Chambers of the Occult - EP# 15 A Night to Remember and Witch Hunts: PROM mom and The Salem Witch Trials

Episode Date: August 8, 2024

This week, we're serving up a spine-chilling feast of true crime and supernatural tales! First, J takes us through the harrowing story of Melissa Drexler, the "Prom Mom." Discover how a night meant for celebration turned into a tragedy that shocked the nation.Next, Kai delves into the infamous Salem Witch Trials. Uncover the hysteria and paranoia that gripped a colonial town, leading to one of the darkest chapters in American history.Then, Alexis will share the haunting tale of a ghost who returned from beyond the grave to help identify her own killer. This spectral detective story will leave you questioning what lies beyond.And for a special treat, our guest takes us to the wilds of Alaska to introduce us to a man whose hunting expeditions were far from ordinary. Get ready to meet a hunter who preyed on more than just animals for sport.Join us for an episode filled with dread, mystery, and the supernatural. You won't want to miss it!Send us a Text Message.

Chambers of the occult may contain content that might not be suitable for all listeners. Listener discretion is advised. Hey, I have a doctor's note. I'm going to be out for the next, you know, two months. I've been diagnosed with enwichment. Enwichment? Yeah, sorry, which got to me the other day. I'm here to introduce yourself. I don't know. You should introduce me. Who am I?

Okay. Hey everyone. Welcome. I am welcome. Yeah, go ahead, Kai. Welcome to Chambers of the Occult. I'm up sub 15 now. Yeah. As always, ahead, Kai. Welcome to Chambers of the Occult. I hope it's at 15 now. As always, I'm Kai.

I'm Jay. I'm Alexis. And I'm the mystery guest. We're here with our special guest today, the beloved Jesse. Benefield. Benefield. Thank you. PhD. PhD. You can edit that part out if you want. Multiple

PhDs actually. We can be man. I agree. But yeah, we have a special episode today with a guest. Hope you like it. It's going to be a fun one. Yeah. Yeah, episode 15. That means I have to catch up on some others. But I'm sure I'll be fine. No spoilers. Yeah, yeah. What are we gonna spoil? I'm gonna be honest, I don't even remember like half of the cases that I cover. But then you can do them again. I can, yeah. Like a couple years down the road. More than half this time? Yeah, yeah. For me, years down the road. Yeah, yeah. Maybe episodes, just retails, you know.

We do all our things. We need to start, or like for when we do our like TikToks, like recapping the stories or like summarizing them. I guess it'll be good to know. Previously on Chambers of Vehicles. Exactly. Oh, we can have Jesse narrate them. We used to do that on D&D with my friends. They'd always have me use my previously voice, previously on D&D. And then just make up some story.

That's good. They take advantage of you. Well, like, have you? You should. Very take advantage of both. Take advantage. You should. Very take advantage of both. You should. Period.

Alexis, how do you feel about Jesse being on our podcast today? I feel gay. Oh, yeah. I'm gay. That's it. Nothing. He contaminated me. Gay meaning like happy.

One of those. Because my husband is on here. Oh. contaminated me. This is for you. You're like happy. One of those. Because my husband is on here. Oh. That's right. Yeah. Yeah. I forget the context. Congrats. It happens. It's okay. Yeah. I don't. Yeah. I don't even know when it happened. Most white guys end up marrying a woman. I think. Yeah. What, your second husband and you have like what, one, two wives? I think your second husband and you have like what one two wives? No, no, no, I love my husband Jesse's my second husband. I have one wife and that is Evelyn. Okay, got it

Okay. Well, we had both of your husbands on the podcast now now. We need to have your wife through we need your wife Yeah, yeah, I would love to have my wife on here. My sister wife. I haven't seen her in so long. Who though? When you like look at a family tree, that's what she would be. I'm descended from a second wife. Oh my god, are you? I am, actually. Illegally. My great-great-something-or-other grandfather was a Mormon, but like, practicing without outside the law as Mormon. And he wrote a bunch of letters in prison for polygamy.

And I'm not descended from the first one. I think he also didn't get her out. He got like his first wife out and not the second one. Okay. I guess I respect it. I was just going to say favoritism. Yeah. I guess he was right because I mean like look what that boat line led to. Me. And we all love you Jesse so you know what? Listeners you can't diversity to this Even though listeners can't see the cameras on right now, but we can look at Jesse's beautiful face right now

It is pretty do you want to describe me? What am I wearing? Whoa, Jesse On the podcast. What are you wearing? T-shirts, shorts, boxers longer than usual. Oh my, so scandalous. You gotta have the voice from like that receptionist when you like describe what you're wearing. Don't have a receptionist voice. I have every other voice. It can sound like an old scary woman talking sexy to you. That would be kind of fun. I'm more into that.

But I digress. Yes. You all are here for stories and I'm starting us off this week. Well I need to know how often are we allowed to like interrupt you always always All the time we're here for the banter. Yeah, it's we're just having a conversation a casual conversation If I say something that you want to go off on a tangent, you're more than welcome Perfect. We'll eventually get back to this story Somehow we always find a way Perfect. We'll eventually get back to the story.

Somehow we always find a way. Yeah. We can talk our jobs, rely on it. Yeah, basically. So I have a story for y'all about- Your dish. Well, I have a question for y'all to get started with. Okay.

How was your prom? I didn't have one. Oh, I was a COVID graduate. So there. And Jesse? I went to prom in a truck, a pink truck limo with a Playboy design on the inside, because that was the only limit of a ad. That's kind of cool. Do one of them. I went to a guy with the other one of them. And I went to a gay prom too. So I've had a lot of problems in my experience. Got it.

And Alexis. I didn't have a prom. Also COVID baby. No. COVID baby. Sorry. It's like a cocaine baby. It's just COVID instead. Okay.

Oh, I just realized there's going to be like a big boom of people born from the COVID era. Oh yeah. What are you going to do when you're stuck inside? It's going to be the COVID. boom of people born from the COVID era. Oh, yeah. What are you going to do when you're stuck in society? It's going to be the COVID. Sleep with whatever moves. The baby boom. Yeah. Kai, what did you end up saying?

Like COVID graduate? Is that what you said? Yeah, COVID graduate. Yeah. Okay. Was that you too, Alexis? That's what I meant to ask. Yeah.

Yeah. I went to a continuation school and my continuation school didn't have any school activities, no football games or anything like that. So yeah. And then I didn't go junior or senior year because I was like, I don't have people to go with and I don't think I'm missing out. Still don't regret not going. I did go my sophomore year because there was a junior that was like, hey, would you care to go with me? It's like, sure. And I got a free suit out of it.

What? Huh? I got a free suit out of it. Oh, you got a free suit? Well, because I didn't. No, no, like her dad had like an extra old one that he didn't fit him anymore. So I got a dad's old suit. Huh?

Did you get it? So you like got to keep it afterwards or do you have to give it back to daddy? No, like he didn't want it back. It wasn't gonna fit him anyway. Got it. Yeah, he was just like, it's all right. Like I said, I want you can three problems technically one for each of you.

You guys can have them. Fair. Oh, thank you. I'm sweet. Didn't appreciate it. Yeah, I don't remember the theme for what was the thing for your prom? I don't sure. Yeah, I don't remember.

I don't even know if there really was much of a theme. Okay. I think it was just dance. I like I had to decide where one of them was because it was Okay, the studio. Ours was something cheesy. I think I was like under the sea or something like that, whichever one does. So, yeah, yeah, the reason I was asking you about prom is because my story, a big chunk of my story takes place in prom. Okay. Proms we never had, except for me, we had three. Ah, yeah. No, so for this story, we're going to New Jersey. Ew. I mean, sorry, if there's New Jersey listeners on here, yeah, I love there.

I've never been, I don't know. And this is a story of Melissa Drexler, also known as Prom Mom. That sounds familiar, but I don't know if I know anything about it. Does it ring a bell for Jasper Alexis? No, no it doesn't. It's a catchy name though. Yeah, and Alexis? It is a catchy name. Okay, but you haven't like heard of it? No. Okay, so this took place in 1997 and Melissa is an 18 year old high school senior in Aberdeen Township, New Jersey. And I'm going to give you a little bit of her background so you know what we're I wouldn't say dealing with but who we're talking about. She was a single

daughter from a Catholic family. She loved to draw and she was interested in fashion design. So in her sophomore year, she met her boyfriend, John Lewis, who was two years older. So he was like a senior, and she was a sophomore. No, he was, is that what it was? Yeah, I think so. So it was a love at first sight, but they did like each other, they started talking,

and then they started dating. And then soon, the two of them, like high schoolers, just started to have sex. With each other. Disgusting. Yes, let's clarify that, with each other. Good, thank you, Jesse. But the relationship was- No problem, I'm here for context. Thank you. each other. But the relationship was always a little bit rocky so they would break up quite often

and within a day or two they would make back make make up again. So according to Melissa, she was a friend of John. Sorry, so according to friends, I don't know what I'm saying, Melissa and John did like each other, but they never really talked about marriage. And they were more focused on their life after high school. So they would talk about attending university together and like getting jobs and things like that. And it would be in early 1997 where Melissa and John would start talking about attending prom. Now, being for prom was not under the sea. It was

a night to remember. Okay, so that's like the second most common one. I think there are plenty people remembering their nights to remember. Yeah. Fair. But that really would be a night for them to remember. So one day Melissa just realized that she was late with her period. And yeah, so she decided to tell John. And then she reassured him that it was not a big deal, that she was probably just late or something like that. So Melissa and her best friend, Rebecca, go on and they try prom dresses.

And Melissa doesn't notice anything off. Rebecca doesn't notice anything off. So Melissa starts to wear some bagging clothing around people and no one seems to notice. Not her friends, not her parents, not her boyfriend, but of course Melissa was pregnant. Yeah. Now we're going to fast forward to prom night, going to fast forward to prom night, which was Friday. She later. Something like that, if not more, a little bit more than that. So John picks up Melissa.

She's wearing a sleeveless black dress with a v-neck and a white corsage. Her hair is done in an updo. And there's nothing unusual about her. So John and Melissa arrive at the prom and it takes place in a banquet hall and then she heads straight to the restroom. She tells some of her friends she's like hey I have like a heavy flow period like I have some bad cramps it might be a few

minutes I'm gonna go to the restroom. So John and the friends wait for her. It's no big deal. And this is where I'm going to give a warning. I mean, listeners already know, but this is where it can get a little gruesome. And if you don't want to hear about infants, you might want to skip this story or. Okay. Yeah. Ew, infants. I'm leaving. Definitely don't want to skip this story or... Yeah. Okay. Yeah.

Ew, infants. I'm leaving. Definitely don't want to hear about those. Bye. So, Melissa is in the restroom at the banquet hall during prom. Other girls enter and leave the restroom. And then some of them start to say that they heard some strange noises. And one of the students thought that the noises were of another couple having sex in the restroom.

But nothing really came of it. People were just hearing noises going in and out of the bathroom. Like what I'm assuming is happening in there should not be the sounds of sex. Yeah. Yeah. So. guess is correct. Yeah, you're on the right track. So other young girls... Are doing sex wrong apparently. Yes, Yeah. So after nearly half an hour, Melissa gave birth to a baby boy that weighed about six pounds.

Wow, I don't know if that's like a normal size for a baby. Isn't that like heavy for a baby? And also when you hear about people giving birth birth you usually hear that it takes them a couple hours if not quite a few hours. Yeah. And for Melissa it was just like half an hour in there baby popped out. It ranges between five pounds and eight pounds. Okay. Regular. Yeah. Baby. So while well, this is happening. Everyone else is on the dance floor. Everyone's oblivious to this happening. And then Alexis, you might be able to speak on this a bit more because men's bathrooms don't have this, but Melissa decided to cut the umbilical board

with a sharp edge of the metal trash container in the stock. Oh. Yeah. container in the stock. Oh. Yeah. So once again, that's yeah. Here's that warning once again if you would rather avoid anything related to infants you might want to skip this. And the next thing that Melissa did was apply pressure to pressure to the neck of her newborn son. Oh, yep. And eventually, yeah, she starts to look for something to hide the body, the body of her son. And then she starts to clean up the mess and she finds a trash bag. Now, I read a lot of different things, but a lot of the things that Melissa stuffed her newborn in a trash bag, into trash bags, and then threw him into a trash can, walked back out of the restroom into the prom with her friends and her boyfriend. She went up to the DJ booth and she requested a song the unforgiven by Metallica.

Okay. So she just walked out. Yeah, man, just like hold on guys. Let me get birth real fast. Yeah, just give me half an hour and then we can ensure the rest of the night. Yeah. So, half an hour and then we can ensure the rest of the night. Yeah. So her friends were just thinking that she wasn't feeling well. That's why she was in there for half an hour. And then other students started to report that when they were talked to, they report that Melissa seemed to just enjoy her time at the prom. They didn't really notice anything odd about her. Meanwhile, she was dancing and just enjoying the prom. Students alert the prom supervisors

about blood in a stall in the girl's bathroom. So that's, yeah, when a janitor... Had the body gone up to blood, huh? Well, I mean, they see the blood. the body's not the blood huh well I mean they see they see the blood the body's in a bag I know I just mean like if she's gonna take the time to like kill her baby and get rid of it she can at least clean up the blood a little bit I also imagine how what things do you have to clean up such a mess in the bathroom? Ant bones? They're meant for absorbing blood, aren't they?

Yeah, but are they going to absorb things if it's on the wall? Or is it just going to smear it more? I mean, pat it down with some water. The point is, people are going to ask questions if you're in this room full of blood smears all over the place. You should find a way to get rid of it. So once again, it was just like one specific stall that was covered in blood. So the janitor goes in to clean it and the janitor then notices that the trash bag feels too heavy to only contain paper towels.

So she calls in another janitor and between the both of them, they check the contents. And of course, they're shocked because inside of the find, they find the tiny body of Melissa's newborn. Now, meanwhile, this is all happening in the restroom. Melissa's just in the banquet hall and enjoying a salad like nothing has happened. And that's when like a supervisor is informed. And that's when like a supervisor is informed. And then other girls also test testify that that was the stall that Melissa was in. So between asking around like the chaperones and the kids, they're like, yeah,

who was in that stall? Oh, Melissa was in there. She wasn't feeling well type of thing. So during this whole time, the paramedics were also called, they were rushed, and they tried to save the baby by providing some CPR. The paramedics tried for almost two hours to revive Melissa's baby. And Melissa was taken to the hospital for treatment. And meanwhile, her boyfriend John was questioned about the pregnancy. They asked him, it's like, hey, John said that she was feeling sick and that she wasn't pregnant. And then they proceeded to tell him that Melissa was pregnant and she had a baby tonight in the bathroom. So he's shocked, taken back, because he's like, shouldn't look pregnant. Is the baby okay type of thing? And of course they had to tell John that the baby was not okay. So the

authorities called the parents and once again the parents were completely unaware that their daughter was pregnant. Yeah that's crazy. Like labor beforehand or like just somehow was gifted the gift that all mothers probably wish they had just 30 minutes of labor instead of hours. Yeah. There's lots of people out there who don't show their pregnancy that well. You really can't tell they're pregnant. And some people are, it's very obvious that they're pregnant. So the theories are like, are saying that Melissa did not show her pregnancy at all. Parents, that can take hours and she's just like, well, Parents. Because that can take hours in pain. She's just like, plop.

Yeah. I mean, that's why someone thought that someone was having sex in the bathroom, because someone was, I don't know, growling. Again, not what sex sounds like, I don't think. Don't tell that to high schoolers. You might want to encourage them to figure it out. Just painful screaming, yes. Yes.

So, Melissa's parents are asked to come to the hospital and that's where they give them the rundown of what happened. They were unable to revive the baby, so they did an autopsy to determine whether the baby was stillborn or if he was alive and then killed by Melissa. Because obviously people wanted to know if Melissa was a killer. And it's quite different if it was a stillborn compared to if he was alive and then killed by Melissa because if the baby was born alive, he would have received a birth certificate and then they would have issued a death certificate. If the baby was stillborn, they would have only issued a death certificate.

So it would be on June 9, 1997. This was three days after the incident after prom. Melissa Drexler was arrested and she was charged with murder after an autopsy revealed that the baby was born alive and died of asphyxiation. Of course, like I said, everyone was shocked. The family decided to name the baby Christopher and there was a private burial. So because you can't really keep this hidden, especially because it happened at prom, when word got out, other students that were there and students around the school just spread the rumors that someone had had a baby during prom and that the baby was killed. So some people wore white ribbons in order to

memorize the baby. So a 17 year old named Valerie, she was a Lacey High School student. She discussed plans to distribute white ribbons at the high school during a like assembly type of thing in memory of the infant at the school prom. Val, yeah, it says I have a little newspaper clip and that said Valerie plans today to distribute white ribbons to her classmates in memory of Drexler's baby Quote we just want to show that we care about human life I'm going to try to give them out to as many people as I can she said But Where there's good people there's always bad people

Unfortunately, there was also the opposite reaction. The Asbury Park Press newspaper from New Jersey brought to light that several walls in the girls' and boys' bathrooms were defaced with graffiti linked to Drexler and her baby, more than like a dozen students. So people would write in the bathroom stalls, baby killer, bathroom walls. Holy fuck. Yeah. So complete opposite. Um, several of the, um, what is it? Yeah, several of the boxes in the girls bathroom to dispose of sanitary napkins, tampons, everything, there were also defaced with baby killer and things on them. And then one girl named Melanie, she was a 14-year-old freshman. She said that kids also smeared ketchup on garbage cans in school.

And once again, this is because it was all referenced to them finding the body in the trash can. Aren't kids fun? What was that? Aren't high school kids fun? Yeah. That's one way to put it. And then quickly headlines started to call Melissa. It gave her the nickname prom mom, which took over the headlines. And eventually some students started making bets to see if Melissa would

show up for graduation or not. Oh my god. Yeah. It's like tormenting this girl. Should we do that? No, just kidding. No. For who? Well, not you, Jay, because you already know the city. But we we don't know whether or not she's oh, she shows up to graduation. Got it. No, I'm not gonna put money on it, but I bet she shows up. Yeah. So some of the newspapers, yeah, reported more of the incident of this is what happened. Some of them were more of just going wild to get people to buy the newspapers. And some were just wanting to inform people that Melissa's deception of being pregnant is by no means unique. And then these are the numbers from back in the late 1990s, but it says that the US Justice Department statistics show that between 300 to 400 dead newborns are

discovered discarded annually, whether stillborn, killed or dead, or killed or dead from exposure. According to Dr. Phil J. Resnick, a leading expert in the murder of newborns. I'm just going to say Dr. Phil. I'm like, maybe we shouldn't use Dr. Phil. No, not, no. He's the scientific authority. No, Dr. Philip J. Resnick, he is a linen expert at the time on murder of newborns. And one of the things he said was, but nobody knows how many don't happen to be discovered because that's 300 to 400 being discovered, but that doesn't account for the ones not

discovered. And then they say, it was unclear yesterday whether Drexler had been in denial over the changes in her body, or if she had just hidden them so successfully that even her best friends in the bathroom minutes before she gave birth were unable to see her friend's circumstances. I mean, like, as a high schooler, I feel like it's pretty easy to hide that just because like baggy clothes you can wear, nobody's gonna bat an eye. And also, like your high school friends, they're not gonna pay attention to like if you're pregnant or not. Like I don't really care.

I'll send it to you once we're kind of done with the story so I can look it up. But you can see a picture of her wearing her prom dress and she physically does not look pregnant. Okay. So there's like I said some people that really show it some people that don't. Yeah some people just don't. Yeah and she went with her friends to try on prom dresses so they didn't even notice anything with Melissa. Okay. Yeah. Weird. So I think that like if you were baggy clothing, fine. Yeah. Like you can probably hide it, but as soon as you go to try on a prom dress. Yeah. Okay.

Especially when you go to try on multiple. I assume that some will show it more than others. I wonder if her friends were probably like, oh, like secretly they're like, oh, she's getting some weight, but like they didn't tell that because they don't want to like say anything about it. Yeah. If they have that type of friendship of like, let's just not comment on her body type of thing. Yeah. Yeah. So another quote says that so from Dr. Phil J. Resnick says

that some woman may be in a calculated way, hide their pregnancy, anticipating that they will get rid of the baby. More often than than more often, they may deny the pregnancy said Resnick. It's kind of like This problem will go away I read that in situations like this there they could be in so much denial That they are hoping either for a miscarriage or to get rid of the baby when it's born or like Melissa's case, kill the baby. Yeah. And I would say that it's kind of split between some people being in denial that they're pregnant,

some people are in denial that they want to be a mother. Yeah. And like, I don't know, I feel like it happens so much more than like anybody realizes of like a mom who either like, yeah, denies her pregnancy or whatever it may be to just immediately then like either give up the child or like in a more sinister sense, you know, kill their child and move on afterwards. I don't know. I don't know what the thinking is afterwards. I don't know. I don't know what the thinking is, but

I don't know. That in California, you can be both excused from school to get an abortion and they can't tell your parents about it. Oh, one thing I learned when I was in college, not in college, in high school. High school? That sounds like I haven't gone on an abortion, but I did a bunch of those when I was in the GSA, a bunch of different rights. Okay. Yeah, yeah. So, yeah. Yeah.

So another thing that's mentioned here, it's kind of talking about what they go through when they're like denying their pregnancy because it says that experts say that it is common for teenagers to deny their pregnancy. In some cases, the denial stretches into late into pregnancy, and in rare situations, the rejection of the reality continues after birth, during which some women will disassociate themselves from the experience. I say they're viewing themselves from above watching someone else give birth to the child. That must be, I mean like if you don't want the baby that that's bad but I feel like if you're getting birth that might be a nice thing. You know you're

like in the midst of labor pain and suddenly like nope, not me. Oh Yeah, like you're watching someone out. Yeah it's just like I don't know like Watching the midwife. I can't understand someone just so stating that much but yeah watching the midwife But it's just something that I found very interesting Heather like there's been so much like research into this because it's happened so often. One thing that Dr. Peter Harris said, he's a medical director from the Medical Health Services at New Jersey, Shore Medical Center. He said that with babies, they just keep growing and growing and growing. They don't go away. And of course, in the crisis when the baby is born, for nine months, you must bury your head

in the sand. You hope to wake up and the problem is resolved. And in crisis, kids do incredible things like have a baby in half an hour, or maybe put it in a bag and put it in a trash can. I'm going to recycle it and do it by myself. Or compost. I guess that would be compost, yeah. Yeah, so one more thing that he mentioned is that it's pretty amazing how good some teenagers are at hiding the fact that they're pregnant. So, Seth Harris, who in his 20 years of legal career has counseled four or five women who hit their pregnancies and abandoned their newborns.

In about half of those cases, the babies lived, he said, and in every instance, law enforcement officials became involved after the babies or bodies were discovered? Can they live happily ever after? I would assume not. I'm trying to see what else I can pull out from this newspaper clipping because there's a lot of really interesting information related to this case. But I think I'll just move on from this little clipping. Okay. So she, of course, was taken into custody. She was arrested. She was sent to a trial.

custody, she was arrested, she was sent to a trial. And the judge that was to proceed over her legal proceedings was Judge John A. Riccardi. And because the parents wanted to protect their daughter, even if it meant to give her less time or something, they hired a private lawyer to handle Melissa's defense. Her lawyer was named Stephen J. Cicar. I think that's how his last name is spelled, said. He was a lawyer based in Tom's River in New Jersey. And one of the things that they brought up during the case was that the director of autopsy services, he ended up doing the autopsy. He said that the discovery of air in the intestines also suggests that the infant's throat and the larynx were obstructed, perhaps broken, forcing air back into the stomach. Oh, shit.

So once again, there was a debate of was the baby born alive or was it a stillborn? And according to the autopsy report, he was alive. Yeah. Or bed bed. Oh, fuck. Yeah. So Melissa's defense, the lawyer, he focused on several key strategies to try to influence the outcome of the case. He focused on the emotional and psychological state of Melissa's condition, because they highlighted Drexler's extreme emotional distress and psychological state at the time of the incident, because this was crucial to portraying her actions as not necessarily thought out more of like a heat of the moment, like a panic. Because for all she knew, she was going to go to prom and she was going to have the baby some other

day. But it just happened to be on prom. It just happened to be on prom. Yeah. Like, prom pin. Yeah, because he also focused on that Melissa did not have the intent to kill the newborn. And then this point was supported by the fact that she had no prior criminal records, but at the same time, this is an 18 year old, so I assume they wouldn't have a long criminal record, if at all any records. Now, this is where, as I was finding this out, I freaked out for a moment, and I was going to say, Alexis freaked out for a moment. And I was going to say, Alexis, you know this person. Oh, I do. Is it Josh Hutcherson? No.

No. So what ended up happening was because of course they wanted to cause as much doubt that Melissa did this willingly. She had like evil intentions. They brought out, they brought a forensic pathology expert to provide an independent review of the autopsy findings. So like a second professional and his name, I don't know if this is gonna ring a bell Alexis, but his name was Dr. Cyril Wench.

What's his name? Dr. Cyril Wench. What's his name? Dr. Cyril Wench. What? I, how do you spell that? Okay, well, the reason I'm bringing the, do you know why? Oh, oh, I do know why. John F. Kennedy, brother. What?

Wait, hold on. Whoa. What? He didn't hear work on the assassination of John F. Kennedy? He was also I don't know if that's true or not, but he was also involved in the case of OJ Simpson. Yes, that too and also Elvis Presley. Okay. Yeah, I think John Bonet, Ramsey too. Okay, but he was involved in the OJ Simpson. That's the only one that I know because

it made that connection when I was reading articles and I'm like, whoa. So this man has been involved in some, yeah, he's covered some dark cases. He was involved in this as well. So Dr. Cyril, which his testimony testimony just supported the idea that the baby was suffocated rather than being internally, uh, intentionally killed through strangulation. He said that when they put him in the bags, he just suffocated himself.

Which he tried to align that with the narrative of panic and distress with Melissa, rather than the premeditated murder. Okay. So, yeah. So once again, the defense tried to get empathy from the judge saying that Drexler's young age, she was 18 at the time of incident, and her lack of prior legal issues, and her significant emotional and psychological pressures were all factors that contributed to what ended up happening and that it should all be taken in consideration when it comes to her sentencing. Because

they knew that Melissa was going to get sentenced, they just try to get as few years as possible. So after all this work on August 20th, 1998, this was a year after the incident, a little bit over a year, Melissa pleaded guilty to aggravated manslaughter as part of the plea deal. And the plea agreement just reduced the charge from murder to aggravated manslaughter. And considering her emotional state and the lack of prior criminal history, on October 29th, 1998, she was sentenced to 15 years in prison. Damn. And then she lived after. So she was given 15 years in prison and Melissa's boyfriend John Lewis. This happened in 1997 and then she was sentenced in 1998.

Okay. Yeah. So she's. So we'll talk about that. Yeah. Yes. So Drexler's boyfriend, John Lewis, he was, he reportedly cried as the judge sentenced his girlfriend to 15 years in prison.

And in addition to that, when she, her sentencing, Drexler simply said that she was, well, sorry, okay? End quote. She's straightforward. That's it? That's it? So it kind of just goes back to showing you that she, her mental state that she really

disassociated from what she did. I don't know. her mental state that she really disassociated from what she did? I don't know that sounds more like it's not like she'd still be dissociating though. Sounds like she's just I don't know I haven't heard her tone. Yeah that's true I guess that's true. So just sorry then you know. Sorry okay type of thing. Yeah, no, I don't think there was that. They just gave him 15 years.

Yeah. So Melissa didn't have to say sorry, so good for her at least. I guess. Look at Brightside, yeah. So Melissa was sent to the Edna Mann Correctional Facility for Women in Clinton in New Jersey and this is the state's only correctional facility for women and it houses inmates with various security classifications including maximum security so there is a wide variety of people there. The diverse person. Yeah, when it comes to, yeah, yeah.

Right. Now the facility offers educational and work opportunities as well as counseling and other programs. So it would be in prison that she would spend the next years. And of course, she quickly found out that the roles were different from society, from the society she had left.

And I found a newspaper clipping where they talked to some prisoners there while she was in there. So I summarized a few of the things that they said, but here inmates say that women are judged on the types of crime they have committed. And neocide, the killing of a newborn, is at the bottom of the list. In a world of the inmates, and this was said by Deborah Litter,

she was 33 at the time, who was serving a 25 year sentence from strong armed robbery and capital murder. So yeah, she's like, if you're here because you killed a newborn, you're at the bottom of the list. Like you're the worst of the worst. Like we don't- Worst of the worst. Yeah. Yeah. So officials at Edna Mayhan Correctional Facility, could not really say how many women at the county prison were there because they had killed their babies.

But they did say that, but the prisoner that they interviewed said that she knows about one dozen women serving time for murder, for murdering their children, not necessarily infant, but just their children Um, so this woman she said, uh were taunted such as when time Uh such as at a time when inmates um would mock the people by

make by sounds of crying babies Yeah, um, and yeah, just like make by a silence of crying babies. And yeah, just like, okay. So they would, they're like, why are you here for? Is that, oh, I killed my newborn and they would want you. Yeah. You can lie about that in prison, you know, just be like, I, uh, I robbed somebody. That's something interesting because the officer that the interview said, we actually tell them

to not disclose why they're in prison for with the other prisoners because of reasons like this. You could lie. I don't imagine it's easy to keep it away from other prisoners because they want to know they're going to find something out. I also assume. They'll give it something that won't. Yeah. it away from other prisoners because they want to know they're going to find something out. I also-

They might as well give her something that won't. Yeah. But this is also like an 18 year old. She could be quite naive in some things, aspects maybe. I mean on one hand it's like, yeah, like why would you murder like your own child? But on the other hand, like you do have to think about the circumstances of like what drives a person to do that in the first place Yeah, isn't supposed to be their punishment Yeah, so in addition to all that

Sometimes they're even shunned as well so You're completely cut off from like everyone there as well So you're completely cut off from everyone there as well. Other people that would obviously talk to you, like maybe like, I don't know, officers or something like that. In addition to that, if this people receive financial support from their families, other inmates would often use the cash to buy cigarettes and coffee. So when it came to commissary,

you didn't even have that, you know, luck or privilege, I would say, because other inmates would pretty much take your commissary. Now, I did say that she was sentenced to 15 years in prison. And due to good behavior, Melissa would be let out in three years in parole. So she was released on parole on November 26, 2001. She only served three out of her 15 years. Wow. Yeah. So during her time in prison, Melissa got to complete her high school education. She received her diploma in 1997.

In addition to that, she took some fashion courses while she was incarcerated. And she expressed hopes of working in the fashion industry upon her release. Now, something you say, what is the new black? Now, something very interesting that also I ended up coming across was that if Melissa had her baby, three days later, like if the birth was three days later, and the death of the baby happened three days later, Melissa would have been sentenced under a new state law

that would require people to serve, that are serving time to serve at least 80% of their time before becoming eligible for parole. Oh, shit. It really was a lucky birth. 30 minutes at the right time to not get in trouble for infanticide. Yeah, no, so

if it was 3 days later she would have had to serve 12 years instead of 3. Wow. I forget. Is it because she turned 18 3 days later? No, no. It was just the new state law that went onto place Okay Yeah

So before you think about killing your baby, look at your local statutes Yeah educate yourself maybe talk to a therapist a psychologist Or a lawyer speak to your local congresspeople Yeah, so when she got to go out and parole and everything, her lawyer still talked a little bit representing her because she wanted to be away from all social media, all newspapers, everything. So her lawyer said that Melissa has spent much of her time sleeping while she and the baby's father, John Lewis, have continued their relationship. She spends most of her time alone in her bedroom, sitting at the edge of the bed, staring into

space. And that earlier the year that she got released, she tried to get a job at a video store But when the owner learned of her criminal history He quickly backed away from hiring her Yeah makes sense Yeah so Like I said, she tried to be bad at doing video stuff

True, but like you could still be qualified Yeah, I just decided to not hire. Oh, God. Did you just say snuff films? You can edit that out. Or if you leave it in. Or we can leave it in. I mean, we gave everyone a warning.

You know, I tried to see what we knew of her nowadays like in 2024. She really has kept off mostly talking to press and things like that so she's just a normal woman at this point just living her life. She's now married, she has two kids, which is a redemption tale, which I assume it would be a tough story to disclose to your kids whenever they hear about that. So frontal lobe wasn't finished baking. I'm sorry. I was just a girl. Yeah. Yeah. She did not go on to marry her high school boyfriend, so she married someone else. Okay.

But John and Melissa did reconnect and they're like still in touch, but they're not dating. They're just like acquaintances. Married with two kids, I hope not. No. So that's the story of prom mom, Melissa Drexler, and I'd like to wrap up this story with some sources, some interesting things that I found because in all 50 states, I don't know if you've heard of it, but there is what's called US,

in all 50 states in the US, they have a safe haven haven law, sometimes know as baby Moses law or safe surrender laws, depending on from the state. And this loss are a lot are to allow parents or people with legal custody to confident confidentially out confidently surrender a newborn infant within 72 hours of the birth without fearing arrest or prosecution for the child's abandonment. So the law, what the law is at fire stations, right? I was just going to say this pop-up area fire stations isn't there. Is that just

I think so. You have to look it up because it's different in every state. Yeah. Do you think typically- I mean, the location is different in every state. Yeah. Typically though, it's like one of the locations is just like a fire station. Like you can drop them off in front of a fire station and- Yeah. Because the loss per visit is just- You can drop your voters registration. Save more life.

South F.S.T. library. You can drop your newly born baby. Yeah. So it's meant to save lives of infants when something like Melissa Drexler's situation could have happened. Maybe if she had her kid outside of prom, she would have taken him here. We just, it's something we don't know. But yeah, if you're in need, please search for your closest location. Do you know if this case affected the implementation of these laws? I'm not sure. I'm pretty sure they were already in effect during Melissa's time.

I'm not sure if it became more accessible or they added more locations. Um, that is something I would have to look up, but I'm not sure to be honest. Okay. Got it. And they lived happily ever after. That is a good mom. Apparently now she's trying to live her normal life. Yeah.

Like, okay. I believe in redemption. Like I said, like I said. So I would say good for her, you know. I guess so. Like, I'm glad she's doing better. And like in a place that's, I guess, recovered from all of that. Yeah. I mean, I imagine that there is not a day. I mean, maybe a day or two, but like when she meets new people. Or when she started dating again, when she met her husband, she would at some point have to disclose probably about her or because if not, someone was going to tell him or he was going to find out for someone else.

Yeah, I think that even though she's out and she's trying to live a normal life, this is not something she can like truly get away from. It's just something that. Oh, never. Yeah. What's that? The. Yeah. To her kids. Yeah.

For her in-laws. I imagine. Don't kill your babies. This is why. Kill your babies. Yep. Yeah, because I'm trying to think of like now you talk to your in-laws, how are you going to disclose this information to them? Yeah, I mean, about 100%.

The in-laws don't have to know. I just say. No, but at some point someone's going to tell them. Probably. I just stick to letting the partner know and then the partner can choose. Tell the in-laws. Yeah. Unless you want to, but like you might just want to be like, no. Yeah.

And then I'm sure the whole conversation of like, hey, do you want to have kids? It's like because of your past type of thing. I mean, it seems, you know, she's okay having she has two kids, so that's great. But yeah, that's the story of prom mom. I hope you enjoyed it as much as it wasn't as much as you could enjoy it. Yeah. It's, it's honestly a little bit jarring hearing how like casual of a name they give, like this case like prom mom you know yeah no no definitely

it's nicer than what they could have come up with no definitely murder mommy i was like oh prom mom i think like i think i recognize this at like the start but i was like i don't know anything about one more thing i'm yeah i thought it was going to be like some weird older woman coming to prom or something no um there has been a lot of references made to this case in pop culture. One example that I can think of right now, I don't have the other ones with me, but there was a musical number in Family Guy. No way. About dumpster baby problem. What is it? What is it?

It's a prom night dumpster baby. A prom night dumpster baby. That's insane. Yeah. So actually kind of a catchy tune. It's unfortunate. It is. But in defense of Family Guy guy, in that one,

the baby doesn't die. The baby is just having a musical number. Out and then left and then the baby just does this dancing scene with other babies. Yeah. So yeah. There's also been like other TV shows that have made references to Prom Mom. So it unfortunately became a part of pop culture and all that stuff but so gruesome could be like a hashtag like we got pregnant at prom hashtag prom mom prom mom no no don't use that so if you guys would like to contact us or our podcast just make sure you put that hashtag prom mom at the end. No, do not listen to him.

Do not listen to him. Jesse is a guest for a reason. Go ahead and email the podcast all of your feelings. Do you think that prom mom should be a hashtag? Answer now. And for proper identification reasons, you also need to include your social security number and address. Thank you very much. Your mother's maiden name, the name of your first pet. Yeah. Yeah, it just helps us with the demographic purposes, you know.

But yeah, so that is all for Prom Mom. Thanks for that case. I just realized I'm actually more of like the opposite of a diversity guest. I'm like, the only white cis man here. I mean, not cis, I mean, just like if you come up here or anything like that. Like you balance it out. Like you make Republicans feel comfortable listening to it. Exactly. Oh God, there's a really bad joke I can make about Republicans right now, but I'm not going to make that on the podcast. New Jersey. So it's, it did

make fun of New Jersey, but that's just, everyone makes fun of New Jersey. Sorry, New Jersey. So it's. It did make fun of New Jersey, but that's just. Everyone makes fun of New Jersey. Sorry, New Jersey. I'm sure you're I've never actually been to you could be a lovely for a line. Yeah. Let's see. New Jersey. So yeah, who's next?

I guess it's me. You have the paranormal for us. I do. Um, I guess I'm going to have to go. I'm going to have to go. I'm going to have to go. I'm going to have to go. I'm going to have to go. I'm going to have to go. I'm going to have to go have the paranormal for us? I do. It's not like a straight up paranormal case. And that's because paranormal cases are surprisingly hard to find, actually.

Like, like surprisingly hard to... I think Jesse's trying to fix his mic. Why not super informative? Yeah, they're usually like small cases that don't have much info. Jesse, are you... good? I'm trying to be good. Okay, we can hear you. You're a little quiet. Yeah, we can hear you. Can you hear me?

Yeah. Okay. Why am I so quiet. Yeah, we can hear you. Can you hear me? Yeah. Okay. Why am I so quiet? I can see my voice bar. I can shout. I don't know. I was gonna say the longer you talk to, the louder it picks up.

I don't know. I'm gonna try something. Okay. Well, Walt Jessie is trying. Yeah, I think you're good. Awesome. Cool. All right, well, I guess to start my case, I also have a question for you guys. Yes, I went to prom already.

God. Okay, but have you ever seen like a witch at prom? I mean, yes, actually. I mean, I've seen pagans at prom. Sounds like a fuck. Okay, when you guys think of a witch, what do you picture? I'm gonna be honest, I picture the typical wart on the nose, a witch hat. Okay, okay.

As an atheist pagan, I look at myself and I think damn, that's a hot witch. Oh, well nowadays like there's a different image of which, which is. I also think of Wicked, but then I'm also like, that's musical and that's not all the witches. They're not green. They're all green. They're all green on the inside with jealousy. Why would they be jealous? They're the ones that can do witch stuff. I don't know. Yeah, I think being a witch would be super fun.

Alexis, what do you think of witches? Alexis is a witch. Yep. So, should I pick the next one I think of witches now? Be careful what you say next because I will put a hex on you. Dark-haired Latinas. Those are witches. Wait, what? Be careful what you say next because I will put a hex on you dark-haired latinas Those are witches wait what dark-haired latinas. Oh

What Anyway. Yeah. It's like Spanish, right? Rujas. Something like that. Wait, what? Uh-huh. Yeah. You're also a little quiet. Why am I quiet? I'm just trying to live my life.

Squadcast knows that. I know how to project my voice because of my job. Is that any better? That is a lot better, actually. Yeah, that actually is better. I'm very loud right now. Actually. Oh my god. Better. Okay, there we go. Yeah. Okay, now it's just overreacting. Okay, well, anyway, it's fine. Keep going. Yeah, let's hear about

this. Thank you. Thank you. Well, Yeah, let's hear about this. Thank you. Thank you. Um, well, um, do you guys, do you guys, uh, where am I going with this? Good question. Um, I mean, do you guys picture just like, like, you see like a random girl on the street and you like, you'd be like, oh yeah, that's a witch. I do. Multiple times I've been in trouble for seeing a woman.

I just started throwing rocks at her. I'm like, witch! Oh, you're a witch. Oh my god. You're like, Jessie, you can't do that at work. And then HR gets involved. And you guys just introduced my case for me. Welcome to the witch trials.

Oh. Yeah. is for me. Welcome to the witch trials. Oh. Yeah. That I do know something about. Witch trials? You guys would, you guys are literally like the proprietor, like the perpetrators of the witch trials. And you just gave me that at events. So. Excuse me. Only one got like crushed to death i think you're exactly right you think i know every so i was like looking for a case and um i realized that

like the Salem witch trials they're they they are literally something that everybody knows. We all know what that is. I've grown up knowing about the Salem witch trials, but I realize I've never actually read into it at all. How many of those do we know? No, I don't know what happened, what started it. Well, if you want a fictional event event Salem is a really good television series okay do not use it for history it has little tiny pieces of history it's like the Winchester movie I will use it for history thank you Jesse well you

should watch it because it's kind of badass yes did you know listeners did you know that in the Victorian era people would use your it they would fermented urine as bleach For their clothes when they're intelligent person Try it out yeah now that you've heard that in from us we don't have to repeat that ever again Well, I'm going to everyone at my job Oh my god On icebreaker thing wait what would like I my name's Jesse and I know that Fermented urine can be used to bleach clothing. Yeah

I used to talk about you know fermented you're being used to bleach clothing Yeah, hi My name is Jesse and I would throw stones at a little girl walking down the street because she looks like a witch I didn't say she was a little girl You foul foul man No, little girls are nice and little i'm sorry sounding bad. Nope. Nope ending That's the you throwing rocks at people i see you throwing pebbles at people though i don't like them more than anything you're a witch

pebble yeah that's what i see more of you rather than rocks this is slight annoyance rather than any actual damage yeah um you see like the lady covering her head and running away? Ah, they got me. Now we're getting to the Puritan stuff. That's very weird. So the Salem Witch Trials, they started in February of 1692. They ended pretty abruptly in May of 1693, so just a little over a year after. So in the witch trials alone, honestly, there was a lot less people than I realized that were actually involved. I don't know,

it felt like such a bigger thing, like what I've learned. There were over 200 people accused in the trials, but there were really only about 25 to 30 people that were actually found guilty and about 25 that did lose their lives. That's per month. What? That's two per month. You just did that? Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, you said like 25 and I'm like, that's close to like 24. So two per month. Okay. Yeah. You're right. Oh, that's a lot. I'm not good. Hi. Okay, yeah, you're right. Wow, that's a lot.

No, but like, I thought it was a huge thing. That's nothing. Yeah. I mean, they would have died of disease anyway. Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry. Yeah, so, 19 were executed, about five people died while they were in jail, some died after torture, and like Jesse mentioned, there was a man who actually died by being essentially pressed and stoned to death. I apologize if I gave spoilers. I will get into them just a bit. No, no, you're perfectly

fine. But first, I guess some context behind witchcraft behind witch hunts. During that era. The Salem witch trials, they actually they happened pretty late in, I guess, the era of witchcraft and its prominence. I assume you mean of charging people with witchcraft. Yes. In terms of trials and when it was the witchcraft craze going around and the fear going around as well. Stop being witches around this time. it was weird when people started getting

charged. Exactly. No, yeah. So witch hunts primarily happened actually in Europe, starting around the 1300s all the way to the 1600s. And they sort of faded off after that. But it's just because there was such a prominence on like puritanical Christianity back then. And there was just widespread fear that people were going around

and essentially making deals with the devil to serve him, getting powers in in the process. What? No, it seems like their own business. Exactly. Like I wouldn't really mind. Maybe like failures and whatnot. Yeah. You know, and so but especially when the number of people involved in Salem alone, it seemed a little small compared to the entirety of people during the few hundred years when witch hunts were taking place. During around the 1300s to the 1600s, it's believed that there are about 110,000 people that were tried for witchcraft, and about 40 to 60,000 of those people were eventually executed because of it. So that is a ton of people. Yeah, compared to what you could set before, that's a big number. Yes,

yes. And so I guess that's what I what I meant by that. America needs to step up its game. Just kidding. Please don't plant your local witches. They're just fine witches. No, please, please, please. No, especially because now that people are more like- Witches are like good. ...gently about it. Yeah. Witches are just like people who like crystals nowadays. Like, I can't- Exactly. They're not hurting anyone. It is so different. I have crystals in my- It's like shiny rocks in the environment. Exactly.

But yeah, I guess there was that. And so the Salem witchcraft was happening in 1692 was actually pretty interesting because like I mentioned, it was already kind of gone away with at the time. People weren't overly concerned with witchcraft. And. I guess the fear that came along with it. So was it just like a handful of people that decided to take it back up? Pretty much. Yeah. So the way it all started was there was actually the Salem witch trials sort of happen in two different towns. They're right next to each other in Massachusetts. There was the more rural Salem village, which today is known as Danvers, Massachusetts. And next to it was Salem town, which is what we nowadays know as

just Salem in Massachusetts. So there was the two different cities and their like political climate was a lot different because Salem town was like prosperous, it was the more populous of the two cities whereas Salem village was in more of like despair, it was a lot more poor, a lot more like stressed and distressed within the community there. So the events really happened in Salem Village. Started in February of 1692. A girl named Betty Paris, she was nine years old, and her cousin, Abigail Williams, she was 11. Betty was the daughter of Reverend Samuel Paris from Salem Village, so a respected figure in the

village. Abigail was, of course, his niece. The two of them kind of together, they started having The two of them kind of together, they started having like fits of witchcraft essentially, as it was described. Described as quotes, like, beyond the power of epileptic fits or natural disease to affect. That was quoted by John Hale. He was essentially the nearby doctor of the town who came to examine them. It said that Betty and Abigail, the girls, they threw things around the room, they screamed,

they crawled on their furniture, contorted themselves, and they just babbled and said strange sounds. So they were eventually pretty much diagnosed with enwitchment. Like they were infected with witchcraft. Yeah. I love that word. Yeah. So like the diagnosis. Exactly. You know, the doctors at great. I would love to go about work and be like, hey, I have a doctor's now. I'm going to be out for the next, you know, two months. I've been diagnosed with enrichment. Enrichment. Yeah, sorry. Which got to me the other day. I'm not feeling too good. Sorry, I can't be there. But yeah, that's pretty much like what they were diagnosed with because of course

that was the known fear, the known thing back then was witchcraft. They didn't know, have the medical knowledge we have now. Or were they afraid of the unknown? That's exactly what it was. They, the doctor John Hale, he had, or they had the doctor John Hale and also a man named William Griggs, who's believed Sue, those doctors, they just, they had no clue. They had no clue what was going on with the girls. Exactly, you know, they were witches. Yeah, the witches got to them. And they were a lot of things can fall under the category of and which meant Mm-hmm

Thank you, I Just want it on a just and which meant no more context that's it In which make can we please make that our merch? Yeah Alexis will be the model. Um, yeah. And then we'll just from like, we'll crop your head out, right? Yeah, no, no, you can keep it in there. But we're going to Photoshop my face to make it witchier.

What? In what way? You can Photoshop my face on her. Yes, Photoshop Jesse's face onto them. I think that's perfect. Are you saying Jesse's face for the model or Jesse's face on a T-shirt? What are the models? Whatever. Either. Jesse's face on the t-shirt and he's also the model wearing the t-shirt.

Yes. My head is. We have Alexis' body. Yeah, but it's Alexis' body. Yeah, perfect. Cool. We figured it out. I'm glad we were decided.

Back to Betty and Abigail. The two girls. Abigail, but I don't know much of her. Okay. Yeah. So, yeah, the doctors, they didn't find any physical evidence of anything. And that's when some other young girls in Salem Village as well, they started to exhibit some similar behaviors of, um, you know, conjoining their bodies, uh, screaming sounds, and witchment once again.

There was like a disease going on or something. Yeah, um, there are some theories and I'll get into that in just a little bit, but, um, there's, there's some, I think, very plausible explanations for what did happen. But being that these two girls, Betty and Abigail, were like the daughter and the niece of the very respected reverend in the village, they needed to find who did this, who did this to them, the witches that infected them. And so pretty shortly after... With witchery, right? Or what was the word? With witchcraft, I guess so, yeah. Like the diagnosis. Which man? Which man? How could you forget that word? It's amazing.

Do better. Because it had the word men in it. Usually it was meant for women, not which men. And which women. That just sounds like it's catchy. So yeah, the first people that were afflicted were of course, Betty Parris, Abigail Williams, another girl named Ann Putnam Jr. She was 12, another girl named Elizabeth Hubbard. And so the four of these girls were sort of like questioned in a way about who did this to them. And so very quickly, there were three people that were accused and arrested for infecting and witching these girls. The first was a lady named Sarah Good. Sarah Good, she pretty much was a lady who lived in Salem Village. She was very poor. She was a beggar. And definitely

just people pretty much just didn't like her in the village. And which would you really be poor? I feel like you'd love to do something to better yourself if you were a witch. Good was also in her name. How could they not like her? Exactly! Or was it like a cover-up? I don't know. So I guess the... it was also sort of determined that people just didn't like her because she was accused of rejecting good, like, puritanical Christian ideals um and and teaching those to children apparently she chose to torment and quote score in their children instead of leading them towards the path of salvation um but so she was one of the first same thing to me brother and yeah you would be a

you'd be accused to be a witch, Jesse. I don't know. I mean, how does that feel? I'm teaching them the way of salvation, all that stuff. Doesn't sound like a whole lot of fun. You'll pass on it. I'm good. I feel like you'd say double and pass it to the next person.

That I choose that one. Yeah. Yeah, I'm not a witch. Double it. Next person. Get the witch in front of me. Sorry guys. Reverse uno. Could you imagine if like people said that back in the day? It's like you're a witch. It's like double and give it to the next person. Or like reverse uno. So it to the next person. Or like reverse. So I feel like if we were to reply with double it and give it to the next person,

you would get accused about about that. 100%. They would immediately take you to the hanging. Or something. Yeah. So the next person to be accused was also a Sarah. Her name was Sarah Osborne, though. And Sarah Osborne did not have as good of a reason, I guess. She was also just a social outcast in the village. She was also very poor. And but Sarah Osborne, or this girl apparently, she just never attended church. Oh! She never attended church.

It was suspected due to a long illness that was suspected to be depression. So she was accused of being a witch because she was depressed. So that's pretty cool, I would say. I don't see Miss Osborne at church today. Do you know where she's at? She's practicing being a witch. I think she's at home with that witch thing called what? What's it called?

Depression? Depression. Only witches get depression. Oh, we are living in a time of witchcraft. Yes, we are. Half of the witches that I see on TikTok also are depressed. So maybe those poor baby witches weren't able to do whatever they wanted to the moon. Forget what that was. What was it they were trying to do to the moon.

All the baby TikTok witches. I don't know. I don't know. Try to do something to it. What's the normal? Just try to get rid of Trump. Oh. Anyway, that's why it's important to stay on your TikTok news. That's important.

That's why it's important to stay on your TikTok news. That's important. That's why it's important to not be depressed because you might get accused of being a witch. Yeah. Yeah. So that was that. Sarah Osborne, she also married an indentured servant who lived in the town of the Salem village. And so people were very just distrustful, of the Salem village and so people were very just distrustful, disapproving of her, both Sarah Osborne and Sarah Good. The third person who was accused was a lady named Tituba. Now that, which is name? Yes. Tituba. Tituba was, she was an enslaved woman in the village. She... No one's

safe. Yep. So she was in sort of the historical document she's referred to as Indian, but she is not. She is a South American woman from probably the Caribbean, sort of around like the West Indies, where she was taken from and then enslaved by, enslaved in the town of Salem Village. And so she was a slave. People didn't like her. She was a, you know, darker skinned woman. And of course, all of that immediately just points to yes, she's of course a slave. We're going to use her or she's a witch. Yep. She apparently she was accused of like, you know, attracting girls like the ones who were in witched with stories of witchcraft and enchantment and sort of swaying the minds of the young children in

the village to turn them towards witchcraft. She of course also was just another outcast, another poor woman in the village because she was a slave. So for those three girls, Sarah Good, Sarah Osborne, and Tituba, there was just no way they could defend themselves. They are immediately brought up to be accused. this is kind of where it gets good though, I think. Okay, thank you. Um, this work is kind of good because during their like trials, essentially, Sarah Good and Sarah Osborne, they adamantly just denied they adamantly refused to admit that they were guilty. They did not practice

witchcraft. They did not spread it. But I wonder why. I wonder why. But Tichuba, she just said, Yeah, I'm a witch. She just admitted admitted she just admitted witchcraft told her she was one americans have been didn't really listen to people of color so i mean the smart way as she did was probably just to be like yeah along with it yeah one out of three women in salem get accused of witchcraft and one no yeah and only one of them is a witch i don't know i don't know where i was going with this want to try that again no there oh maybe one out of three women's that are accused of witchcraft are actually witches boom well i'm not i feel like the people who are arrested for would like to be doing a lot more damage.

I would anyway, if I actually had those powers and was like enslaved. I don't know. But yeah, I think it was kind of a girl boss move by Tichuva because she admitted she was guilty and but instead of just like like just facing the consequences she tried to like get herself out by essentially turning herself into an informant for the other witches in the village. Make those white ladies pay. So yeah so she accused Sarah Osborne and Sarah Good so it made things worse for them and she said there are also seven more witches in the village that needed to be found. Tituba, damn girl you've

got some vengeance in ya. So she just, she very quickly spread, like widespread fear of witches in the village and that's how it blew up. I feel like anyone that did her wrong is now scared for their life. 100%. Because like, I mean, think about it. Like, she was a slave in this village.

She didn't care about anyone, probably. Like, she hated them all. Oh, look at this. How else are you as a woman and a woman of color gonna get some power in that society? Exactly. You just found a way. Fear. Exactly. So, I don't know.

Good for her. She was very smart for that. Yeah, good for her. I mean, I'm sorry to those who weren't bad back. You know, yeah, all doubt. But yeah, that's all I actually had to say. Thank you. You're welcome. Yeah. So but a lot of these girls, you know, of course they were they were interrogated for several days. They were trying to go around to accuse more people of witchcraft, I guess. And there were some more people that were accused. A lady named Martha Corey, Rebecca Nurse, Rachel Clinton in one of the nearby cities as well. But one of the, I guess, most interesting

accusations to me is a girl named Dorothy Goode. She was the four-year-old daughter of Sarah Goode. This girl was only four years old. I'm sorry. She's not the only witch. Her four-year-old is also a witch. Exactly. So they interrogated Dorothy. She's four! Yeah, and they took her fear and her apprehension to answer questions as admissions of guilt. So you're questioning a year old and if they seem nervous that's a yes on the witch. They're a witch, yep.

No. No. So Martha Corey though, one of the other ladies who was accused. Actually, her accusation, she was accused on September 9th of 1692. She was eventually hanged on September 22nd of 1692. But she, the accusation of Martha stirred up a lot of things because Martha was actually a full member of the church in Salem Village. So people were like, if Martha is a witch, then anybody could be a witch. Yeah. Even her name screams, I'm a goody. Goody? Yeah. Churchgoer. Yes. And so that's when things went crazy. That's when you know Dorothy good the four-year-old girl got questioned afterwards Wait, so Martha was like what open up the floodgates. Yes. Yes And so they were just so

There was so much fear after what happened and that was really what spread all of this. So like I mentioned, there was a lot of political turmoil between the towns of Salem Village and Salem Town that were right next to each other. And that really pushed forward these trials a lot. So Salem Village was essentially power hungry. They were trying to establish their own, their own municipality. They were trying to prove that they were good to Salem Town, so they appointed some head figures, they appointed essentially like a

mayor, just new management that came in along with the fear, and so in order to get things going they just quickly pushed forward these trials for all of this witchcraft. And of course, you know, like, like we know there was the, the ways they would try to prove people are a witch. If you, if you throw them in the water and they survive their witch, but if they drown, then well, they're not a witch, but they're dead. There was never any rhyme or reason. Yeah. Like, that is... humans are so stupid. Like, how did we... If your body had like imperfections, you were a witch? Seriously yeah like if they they would check for like moles and birthmarks on your body and if you had like too many of them you were a witch because that was

a natural growth. So specifically looking for like human things like literally literally. Would it not mean that like all like French royalty were witches because they had like that mold like drawn on them? Yeah but they drew it on so it's okay. Yeah but if the devil drew it on you that's when you're in trouble. Fair. Um no seriously yeah like moles birthmarks and stuff they were just associated to be associated with the devil like they were marks from the devil on these bodies and Oh no. Yeah. I'm sorry, I'm thinking of this that as soon as they announce like, if you're born with

like a mole, you're a witch. I want to picture or like imagine that someone gave birth they saw their child with like a mole and they're like oh no I gave birth to a witch the devil came out of me back in it goes exactly quick jingle it and then put it in a garbage can way sense back in the day was wild. It seriously was. People were, they just let all of the fear just completely rule them. So for the, I guess the courts, the court proceedings, because they did actually go to trial for these things, which is still

crazy. There was actually a special court that was created just for the prosecution of the witches. It was called the Court of Oyer and Terminer, I think. I don't know. I'm not going to try to pronounce those any other way. So there was a new court that was formed on June 2nd of 1692. William Stoughton, he was the Lieutenant Governor, he was the Chief Magistrate of the court. And William Souten was of course a heavy, you know, New England Puritan. So there was, of course, zero, you know, separation of like church and state or whatever it may have been. All of it, all of his things were ruled part of that court as part of the Puritan lifestyle.

So anything that went against that was evidence that you were a witch. The first person that was officially brought to the grand jury, her name was Bridget Bishop. Bishop, she was, she did not live a Puritan lifestyle. She apparently wore black clothing and odd costumes and that was against the Puritan laws. That's like Alexis. Exactly that's why Alexis is a witch. I'm gonna get some crystals. But yeah so her everything about her lifestyle went about went against the Puritan ways. Um, so this along with her quote, immoral lifestyle, um, made the jury just decide that

she was a witch. Uh, she was convicted on the same day that she was sent to trial. I was gonna ask what do you mean immoral lifestyle? The way she dressed? Mm-hmm like her not in the church, her dressing in all black, her wearing costumes as it were. Yeah, pretty much. Bishop was later executed on June 10th of 1692 by hanging. And so she was, of course, one of the 19 that was executed by hanging during this time. So throughout the year, you know, February of 1692 to May of 1693, there was a lot of trials that went into place. You know, like I mentioned, more than 200 people were accused, but roughly only around 30 of them were found guilty. But in May of 1693, of them were found guilty. But in May of 1693, the witch trial just sort of like very abruptly stopped.

There was no more evidence of people practicing witchcraft in the village. The special court that was created was dissolved. There was really no was dissolved. There was really no, no like rhyme or reason why it stopped in the way that it did. But Tichuba just stopped finding witches? I guess so. So what happened with Tichuba actually was so after she was accused, she was thrown into jail. She was left in prison from February of 1692 up until May of 1693. So she was in jail for prison a little bit for over a year. She eventually was brought up to that grand jury, but they rejected the charges that were brought against her.

Um, and she was, was released. She was released. Um, her enslaver paid her jail debts and nothing else is known about her after that. So she just left to do her own thing. Being enslaved or being imprisoned? I guess it depends on what kind of work you're doing. I guess it does, yeah. Slavery was pretty bad as far as I can tell. Jail is bad. But it has less spoil, I think. So I guess I'll briefly go over a few more of the people who are accused.

Yeah. So Bridget Bishop, she was the first that I mentioned. There was Tituba. There was a man named George Jacobs Sr. He was... George Jacobs Sr. He was living in the Salem village. He was a farmer, a country farmer. He suffered from arthritis. He used two canes to walk because of it, so he was really slow. And also because of this, he just did not attend church regularly. He was a witch. He was a he was an old he was a witch he wouldn't make his like legs work again. Exactly. He was an old the old-timer farmer he was a hardened personality. He said he was known it said he was known for a violent temper and

defiant spirit and so that along with his disability made him a witch. I love the evidence they're bringing to the court case. His personality and his canes and lack of attendance to church. But the thing is, his granddaughter is the one that accused him. Bitch. Yeah. Granddaughter's name was Margaret. Oh my gosh, she just hated her grandpa.

I assumed that granddaughter was not left on the whale. Definitely not. So George Jacob Senior, he was brought to court accused and in August of 1692, he was sentenced to death by hanging. Two other people, or actually three people, they're all sisters, Girl named Rebecca Nurse, Mary Esty, and Sarah Cloyce. They were all sisters from a nearby town of Topsfield, Massachusetts. It was right next door. They were all married. Rebecca, she was elderly at the time. She was a respected member of the church. However, she was not able to actually prevent herself from defending herself in court because she was nearly

deaf. So when she was brought to court, they were... Nope. So the people who are worse off are the witches you know the ones who are supposedly with the means to better their lives with magic are instead lighting crops and not helping their own maladies. I think I think it's so insane like she was brought to court. The jury initially did not want to convict her, but the judges literally asked the jury to reconsider. So they did, and they decided Rebecca was guilty of witchcraft and hanged as well. Or? Yeah. So there were the other two sisters as well, Mary and Sarah. Mary was also put before the courts, but she actually, she tried to expose the flaws within the court, but that of course only furthered the distrust for her.

An educated woman. An educated woman. An educated woman. An educated woman. And they executed her for that. And the third sister, Sarah, she actually was left in prison for months, but she was eventually cleared of her charges. It's actually still unknown why Sarah was cleared, but she was let free. No, no. Did anyone ever accuse the judge?

You mean the reverse uno card again? Yeah. Or like the bishop or like someone in power. Because that's what should have happened. I don't know. I don't know. I think I'm sure some of them did and I'm sure some of them probably were found guilty of witchcraft in doing so which the great equalize

If they accuse me I'm like the judge and the bishop or in cahoots. They want to be the only witches in town. I Don't know Salem Salem has a good back plot for it because the witches are real Salem. Okay, not the movie I still be will space and so good back plot for it because the witches are real. Salem. Okay. Not the movie. I still believe it was the SM cell. Yeah. Okay. So the last person I want to talk about though, um, is named, uh, Giles Corey. And so Giles is actually, um,

the, um, I believe, brother of Martha Corey, the one lady who is also hanged, I mentioned earlier. She was the well-respected member of the church and she's the reason what, or she's the gateway for the widespread panic of who could be a witch. So in March of 1692, Giles, he actually testified in court that Martha had bewitched him and his farm animals. Yeah. And so that's... Is he profiting in any way? I don't know. And so that's why Martha was brought up in the first place. Now Giles was later on in court, he was ordered to participate in the trial, but he refused. And so the court tried to extract a plea out of him, like a plea deal to get some more information.

to extract a plea out of him, like a plea deal to get some more information, but he was ordered to be pressed under stones in order to extract this information. Giles did not cooperate, and so Giles was the man who was pressed to death under the stones. I forgot that someone got pressed. Yeah. But also, because he remained silent and there was no information he could have given, Martha was of course later on of course convicted and then hanged as well. But did you guys hear what Giles Corey said his last words? what Giles Corey said is last words? No, no, wait.

Oh, good for him. Did he actually? Yeah, not even imminent death to convince him to go to trial. So they're trying to get him to do it. And his last words, more weight, at least according to legend. I love that. That's what makes them do real records that we have why do the Salem witch trail seem so unserious like like with Tichuba the Corey family because the Puritans were Puritans and they were doing

were Puritans and they were doing the Salem trials even happen in the first place. There's been like research by doctors and scientists over the years. Of course, it's nothing actually like widely fully accepted scientifically. But there is a certain disease, it's called ergotism. It's essentially a like a fungal growth that happens in rye. So it can be used to make rye bread, rye wheat, and rye whiskey, things like that. So the grain, of course, that was very popularly grown and consumed around Salem Village and Salem Town. So in lots of research over the years, there's specifically one doctor. Her name is Dr. Linda Caporiel. In 1976, she was actually doing some evidence or some research and her evidence that she found it supported the idea that

the quote unquote like enwitchments and the witchcraft that was being displayed in some of these kids was because of the ergotism or ergot disease, you know, that fungal disease in rye. So back then, that's what a lot of them ate. And so it was a disease in the rye, and when it could be eaten, it would make someone exhibit all of the symptoms that were very common with being enriched. The babbling, the weird body movements, the sudden illness, the fever, it was a very common disease from back during that time because the ergodism disease on rye develops after a very cold winter and then a very wet spring that happens immediately after. And so this, the whole witch trial started in February. So apparently the conditions were perfect to create this disease on the rye and that's also why it ended so abruptly in

May because all of the diseased rye was gone at that point. Nobody else was eating it so nobody else was getting infected. People that should have been were the farmers and the bakers. Exactly. As it should be. I don't. I've had heard of that theory. I completely forgot about until you brought it up and then you started describing it. And I'm like, I've heard of it. But hopefully that's it. Otherwise, I wouldn't know what to go to a doctor before keys and people of witchcraft. Did no one seem to go to a doctor before Keese and People of Witchcraft? Well, they did. It's just the doctor didn't know what it was. They just didn't do things very well back then.

It was kind of like that. No. Head's for tails. Sometimes what they did made it worse. It was like, let's kind of guess what's happening here. Was it caused by like bloodletting or like hot blood? I found a cool set of blood-letting tools from the 1800s that were being sold for only like a hundred something and I was so tempted to get it.

Let's try it out. No I wouldn't. They looked rusty. I don't know. I just I love to think about how, I guess not love, but it's, it's so interesting to think how like this entire phenomenon of phenomena of the witch trials could have happened because of of rotted rye wheat. The panic spread by somebody admitting that she is a witch, and also just the political climate of fear of witchcraft during that time. It all came together to create what is one of the most talked about widespread and captivating and pop culture, pieces of culture of history that is out there. And I don't know, it's like something that is just so incredibly crazy to think about. But anyway, that's the Salem Witch Trials. Thank you guys for listening. Thank you. You're welcome.

Well, does that mean it's little mine's turn? I think so. I think it's either you or Alexis. Okay, I can do this. First of all, I apologize to my family, especially you, Mom, for any of the bad words I might say. You know, things like, darn. Grat. Dude.

Shit, fuck a bitch. Anyway. So, guys, out of curiosity, have you guys heard about the Titanic? Yes. Yeah. Dad, right? Yeah. Alexa has nothing to do with that whatsoever.

Okay. Yeah. That's awesome. You to do with that whatsoever. Okay. Yeah. That's awesome. You know, it was sad. Thank you. Anyway, I'm reporting on The Butcher Baker of Alaska, one of Alaska's most popular serial killers. I really thought you were going to cover the Titanic.

Nope. Okay, so he's basically the true version of the most dangerous game. Were any of you guys forced to read that in high school No, I Think I read it just because I wanted to maybe it's a bit harsh to stay forced Honestly as far as stories, I was forced to read it was kind of the most entertaining If you don't know it I'm not gonna spoil the plot for it until a little bit later Also, I'll see if I can keep mine as long as your guys, but I'm new at this, so, you know, give me a...

No, if it's not as long, that is perfectly okay. Yeah, anyway, our story starts off with a guy named Robert Hanson, born in Iowa, which isn't the most exciting name, Robert Hanson. Doesn't really have the, uh, Domber kind of Bundy ring to it. I don't know, I like the last name Hanson. That's fine. It just doesn't scream Dom or Bundy, you know? Oh, I'm sorry.

It just doesn't have the same ring as like John Hanson. John Hanson. No, it doesn't. Honestly, his childhood wasn't as dramatic as it could have been for what he did. I mean, don't get me wrong, it sucked. But like, it wasn't multiple murders, sucky. You have all these other murders that were abused and traumatized in their youth. So you can like kind of see where they went wrong.

But for Robert, it wasn't like great. As far as I've read his upbringing, it was unpleasant, but not who fucked up. Anyway, so Robert Hansen. He's born to an American mom, Edna, and Danish dad, Chris. Daddy was a baker and apparently a bit domineering, a rather religious guy, although I haven't really heard any horror stories in his youth. Still, it kind of sucked to be old Bobby. He was a loner, as many of our red flagged girlies tend to be. He had a stutter, a learning disability and pretty bad acne, which would eventually scar his face.

Okay. Now, for his outcast ways, the girls at school snubbed him, which was unfortunate for him because apparently had fallen in love with all of them. Robert Hanson really liked girls. You'll see that more as we go in. Okay. Now, if you guys recall, daddy wasn't really particularly coddling to his son. Robert was left-handed. He forced his son to do everything right-handed instead and in general if he had a problem like stuttering for example or suffering

Basically that prescribed prayer and hard work which means chores and bakery duty as he was a baker So so far, you know, I think his childhood it sucks right But does it scream serial killer to you guys? No, not really. I'd have to do a single bacon with my contaminated rye. Yeah, well that might be something. I don't know how this is designed though. His mom was actually apparently quite loving, so I guess he took refuge with her a lot. So rather than spend time with his friends, he spent time practicing hunting and archery. And for those of you who know the aforementioned most dangerous game, that's called foreshadowing. Now let's go back again just to kind of add all that.

Just for details. So he was born in Estreville, Iowa in 1939. I Don't know where that is. I don't know any prayer in Iowa. I thought I'd mention it in case anybody out there He's born. That's a sucky childhood. He's a He's fully whole shebang. He's a disappointment to his father because of all the problems, of course, and he's an outcast at school. So he starts to work at his father's bakery and they moved to Richmond, California. So, you know, at least they have that going for them. Just kidding. They moved back to Iowa seven years later to a town called Pocahontas because they like to make bad choices. And I'm really getting all the places, New Jersey, Iowa, anyway, like I said.

I love it. Yeah, it's gonna be like, is that like a real place or are you like also pulling our leg? So those movies, or sorry, those moves, not movies, those moves occurred during his formative years and only exacerbated his loner tendencies. Now eventually Robert grows up, joins the army reserve. During this time he got to explore the city and it was there Robert would hire

a sex worker and have his first sexual experience. Oh little Robert's growing up. So it's honestly nothing to lose. You know, got a sex worker. He found he liked it. Yeah. Oh, you don't say. Sex workers tend to be practiced in making people feel comfortable. They can be kind. They make their client feel desirable. And of course, they're usually pretty well versed in getting pleasant sexual experiences. Thank you for your service, ladies. And men. And them. Me. Thank you for your service, ladies and men and thems.

But it goes beyond a good time with women who didn't spurn him. In the sex biz, there's a barter, body for cash. How likely Robert took this viewpoint a bit further. He felt some sort of ownership over the woman in this exchange, as he thought he bought them along with a sexy time. Remember, his childhood consisted of powerlessness. His father controlled him, his peers bullied and avoided him, but now Bobby could be in control. At least that's what some of the psychological profiles for him I read said. So, you know, maybe keep that psychological profile in the pocket for a little bit later.

Okay. So now, with a preference for those in the sex biz, he was able to start overcoming social anxiety, found himself requesting things he would never ask of a lover. And he will. Anyway, he continues working for that military job for around a year. And then after a year, he gets discharged. That honestly sounds like there's an interesting story. But as far as I looked, I couldn't find it. So just Okay, it's like a dead end. Yeah, unfortunately, eventually becomes a drill instructor at a police academy, another way to feel power over others, he dates and becomes engaged to a woman named Phoebe. And that's the end of the story. What do you guys think?

Uh, there's more. Yeah. Jesse, no. For this next part, I want to ask you guys, did you guys go to prom? No, I'm kidding. go to prom no I'm kidding I know we've already no by the end of that same year in December he was arrested for arson but I'm getting ahead of myself despite things finally going well he has a girl a job okay dad is a bit easing up on him and giving him some more free time despite all that Robert still has these pent pent up feelings of anger from his childhood. And just at this point for some reason doesn't feel like he can relate to other adults.

So in spare time, he starts hanging out with teen boys. Now I know that sounds like a red flag and it is but not in the way you're going to think of. So one boy he starts to bond with, especially because that boy gets hired on at his father's bakery. So he and Robert start hanging out. Robert talks to him, convinces them that they should burn down a school bus garage, the usual things.

But yeah, so he, yeah, that's what we're talking about. His anger at school. What was that? Yeah, because that's what we like to talk about burning things down regular teenage dance. What? Oh, technically we do talk about burning things down. I love fire. I love arson. It's pretty fire is pretty, you know, as a California though, I feel like I shouldn't say that because we're on fire like all the time.

Anyway, oh, you mean you're we're not the state of you know, fire. We should be called the state of fire. We should we should change our entire thinking. We were like state of drought. Oh, yeah, because we're always in a drought. We have a state sounds prettier rather than saying decimated state. No because we're always in a drought we have Sounds prettier rather than saying decimated state. No, we're pretty I mean Golden could mean like the fire blazing but it could also mean all of the dry wheat that's everywhere and the dead grass

because That's all golden. So I see I'm thinking that we're the golden state because at this point we're golden brown because of so many fires so they burn it all down by all down I mean the school bus garage but Robert creates some alibi and it works for a while he gets confident but eventually feeling bad that boy I don't know if he ever found out but eventually feeling bad, that boy, I don't know if he ever found out his name, I forget, but that boy turns him in. It might have been kept in there, but it could be wrong. Now, Robert's family and Phoebe, the fiancee, they don't believe it. They think Robert's been framed. Before he can be sentenced, Phoebe and Robert

decide to tie the knot, so they don't have to like wait because he's in jail. But Phoebe says, if she ever finds out that he's lying about not starting the fire, she's going to divorce his ass. Wait, no, you guessed this trigger. What's the nope. Okay. It's different triggers. There's a lot of triggers to Robert. Robert's trigger happy. But so Robert's being smeared in the middle of 1960 and then he gets sentenced to three years in prison with psychological evaluation. In the end he only had to serve 20 months, a little over half the sentence, and this leniency

is going to continue to be a pattern in his life. The diagnosing psychiatrist at the time starts evaluating Robert and Robert starts proudly admitting what he did. He's just assuming client, privilege, confidentiality, that thing. So the psychiatrist is talking to him. He comes to the conclusion that Robert is obsessed with getting vengeance against those he perceived as wronging him. I mean, no shit. And then he's labeled as having an infantile personality. But that means he never quite mentally matured beyond his younger years. He was somewhat stunted, so maybe that was all those moves during those formative years. The bullying, the controlling father, the lack of like communications with others being a loner.

Honestly, it's probably all the above and then some. But it does explain why he felt he had more in common with teens and also that he impulsively burnt down a bus garage. Anyway, confidentiality doesn't apply to this situation. His wife and family know that he's guilty, the wife divorces him and the family moves away in shame Yeah, honestly good call Phoebe, but honestly that's kind of rude of his family. Like if he murdered someone I get a star son also Didn't they get married and it's like till death do was part

exactly nine divorces ass to Okay, I mean, yeah if you do that. I mean yeah, you can do that. She told him, she's like, you tell him he's straight up right before the wedding. Did you do that firing? He's like, no. Okay, but I'm going to divorce you if you're lying to me. He got to come clean now. At this point, everything good seems to have disappeared.

He doesn't have his bakery job, he's lost his wife, his family, also he's in prison. But he plays nice and everyone thinks he just had a stint with a mental illness and his back on the straight and narrow, so he gets off earlier. Then he convinces his family that he's a good boy and he moves back to them and everybody likes him. He learned to become endearing at this point. From there, he marries a deeply religious woman, and her name is Darla Henriksen. They moved around a bit as Robert took temporary baking jobs, and during these jobs he starts stealing things. Apparently he's even bragging to his co-workers about stealing things, so

no doubt he gets lucky a lot of times times and talks his way out of it. He had a shitty draw so he felt entitled. Eventually Robert gets caught stealing cash but it doesn't matter because he already has a job lined up. So they move, he and Darla move to Anchorage, Alaska away from that job into a new one. They have a couple kids, and finally he gets his life straightened out. Just kidding, it gets worse. Okay. So now something's going to trigger him.

So it didn't seem obvious to his neighbors that he got worse. He was really well liked by them. Set some hunting records for the area. Friendly, a prize-winning pillar in the community, a family man, a baker. But privately, he starts going back to crime. Now his wife knows he's up to something late at night, but she just assumed prostitutes. Hanson's apparently had some kinky derelictions that have been packed out with religious starlet. So she's just kind of there. He's not doing anything or hoping Christianity would fix him. But no, it was more than pain for

sex. Starting with petty theft, Hanson was getting in more trouble. So not a great start to his new found freedom. But it could be worse. By 1971, it was. From Arson and Larson, he moves to rape and kidnapping. Now first was the abduction and the attempted rape on an 18-year-old secretary. Her name was Susie Heppard. Apparently they shared a glance where she politely smiled as they both waited at a stoplight. That's not an invitation. No, not at all. Are you scared? Because he thinks it's flirtation. So, you know, when someone

flirts with you, how you follow them home. Yeah, that's what he does. Exactly. I do that all the time. Yeah, follows her out, asks her out, and she politely tells him, sorry, I have a boyfriend. So I'm pretty sure you guys know Robert doesn't like rejection. It was so common in his childhood all the other women For some reason fell in love with they said no can't imagine why That's me to me I should say I'm sorry for his job, but Anyway, so Robert is like he's responsible for his actions. So he is not there in the end He also doesn't like the fact that rejection puts the other person in power so he returns and holds rack and points with the plans to abduct and rape

her saying shut up sweetheart now luckily despite him telling her not to scream she screams and the date no way so he runs away then he picked up, but he blames mental illness and memory loss and they don't imprison him yet while he's awaiting trial. Not long after that though comes the actual rape of someone. Patricia the prostitute. We've got Fibi the fiance, now we've got Patricia the prostitute. Anyway, when she tried to blow off his advances, he got angry, again doesn't like rejection, abducts her and rapes her.

And when she promises not, he lets her go, but she being a smart girl, still reports him. Good, good for her. Apparently it was her fear and his feelings of power that started getting him hooked on those feelings. That's what he says. It's when you start realizing he really likes putting fear in people, raping them, and things like that. Once again though, he gets off easy. Due to a lack of evidence, he was given a plea deal, pleaded no contest, contest to assault with a deadly weapon.

What the hell a deadly weapon or the housewife and the rape of the prostitute is dropped which kind of seems like if anything that could have been reversed but uh he was sentenced five years but got onto a work release program and was released to a halfway house by month six. In what? Yeah. This man. Reform was not accomplished. Since less than a year later in 1972,

it is believed he had begun adding murder to his rhymes. He seems especially fond of prostitutes and exiles. Oh my God. Remember, he decided he likes prostitutes. Bodies were found. What wasutes. Bodies were found? What was that? Bodies were found? They will eventually.

Now, he seems especially fond of the prostitutes, and from his interviews, it does give the impression, like I said before, that he feels this ownership over them when he pays for them. Which, for any of the listeners here, should know that when you're paying for sex, you're paying for sex, not the person. Unfortunately, you shouldn't be paying for that. Yeah. Unfortunately, targeting sex workers in Alaska was a smart idea. A bad mean thing to do, but a smart idea because at this point, there's this pipeline boom going on. Lots of men are making their way up to Anchorage, Alaska because of the pipeline. Now, following them were women.

Men go up, women are looking up to make some money in the oldest career. Although some are trying to make money in more traditional ways, but a lot of them end up still having to use their body for their career. So here we have it, a town full of strangers. Lots of new men are coming every day, lots of new prostitutes are coming every day, and that makes it a little hard to notice when someone goes missing, especially when it is common for the prostitutes and exotic dancers to really just kind of leave after a while without telling anyone. Never making really big roots in the air.

So especially for those in that sexy trade. Again lots of strange going in going out but I digress. Here is his MO. 1. Dock a woman. Usually a prostitute, an exotic dancer, and oftentimes these are teenagers. Number two, once he learned her habits, he would get her in his car and take her to his house at gunpoint. Three, he would rape her, usually she would be bound up. And four, this is where the plot of the most dangerous game comes in. He takes her to a seclude, releases her and hunts her down like an animal. He uses a bush plane to go to these areas that other people couldn't necessarily get to.

Remember Alaska has a lot of wilderness in it. Yeah. And it was really the fear that gets him off. Control over women equals control over his wife for some reason. Another impression I got from his interviews. Can you like really imagine being stranded in the Alaskan wilderness? No one knows where you are and you're being hunted by a serial killer after you had been

framed or you've been raised. Well if you want to watch a movie based off of this, watch The Frozen Ground with Nick Cage and John Cusack. Okay, I you want to watch a movie based off of this, watch The Frozen Ground with Nick Cage and John Cusack. Okay, I'll check it out. I want to watch The Frozen Ground. Maybe you two will watch it together at some point. Anyway, his first victim is thought to be one Celia, also known as Beth VanZenton, who appeared, or disappeared on December 22nd, 1971. But in our first fuck you to Robert, she seems to escape,

which is good, though sadly, she still froze to death. She will be found on Christmas. That said, he never admitted to her death, but there's a lot of similarities with the way he did things. Now, it's around this time that bodies are being found. And the fact that they're finding 22 caliber cartridges with most of them becomes suspicious. The first body found was never identified, but they named her Eklutna Annie

since she was found near Eklutna by some construction workers. Which I think Eklutna Annie would be a really cool cowgirl name if it wasn't. The Kluetna Annie? That actually is really cool. I like it.

It's really cool actually. Now according to Hanson, that's the serial killer and his, because I keep calling him Robert so maybe I should stick with that, but according to Robert Hanson, she was a prostitute, surprise, but she got spooked by Robert and pulled a knife out, so he attacked her. He claims that she was his first kill. Now the next body found was Joanna Messina, found in a gravel pit near Seuwerk. Robert had met her, and she made the mistake of being nice to him.

He had this fantasy of them actually being in love with each other because of that. I think they might have actually done a few things together, but you know, sexy times and she's not like, they've sued her anything, but I'm getting the idea that maybe she was looking for some money for sexual favors because his fantasy of them being in love with each other abruptly ended when she asked for money from him and he killed her. Now after her, they find 23-year-old Cheri Morrow in a shallow grave near the Kinnick River, identified by dental records. Cheri was an exotic dancer who was offered some money for a photoshoot, I assume of the

sexy kind. She was stumbled upon by some off-duty law enforcement who were hunting and was determined to have been killed a year earlier from her being found. So with her body found to be, uh, however, also with her body, they found that she was missing a necklace she was wearing, a golden arrowhead. So just keep that in mind for later. Golden arrowhead necklace. Okay.

But remember, these bodies are being found at least that recent one and the others are being found a little bit further after they're dead. So they're decayed. You're not necessarily getting as much useful information from the body as you would have if it was a fresh kill. But back to Robert, he starts killing but he gets arrested for once again, arsony. After stealing chains off from my favorite chain grocery store, Fred Myers, which I don't think we have in California, but you guys are ever in Oregon or

etc. up there. Go there. It's like Walmart becoming classy. I digress. Okay. I'm surprised that weirdly once again his sentence was reduced. This time by the Alaska Supreme Court, although at least they required him to receive treatment for a bipolar disorder that he was claiming to have. Didn't fix his bad behavior though. So he gets out and starts crying again and chooses another victim. And he's been killing for a while now. But again, I'll get to those victims once the cops have leaked them. So he chooses a victim and guess what bitches? He escapes. So one point, no way to fuck you Robert. This girl is a 17 year old prostitute

named Cindy Paulson. The year is 1983. He lures her by paying her $200 for a blowjob. On that day, that is $630. Not a bad deal. Whoa. Yeah. She's smart. She's smart. Not just because of that because she says she, I'm going to do it in the car with you, but I'm not going home with you. Good. Good for her. So, after she's stopped for John, so he takes her home at gunpoint, rapes, torches her on a bearskin rug, and chains her by the neck to a post in his basement.

Eventually, he takes her to the airport with his plane. I don't know if anyone knows planes but it's a Piper PA-18 Super Cub. He tells her that his plan is to take her to his cabin, a romantic way of saying a crappy shack in the Knick River, only accessible by boat or bush plane. But while he's loading the cockpit, she escapes, flags down a truck and makes her way to freedom, and she alerts the authorities, identifying his airplane, describing the car he drives, and describing what he looks like, as well as describing the inside of his house and

how it's full of animal trophies. The authorities don't believe her. Robert makes up a story about how he was angry at him because she was extorting him and he refused to meet her demands. So they check the house and everything is exactly as Cindy says except for the lack of chains and they actually even find guns hidden in the wall. But none of those bodies. But I still honestly think it's kind of suspicious to have secret wall guns, even if they aren't the ones matching the bodies. Because I don't get paid good enough to like ice multiple guns and like a plane. Or where is this money coming from? So honestly, that's kind of funny.

It's something I forget if I put that in my notes, but was charged with something beyond murders. See if it was there. Yeah, you'll find out where he gets the money a little bit later. It's another one of his crimes. Anyway, anyway, this is just me saying I'm against secret wall guns. And maybe that's because I'm a California. But anyway, his innocence, his friends come up with his friend comes up with a phony alibi for him. And this is a tactic he uses for his other murders as well. Besides, the police are looking at this guy's this like mild mannered meat baker.

Bakers don't murder, especially one that's literally giving police investigators treat donuts. So they labeled him a non seriousserious suspect and moved on. The higher-ups in the police department decide to close the case on him. But this doesn't sit well with everyone. One of the cops, Greg Baker, decides to continue the investigation under the noses of his superiors. He said he knows of several bodies that have been found since, and he suspects Robert. So he forwards the information to

people who can do it, without getting in trouble, to state troopers, and specifically it goes along to a man named Detective Glenn Flough. Meanwhile, yet another body is found, this time Paula Golding, an exotic dancer who was killed five months earlier. Opposite to all those crime shows where there's a jurisdiction war between everyone, Foff actually then contacts the FBI agent, John Douglas, and works with him for help on profiling. Now, he did a really good job. I was actually really impressed with his profile. I'll give you a little bit of a walk. I won't go through all the science of it, but just a little bit on the psychology.

Cool. Yeah, I like that. To begin with, so many killings have occurred, right? The killer would have to be able to operate unnoticed by the community. If he was respectable and had some kind of community standard or standing, that's going to work to his advantage. So that's probably the case. This is something you usually find in business owners.

He owns a bakery, especially ones that regularly interact with the community, Smet Vat. Now being a business owner would also mean that he was rooted enough to have local knowledge and give him financial stability, somewhat but not totally helping him afford a plane, without anyone questioning where those funds are going because he owns the business. Furthermore, control and independence coming from owning a business fits with the killer's need to control their victims,

which they feel that a serial killer really had based off of just some of the traits of his victims. And then, so the killer would need to control their victim and he would be able to carefully plan the abductions and murders, again, going under his ability to control the situation. Now, to be able to find where these bodies were or to be able to put these bodies where they were in the wilderness, this man would also have to be an outdoors man, something who would like to hunt a lot, for example. So, so far we have an independent business owner who hunts and likes to hunt.

And then based off of other killers who preyed on hookers, he would probably have difficulty talking to women and have low self-esteem. Probably growing up as an outcast. Okay so now we have someone who's growing up as an outcast, likes things like shooting an archery and is an outdoorsy guy, and would probably own a business. On top of that, based on similarities with other killers, his outcast tendencies were likely partially fueled by a speech impediment, either a lisp or a stutter. And if you remember, our serial killer here has a stutter. Finally, he likely keeps souvenirs of his murders to remember them by. That one's less of a like thing that's really impressive because honestly that sounds like

most serial killers. But the fact that he has a sitting in his stutter is impressive. Anyway, so Hanson has all this going on, plus he has that stealing crime rep, and that's considered as well. And hey, not only does he fit the profile, he has an airplane. So our heroes are able to use this along with Paulson's, our survivor's claim. This would be one of the first warrants based on a behavioral profile. And they knew they needed to find the rifle with the point 22 cartridges. If they were going to make this work, was it in the wall?

What's that? Nope. Wasn't none of the guns or two cartridges in the wall. So here's what they found with their warrants. Nothing damning at first. So they look harder. In a last ditch attempt, they look in the insulation. Bingo. They found missing women, including a golden arrowhead necklace, guns, and a point.23 caliber Ruger mini 14 semi-automatic rifle. Hmm, a semi-automatic.

I certainly don't have anything political to say about that. Anyway, what they also find is an aeronautical chart. So that's like a time map of the area with 37 X marks hidden away. And as you can guess, those Xs hide a treasure. Sure we can guess what the treasure is, it's a pretty gruesome one. Uh huh. Bodies. Yeah. On top of that, they are conducting the search and they run into his previous false alibi's wife who says, no, that alibi is false. And the alibi himself says yeah I

made that up. He heard the gruesome accusations and he's like what the hell. So of course Hanson denies it at first but just like any in cell which isn't a thing at the time but I imagine he'd be one today like any in cell he's blaming the women to justify his actions. Finally, he admits it. And we now know Hanson to have raped and assaulted over 30 women and to have murdered at least 17 women ages 16 to 41. And then here's one being the nice guy that he is he did claim he eventually would or occasionally let victims go if he was convinced they wouldn't tattle on him. And he mentions one of the main highs he gets from his

hunts and the torturing of them was from their fear. He likes their fear. From evidence, however, it is believed he actually killed at least 21 women. Hansen would only be charged with four. Hansen would only be charged with four. Sherry Morrow, Joanna Messina, Eklutna Annie, and Paula Golding. But there is a little bit of justice. The kidnap and rape of Cindy Poulsen, that is also something he would be charged with. Even though they thought he was lying, or she was lying before. And on top of that, he was charged with assault, kidnapping, weapon offenses, and theft. And as a cherry on top, to answer your question about money for an airplane, insurance fraud. Apparently, he had filed the alleged theft of some of his hunting trophies and used the funds to buy a plane. Turns out he had recovered his money from his backyard,

but had quote-unquote forgotten to inform the insurer. Anyway, the ballistics tests link the bullets to the crime scene with his rifle, and he makes a plea bargain, and this is why only four murderers were charged, so that he can serve his time in a federal prison outside of Alaska and escape publicity from the press and keep his family out of the mess, at least something, he would plead guilty to four homicides, excuse me, help provide details of other victims and help decipher markings on his murder map. At 44, old Bob the Baker is arrested, ending his at least 12-year reign of terror. He is sentenced to 461 years in prison and life without parole.

Aside from those though, they couldn't find... Or aside from some many of the areas, I forget how many exactly, most of them I don't think they were able to find because of being spread out by scavengers. And it's likely, according to the psychological profile, that there's also bodies that were never marked on the map and still have yet to be found, since he's all about controlling perfection, so if the murders didn't go out just as he liked, he died of natural causes in prison. And they lived happily ever after. Thank you, Nessie. I'm giving you a round of applause right now, but you probably can't hear it. Oh, thank you. I'll take it. Okay, so let's see. Let me remember who the... I feel like I should at least give some of the names

of the others who were murdered. Let me find that fast. So, in respect for those we know, the following victims are as follows. Sherry Marlowe, Paula Golding, Joanna Macini, Yelutna Ani, Horseshoe Harriet, another unidentified victim, Sue Luna, Malaie Larson, another unidentified victim, Sue Luna, Malaie Larson, Delaine Frey, Angela Federn, Theresa Watson, Tamara Pedersen, Andrea

Fish Alteri, Roxanne Eastland, Lisa Fetrell, Celia Beth Van Zanten, Megan Bill. The end. Thank you. Thank you. Any questions guys? No? I mean you answered the one where the money was coming from. Yeah. Okay. How long did he spend in prison before he passed away? That's a good question. Probably like 30 years or something. Let's see, let's ask the internet. Prison was for... Oh, it doesn't want me to know. So, 30 years. Hey, I was right. Approximately 30 years. Nice, Jesse. Nice. Thank you. Okay. Okay. Okay. Well, thank you. Absolutely. I don't know if I've heard of this before or not, but it's interesting. I mean, it's gory to say so, but I kind of wish I had more details on the hunts. Well, yeah, but if you never spoke about them or if the women that got away never spoke about it.

Yeah. But he's dead. True. Out the bakery. Good. He's somewhere a little bit warmer now. I think we all are though, because climate change. I think it's always fun hearing stories that are based in Alaska.

I don't know. Yeah, we should get away with that. Because something about Alaska is really conducive to true crime. I agree with that. Still isolated maybe. Yeah. Yeah, because it is it's isolated. There's this vast areas of harsh weather that exists. And it's far away enough from the rest of America to make us feel safe.

Yeah. Did I bring a downer to our podcast? No, no, it was a good story. Not at all. Not at all. Yeah, good story. Thank you. Yeah, I thought it was interesting.

Thank you. It's hard to keep track of all those dates though. I'd like to go back to the... Oh, 100%. Yeah. A lot of these documentaries to watch and the internet things aren't in very good order. Whenever I have to organize my notes, whatever comes to dates or people's names, I have them bolded just so I don't forget them. It kind of helps sometimes. Sometimes it doesn't.

And I don't have a citations list for that. So you'll just have to pretend I'm not. Take your word for it. have a citations list for that so you'll just have to pretend I'm right. Well should we end with a final story? Do you have anything for us Alexis? Yes I do. Can you guys hear me? I can hear you. Absolutely. Okay that doesn't. So my story is, or my case is about the Greenbrier Ghost. And it begins with a woman named Elva Zona Heaster-Shoe. What the fuck? Could you say that again?

Elva Zona Heaster-S shoe of I'll type it in. It was my name, too. It was the people we shout. What was the name again? Oh, it's on a he's there. She there. I typed it in the time. No, no, no, no, no.

So he's there. She was. Now, is she married? She is. Okay. But um, now her name is Ella. She wasn't Jay. No, I'm just trying to figure out if the shoe last name is hers or if it's her husband's.

It's her husband's. It's her husband's. But he was known as the Greenbrier Ghost during that time. So Alva was born 1876 in Greenbrier County, West Virginia. And in October of 1896, she met a blacksmith and his name was Erasmus Stribbling Trout Shoe. Hold on. Did you also spell that out? Yeah, type that out and say it one more time. Okay. So his name is Erasmus Stribbling Trout Shoe.

Sounds like an insult. What the fuck? Erasmus, Stribbling, Sprout, Shoe. Sounds like an insult. What the fuck? What I'm hearing is that a tongue twister buried another tongue twister. What do we, what do we, what do we? So they met- Where is this located again? This was in West Virginia, Greenbrier County.

Huh. This was in West Virginia, Greenbrier County. So they met in October. Within that same month, they married each other. And three months later, on January 23rd, 1897, to the husband, he had a neighbor, he was 11 years old, and he would have the 11 year old boy run errands for him. So he would come into the house, she would give him a no or a list of groceries that he needed that day. That little boy would leave, come back with all those groceries and put them away. And he got paid for it. But that day when the young boy went into the home, he found Elva's dead body. Now, the local coroner was called onto the scene. His name was Dr. George W. Knapp. And before he arrived to the scene,

Shu, the husband, he had already moved Elva's body. Now, from all the sources that I read, it doesn't say where in the house she was prior to the coroner coming into the scene, probably just because it wasn't documented. But we do know that Shu had moved her body into their bedroom. He even put her in a high necked stiff collar dress, which is typically a job done by an undertaker. Wait, I think I've heard this, but keep going. Wait, I think I've heard this, but keep going. Wait, keep going, yeah. Yeah, Dr. Knapp, he arrives onto the scene and he saw that she was holding Elva's,

hide it in his hands and he was sobbing, as if he was mourning, grieving, seeing his wife's dead body. And Dr. Knapp, he decided to do a brief examination of the body. He noticed there was some bruising around her neck, but he didn't perform a thorough autopsy because of Shu's mental state at that time. Instead, he listed her cause of death to be everlasting faint, which is basically like heart failure.

And then that's a way to put it. That did do it. Yeah, it is. But what year was this? I think everlasting faint. That was the initial cause of death. It doesn't say when he changed it, but he did later change it to childbirth complications Nothing says about her being pregnant nothing says about how far along she was who was the father

Nothing, it literally just says cause of death, childbirth complications. So I had no idea she was pregnant before reading that when I initially researched it. And I tried my best to find things, but really, before her death, she's literally just a complete mystery. So there's no record of her even being pregnant from what I can see on the internet. But it did confuse me, you know, I confused all of us here that it was child, but he doesn't say anything about it. Yeah. But the but they then started to prepare her body for her herbureal. He was actually involved in it. He was always handling

her head when he was involved too, was one thing that they had noticed. And when they put her body into the casket, Shu had got a sheet and he folded it and he put it on one side of Elva's head and then he got a piece of her favorite clothing and put it on the other side to help her rest easier. And then he tied a scarf around her neck and said, quote, it had been Sona's favorite, end quote. So as I mentioned, they put her body into the casket. It was an open casket. And they brought it to her mother.

Her mother was Mary Jane Heaster. And she lived by the big Sewell Mountain. And the next day on January 24th, 1897, they buried Elva's body in a local cemetery on a hill. It's now known as the Soul Chapel Methodist Cemetery. There we go. She was buried January 24th, 1897. Just a month afterwards, Mary Jane said that she had been visited by Elva's spirit. He said that for four consecutive nights, Elva would come to her and tell her about the abuse that she had experienced in her marriage with Shu, even claiming that he had murdered her. Yeah, after she started seeing her daughter in spirit, she started telling her neighbors about how abusive Shu was and how he had murdered her daughter in a fit of rage, oops, her daughter in a fit of rage and broke her neck. Now Mary Jane, she took this information that she gathered from this spirit and she went

to the local Lewisburg prosecutor. His name was John Alfred Preston and she literally went into his office and talked to him for hours and just tried to convince him to reopen Alva's case. Now whether or not Preston fully believed Mary Jane, it still was enough reason for him to have some of his deputies interview the people of interest in that case during that time, as well as the coroner, Dr. Knapp. Knapp, when he was interviewed, he immediately confessed to not doing a thorough autopsy

or a complete examination of the body. And he also even admitted that he might have made a mistake with his final diagnosis of her cause of death. Oh wow, really? Yeah. So then they did an investigation. They did an investigation on Shue's background as well. When they did a background check on him, they found out that he was married twice before Elva, and he was also in the West Virginia Penitentiary. Now, it doesn't say how long he was in there for nor what he was in there for. It doesn't say what crime he committed. It just says he was in there for nor what he was in there for. Does it say what crime he committed?

And just says he was in there for about a term, which is like four months. And. The two wives that he had prior to Elva, I both died. One of them broke her neck by falling from a haystack and the other had died. Yeah, the other died by helping Shu repair their chimney. So she was on top of the chimney and his wife at the time was at the bottom placing rocks into

a basket that was attached to a rope. And Shue would basically pull up that rope and he would get the rocks and placing them, blah, blah, blah. But as Shue was drawing the basket back up, one of the rocks fell out of the basket and landed on his wife's head. wife's head. And all of this led to the exhumation and autopsy of Elvis body. Erasmus found out, he found out that they were going to dig up his wife's dead body to do an autopsy on it. And he complained to the Greenbrier independent, which was like a local paper at the time. But he knew that whether he liked it or not, he still had to attend. He needed to be there to see what they would find. He had a feeling he would be arrested after the autopsy and he had a rebuttal. He said, quote, but they will not be able to prove I did it.

And oh, shit, which, which implies that, you know, of course, he knew that he his wife, he at least knew his wife was murdered. Yeah, exactly. And so they performed the autopsy on February 22nd, 1897. They performed it in a local schoolhouse, which is crazy. And it lasted for about three hours. And they found that Elvis neck had been broken. The autopsy report was published on March 9th, 1897.

I literally cannot find it for the life of me. But it stated that, quote, the discovery was made that the neck was broken and the windpipe matched. On the throat were marks of fingers indicating that she had been choked. The neck was dislocated between the first and second vertebrae. The ligaments were torn and ruptured. The windpipe had been crushed at a point in front of the neck. End quote.

And after this information was revealed, they arrested Erasmus Shue and charged him for the murder of his wife, Elva. The trial started June 22nd, 1897. Elva's mother, Mary Jane, was actually the star witness. Now, most of her testimonies were based on like dreams and ghostly sightings. Although the prosecutor did try to, you know, drill it into her head that she needed actual factual evidence, but she still was just going on with the ghost sightings that she had. And Shue's lawyer, he decided to take this as an opportunity to question Mary Jane, kind

of trying to hope to prove her to be an unreliable source to the jury. But despite all efforts, she pulled through, she was pretty calm during it and so calm that she convinced the jury that she was telling the truth. So Erasmus Shue was found guilty for the murder of his wife and sentenced to life in prison on July 11th, 1897. There was while she was in prison, there was actually a lynch mob organized to take him out and hang him. No way. Yeah, sheriff deputy. Yeah. Four of the leaders of the organization were charged for attempted murder. So that stopped before any damage was done. But Erasmus did die in West Virginia penitentiary, Moundsville, on March 13th, 1900.

It was actually due to an unknown epidemic at the time. He was buried in an unmarked grave in the local cemetery. And this case made American judicial history. It is the only case known where a ghost literally helped solve a murder and it would have just been considered as accidental. Yeah. Yeah. But that's really cool actually. That is actually all right. But yeah, I thought that was pretty cool. I saw the literally ghost helped with murder and I was like, oh, all right. Cool. Yes. Yeah.

This is when I'm right. This is the only case where like a ghost has helped solve their own murder. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. I thought it was pretty cool, though. It is. I have heard of this performance. Thank you. I've never heard of it before, so that's cool to hear about. I don't recognize the story, so, yeah.

Elva Zona, Hester Shue, and a Russian Strip. I would have been sure I would have remembered those names Yeah Elva Zona Hester shoe and then Erasmus stripling trout shoe again, that just sounds yeah, it's old stripling It does

So therefore, I will put our heart next to it. Erasmus apparently means Edward. You know, Erasmus, Edward. What a way. Does it come from a specific, like, nationality or something? Greek, I believe. In Greek it means, um, beloved. What about scribbling?

Yeah, what does that mean? Yeah, no does that mean? That's just an insult. And proud just means proud. Scribbling, proud shoe. And they lived happily ever after. They did. Amazing.

Well, thank you, Alexis. Thank you, Alexis. Thank you. Thank you, thank you, Alexis. Thank you, Alexis. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. The case of the, what was the ghost called? The green what?

The green briar ghost. Green briar ghost. Why is she green? Why aren't you? That's just the county that it was in. Oh, where's the county? Green briar. Oh, green bri the county? Greenbriar. Oh, Greenbriar.

Okay, for some reason, because I thought, you know how like there's white ladies? No, it's not two separate words. Yeah. I thought it was like, like shishnooks, like green lady. Because there's green ladies, brown ladies, white ladies, red ladies, blue ladies. All the colors of the lady rainbow. Yeah. Okay. Lady rainbow. blue ladies all the colors of the yeah okay lady rainbow i'm gonna guess him all right well i feel fully educated today on true crime and occult

perfect that's the goal got two spook. We've got two non-fictions. I feel like we covered our bases today. Yeah. I guess because it was in court, you could only say three non-fictions, but you know, they did end up in true crime. Yeah. So free true crimes, two spirits, but a little four stories. Or not spirits. Okay. I can't speak. You know what I'm saying. Nice.

Yeah. Yeah. Do you feel like a changed man now, Jesse, after being on our podcast? I feel like two changed men. That's how changed I am. Oh my gosh. You feel like two and a half men. You feel like you've changed into one person?

Oh. What happened to the other half of the third man? Awesome. Well, thank you guys for being here. Thank you listeners for taking a listen. Hope you enjoyed listening to Jesse as well. This is our longest episode. Yeah. Yeah. So yeah, we're sticking around if you're still here yeah but catch you later on chambers of vehicles chambers of vehicles.com yeah um and we'll see you next episode. Yeah. Check us out on all of our socials and everything and make sure to take care of yourself. Sit up straight, drink some water. If you want to send us a text quicker and not write us an email, you can go to the description and it says send them a text or send us a text.

And you can do that too. We do not get your phone number. We just get like their last three, four digits. Four digits. But do you send us your social security number? Yeah. That is a joke. We're going to thank Jesse if we get that. Well, sleep well. Have a good night. Bye. Bye bye, see you. Bye. I see you. And I, being a good guest, totally didn't forget to say thank you for having me.

So I'm just going to go ahead and say thank you guys for having me on your podcast. I expect to be here soon. I mean, it'd be cool if I was here soon. Okay, bye.