in it. Okay. So it was this book that apparently other people had already made a deal. Their names were signed in blood.

She, too, should sign and make a deal with the devil. Elizabeth Knapp said that she wouldn't make the deal with the devil, but he kept coming back. And that's why she had seen him so many times in the last couple of years. Cause he keeps trying to convince her. It's he's like one of those door to door salesmen or something, but he it's, can you imagine being the devil and like a woman's just like no and like for three for three years you just keep like

like bombarding her it's the one that got away honestly that makes it so much more romantic i mean it's a little romance with the devil but i was also thinking too what was i just thinking that like in terms of like because i was waiting for like oh yeah and if you sign your name what do you have to give it is funny that like just the act of signing it is so scary I wonder if that was like a Puritan culture thing of like even just the idea of making a deal with the devil and like possibly having something to it's probably what maybe it's the thing of like you would have to give something at a later date that you don't know about right right maybe but like also in puritan culture they were like super religious right so i imagine if anything if the fact that she's even talking to the devil was like enough

she was like i'm out yeah get your letter apparently yeah well apparently she felt so tempted she never signed the contract but she did feel tempted and i guess after a while of him being around her he was starting to like lure her in and eventually she admitted she was even coming home late from work so that her and the devil could walk around with each other at night oh wait that's romantic again this feels a little like they're about to kiss are we about to kiss right now oh my god what's happening she said that her encounters with the devil were usually more sporadic but in the last few days when she's been having all these violent fits she was now seeing him in every room so he thinking more on

like this like salesman tactic i feel like he had a quota he needed to hit and he's now come into the house every day like hello your cars extend he needed to hit and he's now come into the house every day. Like, hello, your car's extended warranty. Are you kidding me? He's like the higher ups are breathing down my neck. Who would the devil's higher up be? She also said, uh, the devil had been tempting her not only into like hanging out with him and like, you know, just become pals, I guess. The devil had also tempted her to kill her

parents and her neighbors oh god and the willard's children when she was working there and drown herself in the well oh my god so many things that's not ease of labor devil that you know he is tricky he's tricky going back on his word i guess sneaky sneaky devil so what one time he even sorry christine earmuffs i don't know if you're ready for this he the devil told her to throw reverend willard's baby in the fire oh no um quote in the fire on the hearth and into the oven oh levels of fire i guess that makes sense the devil and how he's like fire as long as there's flames i'm happy i guess is the devil um and then he even tried to convince her to kill the reverend in his sleep while she was there which like at what point was i don't i guess she was a servant so maybe he'd like go to bed and she would still be working. But one version of him trying to get her to kill the reverend,

one version even said that she was in a trance about to actually kill the reverend, but she didn't know what she was doing. And luckily the reverend actually hadn't gone to bed yet, so he ran into her on the stairs and woke her up. And she had a hook in her hand oh a hook ready to kill him and she apparently he didn't know that there was a hook in her hand like the devil was still with her enough that he like hid the hook when he showed up so she later admitted like oh i had a hook with me you just didn't see it oh shit um she also said that anytime

she was laughing really creepily or um if when she was having those like violent fits if people asked about them she would kind of like neglect to answer and she was saying that the reasons this was happening is because the the devil was trying to cover up his visits so she would just like out of nowhere start laughing just to like redirect attention to the fact that the devil had been there oh my god literally trying to come back into the conversation from like something i mean not sleep maybe maybe possession you were onto something though because Very true. She was just like, ha ha ha. Anyway. Hi. Hi. Hello. Help me. So I guess after Reverend Willard heard about all this, he was like, OK, so we should get a bunch of preachers in here and maybe help you pray. And Cal Suprise, nothing helped. So when Reverend Willard tried to pray with her, apparently she was either completely silent or she would still shout things like money, because apparently to answer the question of why these were the things that the devil had promised her.

So, OK, it was almost like I guess the devil was screaming to her. Like, don't forget, like if you stay like don't let these prayers, you know, sway you over to the other side. Like, stay with me because you'll have money and you'll have all these other great things. Interesting. It also makes me think, too, that, like, money does, like, can sometimes lead to ease of labor. So maybe it was, like, it started with money where he was, like, you'll get all these things because you won't be a servant anymore. You'll have money. You could do these things.

Yeah. That's the great point, actually. Eventually, the reverend's also like, let's get a doctor in here just in case. I mean, smart. Yeah. So I do want to say, let's remember what's interesting about this case before the Salem witch trials is that this is being handled kind of more scientifically and logically than the witch trials are only 20 years later where he is like, okay, let's get a bunch of priests in here. Let's get doctors in here. Let's take notes of everything that's going on.

It's very different than what happens only 20 years later. So that's a really good point because like, wasn't a lot of this kind of thing, like a reason to kill women and people that were like outside the norm then during the witch trials? It was much more like blind accusation based. Yeah. Yeah. So when the doctor came to examine her, his best guess was that she had foul fumes in her stomach that were rising through her body and going to

her brain oh my god foul fumes imagine if your little belly fumes were hitting you in the brain so hard that you're possessed by the devil like it's oh i'm sure that you're imagining you know i'm trying to think of like what would cause like what's the there's like a joke yeah i was like what's the one there's somewhere someone in there Yeah, I was like, what's the one? There's somewhere, someone in there. There's a joke in there. Yeah, it's either Chipotle or Taco Bell every time. Or the Subway tuna that's not tuna that we all ate on tour.

We were really brave a few times on tour. I, there, I sometimes think about, like, why on earth did I go to a gas station and get tuna sandwiches? What was, what was I hoping would happen? We felt invincible. We really did. Oh, poor Eva and I, we really bonded over.

When did we get sick? We ate the Philly cheesesteaks. Yeah. And to be fair to anyone in Philly, it was not like one of the like main places that suggested to you. We were like near, we were near the venue and we were like, we just,

on principle, we want a Philly cheesesteak. Let just go to the next place because he that offers one and you and i look i was nervous that i wasn't gonna be able to make it on stage because we ate that like what two hours before we were gonna perform what we were so stupid it was pretty yeah and i realized there was i feel like there was a moment i can't remember when it was but i feel like there was one specific moment I remember where we like locked eyes and we were like did that rock your fucking body because it did to mine Eva I remember we looked at each other I had that you're right in that oh no I can tell you from my perspective I was also in that moment with you. I remember we looked at each other and I was like, we don't have to, we don't even have to get into detail.

We know what happened. We both know what happened. It was not good. Oh, God, the bathroom drama. The end. I'm still willing to have more Philly cheesesteaks, but certainly not from there. No, no. So, hmm, how do we get back to where we were wow that one yeah that one the segue back is just gonna be real difficult for you oh yeah fumes from the

stomach that's what it was indeed that also fucked up my brain and for all you know i was laughing nervously just like she was so listen we had the devil in us and we had to go through a lot to get it out. Is it too graphic? We can cut that out. We don't have to. It's the truth. I don't want to be ashamed of my truth. So she had fumes

to her stomach, period. That's how we could have ended this and we just chose not to. I can't relate. So Elizabeth Knapp was sent home for a while, which like,

first of all, can you blame her? Can you blame the doctor? If the doctor's like, my best guess is she has an upset stomach, but like, this is kind of wild what's going on.

Just send her home. Yeah, get out of here. Don't lay down. Yeah, so she went back to her parents' house, got some nice PTO, I guess, and her symptoms continued. She kept getting into violent fits. I guess for a while there were less and less of them, but they were still pretty violent when they did show up.

And with one of the fits she was forced into silence she started saying using this a lot in her storyline that she was forced into silence where like the devil it who was inside of her it felt as if her tongue was like tied up and like couldn't actually move so she couldn't speak oh gosh that's so scary during another violent fit six people couldn't hold her down oh god i think at this point the doctor was like i don't know man like i don't know what's going on just you know good luck um and there were days where she quote barked like a dog or bleeded like a calf. Bleeded I didn't know was a word. And there was one violent fit that lasted 48 hours. Oh geez like like physical fit like she

was like. Yeah talk about exhausting. Wow Jesus yeah imagine waking up after that you'd have the worst hangover ever. Also like shout out to anyone who like genuinely has to deal with like having convulsions or something I can't they're like only I don't know much about them but they only last a certain amount of time and you're exhausted afterwards like a 48 hour one I think would feel like it's gonna kill you yeah I remember there was a listener story a few listeners episodes ago that I just it I feel like I picked it because like my I felt so bad for this patient too, that was like having different seizures and things. And, you know, I feel like there was like a lot of that. That's really, really painful and hard. One of my childhood best friends,

she has seizures and it's, I can't, it just sounds really awful. So um sorry if this is making any of those people feel sensitive yeah yeah uh after this time uh reverend willard after she's had some time off and it seems like the violent fits are like dying down um reverend willer asks elizabeth knapp for more information is like okay like are you willing to talk more about the devil like give us more intel and she says that the devil had done everything to try and convince her to sign a pact with him and he even once climbed down the chimney and sat on her chest pitching his case oh like just like do you i just imagine he's like crisscross applesauce on her chest it was like so anyway here is my powerpoint and we going to go slide by slide while you should join me.

Hey, Bessie. Hey. So later that day, as she's telling Reverend Willard this, Elizabeth Knapp has another violent fit. And she said that the reason she's having this particular fit is because there's a witch outside trying to come into the house. Oh, which is interesting, like being so soon up on the witch trials, like, that that was already in the ether. The zeitgeist or whatever. Yeah, yeah. So apparently this witch looked like a dog with a woman's head.

A dog with a woman's head, okay. Which is interesting, because the last one was a dog with eyes on its back. I was just saying, and she was barking like a dog, too. Yeah, so it feels like it just keeps showing up as a weird dog um and nobody else apparently saw this creature but they did say later when she said like oh the witch is trying to come inside she'll probably come through the chimney like the devil does they did see a weird animal paw print in the fireplace later so that was their way of being like okay that's valid i guess yeah um and she said that the witch had uh already been attacking the fireplace and bewitching her and uh but once she once this witch had finally been apprehended by other people it

would all stop and she wouldn't have to worry about the devil being inside of her okay wait sorry so once the witch is apprehended then the devil would leave her alone i feel like in so i feel like what she's saying is the devil is inside of her and the a witch or someone who had already signed the pact and was working with the devil was helping bewitch her. Oh, got it, got it, got it. I don't totally understand. I don't totally understand. The witch was a horcrux.

She had to get rid of the witch. Then she'd be fine. It sounds like once you make a deal with the devil, then you can practice witchcraft yourself. And maybe the devil who was inside of her was having other minions of his like help him go into these violent fits or something i'm unsure gotcha but she said because of this witch and you're gonna understand why this is kind of confusing in a second once so she said like oh once you find this witch she's trying to climb down. She's trying to get into the house. Once you stop her, then I will not have as many violent fits anymore.

Got it. So the, so Reverend Willard says, okay, who's the witch? Let's go get her. And Elizabeth Knapp tells him that it's a woman in town. We don't know her name to this day because Reverend Willard knew the woman she was talking about and said, I don't believe it. She's not a witch.

And then went so far in defending her as to like, keep her name out of any of his notes. So that she would never get like accused of witchcraft again. Wow. That's so interesting. It's the exact opposite of the Salem witch trials. It's only 20 years before that. Like all you have to do is say she's a witch and people were getting executed. Wow.

In this story, she was like, she's a witch. She's part of the reason I'm like this. And the reverend was like, no, next. Oh, my God. Thank you, next. Yeah. So that's kind of one of the reasons why it's so confusing, because all of a sudden she's talking about a witch,

and it just kind of feels like she just came up with this story out of nowhere. Huh. So what's interesting, it's like almost two, instead of attacking this random woman who's been accused as a witch and sending her to jail or executing her or whatever, he finds this woman and then brings her into the house with elizabeth knapp oh and then makes them like have a heart to heart oh my god hey bestie again it's like a little too full housey for me wow that's so interesting and apparently so there's some versions of the story where this

happened twice where there were two different women she accused, and the reverend had to bring them in to help Elizabeth Knapp recant her accusation. Wow. But so they end up having a one-on-one, and eventually Elizabeth Knapp is like, no, never mind. She's not a witch. Oh, she's like, I like her now, and hopefully she's okay. We cleared the air. We cleared the air. We cleared the air. So a few days later, Elizabeth Knapp has a new confession.

So that she actually did sign the devil's book. And had been lying the whole time. Oh no. Was it like that she was manipulated or she like wanted to do it or what did she? So the, so one day she saw a man in a meadow walking towards her who i guess is the devil okay um he showed her the book i guess for like the thousandth time and finally convinced her to sign it and she said she didn't know how to write so she couldn't sign the book but he said oh well let me get your blood and dip the pen in that, and then I'll direct your hand for you.

So he guided her signature. Jeez. Apparently, when she signed the pact, it was for seven years, one year of her being faithful for six years of him serving her, with, like, money and youth and all this. But for that one year to be faithful to him, she would have to be a witch. Oh, okay.

She did not want to be a witch. Oh, okay. Okay. She did not want to be a witch, but he showed her hell during this conversation and said, if you are not faithful to me, you will go here. Oh, yikes. Okay. Also an interesting time to mention that Elizabeth Knapp,

uh, then has sex with the devil. Okay. Also her hesitancy to practice witchcraft is apparently why he keeps tormenting her. So even though she had signed the book, the reason that he keeps showing up is because she won't actually do what she's supposed to do in this deal. She admitted that the devil would appear most often when she was unhappy with her life and when work got overwhelming, which like, sure, I feel like we've all had a rough day and we're like, oh, just take me now. Yeah. So during these times, she would feel a very strong pull to practice witchcraft when she was like overwhelmed at work, which like I feel like is a lot of people these days, but in a open liberal setting right like i'm gonna go get some crystals and a candle and yep i'm gonna you know do my little rituals get all the bad energy out of here uh she after she admits to all of this

that she's actually does have a pact with the devil she then goes into more violent fits she's forced into silence again and this time she's now spitting and scratching and laughing if she successfully hurts anyone. Oh, Jesus. Okay. Also, during these violent fits was now being silent again. And her head seemed to be forcibly shaken no when asked if she would repent for her sins. Oh, geez. Yeah, that's very, I feel like, yeah, Puritan-y puritan-y witch trially like very visual of that

time very visual like her body was like twisting and it seemed like it wasn't up to her kind of like yeah classic possession imagery too bingo bingo so this next part i think i don't know where it happened it could have happened at her parents house or could have happened at the Willard's house I feel like I saw two different accounts of that um but although she couldn't speak uh she's in a violent fit and the devil quote began drawing her tongue out of her mouth most most frightfully to an extraordinary length. And then vocally in her, he railed calling these people rogues and charging them for folly and going to hear a black rogue who told them nothing but a parcel of lies.

So, so he's like calling out her parents or whoever is next to her saying that they're the black rogue here is the is the preacher, I guess, because he was wearing black. Oh, OK. And so they charging them for folly for listening to the preacher who's telling them nothing but lies. OK, but like his voice so her tongue was it's like a classic a classic demonic situation where like it's a voice coming out of her body but she's not speaking it and she's not moved like her mouth isn't moving got it yeah i think yeah her tongue was like hanging out which like also goes to prove the like she

wasn't saying these things like because her yeah tongue would be needed right she physically couldn't yeah right so um hearing all of this reverend willard is basically talking back to this creature and uh says that he can hear animal growls coming from her the voice was really deep and hollow her lips were not moving so like this was not her and he knew he was talking to the devil so he responds to this voice by saying uh or no he doesn't respond yet the uh when he hears about this and rushes in to be like who was talking in that voice i guess elizabeth knapp slash the devil looks at him and goes, oh, you are a great rogue. And I'm not sure what rogue means.

Rogue. Rogue. With an A, which is weird too. Oh, with an A. Maybe that's like a British spelling. I only know from Rogue One, which was one of my favorite new Star Wars movies. But I feel like that one is like about like someone who goes against the

door. Like gone rogue. Yes. Like, right. Yeah. Like gone out of. Yeah. Well, because I, but I feel like that one is, like, about, like, someone who goes against the door. Like, gone rogue. Yes, like, right, yeah, like, gone out of, yeah. Well, because I, so, I don't know what rogue means, because all I I just looked it up, um, I just looked it up a second time, too, while I'm with you, and the definition hasn't changed in 24 hours,

by the way. Got it, got it. But it just means, like, a vagrant or a, oh, a dishonest person, so maybe that's what it means, like a liar. But whatever. He keeps calling them rogues. So he sees Reverend Willard goes, oh, you are a great rogue. And Willard, now talking to the devil, replies, I observed not of her organs to move.

The voice is hollow as if it issued out of her mouth. And he then again called me a great black rogue and i challenged him to make it appear but all to like to show himself oh gotcha um but all that the devil replied with was you tell the people a company of lies and so reverend willard said satan thou thou art a liar and a deceiver, and God will vindicate his own truth one day. And the devil says, I don't know what this means, everybody. I don't know what this means. The devil said, I am not Satan. I am a pretty black boy.

And this is my pretty girl. And I've been here a great while. Oh. Oh. Oh. That. i don't know what that means and i hate it because i don't know what it means yeah it seems like problematic and maybe like really loaded in terms of i mean a lot of different things yes um i don't know what it means i kept thinking uh like black was like because he kept calling him a black rogue and that it was like about his clothing. But I don't know why the devil would call himself a pretty black boy. I don't know what it means.

And I hate it. Yeah. I mean, I mean, it did, you did say, didn't you say earlier that the devil had shown himself to Elizabeth as like,

he was showing up as like men, but also as a boy, a black dog and a black dog. But I don't know. I don't know what the race of the boy looked like. I have no idea. So he was just basically saying, I'm not Satan. And this is my pretty little girl. And we've been here a great while. Yikes. Okay. The devil then says to Reverend Willard, Oh, you black rogue. I do not love you. Which like, ow.

Yeah. Thanks so much. It's like, I got the hint, but you don't have to say it. I already knew, but like, you don't have to spell it out for me.

And Reverend Willard says, I hate you. It's like, this feels like, this feels like a sandbox conversation with someone who stole my toy. Yeah. We went from like a sleepover earlier to now this is like a recess fight yeah i and maybe there was racism in there i'm not sure um like and so he says well i hate you and the devil says well you better love me it's like this

i'm reading the room and it feels toxic yeah this is not great willard asks uh everyone in the house to pray over elizabeth during this and the devil says hold your tongue hold your tongue get you gone you black rogue what are you going to do my god this sounds like a play do you want to reenact it no i'm kidding i no no um after they prayed um other people started like talking with the reverend like other people started talking at elizabeth knapp slash the devil um as they prayed they would say like god has you in chains and then the devil said for all my chain i can knock thee on the head when i please as i'm like it's like okay maybe i'm in chains but i'll still like beat you up it felt really yeah cheap cheap shot. Yeah.

And they kept saying God's stronger than you. He would say I'm stronger than God. And eventually Elizabeth Knapp, she, after this whole experience, we just don't really hear how it ended. I'm assuming she just kind of collapsed and they prayed over here. Later on, she explains that the devil originally had possessed her by coming into her bed at one night when she was like getting ready for bed and just like jumped into her mouth and she'd stayed there ever since oh i hate that i feel like that's something that like you know like when you're about to fall asleep and i feel like sometimes maybe i'm about to like not have this be like oh hey everyone does this but i feel like sometimes like the like as you're falling asleep and some like really scary things that you might think about that come through.

I feel like sometimes I'm like, did a ghost just like jump into my mouth or like did like, you know, like something like that. I'm like a cat with spiders. Oh, fair. Like I'm also you have cats. I would always be scared if my mouth was open that all of a sudden I just wake up with like a cat face in my mouth, you know? Oh, listen, Shadow does like to curl up like right here and I'll wake up sometimes and he'll just like paw my little face.

Okay. That's precious that he's petting you versus like, I imagine my mouth would be the opening of like a glass of water. And you know how cats just kind of like completely face dive into that. I'm afraid that my mouth would have that experience with a cat and i would just feel whiskers hitting my lips so apparently so she tells after this whole experience is like yeah so that's how he got into my mouth you know just stayed in my body and several more ministers try to pray over her but it doesn't work at the same time there's more violent fits and the devil's voice is being heard

and like silencing her again. But these fade in severity and frequency. And so we're starting to think it might be because she was being prayed over during that one really wild fit where the devil is speaking through her. And Nap does seem to go back into a fit with strangers whenever they visit or if people try to come and pray over her.

But other than that, the experiences kind of just fade off. They only stick around when someone new is in town. Which, like, okay, I get it. Social anxiety. Yeah. Yeah. And after this, she has, like, a bout of bout of like not talking to anyone for a while probably because she's processing yeah sure and she later has one final confession oh that she lied again

and she never signed a pact with the devil oh wait so she never did so she's throwing us all around she was like originally she said she didn't then she said she did then now she's throwing us all around she's like originally she said she didn't then she said she did then now she's saying she didn't it's very confusing but her story just keeps changing and uh she did claim that the devil was possessing her okay but she never signed a pact with him so the whole guiding the hand with blood never happened. Question. Do you think maybe at the end they were like, oh shit, this was ink, not blood. Right. They should have just, if only they had DNA

forensics at the time. Yeah. It's like, no, your blood is made of ink. So not legally binding. Right. Yeah. So she didn't, she did claim the devil was still possessing her and was in fact controlling her speaking but she never signed the pact

she did take back that the devil got inside of her through her mouth when she was trying to go to sleep but one thing she did not take back and admitted to was that she still had a pull to murder the Willard's family oh okay

plot twist hey still hate you that she still had a pull to murder the Willard's family. Oh, okay. Yikes. Plot twist. Yes. Hey, still hate you. Can you imagine if you're the Willards and you're like, what the fuck? I have done so much lately for you. So the last event in Reverend Willard's notes is another random fit that Elizabeth Knapp was in the middle of,

but there was nothing that Reverend Willard could do which by the way why is he still trying at this point like you just found out she still wants to murder your family like despite the devil being there or not I mean maybe not to get murdered okay fair enough fair enough or maybe he thought she could do it you know or maybe he thought that like the devil like that was actually the devil talking and it was a trick and like he didn't want to like he didn't want to turn on her that's a good point too yeah so he says uh in his last little note he says i shall suspend my own judgment and willingly leave it to the center of those that are more learned aged and judicious so he's basically like

i this is above my pay grade you figure it out someone else i pass i bequeath this to someone else yes and so when questioning if she was really possessed he stated publicly that he was not sure if this was true or not but he leans towards yes because of her insane strength the fact that he was able to like the fact that she was not speaking and yet speaking a completely wild voice yeah and another one of the reasons that he like is pro she was possessed is because of her like nasty attitude towards him which like okay that could also be that she's 16 and your employee but okay yeah um but he used that as he was like but she was never mean to me other than when she was possessed like she was a wonderful person besides when she was

possessed um the argument could be well she wasn't possessed and using that as an excuse to be an asshole like right yeah sure um that being said he does think the amount of times that she waffled on her story and kept contradicting herself is very odd yeah and he seems what's interesting about this versus the Salem witch trials is that he did seem more like he's prioritizing whether or not she was working with the devil with uh because she consented to that or was the devil manipulating her into this and and then in which case is she guilty or not because if it's something that she's being coerced into it's not her fault right so like that could have been a great stance during the witch trials of like oh well maybe she's practicing witchcraft against her will or like there was like at least some

sort of benefit of the doubt that he was trying to give her yeah that's interesting that that happened that that idea was there even before the witch trials but doesn't i mean not that i know of i and i don't know a ton but like i wonder if that it seems like that wasn't really taken into account later when people it was like it had clearly the notion had existed before so why did we just throw that out the window well i was also oh sorry go ahead no no no go for it go for it oh i was just curious because i was also thinking too in terms of like her story changing if like it sounds like it was such an interest interesting what a word probably like such a like a loaded time period of like you know the witch trials about to start and like obviously puritan culture being really strict like i wonder if she was kind of

going back and forth between like what would get her in trouble and what like was maybe like interesting felt like was coming down the line of like i mean who who's to say like what they would know or feel like but i wonder if maybe at some point she was like oh fuck these people are gonna start killing people soon or you know who knows or something maybe she was like trying to like get a good gauge of the room of like, are we killing people with this? Right. Like I need help, but also like maybe if I, maybe they're not going to help me.

It's like, I'm not feeling good, but also are you about to make it worse? Yeah. Well, so yeah. So these are all great points. And that's one of the reasons that this story is so interesting is that it

happened 20 years before people just like were blindly executing people on a whim for maybe or maybe not being a witch but he on the other hand didn't immediately jump to her being a witch or even practicing witchcraft and he was like he had so much hope that she was just like a good puritan who like was in trouble yeah um and he also him keeping a log he was able to look back on the event. So there was actually some sort of documentation of what was going around versus just randomly accusing people. Um, and he was, remember discrediting the random accusations of other women being witches without having any proof, which is the exact opposite of how the witch trials go. And 20 years later,

fun fact, uh, character development 20 years later during Salem, during the Salem witch trials go and 20 years later fun fact uh character development 20 years later during Salem during the Salem witch trials Willard himself went on to discredit even more women of being accused of witchcraft so he saved some lives oh what a I mean yeah that's great I mean you don't hear like I feel like you don't hear those like kind of uplifting stories. How often do you hear of a white man, let alone in the Puritan culture, who is a reverend saving lives. So he, he was criticized or he was one of the first people to criticize the Salem witch trials.

And he said that the trials were not fair or legal and that quote, supernatural matters shouldn't be held in a courtroom. Wow. And of course, because it was the witch trials and if anyone criticized it at all they were also accused of witchcraft so he had to deal with that whole thing of almost dying like people accused him of being a witch too they were like well clearly you're a witch since you're like not for the witch trials oh god so um similar to sam this it was similar to the salem witch

trials though and that this was a young woman interacting with, quote, a source of evil, which often presented itself in behavioral changes. Okay. But it differed in that this devil literally possessed her, and yet she was still not accused of witchcraft. Like, so much worse than what some of the other people were getting accused of. And with more proof, and she still wasn't getting put on trial. Yeah. So here are the reasons why we think this is happening. So for Puritans at the time, possession actually, this is only 20 years earlier.

But for Puritans at the time, possession was not seen as being guilty of witchcraft. It was just you're afflicted and this could lead to the potential of you being a witch. Do you know what else? I wonder too, that made me think too, because like, you know, growing up super Christian, I feel like I was always told

kind of like, you know, weird things here and there of like, you know, oh, the devil will attack you if you're like the best, not like the best, they wouldn't put it like that. But like, if you're so close with God, of course, like the devil's

going to attack you specifically. He's going gonna get his strongest warriors or something right exactly so i wonder if it was like some um almost like a weird badge of honor to be like look i'm so christian i got possessed yo i didn't keep this note in because it didn't make sense and now you're saying that and it makes total sense but cotton mather later even said yikes later said that like it was flattering that the devil was so desperate to get her because that's it because she was like one of the good ones i guess and like if he could take her down he could take everyone down i mean again not to say that like the christianity i grew up in is any you, who knows how what survived from the different versions of Christianity throughout the times. But I just remember hearing that as a kid.

And like, it makes so much sense. That actually really makes a lot of sense with that quote now. And so also at the time, because it wasn't considered witchcraft to be possessed, it was just like a really scary things. You're so close to potentially being a witch. Right. It was religious leaders in the town's responsibility to help you out of your possession so you didn't become a witch. Got it.

So I think that's interesting because 20 years later, the Salem Witch Trials, it's like if anyone was possessed, they would have just been like, oh, off you go. Like, I guess we're going to execute you versus like, Oh, it's my job spiritually to take you out of this. So you are not, you don't become a witch. Right. It's literally what you see on like every nuts out myself is like watching all of the reality TV, but you know,

like in all of those, like, you know, the, the ones where you're like, people are on teams or whatever, like Top Chef or whatever. It's always the person who leads the team that gets in trouble at the

end. If anything goes wrong. So it's like, you led the team. Sorry, Cotton Mather. You were leading the team that gets in trouble at the end if anything goes wrong. So it's like, you led the team. Sorry, Cotton Mather. You were leading the team. Yep. Yep.

And so we don't actually know what happened to her after this. There's confusion between two different Elizabeth Knapps who were born at this time. Oh, interesting. About whether she married off to a guy named Afran Philbrick or a different guy named Samuel Scripture. Scripture? I know. Samuel Scripture. Couldn't get more Christian than that.

Okay. And there are potential ancestors from either Elizabeth Knapp who try to determine whether or not she's the Elizabeth Knapp of these stories. Oh, interesting. So I'm not sure what happened, but in either version, she gets married and has kids. And you just kind of, like by 1673, there's like no public record of her.

So no one really knows what happened. I'm shocked, by the way, that during all of this story, no one, even the doctor, tried to like blame it on just like female hysterics i was i thought that earlier too yeah that it sounds very much like hysteria and like being you know yeah put away so the modern theory of what was probably going on if there was a medical condition because people

even today could be like she was just like a like attention grabby or something. Yeah. Um, the modern theory medically could have been that she had adult onset Korea, which is, uh, Huntington's disease. Oh, geez. Yeah.

Which is it quote causes selective deterioration of certain motor functions. It's a rare genetic disorder. The symptoms start near puberty and she was 16 and it causes excessive irregular movements of your limbs, which don't, which actually doesn't happen while you're sleeping. So it makes sense why when she would like pass out from these convulsions,

nothing would be happening. It could also be like good old fashioned epilepsy maybe. And she was like this, but then she was talking through it. So that's, that doesn't really make sense. Although I have heard of like people having seizures and like not convulsing, like just kind of like standing still.

Like, I don't, I don't know enough about epilepsy, but that could be one of them. One of the theories, the biggest theory of today psychologically and religiously is that the devil quote sensing her discontent or her unhappiness at her job and in her life was actually her acting out against the patriarchy which i fucking love oh yeah so because because in

strict puritan times men were and also like this is not much of a surprise anyone but the men were the well-educated the well-traveled the well-versveled, the well-versed, they had lots of opportunity. And women basically did all of the daily labor so that their men could go travel and bring home the bacon. But the women were doing all the work at home. So Elizabeth Knapp could have resented the fact that men had a different place in society compared to her own, which I think is really funny because basically she's saying like i'm so bored at my job i'm gonna pretend i'm possessed yeah i was just thinking that is kind of a fun reaction to it that's like well if i can't be happy i'm gonna like just cause this for everyone you can't live your life either exactly it's like i'm unhappy with where i have

to be in the social order um so i'm going to fuck that up for everyone. So apparently, in theory, then the devil would know she was unhappy. Because the story did go, like, the devil would show up most often when I was overwhelmed with work or when I was unhappy about, you know, my personal life. And all of a sudden she'd be tempted with money and things that she didn't have. And so I guess the thought process, if this was a whole agenda, it would have been, if I'm possessed, then I didn't have and so i guess the thought process if this was a whole agenda it would have been if i'm possessed then i won't have to do the work that i feel like i'm expected to do in society wow also oh sorry go for it no i'm so sorry i also had another thought

to you that i was thinking earlier too this might be like a full long shot so just but like there also is there a chance that like maybe she wanted to be a witch and like when did satanism become a thing like wonder what if she was like hey i kind of want to talk to the devil and cause it like compared or paired maybe like maybe she's like actually genuinely interested in the quote occult and all that right yeah that could have been it but there actually is an interesting what might have been uh attractive to her to which to being a witch right so um basically by in the like the feminist theory of it is that by her um becoming possessed and taking herself out of having to do all of these expectations and do all these responsibilities and duties at the Willard's

house. She was technically, uh, quote, moving up her place in society because even though she was possessed, she at least didn't have to do the labor of a woman. And therefore she was, had more power or independence even if she had

to like fake a whole narrative to be given that independence more clout she had like people were yeah was literally in the conversation people were talking about her and she wasn't doing the responsibilities of a woman so she didn't feel stuck in her place in the social world. Plus, while she was possessed and it wasn't her voice, she could say how she really felt about authority, like Reverend Willard. She could like talk trash about her parents in front of everyone, like every 16 year old. And by being possessed, she could basically lean into the quote sinful behavior of a woman.

Oh, that's so interesting so let's also like just psa this is a fun theory but i also want to give a shout out to like being in like falling into like witchcraft or something does not make you like interested in murdering people because let's remember that she did say like she did still have Oh, yes. I forgot about that part. That's right. That's right. I forgot. Yeah. Yes. A hundred percent. Yes. I forgot about the, the, the small thing of the murder. Yes. No, that's for sure sure i was definitely not comparing the two of no no no maliciousness in any sense for sure you were not you didn't do anything i just want to say it for other people for me to be like oh like look at her fun little like trying to stick it to the man it's like okay but she also wants to kill people so it's like those are yeah yeah a nuanced mix of things that were like yeah and maybe that could

have been more partly just just her like getting things off were like yeah and maybe that could have been more partly just just her like getting things off of her chest or maybe that would let her lean into like sinful behavior or something and she could just blame it on the devil or whatever right um and it's also like a weird ironic victim blaming situation because if she had to do all this because she she hated her like stance or her status as a woman. If it was like, if she, a lot of the preachers at the time basically said like, Oh, well if you were just content with how your life is,

you wouldn't have gotten possessed. Like, so it got really victim blame me very fast, but I'll end on this quote from roots web, um, that talking about like her, this like kind of like feminist theory of why she would have leaned into becoming a witch or being possessed or whatever um quote only when taken over by the prince of evil could she truly express the full force of her feelings and her

desire for independence and the power is embodied in the symbol of the witch and her rage at the man who taught her that independence and power with the ultimate female evils so like it was just like you know witches get to be independent and not have to listen to whatever the fuck men say so yeah and then when possessed she could assert the witch within and she could rebel against the many restrictions placed upon her she could dismiss the kind within and she could rebel against the many restrictions placed upon her she could dismiss the kind man in the black robe who himself symbolized her longed for independence and power and tell him what a rogue she thought he was and for that moment she could be as powerful as he wow that's so interesting oh my gosh what a what a combo of like it's so

it's almost like it's hard and frustrating not to know exactly what she was thinking. But like, those are such interesting like through lines. And, you know, what I was thinking earlier about the tongue, the imagery of like the tongue and someone like speaking out of her body. That actually, when I was growing up, my mom used to always say, and I have actually had dreams like this too. I have like a minor little tooth phobia because I, I think because I would have dreams where like my teeth would just fall out of my mouth or like, would be like in my mouth.

And my mom, when I was growing up would be like, you know, I actually had those dreams too, just of like, you know, something being stuck. I think she said,

but something being stuck in her mouth and be just being pulled out and pulled out. And her dad, who's a psych, who was at the time um a psychiatrist said that i mean for a lot of other he's anyway he used to say at the time that he thought that it was because um it was like you were trying to say something but you felt like you couldn't like that was like oh interesting yeah like imagery of like you have you have so many things or or

anything that you want to say but feel like for whatever reasons you can't get it out. You can't say it. Fascinating. Repression. Like, you know, the things that like. Hey, that makes a lot of sense. Maybe she was, she kind of connected with that in some way or like somehow had similar feelings and it just kind of presented itself the same way of like, oh, well, I'll just act like I'm silenced and then I can really say what I want. Right. I don't know. Also, that tooth dream is pretty common, right? Doesn't it mean like a loss of control or something? I think something like

that. Yeah. I think it can mean a lot of different like things about like things right out being out of control or things that you want to, I don't know. Are your roots being shaken up? Like if you're like, like if you're like about to move or something, like maybe things that like should usually be in place and are your comfort zone or like falling apart. Oh, that's true. Cause it's like rooted things not being,

Oh, Hey, I teeth just stay where they are. Anyway, I like to fall on, on the side of like, she was just like given a big old fuck you to the patriarchy. Love that.

And the, the other weird irony of that is that like 20 years later, like, wow, men really did a number on women. Yes. Oh my gosh, you're right. Not for the last time, by the way, but like, holy shit. Like the, what should have, the way that they handled her case, when like she had like arguably much more evidence,

which like it wasn't even that much of evidence like she like had convulsions that probably really needed to be fucking looked at or she was way dramatic and she was rude like that was like that was fucking it like and they were like she's possessed and they still didn't fucking do anything about it right and so for all these other women 20 years later to be like, Oh, she's a witch. And then they just kill her. Like, are you fucking kidding me? So it's so sad,

but I mean, it's so empowering to think that, and then so sad to like, have that be like in the shadow in the distance. That's really awful. Yeah. But glad she was okay. And glad like,

yeah, that my gosh, whatever the combination of those things are. I know. What an interesting case. Oh, my gosh. I know. I'm sorry that was so long.

I did not realize I spoke for like a literal hour or something. No, I'm so sorry. I feel like I kept like throwing in about like Philly cheesesteaks that we like couldn't process digest. That whole story was a lot to process just like that Philly cheesesteak. So wow. Okay. That is a gold. That was a gold star. On the metaphor. Yeah. Transition wise. Thank you. Thank you. Anyway, that's the story of Elizabeth Knapp. Oh my gosh. I loved it. Thank you. Oh my gosh. This is so, this is so exciting. I just, I'm here for the stories. Are you prepared prepared this is your first story

you've ever told on the show I have a story for you oh my god it's never happened oh my gosh exciting okay so I have a story for you if you would like to hear it sit back with your high c thank you you know I've been I've been having a juice box, a comeback, if you will. Oh my gosh. For some reason in my head, it filled in juice box cleanse instead of like a juice cleanse. Hey, if this is a way to detox, throw the high C right on in, you know?

You're doing it. So this is called the trick or treat murder. Eva. And it's also, it keeps with the spooky times because it was just Halloween a while ago. I know. I figured, you know, with great guest hosting power comes great responsibility. And I thought I would just come in and extend Halloween. And a Spider-Man quote.

Take me now. Are you kidding me? I did that for you. Also, part of yours took place like right it was right after halloween right like the day after i think it was the day before halloween her symptoms started showing oh before okay yeah yeah so we're bookending halloween with this episode oh my gosh what a fun what a fun so fun yes okay great okay so this is called the trick or treat murder also as um the vice article that I read put it, the, quote, bizarre lesbian murder scandal that rocked 1950s LA.

Eva, it's about to rock 2020s LA as well because I'm shaking in my little gay boots over here. What the fuck is this story? Yes. what the fuck is this story yes okay so first i have to give a shout out to my girlfriend rachel because as soon as she knew that i was like doing episodes on on the podcast she was like i'm gonna find you some gay stories and it's gonna be great and she did i mean just yeah thank you rachel well done thank you nothing nothing i love more than a than story. It's great. And so I never would have come across this story. So truly, like, thank you, Rachel, for that. So, so good.

It's also one that, like, wasn't super out in a lot of different. There were some, like, articles from the time that a lot of more recent articles kind of pulled from. And then there was one. So of my trial crew friends one of them Caitlin who I think you've met um loves this YouTuber Bailey Sarian so she Bailey Sarian um just like oh the makeup makeup yes yeah she does also if if if she hears this sorry I just called you makeup girl but that is how I I know you immediately is like oh the makeup true prime yeah she's makeup she does her makeup while like a makeup tutorial basically that's like usually fun like this one was like halloween

themed so she was like in a costume by the end but she told the story um and i feel like she told it a little bit more basically because it has queer through lines from like queer relationships um it's i'll get into it but it definitely has some like big points because at the time obviously it was like scandalous to even mention that in newspapers sure like the story is about a lesbian literally they wouldn't even print the word lesbian like that's not they just they were roommates they were abnormal which is the term that they kept using which is wildly problematic oh no eva we're both wildly problematic. Oh no. Eva, we're both pretty abnormal. But if that's the case, we're so abnormal. Oh, so first let me, yeah,

let me shout out my sources real quick because there were a bunch of articles. One, the, I think it was the daily news article that Rachel found initially. Then I read the LA times blog. There was another blog called Deranged LA Crimes. Vintage Woman Magazine had an article on it. And then Vice had an article as well as Bailey's story that I just watched. Gotcha. Cool. Those are my sources. So other than a title that sounds like when I first heard it, I was like the trick or treat murders.

And I typed in the trick or treat murders instead of the people's names and immediately got a bunch of cozy mystery novels, which also feels very fitting. I was like, okay, this is an actual murder. So. Oh yeah. Okay. We do. Yeah.

Yeah. Let's dial it down. It is a murder. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Um, I know, I feel like I keep going, like, it keeps being like, I literally have in my notes a couple places, but this is a murder.

I forgot. Like, let's. Yeah. It's, like, at first, the title of, like, oh, it involving trick or treat, and it's like, oh, could it get better? And then you said lesbian, and then I was like, oh, my God. And I totally lost my place. Okay, this is a murder.

Yes, we are. We're in the true crime segment. We're my place. Okay. This is a murder. Yes. We are. We're in the true crime segment. We're back here. Okay. So. Yes. To set the scene, it's 11 p.m. on Halloween night in 1957. Okay.

In Sun Valley, California, which is very close to us. Yeah. That's where I, that's where ISS is. Oh my God. Fun fact. Wow. I didn't know that yep well so because it was 1957 i did look up and it was halloween i tried to look up like what would the costumes have been like maybe the favorite movies or favorite tv shows but i didn't really get a ton from like so the favorite movie of that year was bridge over the river quai which is a world war ii movie And then the favorite TV show was Gunsmoke, which was a Western.

So like maybe Cowboys costumes type, but like, I couldn't really get much from that. But I did look up and save this for a few bullet points down the line. Batman was around. Oh, fun. And Batman is still one of the top five costumes of today. Oh my gosh. Such staying power. my gosh such staying power

yeah yes absolutely that's what batman's here for so yeah apparently the first batman comic i think if i looked this up right came out in 1939 so definitely would have been on the table oh yeah batman was definitely a costume that people had yes so lock that away for literally like three bullet points from now okay perfect okay so to set the scene further two women are sitting in a car together by themselves watching one single house in a neighborhood like the sun valley neighborhood so what they're sitting there the lights go off in the bedroom of this house they're watching and this one woman the driver joan and i'm just gonna call her joan her last name is r-a-b-e-l bailey syrian i think pronounced it like rabel but it's

kind of unclear there's so little information it's like we don't know how to pronounce it um so joan is the driver and she says as soon as the lights go out in the bedroom in the car she's in the car and she says to her partner sitting there in the car, all right, go do it. Oh, shit. I was about to say, why were they just randomly watching this house? Okay. I'm seeing what's happening now. Something is afoot.

So the person in the driver's seat, or the passenger seat, sorry, not Joan, this person who will remain mysterious for the moment, gets out of the car. She is dressed in jeans, a khaki jacket, red gloves. A lot of sources said heavy makeup, but I think that goes with this next thing, which is a domino mask they called it a domino mask but a lot of other sources said that was um a rock like of the mask that robin from batman and robin wore oh okay and i think the heavy makeup one source kind of implied that it was that she had like blacked out her eyes inside the mask you know how sometimes it's like like batman movies you have the mask and then like the insides where you can still see some like little bits of like eye I think maybe that's what they were implying but I wasn't fully sure gotcha okay um so she's wearing just kind of like a disguise but then the the mask to really disguise

herself and she's clutching a paper bag that's supposed to imply that she was trick-or-treating okay I see yeah so she gets out of the car. She goes up to the house, rings the doorbell. And when local businessman, Peter Fabiano answers, she shoots him point blank, just below the heart.

Oh, with like, she's like, her hands are kind of trembling, but she hits him right below the heart. And he dies on the way to the hospital. Wow. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. below the heart and he dies on the way to the hospital wow yeah okay yeah so our mysterious woman runs back to the car where joan speeds them away but not before joan kisses her and says

thank you oh shit yeah oh okay yeah okay yeah so guesses so far yes was this man an ex lover of either of the two women in the car yeah no oh okay because it sounded like maybe it was like an ex that needed to like be quote taken care of he is in some i'll i'll get to it but he is in some ways an ex but also not kind of like there's so many twists in the story and it's actually kind of interesting because so many different sources started like the story is so there are a lot of twists and like I feel like each article I read and like Bailey Sarian too they all started it in different places because you can there are so many different plot twists that you can be like and then this happened kind of that's so fun and also so overwhelming i would not know where to start so yeah no i was like halloween costume i think i'm gonna start on

halloween so hopefully this pans out as fair enough twisty as it giving it the credit that it yeah um okay so uh telling her thank you they drive away um so peter fabiano would pretty quickly die from the gunshot wound some sources said on the way to the house i think i said on the way to the hospital i think most said on the way to the hospital but others said um shortly after arriving he he basically never woke up from this gunshot wound um going back to the women in the car they burned their clothes returned the car they had borrowed oh from a friend and walked in opposite directions back to their homes and jones parting words were forget you ever knew me oh shit i know that is that on its own is a twist because you would think i'm only going like if you're going

to kill i would only kill for someone that's like by ride or die and now it's see ya like yeah you're like part ways yeah that feels like it was not worth the effort okay right yeah and that it's joan who's the one who is like orchestrating it but not doing it like there's so many different like levels of like what's happening here so in an homage to your both of your jokes about like record scratching we're gonna do a record scratch and be like how did we get here yes that sounds great I would like the the reverse music yeah yeah yeah yeah we're gonna reverse and we're going to reverse and we're going to go back and be like, hi, who is Joan? So that that was my first question and my second and third. So perfect. We'll hit them all. Knock them out.

So Joan is kind of mysterious herself. Not a ton is known about her, but she claimed to be from Philadelphia. Sources think that's based on the ship's manifests from a couple different ships that traveled between Los Angeles and Honolulu because it would turn out that she was taking classes at the University of Honolulu for writing. So she was a writer. She's an artist. She was a writer. I think she made most of her money as a freelance photographer though because most sources said she was a freelance photographer. Oh um however vintage woman magazine article found another newspaper from the time that said she was from lithuania so it's like kind of unclear exactly wow where she was from where

how she showed up where she did just like a ship in the night she just yep arrived a ship's manifest in the night she was just scribbling whatever she wanted. Yeah, it sounds like it. So, she was a freelance photographer and writer, took some classes at the University of Honolulu in the late 1940s. She also at the time of the murder was an ex-hair salon

employee and known to date women. So, the L word that none of the papers would print at the time oh it's currently her only redeeming quality i know i know so yeah this was a really interesting point of the story that like i don't know it just got me thinking a lot about how it was reported at the time and like what we know about the story now which is like based on on those, like, you know, very straight, very repressed, not that they would necessarily be repressed,

but that they were trying to repress the stories of these women and their true identities. So I feel like I just was thinking a lot about how it's like, A, it's kind of sad that we don't know how they truly identified themselves. Right, yeah. We only- We're just saying lesbian, but like-

Right. Who knows what was actually, what was the truth so yeah exactly and it's only based on like phrases and words that were used in the newspapers at the time and like yeah almost every like news source now is saying like well but they wouldn't print anything that was like anything right descriptive especially that it would be like that was like anything right descriptive especially that it would be like described like a way that that person described themselves so all we all we know is they were queer yes and that's like as that's as vague as as vague and as descriptive as we're gonna get right exactly yeah um so let's see oh right so this is where i also had the the fun and not so fun fact that it was mostly termed abnormal in newspapers like they would say that and people would just get the hint like they would

know what that meant in newspapers kind of like how you would say like a funny uncle or something right time when it was like oh he just liked kissing dudes like leave him alone yeah and I meant to look this up too at the time but like I wondered if it was related to the fact that like wasn't there wasn't there like a term like abnormal psychology was like a like a point of reference for it was so what's so interesting is I was so what my favorite class that I took to get my degree in undergrad was abnormal psych. And one of the things they talked about, I actually took pictures of it when I last went home. Cause I still had my textbook and I was like,

I feel like I should take pictures of this in abnormal psych. One of the like chapters was all about like queer people and transgender people. And, and it was definitely an outdated, I'm sure at the time it was like, as progressive as you can get, but I was reading it. And even from like 2014, or whenever, whenever the book came out, I was like, Oh, things have changed. Like, this is not okay.

Yeah, it seems like a lot of that's in the story, too. Like even some of the newer articles I was reading, I feel like Bailey Saron maybe came the closest to being like, you know, just having better language about things. But like even some of the like newer articles, I was like, I don't know if your take is great on this, or I don't know if you're like,

your language is great on this. So weird. No. So, huh. Interesting. Yeah. I mean,

that makes sense. Cause abnormal is just a different way of saying weird weird is just a different way of saying queer so i mean it kind of makes i can see the quick connection especially because all of the women involved were somehow outside of the realm of the quote-unquote norm um because all three women had been divorced and previously married to men but in some cases were known to date women so it caused a lot of speculation oh okay yeah okay yeah wow really setting the queer scene here good job thank you i just i got i you know certain points i was like i want to know more please tell me more and so i like had to go to like wikipedia

and stuff right right um and i hope i got it all right like it really was like I was pulling from like a few different sources so hopefully I got got all that good so back to the murder that was one of my bullet points wow you're really taking on Christine's personality like very quickly oh my gosh am I oh good I like wanted to make sure that I was like doing her honor you literally just did your own version of beep boop bop so Bringing it back. Oh yeah, murder. Oh hi, we're back to the murder. So, the murder victim, Peter Fabiano, was 35 years old.

He was an ex-Marine and met his wife, Betty, in the late 1940s, around the same time that Joan had been taking these classes, the writing classes in Hawaii. It sounded like Betty was kind of the stereotypical beautiful divorcee of the time. Like, you know, kind of picture like a, I don't know. I was picturing like a very

stereotypical. That's what a lot of the sources were saying. She had red hair. Hey, good for her. She also had two children from a previous marriage, which I do not have. Oh, okay. Good. Just checking. Yeah. Yeah. so Peter and Betty were married in 1950 and they lived in New York until they relocated to Los Angeles in 1956. Peter had been working as a truck driver in New York, but in like a real change of career, when he moved to LA, he, so he was working as a truck driver and then he moved to LA and was like I'm gonna open two beauty salons oh yeah okay that's exactly what I nowhere else mentioned that but I I mentioned

you and I both feel like we're like hmm maybe they were were they beards that's that was kind of one of my thoughts nowhere mentioned that and the but one article did say that in terms of like, you know, kind of painted them as like they were the picture of everyone thought they were the picture perfect couple, blah, blah, blah. Including the fact that a lot of people use the fact that he was her hairdresser as a way to be like, look what a perfect husband he is. That's what I thought. that's what I thought are you kidding I mean I'm I get a stereotype as a stereotype and we men are allowed to like whatever they want and beauty salons and yeah yeah yeah I'm just saying it sounds a little fruity I'm just saying it sounds a little like it could more than what I was expecting initially be in that situation correct I literally wrote sounds a little gay I said that too i had the i think my bullet point here was like but that also made me think that he was gay too but that is wild

speculation like i don't know complete wild speculation men can totally like work in beauty salons and be straight cisgender men that is not what we're saying here but but for the fifties trope of a man in a beauty salon and they get divorced. And also this, the narrative is already kind of queer. You know, I'm just, I'm having vibes. Yes.

Yes. So they actually weren't divorced. So they were, so Betty had been divorced previously. So she was in divorce. Yes. So she was previously married. She had these two kids that were now teenagers.

And then she met Peter and married Peter. Got it. Okay. But it also, that is the point too, that like, so these two other women as well, I think less is known about Jones, but I think with this other woman, but I'll get to you. But there was kind of speculation along those lines of like, they had divorced men and then started dating women, basically. Okay, got it. So they have these hair salons.

This is where we start to like kind of weave everyone together. Okay. In the Halloween murder web. Hmm. So when Peter opened these hair salons, he hired Joan, our driver, as a hairdresser at one of his salons. Different sources say different things. They say she was a hairdresser. They say she might have been, since she was a writer and a freelance photographer, they think that she could have been doing publicity for them.

But most of them, I think, said that she was a hairdresser there as well. said that she was a hairdresser there as well and so she became close with the couple especially Betty who would come in to the hair salons gotcha sorry who's the person that's getting close with Betty sorry Joan the driver okay okay yeah Joan the driver yeah Joan the driver yeah yeah okay so at this point Betty and Peter start having trouble in their marriage. They're still together. And again, this is another place that's super unclear and just speculation. We don't know if it's because of Joan and Joan and Betty getting close. It is highly speculated that Betty and Joan were together at some point.

Interesting. Either before or after, we don't fully know. But it could have been, you know, just other issues and the timing worked out in a different way. Basically, Betty and Peter started having trouble in their marriage. And when Betty decided that she wanted to try just a trial separation with Peter, she moved in with Joan. Oh, okay.

Yeah. So it's at that point. that's the point it's like is it is it is it homophobic to assume like that they're i mean but like history would call them roommates but then it's like well that's pretty homophobic so like i where do i stand i don't know are they together are they not together i don't make the. I know. It's like all you want to do is just be like, whatever you want to do, we are happy. My gay little heart wants them to just have their thing and move in and all that, but I don't want to assume the wrong storyline. Right. No, exactly.

Yes, for sure. And especially because, again, the newspapers didn't. That was the place where they were like, and then they moved in together, these abnormal friends. Like, I think they hinted at it, but I don't think it was ever fully, neither woman commented on it. So it was not. They could also both be queer and just friends. I mean, I mean, a lot of things, a lot of situations. A lot of options. Exactly.

That we like, sadly sadly just don't know and so when Betty and Joan moved in together obviously they you know in maybe not obviously but Joan was supporting Betty and it's kind of thought that because of the motive is Betty basically wanting to rescue Betty from someone who's evil like terrible person so again I don't want to assume there was or wasn't abuse in their relationship like none of the sources that I read said there was or wasn't. That feels like another place of like, for Betty's sake, I wish we knew. Sure. Yeah. Just to know, you know, have known, but that's another place we don't really know. But we do know that when Joan and Betty were together, they obviously were talking about Betty's relationship with

Peter. Gotcha. Wow. I blew through a lot of bullets at one time. I didn't realize this. Good for you. Look, I mean, hey, you know your story. So a little bit later, Joan would claim that Betty told her that Peter was, quote, this is from Vintage Woman Magazine, abusive and controlling. Oh, not what I was expecting you to say. Yeah, and that she sort of dreamed about saving Betty and giving her a better, different kind of life is what a lot of sources say.

Ah, okay. I see. Yes. But again, it is really hard to know. Like, it's also hard to know if like. This whole story is just full of holes. I know. It's so hard to like, I know, get a grasp on it because it's very like well it could have

been this and it could have been this because it could have been that you know as like a lot of I think murderers and like this sort of passion crime happens like it could have been that someone became too obsessed and like I don't even that's probably not even the right term but like became too obsessively involved in like the thought process of like saving someone to this extent to yeah save it doing these things to create another outcome um yeah I think there are just so many different takes on it that it's just really unclear and again especially because the papers were kind of intentionally making things vague as well but what we do know is that what happened the thing happened where that like everyone fears when you're talking about like shit talking an ex to directly to the person oh shit

no betty got back together with oh no oh, no! Oh, that's even worse. That's so much worse. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So basically, Betty and Peter reconciled and got back together. Most sources say that Peter made Betty promise that she would never talk to Joan again as, like, a condition of them reconciling. And Betty agreed. Betty, Betty, Betty. I know.

And so Betty agreed and moved back in with Peter. So by the Halloween night in 1957, Betty was back living with Peter. They were having like a nice little family night to themselves. They had cut Betty heads, according to sources, cut off contact with Joan. And then it's at this point that then Joan finds herself outside the door or outside their house in I see the car so almost like a I'll save you situation it's definitely seems most

that's like I kind of I felt like I kind of wanted to be a little bit more vague about it because most sources go really far down the road of like Joan really went off track I mean she did like definitely went yes but it's murder is not good no matter what correct yes yes but like a lot of them go really far down that track of like Joan was obsessive and she was this and that but then a little bit later like I did some more digging and that is also a really kind of weird stereotype of quote unquote lesbians, like as it was identified in papers at the time too. So I didn't want to go too far down that route either. Wow. You are just like dodging grenades. It's like a landmine out there. God, I know. I'm so sorry. I feel like I'm not telling you any actual facts.

No, no, you're good. And also I meant to say minefield, not one particular landmine, whatever. It's stupid. It really is like so not even important, but no, I, it's yeah. You're, this is a, a story I want so much information on and we'll just never get. I know. And it's so sad because I really do like, I mean, the story itself is so like, you want to do justice to especially you know queer women who were probably repressed probably definitely repressed at the time and this

is the best information that the press was willing to cover about them and it's like not cute like it's yeah we do get some like some small quotes from them later that I found but yeah there's really nothing and like Joan never heard anything from Joan so um yeah so back to the Halloween night of 1957 from the Fabiano's perspective in their house they're having like a nice little family night um Betty's two kids were there so she had a teenage daughter that still lived with them and had gotten to bed. They had been giving out candy. So Susan, the daughter, had gone to bed. Their son was in some form of the military. And so he had just left to go back to a base in San Diego that he was driving back to.

And so it was at that point that Betty and Peter had gone to bed and were, you know, in their bedroom, turned off the light, and that's when they heard the doorbell ring. Yep. Yep. Yep. Yeah. So from Betty's point of view, she was still in bed. Peter got up to answer the door. Betty heard from the bedroom the knock, Peter opening the door and asking, isn't it a little late for this? The knock, Peter opening the door and asking, isn't it a little late for this? Oh, like you're training. Exactly. Yeah.

And then a voice that a lot of different sources said sounded purposefully disguised, that this person did actually answer and just said no right before shooting him. Oh, shit. Yeah. So Betty ran downstairs to find her husband on the ground and the culprits already driving away as we talked about uh-huh some sources said that Betty's daughter Susan called the police while others say that Betty ran to a neighbor who worked for the LAPD oh which was convenient yeah but either way the cops were on the scene really quickly um initially the police had a really hard time figuring out a motive because when they looked into Peter Fabiano, they were like, everyone likes him. Like he's so nice to everyone.

He's like pillar of the community, like sure. Businessman, um, kind of upstanding guy. They did find one small bookmaking quote unquote charge from his time in the military since he was an ex Marine. And that was, um, I think, uh, like a bookie type, like gambling. Oh, okay. Small, small charge. But it wasn't enough to connect him to any local organized crime. Gotcha. Okay.

Which is what they were looking at because of the style. Sure. It's like, it looks like a hit and run or like a, yeah. Right? Yeah, exactly. So that was their first thought. Drive-by, that's what it's called. Yeah, yeah. You know, I'm in the mob, so, you know, obviously. So that was their first thought. Drive by. That's what it's called. Yeah. Yeah. You know,

I'm in the mob. So, you know, obviously I know what I'm talking about. I mean, especially from Tea Time Tuesday, everyone, you know,

all the terms from the grandpas and grandmas. I don't know anything about the mob, but certainly everyone who listens to the show's grandparents do. So I don't know what it is. By the way, shout out to Tea Time Tuesday. If you don't follow me on Instagram and Patreon go you'll know what I'm talking about if you do that truly go do it it's like such a good just like release like I feel like it's so it's a lot of people really bare

their soul in those in those comments so oh my god the the affairs and the sneaky things people are doing too. I mean, I really do love to hear that drama. Not to say I am so detached I'm unaware that it's very fucked up information. But if people are consenting to sharing that

information with me, I consent to hear it. I'm posted anonymously. Anyway. I do like the ones that were my favorite and in keeping with the story are the ones that are like, I kissed a girl for the first time and it was great. Or like, you know, so many of you actually speaking of queer, I don't know if representation is the right word, but queer opportunity. So let's take it. This is a PSA to every single person, just in case,

whether or not you have written into Tea Time Tuesday. So many of you think that you are alone and questioning yourself regardless of your age. And I only post a few of Tea Time Tuesday, but like there's hundreds of you, like hundreds of you all are questioning your sexuality, whether you're like 16 or in your forties. And, uh, don't feel alone because there's a shocking amount of our audience who are like kissing girls for the first time and loving it.

So, you know, if y'all got to go make friends, if you want to be the first person in the Facebook group that says like, I'm questioning, I guarantee there'd be like 50 people who'd say me too in the comments. So there you have it. Just trying to keep people from feeling alone. Yeah, we'd love to see it. We love it. We'd love to see it. Okay, so the bookkeeping charge, they're trying to connect Peter to local organized crime just to as like a how who who did this why did

they do it um and so they obviously asked betty like hey did anyone did he have any enemies like did anyone wish him ill like how yeah what happened right is there anything you can think of since we have zero other leads oh the other thing is that they didn't find they obviously knew it was a bullet like a gunshot wound but they couldn't find the casings anywhere. Oh, interesting. It was only one shot. And then they were like, well, the casing usually is like a, like a sign or like a clue. They didn't find that anywhere. And so they were like, we have nothing to go on. So, hey, Betty, can you help? And Betty initially is like, no, like there's nothing I can think of but she does eventually end up giving them Joan's name yeah because she's like well I guess I did talk about

how you know it's unclear obviously yeah it's still unclear what they did say but I guess it was going to come out eventually if she was like, oh, I recently left him and was staying at this other person's house. Like, I mean, so. Yeah. I'm sure they were expecting. She had to expect they'd come asking questions. And also thinking, too, about, like, if people were, who knows if they were speculating at the time that they split up and Betty moved in with Joan. Like, if they were actually romantically involved and if there were rumors already kind of swirling about it.

Maybe she felt like she had to start to admit something because it was going to be found out. Someone else was going to say it. Right. Who knows? So she did end up mentioning Joan. And so the police did. They brought Joan in. They questioned her.

But they actually released her because they couldn't find anything that led her to them, including the fact that she was like, well, I was home alone. Like everyone saw my car in my driveway so I was home that's the most you can do and people did corroborate and say like yeah we saw her car in her driveway no one was with her but so there is this little twist that the police actually got a confidential tip that we don't know who that was but they said hey maybe check this uh so apparently at the time department stores had like lockers that you could pay for kind of like a train station huh yeah which I had no idea but apparently there was a department store in downtown that had these like pay lockers and so the confidential tip was like hey maybe go check those those lockers oh shit I'm sorry I'm still

like like a Macy's like a JCPenney would have a locker yeah it was a department store name that I didn't know so I actually didn't write it down was it Lohman's no I don't think it was Lohman's but it was um like locationally you might know where it is or was because have you ever been to Clifton's in downtown? I think we've talked about this before. Eva, Eva, Eva, Eva. Clifton's has been on. So I, yes, yes, I know what Clifton's is. It's to answer your question.

I have wanted to go for a long time and I kept putting it off, like, for years. And then I started dating Alison and I was like, Oh, I'm going to surprise her with this one day. And I guess Alison also has it on her list of things to surprise me with. So I think we both keep waiting to surprise each other and it's just not happening. Okay. I thought that was the thing. As I was writing it, I was like, I need to make sure to mention Clifton's for M because I thought that I was like, I think you haven't been, but you know about it. I know and already love it very, very much. So it's really fun. I've only been one time, but I would love to go again.

It's so cool. Yeah. Yeah. We'll have to fit. We'll have to check it out. Well, it's, so it's Clifton's cafeteria for people who don't know. Yes. And I mean, you're the one that's been there. Do you want to describe it? It's just, I feel like you might actually do a better job because you're so much better at describing those like experience type places. Stop it. Okay. Let me, let me, um, Clifton's cafeteria. So the, what I remember of it is that it's a, it's a pay what you can afford a situation. Um, I don't know if it's still like that, but it

was like a pay what you can. And that way other people who couldn't eat or couldn't pay could still come in and eat for free, which was really nice. And it was, um, is that not true anymore? I don't think it's, I think it's mostly more like a bar experience place now. Yeah. I also saw, um, the pictures, like it had like a bunch of like weird wall decor. It was like, it looked like a, like a cabin lodge. And, uh, okay. It's one of the oldest surviving cafeteria eateries in Los Angeles and the largest public cafeteria in the world. And I know there was something about this, like, Hey, as you go,

maybe that was temporary or maybe they do it like once a year or something. Yeah. Um, but yeah, it's supposed to be really cool. It's supposed to be like this super tall, like brownstone looking factory building and it looks like there's like a tree in the middle of the restaurant. Yeah. It's like, so it's like, it's so wild. It's so cool. It's like you walk in and they're like staircases immediately. You can go like you already, you walk in and you have to like choose. Oh,

also there's like a bakery pretty immediately. There's like a little pastry place that you can like get pastries. And then like you walk up the stairs and there's like, yeah, there's like a tree that goes, it's like three stories almost something like that. Where do I sign? That goes up through the whole thing. There are all these different rooms that like, yeah, there's like the, there's like a bar at the end of like the, where the tree is. It's like a little like, um, like the where the tree is it's like a little like um forest kind of theme yeah i'm google imaging it now it's very forest themed it's like it's like an adult rainforest cafe where like there's no animatronics but there's a lot of like clear notions to you are

in the woods yes but then it also has like so there are rooms that are kind of offshoots from the the main so like you walk around and there's like the tree here then they're like almost like at like not like alleyways but like hallways that like overlook like there's like a dance floor on the bottom and that's so fun it's so fun but then there are like rooms that offshoot too so there's one room that like had they had when I was there one time shout out to my other trial crew friend, Ellen, who is going to get a huge shout out next time because she basically did my notes for me. Oh, fun. And I love her so much.

But I think it was for Ellen's birthday I went a couple years ago. It's the only time I've been. But I think we were in one of the offshoot rooms that had, I want to say, it was so themed, time period wise so like you walk out of the forest and then you're into like like i don't know the actual time period but it was like 1930s 40s something like around this time probably there was like a full band playing there too like in costume of the time okay eva i would like to i would i'm stating it now let's do this for like um for like christmas this year we'll do like like some sort of i say christmas so allison has some time to actually try to take me first but allison if you're listening if we haven't gone

yet uh you've had ample time i've had ample time so it's gonna have to be a christmas thing for me neva i this and and also allison you're invited um this is what this is so cool. And apparently there's a whole section called Cabinet of Curiosities. Oh. Is that true? I feel like I didn't even see that part. There's honestly like you, that's why I was like, I need to go back because you don't see everything. Like it's just one of those places that has like so many things. Okay.

Well, okay. Anyway, wow. What a tangent, but we're for sure going. Oh, we're for sure going. Yes. Yes. Okay. Anyway, wow, what a tangent, but we're for sure going. Oh, we're for sure going. Yes, yes. Okay, so that was where the department store was, was apparently right across the street from the famed Clifton's,

which was apparently right, opened that long ago. Like, so, so. Right, it's been open since, like, the 30s or something? Or what was it? Clifton's Cafeteria opened since, sorry, this is not important to the story at all. 1931. Wow, 31.

That's so wild. It opened like Great Depression era and is like still hanging out. Yeah, still. I mean, hopefully we hope knock on wood. I think it I think Rachel said it just reopened after COVID. So I think it's back. OK, good. Yes, good.

covid so i think it's yes back okay good yes good um okay so in the department store across from the famed clifton's there was a locker a pay locker and in that locker they found a gun and the police were able to link it to the murder of peter fabiano wow they were like okay we obviously need to find out who bought this fucking locker because right yeah wow is this yeah and like that's a literal smoking gun and also yes like it could only either be joan or the shooter at this point yes right unless like a third person who didn't come with them knew about this or did like betty know that her husband was gonna get shot? I don't know. I don't know. You know what, just put a pin in that because let's talk about that later. You are onto something, my friend. Okay, for now we're at the smoking locker. Of course. Yes. So they were able to link the purchase of this pay locker to 43 year old Goldeen Pizer.

What the fuck is this? Okay. I know. I literally wrote into my notes. It's like the only like quote unquote joke I wrote into the actual notes. I was like, this is a name I would like to hear from my Ouija board. Sending that into the universe.

It's not even a joke. Manifesting into a Ouija board sounds really dangerous, but let's do it anyway. Goldeen. I didn't even know it was pronounced Goldeen until I watched Bailey Sarian and was like, oh, Goldeen. Interesting, Goldeen. Isn't Goldeen a Pokemon? I don't know.

Keep going. It might be. Okay, so it was linked to 43-year-old Goldeen, who turns out to be the passenger and the shooter of said who sounds like she was jones girlfriend no with the giving her a little kiss and saying never talk to me again i mean again super unclear and super speculated on we'll get to that too okay so um yeah literally was just about to read the non-joke that i wrote in here we just for joke um let's see thank you i appreciate the inserted jokes in advance in case like i wasn't nailing it on the show no no it was for me i was like i gotta bring my a game i gotta try hard

okay so aside from all of that, she was actually pretty shy. She was a medical secretary and she worked for a local children's hospital, most sources say. She was divorced from her husband, a Naval Hospital pharmacist, and she was also known to date women after her divorce. Okay. She also lived only about a mile away from Joan. She lived in Hollywood and Joan and joan oh no wait sorry joan lived in hollywood and goldeen lived just a mile down the road down i'm assuming sunset because it says the sunset strip area okay sure so later that's why it's so it was so visual for

me when it was like oh later they like parked the car at their friends and walked in opposite directions to their right to their homes it was like she was walking like very very a rare occasion in los angeles yeah just part ways and be home in a minute exactly yes um okay so only lived my way from joan and like betty goldeen was a redhead the story is filled with. Wow. This is a lot of queer redheads are happening. Right. Yes. Feels like this should be a small statistic of people. And yet it's happening.

It's happening. It's happening. Okay. Wait, what's the percentage of people who are redhead? Oh, actually, I don't know. Is it like 2.5% or something? What percentage of people are i was thinking like what are the probability of someone being queer and redheaded oh true occurring in just one to two percent of the population but again we don't know because

like me they could have been fake redheads that's true that's true that's true you're right but they did say redhead so I was kind of assuming that maybe that was but I feel like if I were in like a newspaper written about they might say redhead too and yeah throw everything off but who knows not me not certainly not me so after Betty moved back in with Peter Joan had met actually it's kind of that's also kind of unclear when Joan and Golden met. Some sources said they met after Benny moved back in with Peter, which is why I wrote it that way. But then I watched Bailey Sarian and I think she mentioned that they had known each other for two years, like prior to. So again, they're kind of like some conflicting bits of information

there. And again, it's their relationship is also unclear because homophobia so it's it's not known bailey syrian actually was kind of speculating that goldeen liked joan and joan used goldeen i mean that's what it sounds like to me right that it wasn't quite like requited. It's like the, Hey, I mean, first of all, it does feel a little fishy. Like imagine if your current girlfriend said, Hey, can you go kill my ex girlfriend's partner? Assuming everyone was dating each other, but it sounds like that's,

that's not a hard red flag to find of like, it sounds like you're still into your ex like yeah you are so jealous that she's with somebody else that you want me to someone who likes you to kill them so you can not be with them and stay with me like that doesn't sound realistic no a hundred percent and this really brings up too I had a whole point about this a few bullet points down but I'll bring it up now too that that like they, yeah, where was it? It was like, I just wanted to know, like there, it doesn't really say, but like, and Goldeen will later, a little spoiler, will lean into the fact of like, Joan manipulated me, but like doesn't go into the details. She was trying to blame it on like, I got swindled into this or something.

Yes, exactly. And like, doesn't want to admit to anything, especially in court. Right? Sure. Yeah. But yeah, that was my thought too of like, was it, was it, did it veer into brainwashing? Did it veer into kind of like, you know, those, I meant to look up the term too, Christine would know it. The term of like, when two, two criminals or two people commit a crime together and one is the dominant personality and one wouldn't have committed the crime if not for the other person, but goes along with it. That sounds like a Christine knowledge trivia thing. I don't know what that is.

Yeah, I think. Christine? Are you there? What a little role reversal that was. Okay. So like, it's hard to say, but like, yeah, I was really curious to know what that dynamic was specifically. If there was, like, some brainwashing involved. If it was really just Goldeen being like, yeah, I'm so on board. I want to do this of my own volition. Sure. But, yeah, sadly, you don't really know. And then, oh, but we do know that they were close enough to share that between them like Joan

would share a lot about Betty and Peter drumming Peter up to be just like the most there are a lot of quotes from the court court later that were like evil vile you know all of that kind of thing making him out to be pretty terrible. Okay. Okay. Yeah. So over the course of, it sounded like only three months, it took Joan to convince Goldeen to be the one to actually kill Peter. Wow. Yeah. Which I can't decide if I feel like that's a long time or a short amount of time.

Like I feel like both is true. Like no amount of time. Right. I don't think could ever convince me to kill someone i don't know how long how long was it one more time i think it was only three months okay yeah i don't think i know i think i don't even know what the average was especially during the 1950s like how long it usually takes people yeah to determine something like that it feels long yeah maybe not i don't know that's true

because it's definitely premeditated in that case like obviously it took time like there was time they talked about it a lot apparently that was another bit of this that they did talk a lot together about killing peter the two of them oh okay um yeah okay then i don't actually now that i think of it like maybe it's maybe it's quick i have no christine are you then I don't actually, now that I think of it, like maybe it's, maybe it's quick. I have no, Christine, are you there? I don't, I don't know. I, I imagine three months is pretty fast. Cause it sounds like in a lot of Christine stories, people are like waiting for months in jail until something's determined. Right. You know, speaking of months, I just, I'm so sorry. My brain just flew in a different direction. And I was like, oh my gosh, I can't wait to talk to

Christine about all of these like stories that like, you know, she'll like hear later and we'll like be able to talk about with her. Well, you'll experience the phenomenon we have where, um, because by the time this comes out and Christine has something to say, none of this information will have stayed in your mind. You won't know what's going on. She'll just text you randomly and be like, this is the term you were talking about. And you'll be like, what is, what are you talking about?

Oh my gosh. That usually, I feel like that usually is me texting you both during a recording. I'm being like, Oh hi, I just looked this up for you. This is what's happening. Do you want me to look at it?

Well, yeah. So unfortunately by the time Christine knows what we're talking about, you will not know what's happening. We'll have left. Okay. So, oh, so the other thing in terms of like convincing people, not, you know, people doing things of their own volition. I also kept seeing the term Svengali come up in the articles that I was reading. And I think it came from a quote that I think it was either in a newspaper or I didn't get the full, I think it was in one of the articles and I didn't fully write it down. But yeah, I saw I read the word Svengali and I was like,

I feel like I've heard that before. And it sounds problematic, but I don't know what it is. I don't think I know what that is. So I looked it up and it turns out it's just a character like the name of an actual character in a novel that came out in 1894 so pretty old. Wow yeah. It was the novel was called Trilby and the character apparently quotes just from Wikipedia seduces dominates and exploits trilby the main character who is a young irish girl and makes her into a famous singer okay the word since then has come to be known as someone who exercises a controlling or mesmeric influence on another especially for a sinister purpose okay so we're thinking that Joan was the Svengali to Goldeen like used her and mesmerized her with her wonderful queer charm wit and charm and exactly

and then said go kill this person and that's so she fell under this like trope of like oh I got Svengali or something yes yes exactly yeah um which I did think was really funny that like Wikipedia both said like for a sinister purpose and then the original character was like made into a singer so I was like right like singers like I feel like the things got lost in translation it sounds like Svengali was like kind of okay in the book i would like to be spangalid of like turned into like the next justin bieber or something right it wasn't i mean i wonder if it what like did the veer off the rails thing but like initially the way it was described i was like i don't know does that sound so bad we are in a grande oh shucks i became a sensation

like yeah oh well so anyway that was that term that kind of was also floating around in a lot of the articles at the time. And then, you know, in the articles that I was reading. Let's see. This also kind of goes hand in hand, I thought, with some of the like not so fun stereotypes of lesbians at the time that they were, quote unquote, murderous degenerates. Oh. According to the LA Times blog so um the LA Times blog article was really interesting especially because the LA Times

was around back then and so I was kind of laughing because I was like is this blog article trying to make up for the fact that like you guys wouldn't publish the word lesbian back then I know it's like making up for lost time I guess yeah let's see oh and then this was where I brought in the black dolly I started looking up the black dahlia case I forget why that like came up I think it came up in one of the articles I read but um that maybe it was just the murderous degenerates and then I started looking that up of like how did that come about that like that was a thought process for lesbians but um it apparently was because the la times was one i think they were probably one of but like there were so many um there's so

much media coverage around the black dahlia case and one of the big rumors was that elizabeth short the victim was a lesbian and that played a big role in the news coverage of it at the time. I don't know if it, if that's true or not, but. Oh, I don't know. Um, but Christine did cover the black dolly case on episode three. I looked that up. Yes. Yes. Shout out to that. And Christine and Christine and also my episode guide. You can check it out on our website. That's exactly, I got it from the episode guide on the website. Even though I have like a really detailed spreadsheet, like other places. I know.

It's like going to the website. I appreciate you. I worked really hard on it. So no, it's here. I know it's your thing. I use it. I use it too. Thank you.

So then I did like even more digging. I think I went back maybe a little bit too far, but this felt also felt like context to me in terms of like queer history. The black Delia case had just happened 10 years before. Oh, okay. Yeah. And so that's why I like,

I think some of the, those got referenced. Yeah, exactly. And then also in the 1950s, something else was happening called the lavender scare. Have you heard of this? Oh, not enough to explain it.

I think I just actually learned about this on TikTok. Oh, no way. Oh, my gosh. Okay, so what is it? Wait, am I a TikToker? Did I just become? Sure. Hey, you're a podcaster.

So, you know, why not? You're also a true crime expert as of right now between the two of us. Oh, no. What's the lavender scare? Yeah, the lavender scare. So basically it was happening around the same time as the red scare, which was the sort of quote unquote like modern day witch hunt in terms of like trying to find and or accuse people of being communists and like blacklisting them basically or firing them from their jobs that kind of thing whether or not they were communists um that was obviously a huge thing here in the

entertainment industry as well was like blacklisting people because of the red scare so the lavender scare was basically the same thing except instead instead of communism, it was queerness. So it was happening like side by side. And also it feels kind of telling to you that like I didn't hear about the lavender scare. I only heard about the red scare. Yeah. Yeah. You know, text and stuff.

Maybe the red scare was a bigger deal at the time than being queer. Yes. Yes. Why lavender? I don't know actually i think maybe maybe because of is lavender the our color is that what i'm supposed to know about i feel like is there like an association with purple maybe is lavender gay sorry sorry how lavender became a symbol of lgbtq resistance oh okay so there is a there is a thing about it and lavender a subtle hue that shifts between light pinkish purples and gray bluish tones oh interesting very fun so it's kind of a catch-all color. It's a catch-all.

Got it. Got it. It does also make me feel extra good about my lavender tattoo here that I've had for a while. Wow, that was manifesting. Telling, right? Yeah. Okay, so the lavender scare basically is the red scare, but it was more, I think it was more confined to the government specifically trying to out and fire people. Their whole like thought process on it was like, they're going to be a security risk to the government.

And so get them out of here. So then with that context, it kind of, I don't know, I feel like all of that. I just wanted to know like the background of when the story was happening. So it's like, it's already illegal. The lavender scare is happening. The lavender scare is happening the lavender scare is happening the black dolly case just happened where lesbians were like basically either like victim blamed for like being yeah like if the black doll yeah like maybe they were like oh she like ran with unsaved

right people right right kind of thing so like god i can't imagine what that was like being queer then like it just seems very scary. But obviously, this is another point where murder still equals bad. So however it happened, Joan and Goldeen did decide to murder Peter together, aka Goldeen, to do it herself, presumably to set Betty free from this vile evil man that they have kind of drummed up and again i don't want to say that with like too much i don't know jokiness because like who knows peter could have been excuse me abusing her but like on the other side of the scale right he could have been like could just been like a just dating your ex and you didn't like it yeah it could have yeah the the potential range of every character in this is a sliding scale of like he could be really bad and she could be so innocent or like she was totally involved in this

and he meant enough i mean it could be so many things the could have been he could have been the amazing gay hairdresser that like he could have been the amazing straight hairdresser that's true too separately amazing it could really there's just basically this is a really nice skeleton of a story it is it's very nice bare bones yeah i know as i like did it and then was like too committed to it i was like uh no this is why people haven't done it it's a no it's a great story it's just why people haven't done it. No, it's a great story. It's worth telling for sure. It's just all these people like we have no idea what the circumstances were. Yeah, I know.

And especially like, you know, wanting to be so sensitive to everyone's like identities and preferences and things like that, too. Like, I feel like it does. It's like more than just like a. It somehow became more vague over time because now it's not just that it was like a potential gay man and a bunch of lesbians it was like we have no idea what was going on like we who knows so oh my gosh the like i when you said that it just threw me to um the uh the shots of billy eichner just running down let's go lesbians let's go let's go lesbians he loves lesbians he sure does okay so um okay murder equals bad however happened um yeah they peter was murdered and um both joan and goldine

were arrested for the murder within weeks like as soon as they found the guy they brought them both in um and rest do we know who outed them who like about the gun not their being gay no i gotta specify in the story no so we don't know who that that's like another thing that i was like yet another vague point that is super crucial to like knowing more about the story but like we don't know who who tips tips them off and also there wasn't a casing on the bullet so how are they able to match it up or is this just a random gun and they assumed or no so i think i think none of the articles said this but a little bit later um i do have a bullet point about how so basically the

the backstory of how of what happened between joan andeen, it's like just down here in like a second. But the September before, like before Halloween that year, Joan had given Goldeen money to go buy a gun at a gun shop in Pasadena. And so Goldeen had bought the gun, had kept the gun with her. And when she bought the gun, she actually only bought two bullets. Oh, geez. But my thought is because she only used one of the bullets the other bullet was probably still in the gun ah so they may be matched bullets i'm guessing oh okay wow potentially i don't know that that

wasn't in anything so that's also wild speculation but like a detective just there oh my god thank you so much you're welcome inspector gross you know if i'd like to be called anything it would be inspector gross please okay so um yeah so basically the backstory then so as soon almost honestly as soon as they were arrested goldeen immediately is like i did it here's everything that you need to know about it let me just confess every single thing right now. Gotcha. So that's when they start getting all the information about like Joan telling Goldeen how terrible Peter is.

Like, and then she immediately starts being like, Joan manipulated me. Like I did. I wouldn't have done that except for Joan. Like all of this stuff. She put a spell over me. Oh. To convince me to murder Peter. That's really turning into like gay witchcraft, which is another fun conversation.

A fun conversation. Wait, can you cover that? You know, gay witchcraft sounds like something that would be very fun to cover. Although like, just talk about like putting a, like a bad taste in everyone's mouth about being gay and witchcraft at the same time. And that like one can cause the other, like it's yikes. That's yeah, no, that's very true. Yeah. Definitely feeding into the bad tropes of like, you can make someone gay and all that. Yes. Oh my God. There were, that's so true. And like, right. True. Throughout this too, it feels like there were so many tropes to like, that's so true and like right true throughout this too it feels like there were so many tropes to like you know and definitely immediately as um they start confessing and then it is also i think

in the at this point where goldeen says that joan and betty were lovers and that's why they were so close and that joan was you know still hung up on betty all of that again it's like hard to know because of like you know that it was illegal and they were trying to not you know, still hung up on Betty, all of that. Again, it's like hard to know because of like, you know, that it was illegal and they were trying to not, you know, get that out in court. Or, you know, Goldeen was maybe trying to save her own self. Yeah. Don't know. But apparently they, yeah, like I said, they talked a lot about killing Peter together. They put their plan into action on Halloween when basically Joan again it's I keep saying it I'm so sorry to keep being like

it's so unclear but Goldeen spoke like said things in court um Joan never did and Betty never did so it's maybe hearsay from Goldeen gotcha okay but Goldeen did say that like Joan is a mastermind. Joan came up with the whole plan. Joan said that Halloween would be best because someone walking down the street in a costume wouldn't be right. Weird at all. Yeah, exactly. Um, they could have the bag, the gun in a bag and it wouldn't look too weird, that kind of thing. Um, oh, and so, yeah, that's where I have the, the Joan, um, gave Goldeen the money to buy the gun at the gun shop. Goldeen told the clerk that it was for home safety and only bought the two bullets, which I feel like is very presumptuous. I definitely think it's presumptuous and that like I if I were to murder someone, I'm pretty sure I would not do it right the first time.

Like I would I'd get more than two bullets like that's pretty confident and you're killing if you've never done it before that's what I thought yeah I feel like anything I get like a million of because I want to build in a million mistakes or maybe they were thinking like you only get two shots literally and then like if you messed up at least there's no more evidence of other ammo or something. That's true. I don't know. I don't know.

Yeah. Either way. So interesting. That's why, well, actually I guess that's not, so I don't know why they didn't find the other shell casing that was actually fired.

I don't know if maybe, I mean, it seems farfetched to think Goldeen might've picked that up or maybe maybe more realistically it just ended up somewhere else like either outside look hard enough yeah they just didn't find it um so that's why um yeah with the initial scene then they didn't find the shell casing that initially led them in a different direction um so yeah then the night of the murder joan dressed goldine in the costume drove her to fabiano's house in a car they borrowed from their friend, poor friend.

Yo, maybe that was the friend who tipped the cops off. Oh, honestly, though, maybe. Oh, that's so interesting. I never thought of that. Yeah, that person is definitely like on the list of people who could have tipped them off. Yeah. Yeah. like on the list of people who could have tipped them off yeah yeah um and then yeah uttering that line that I was like oh god like them sitting in the car and Joan being like all right go do it

like now's the time yeah truly so Goldeen also said in her confession that she was so nervous that her hands were shaking that's why she was like holding the gun with both hands because she couldn't even like hold herself steady yeah like which makes me think this was definitely her first time and also she was wildly hesitant and so i also personally am falling onto the side of like she did this in hopes that it would like impress the person she liked yeah and she did not like see the like clear as day like why does she want you to do this to your to her partners or her ex-partner's partner it it feels like it was like some version of manipulation yes yeah it definitely starts to feel like that for sure

and like the more that goldeen like especially her like immediately confessing and immediately trying to like explain herself as best she could like I feel like that definitely and some of the quotes later too um are very like yeah she's just kind of like I think in one of the quotes later she's like I've always been really impressionable and like this kind of is another thing of that fast forward to the trial Goldeen pled not guilty in front of a grand jury by reason of insanity um and then it might have honestly like some sources said um they weren't really sure what joan had initially pled but actually on my birthday march 11th but of 1958 i am not that old thankfully no you're 59 i am 59 um they both pled guilty to second degree murder taking a plea

deal down from first degree or does it go that way basically down from first rumor to second degree murder and both they both ended up getting five years to life in prison like wow that's a wild range yeah um a doctor did examine both joan and goldeen but like i don't really trust him because patriarchy and homophobia yeah so yeah fair enough but there was a quote um from i think it was oh deranged crimes deranged la the blog, put it like this. The quote, a doctor who examined Goldeen characterized her as a passive person who became a handy tool or putty in the hands of Mrs. Rabble, Joan. So what Goldeen had to say for herself, she said, I had no motive personally. Whatever motive I had was to please Joan. I was always easily influenced. I have been impressionable and always trusting.

Wow. At least she knows that about herself. I mean, now she knows it extra, I feel like. She knows it too well. Yeah. So they're both sentenced five years to life in prison. This later actually sparked a debate about the court system going quote light on women,

which that just was like, that came up in almost every article that like, it was a big thing at the time that then after that, there was like kind of a, like a, just a debate of people being like, you're too easy on women in court, which I feel like is maybe the opposite now. I don't know. I feel like with like preconceived notions, it's and like the patriarchy all of that um it's also let's see where am i oh it's also speculated that neither woman wanted to go to trial because homosexuality was illegal at the time so they wanted to like keep it they took the plea deal obviously just to sure yeah take that and nothing else sure sadly little is known about the women after peter's murder and accounts differ slightly but it sounds like goldeen served

some time and then was released at some point because by 1971 she was named an officer in the miracle mile chapter of the professional women's club whoa okay yeah she died in los angeles in 1998 at 83 betty apparently sold peter's salons after he died and one source i found said she remarried but most said she didn't okay and she passed away in palm desert in 1999 at the age of 81 and as for joan she was as elusive as ever not much was known of her like people like literally sources would be like she stayed in prison the rest of her life Goldie and Toot like some sources were like they both were in prison their whole lives even though oh wow so really just having a yeah just not clear at all super not clear um but also a lot of sources are like but we think she got out and changed her name like there were some speculations about that um and then lastly some sources say she lived out the

rest of her um or wait speculate that she and betty got back together and even suggest that betty could have been in on it the whole time oh okay yeah twist That's a twist. I know. The Vice article actually ends with, most of us know what it is to, this is all a quote, most of us know what it is to love strongly, to go through infatuation, obsession, and surrender. Sometimes that sort of love twists itself up. Did Betty love Rabble? Joan? Did the women ever reconnect?

Did Betty play a role in her husband's murder? Sometimes the line between your thoughts and theirs fades away when that happens there is only one way to explain ourselves i did it for her okay yeah so that's the story of the trick-or-treat murders of 1957. Jeez Louise. Wow. Well done, Eva. Good job on your notes. Thank you so much. I felt like I didn't realize how,

how super unclear everything was. Like part of me was like, as I was reading it, I was like, oh my God, I know nothing about this. That's part of the mystery, I guess,

but you did a great job for like having minimal information. Oh, thank you. And a little trip through queer history. Nice little field trip. Thank you. Yeah. That felt like a good little road to go down to,

to bring some of that in. Yeah. At the end of the day, we're all at least all a little more educated about queer history. Yeah. Wow. This is like shockingly a long episode. I was not expecting us

to go for this long. It's like a two hour episode. Oh my gosh. More? I don't know. So sorry. I literally thought my notes would be like 20 minutes and here I am. I spoke for so long. I'm so sorry. I thought so too. I looked at my notes and I was like oh this will be a quick one. What is wrong with me?

I don't know anymore. Well thank you everyone. I looked at my notes and I was like, Oh, this will be a quick one. What is wrong with me? I don't know anymore. Hmm. Well, thank you everyone. I'm sure you are at your destination by now after a million years of listening to this episode. I, I come back next week for more Eva notes. Maybe it'll stay gay. I don't know. We'll see. And do you, I guess, should we shout out where people can find you and follow you, Eva?

Oh, sure. I'm just ew gross on all the social medias. That's me. Yeah. And come back again, Christine, I'm sure you're listening to this. Looking forward to your texts, although we'll have no idea what you're talking about. Christine, we love you. We miss you. I mean, the baby at this point is like,

even bigger and cuter than before. So Christine, I hope you're enjoying your maternity leave. And hopefully everyone is sticking with us. And Eva will be back next week to hang out with us again. And that's it. Are you ready to do Christine's part? Oh my God. Oh God. I'm not ready. Dialing Christine right now. Hello.

No, I can do it. And that's why we drink. Yay.