Chilluminati Podcast - Episode 302: Richard Kuklinski Part 3 - Man Made Myth

Episode Date: June 8, 2025

The boys tackle the FINAL EPISODE of Richard Kuklinski and expose him for what he truly was, an angry nobody. MERCH - http://www.theyetee.com/collections/chilluminati Thank you to - Zocdoc - http://www.zocdoc.com/chill All you lovely people at Patreon! HTTP://PATREON.COM/CHILLUMINATIPOD Jesse Cox - http://www.youtube.com/jessecox Alex Faciane - http://www.youtube.com/user/superbeardbros Editor - DeanCutty http://www.twitter.com/deancutty Show art by - https://twitter.com/JetpackBraggin http://www.instagram.com/studio_melectro

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Ritual doesn't just have your back. They have the receipts. Get 25% off at ritual.com slash clinical. These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. Hello everybody and welcome back to the Chaluminati Podcast episode 300. Episode 302 is always on one of your hosts Mike Martin joined by my beautiful co-host from LA, Jesse and Alex and so I says to her boys I says to her. Hello, I had to stab her. That's it. That's all I was going nothing else

I'm so you thought you were gonna do like a like a like a comedy tinged Serial killer joke I was going to and I really thought better everything that came to my head I immediately was like I shouldn't you were like anyways, so I stabbed it Anyways, so anyways, he shuffle He's tried to get money out of me and I stabbed him two times, left him on the street and everybody just kind of looked at him and said, hey, ain't my problem. Better?

Yeah, yeah. Yeah. That's what supposedly happened many times. You know, what's crazy is my boss said that you should always dress for the job that you want, not for the job that you have. But he didn't like it when I show up as Batman. Shit, dude, you are ready for this episode. We need those crickets again. We need some crickets real quick. Just real quick. Some

crickets. I want to do, I want to do a Fred Armisen. Somebody in the reddit made a post about that. It's like my algorithm is not fucked up. I don't know why. And Jesse, you responded and said, I wonder if he still has his channel labeled as a gaming channel and God damn it. You were right for the past like four years.

I have left. Chaluminati is under a gaming category. I forgot that that existed as a thing. So you think the money's going to start rolling in? No, I don't. But I do think we might start hitting. But it will algorithmically make more sense. It's weird because I only know to think about that now because I was having a conversation with YouTube where I was going through it and they were like, it's really hard to figure out analytics stuff

with your channel because it's existed since 2010 and you've drawn so much content across so many different things. The algorithm doesn't know where to place you. And so I was like, what can I do? And they're like, the smartest thing to do would have been to have one channel only doing one type of thing. So it knows where to put you. And I'm like, well, that's impossible.

That's the opposite of what they used to say also. Yes. That's the opposite of what they used to say also. In order to test this out, this is no joke, I'm making a YouTube channel called Too Old for This and it's me reacting to Jen Alpha, all the things they love and that's all it's going to be and I want to see just for the algorithmic test. What happens? I change from gaming on YouTube to entertainment that seem to be a comedy was like then maybe the next best, but we do,

you know, we're comedy, but we're also like more than that. Definitely entertainment. But if there's like categories, I'm not sure what the categories are now, but I would have assumed at this point because here's things coming down the pipeline that, uh, exists shows again, like like YouTube red shows. No, no, no. You can change a podcast or a yeah.

Or if you have like, um, one type of thing, you can name it. Like if you do have a playlist, you can now name that playlist, a show. If it's its own thing. Now, what will that do the algorithm? Hopefully, hopefully, hopefully a lot, because I'm ready to be the biggest entertainment channel on YouTube. Let me tell you right now, let me just say to everybody who wonders why we I'm so happy we focus on audio primarily, because that's just shit in the podcast sphere. You don't have to worry about as much. It's about

being really it's about democracy, right? It's about everybody being able to listen to the real version of the show, quote unquote, right? Yeah, I've always thought instead of us being more like entertainment or like gaming, I've always thought we were more like, like our show was like a famous pickle because it's like a really big deal. And you know, thanks to you over at Patreon.com.

You're keeping Dean employed right now, by the way. You are, you absolutely are, and Dean appreciates it. We don't have to be slaves to the algorithm. Thanks to all of you over at Patreon dot com slash Illuminati pod. If you want to support us and get some bonuses along the way, that's where you go. You get some after shows, video content at certain tiers, ad free at all tiers available. Yeah. Go check it out and be sure to check out the calendar

because it's days are numbered. Hey, boys, it's time for part three. Are we learning? Are we going to learn that you have a kid, Alex? Because these are hard to. These are just straight. I have a dog with the intelligence of a human six year old. Does that count? There you go. But he bites a lot more than a kid does, I think.

I have to introduce like the co-host of this show at some point, I think. So last we left off We were spiraling towards the end of Richard Kuklinski the Iceman's criminal career He had been a according to him a prolific and expert serial killer mobster hitman that worked for all five families and while we went over a few of his stories that we that were taken for truth by the author Philip Carlo There is debate as to how much of it is true or not So for today's episode we're gonna reach the end of his criminal career

How he was caught what happened to him in prison and how much of what he said Can be corroborated and how much is even just truth in general based on evidence that police were able to find or not what I want to know is is he the fucking matrix ninja guy den fucking solid snake instant murder that's what I'm here for to I put it in the in the script, but let me let me give you a quote from one of the mobsters That had some sort of connection with him. They called him the force gump of hitmen Like because he's in the right place at the right time Or because like one time a snake bit him in the ass I thought it was a snake but actually it was a bullet because he just kind of was just not really all that Intelligent not all out there. They get used it just kinda was just not really all that intelligent, not all out there. They get used to the story. Not really. That's an insightful all what I took away from that. I took away what Alex was saying that like we wouldn't leave him because the story sounds the same, but it's

true dude. It's true. No, it's more because this is coming from a 1990s mobster when asked what kind of guy this was. It was media literacy was that he just was using. He was just using the R word with another word. Yeah, correct. Exactly that. That's a shame because... I know. That's just letting down Forrest Gump more than anything, honestly. Agreed, agreed. It's a mess up. But before Kuklinski, the Iceman, even knew his end was coming, there was a man who was on his tail already, an individual by the name of Pat Kane, which is just the most detective ass name in the world. Pat Kane. DDS. Yes very much so. He had been watching an apparent what he

said was basically like a pattern of no patterns bodies piling up that had nothing to do with each other and seemed very random but were within an area that he believed maybe an individual was the one acting on these things. These would eventually be the kills that this that put Kuklinski away. We'll get to the victims, exactly the victims and what how they were found dead and whatnot. And Pat Kane, as far as like police and detective went, he wasn't super flashy. He wasn't like a cowboy cop that we've had in older stories. He was just kind of your typical career investigator in the New Jersey State Police Department that was just assigned to major crimes and organized crime units.

This is just his gig. What made Kane kind of different from a lot of the others, what made him dangerous to someone like Kuklinski. He had a big scar and an eye patch and he likes cigars and talking to himself inside his own head. The chief called him a loose cannon because he couldn't save that girl. That's what sent him on the path of righteous justice. He's up for vengeance. The whiskey was in the globe. This guy really, the weapon he used against you plays Russian roulette on the weekend. No, it was literally just simply his immense patience. This detective was wildly patient and he didn't go chasing leads. He constructed timelines, built intricate webs and followed what truce,

like we're being rumored on the streets. He very much tried to ingratiate himself with the, what was being said at street level and never really gave himself away. Honestly. Yeah. That's like the, that's the job. Yeah. The thing of him, you know, kind of had a cigarette in his mouth, hands in his pocket,

walking down the street, just listening to conversations of people he's been following for a long time. That's kind of what he did. And by the early eighties, Canaan started noticing that disturbing pattern I mentioned unsolved disappearances into violent deaths that didn't really match mob hits or any of the street crimes that he had been investigating before. There were no witnesses to these crimes.

The crime scenes were way too clean and or too strange. Like one of the victims, Louis Mazge who was discovered frozen years after his death or Paul Hoffman who vanished could simply without a trace Nobody saw him ever and some victims were beaten some were shot some were poisoned But all of them had one thing in common. No one talked about them afterward. These people just Vanished and this is what really piqued Kane's interest. He began vanished, and this is what really piqued Kane's interest. He began informally at this point, assembling like his own personal files on these kills. He cross-referenced known associates within the mob. He created timelines.

He began to see, and he began to see a name that actually started showing up over and over again. Richard Kuklinski, sometimes connected through business, other times just through a rumor, but there were never any fingerprints No phone taps, but every thread that came seemed to pull on eventually came close to the same individual How many how many are we how many are we like like what what kind of numbers are we talking about right? Five individuals. He's really following five dead individuals that he's been following and Kane also kind of understood something A lot of people didn't as well who Kuklinski wasn't just kind of killing to survive or

profit. He was killing to perfect something. The variety of methods, the precision, the concealment, Kane didn't think he was chasing a typical hitman. He personally believed that Kuklinski was something more dangerous in his mind. A man who had found a way to make his pathology profitable. He once described Kuklinski as quote, the most dangerous criminal I ever investigated, and not just because of his violence, but because of how long he went without a single mistake

that would point directly at Kuklinski. If anything was honest about the way Kuklinski described how he operated, it is how methodical he seemed to be about his killings. And eventually Kane's frustration at the lack of hard evidence turned into a strategy. He pulled, he pulled in the attorney general's office, the Bergen County prosecutor, and eventually the ATF building operation Iceman as a longterm containment strategy. Kind of badass.

Isn't it badass? It's fucking sick. Payne's name was the first one on the planning documents and he wasn't just like on this case. He was the creator of this case. And by 1985, Richard Kuklinski was now officially nearing the end of his run. He just hadn't realized it yet. Law enforcement had been watching him for years from the early 80s on. Not with firm evidence obviously but with and not with warrants or surveillance fans, but just suspicion, rumors

word on the street into that quiet growing suspicion continue straight up Colombo in dude. Yeah, really? I haven't seen Colombo. You know, I was just having a conversation the other day about why we waste our time even coming up with these like it's just like this because you every time go, I don't know, I don't know what that is. And then someone in the comments on Reddit will be like, I'm with Mathis. I don't know what they're talking about. I've never heard of Colombo either. So therefore no one has. Okay, I've heard of Colombo. I've just never seen Colombo.

for no one has. Okay, I've heard of Columbo. I've just never seen Columbo. Yeah, Columbo. I mean, honestly, you guys didn't have that much crossover. Like, I think the last Columbo was when he went to that rave in 2003. It's true. That is so I like I don't think you were like the right audience for like a Peter Falk driven like we not Hollywood olds, like guest star based detective comedy. Uh, but it's really a laugh. Right. I can appreciate it now though. I bet you I can enjoy it now. I went back and watched first episode.

I was like, that was so good. And it was like directed by Steven Spielberg. And I was like, fuck you. No way. He was 24. He was fucking 24. Of course. Speaking of which, did you know that every time that I think of the alphabet? I only think of 25 letters. I don't know why Yikes Cuz we're about to go into some victims right now yikes, so oh I got plenty don't worry Starting in the early 80s when this this first started, there was the pattern. Let's talk a little bit about the victims that started getting discovered.

At first, it was seeming unrelated. We had a man by the name of Paul Hoffman, who was a pharmacist with the side hustle in stolen prescription drugs, who vanished in 1980 True, in 1982. Then you had Louis Masgay, who was a TV salesman who disappeared a year later and then turned up in a park in 1983, frozen so solid, the coroner, the coroner initially placed his deaths at three weeks earlier. The real time of death though, based on stomach contents and autopsy findings thereafter was more than two years prior.

So he did kill somebody and then kill and then keep a corpse for two years. Is that why he's the Iceman? You know, it never really specifies exactly why, but yeah, I think so. Yeah, I think that might be it because the freezing was a part that really kind of caught. It's kind of like in a sick way, pretty genius, like as a way of occluding a victim's time of death. As long as you got the freezer space, I guess.

Yeah. Well, again, you don't think about the stomach contents, which is what ended up being the problem. You always. That's why you bring the rats in. Go to the old rat. Exactly. Then there was a victim, Gary Smith, who was found strangled and shoved under a motel bed where he stayed for days while other guests unknowingly slept above his decomposing.

Oh, that's so morbid. How that's like a fucking hook hand on the car type legend. That's like a fucking that's like a, like one of those like, scary stories to tell in the dark type situations right there. It's awful. It's horrible. And the other part was with all these victims, the method varied the victims didn't all share a background, but Kane saw a pattern anyway. Brutality wrapped in some weird obsession with invisibility. Again, no witnesses, no motives, just a disappearing act.

And it was happening kind of often. What really pulled Kane toward Kuklinski was Louis Mazgay, the freezing, the delayed discovery, the clearly deliberate time manipulation that required foresight access and a specific kind of ruthlessness that he didn't see. True, true. Like the ability to truly not perceive it as a human body anymore. It's an object. It's awful. And Kane had already heard the name Kuklinski murmured around New Jersey's darker corners, always with unease or at a distance. And now had already heard the name Kuklinski murmured around New Jersey's darker corners, always with unease or at a distance. And now he had a victim who'd been frozen like a steak to

cover the killer's tracks. And it didn't feel like a coincidence to Kane. But Kuklinski, true to his reputation, was very cautious. He operated alone. He had no phone in his name, no utilities connected to criminal addresses, no paper trail. He didn't hang around mob guys in public. He didn't boast. He didn't even get arrested. Every job he did was clean, every contract handled with vanishing precision. And so Kane started building a case around that.

First the files, the unsolved murders, missing persons, patterns of sudden disappearances where Kuklinski was known to be in the orbit of. Then he brought in others. The Bergen County Prosecutor's Office, the New Jersey Attorney General's Organized Crimes Task Force, and finally the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms, which is the ATF. The moment Kuklinski crossed into weapons trafficking, silencers, grenades, cyanide, automatic firearms, the ATF would have the grounds. And the case now had legs across agencies. How do they prove that?

Well, we'll keep, we're going to get into it. Okay. That is what Operation Iceman was. But it still wasn't enough. They needed more. Kuklinski wasn't sloppy enough to get caught on surveillance even doing these things. He didn't talk over the phone. He didn't talk into, walk into traps.

If they wanted to prove anything, they needed someone on the inside. And that's where we're introduced to another man by the name of Phil Suleman. Phil Suleman had known Kuklinski for years at this point. He was a Patterson based fence. This is a fence we mentioned in the last episode who worked with low level mob associates and helped move stolen goods. More importantly, Kuklinski trusted this guy. They'd done deals together. Soleimani had introduced Kuklinski to people and never burned Kuklinski. But behind the scenes, Phil was under pressure, legal trouble, leverage, and eventually through all of it, they leaned on

him enough that he flipped. They just, they had him on like crimes. They basically had him like a file on this guy. They just made his life scary enough that he just exactly. Yeah. So in that he agreed to help set the trap. Phil introduced Kuklinski to a brand new associate someone. He said could bring him steady work big contracts and clean money. That man was none other than ATF special agent Dominic Polifrone. I think that's how you say it Pol Polifrone. Polifrone is probably how you say it. Uh,

going undercover as Dominic Provenzano. That's his fake name. Wait, what's his real name? Dominic also. Yes. His real name is Dominic Polifrone. His undercover name was Dominic Provenzano. You're telling me this man didn't go under the cover as the name Dominic Provolone. That's even more Italian! It would have been perfect! Dominic Provolone is like, that's like Jimmy Pesto level. That's like, that's crazy. Dominic Provolone is, that's like a

sandwich. Dominic Provolone has to work for air hypnosis. That's a brand, that's a cheese brand, that's all that is. He's part of you go by dominant Cronoval own from Oregon farmers and Whole Foods and Arawan. It's a little bit more expensive, but the taste is funky. It tastes like an old Italian lady made it. Thank you to Zoc Doc for sponsoring today's episode. And I'm just just gonna you know, give you a little list and I want you to check mark Every one of these you used as an excuse in the past. Well, I can't go see the doctor because I'm just too busy Oh, I can't go. Why would I go it? It'll heal on its own or or I don't know which doctor to go to about I just don't it's too much

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sponsoring today's episode. He was introduced as a fake name, Dominic Provenzano, who was a connected hitman from out of state quote unquote. And Dominic was perfect for the job. He had, he was an Italian American, already pretty streetwise, could talk the talk. And more importantly, understood Kuklinski wouldn't open up to a loud mouth.

He would need to build rapport through patience, mirroring and respect. This wasn't just a one in introduction, here's the contract, get him on tape, we got you. Yeah, let's go, yeah. Over the tape, we got you. This goes, yeah. Over the course of months, Dominic worked his way in. They would meet for coffee, they drove around together, they talked about methods, like poisons, body disposals, making it clean.

Kuklinski was cautious, but eventually became intrigued. This was somebody who seemed to at least understand and appreciate his craft, who wasn't shocked by cyanide or rats or freezers. Someone who eventually Kuklinski might trust enough to share a kill with. You know, going through a nice murder day. I don't know what you're doing after work today, but you know, I'm going to get in the car and go out to the to the Pine Barren pine barons and, uh, kill a couple of people. So if you want to come with me and we can get some, uh, sandwiches afterwards.

I got the Dominic provolone hookup. Did he, did he not do any, I, I guess I understand the forest gump bit a little, like didn't do no research on if, if you, if I was in the mob and anyone approached me I would be digging up every bit of dirt I could we're 1985 1986 now what are you gonna do is he in the phone book man yeah I just yeah all right it feels like bringing someone into your murder circle you have to be careful and this seems not careful. That which is why they worked their way in through somebody they knew Kuklinski already

and inherently trusted and introduced him and then then spent more months being and making himself as trustworthy as it was because that was like some amazing police work. This guy is no joke. Yeah, found the guy that Kuklinski trusted, leaned on him, flipped him and then had off a juice or something. Because this guy, again, like I said earlier, this guy that that Trojan horse never burned him like always got Kuklinski what he wanted and like always work clean with him. And that was something Kuklinski respected. And yeah, this is some incredible police work to get this guy 100%.

This is like what we want our police to be doing. This is this is like an amazing year. A story. These cops kind of remind me of like a chocolate record player. They sound pretty sweet. That one hurt, dude. That one. Maybe if they could get like, can you like Kuklinski might trust them enough to go out and like kill somebody together? That would be the angle. Get Kuklinski to accept a contract. And then after it's accepted, get him talking and get it on tape.

And for the cops, for this project, Iceman operation, Iceman, the game had officially begun. This is like, this is a, how many people are on the team? We're at least three that I know in the names of like their day in day out job is like chasing down the Kuklinski. This is now yeah, it's now it is like this is his day to day like this guy has to pretend to be somebody. And again, Dominic wasn't just building rapport. This man was setting an active trap over the course of months.

Every interaction was bait every conversation at after a few months became one where a wire was worn. He wore a recorder to every meeting eventually. And the trick was simply patience. Kuklinski was guarded, but even with friends. But the more they talked, the more Dominic noticed something. Kuklinski liked to fucking hear himself talk and explain everything he did and get affirmation from it. We talked about it in the first episode, in the second episode.

He liked the attaboy. He loved the, wow, you're so good. Oh, wow. Nobody's better than you at this. And he didn't, he did it in a way where it almost didn't seem like he was bragging. He was like humble bragging. But even so, he wasn't doing it the way mob guys did it even according to these police like he didn't talk to hear himself talk according to them I Disagree after hearing many an interview with this man I just think they mistake calm monotone for not enjoying his own stories. I Just think he keeps himself under emotion because it's part of the show It's part of who he built himself to be. I think he loves to hear himself talk.

But from the perspective of the cops, this is what they said. They'd that he, they didn't, they didn't think he liked to hear himself talk. But when the right question was asked the right way, he would start to open up. He would talk about cyanide, how to mist, uh, how a mist to the face could kill silently, how he liked it more than guns because it was cleaner and more elegant. He talked about the problem of noise, about disposal, freezing bodies, all in that calm clinical way that if you listen to any of his interviews,

this is what he sounded like. And like he was describing a trade in his craft, not a crime. Problem of noise. But none of this would have been possible without Phil Soleula man. So the many, the guy who flipped Kuklinski had known so many for years. He was a low level operator in Patterson fencing, all this stuff.

And he was super fucking connected. They weren't friends in like a traditional sense, but they had like done, not only that they'd done deals together and watched each other's backstaring sketchy transactions amongst other mobsters, like low level mobsters, but they drank coffee in the same rundown diners on Route 46 for over a decade. So like this is kind of close to a friend as Kuklinski could have in this world, I think. A very familiar face that's non-threatening. Yeah, exactly that. Exactly that. And If you don't do friends, I guess that's the next level up, right?

Yeah. Yeah. Like, yeah, I think Jesse was the one that mentioned it last episode because we kind of brought it up a little bit then too. But when you find somebody who speaks your language and your craft, even if they're like super friends, it's almost what you talk about all the time. Inside baseball about YouTube or podcasting, you know, like we, as friends get together, you end up talking about that. So I do imagine if you're in this life of crime and all you deal with is other criminals. You can't talk to your wife. Besides, she's like, you've got you. You're basically an abusive asshole anyway at home. So you don't have anybody you can quote unquote connect with. So who do you connect with the other abusive assholes that you do crimes with? assholes that you do crimes with. There's, there's definitely other like geriatric gaming YouTubers that I run into in my travels who I only talk to about business and slide right back into the old rapport with even though they're not really in my life outside of, you know,

when we're all at PAX or whatever, you know, but also like, yeah, not many people can talk in that language, you know, like, it just, it is, and again, it goes to the point of it being a craft to him and that's what that's what uh, Polyphoron or Dominic noticed is that He didn't act very Pompous and so he mirrored that he Dominic expressed it in a way where he didn't try to impress He didn't try to show off. He spoke the language of quiet and exact, and just mirrored Kuklinski. He didn't act like a wannabe.

He carried himself like someone who'd seen bodies, who knew how to dispose of a problem, and who appreciated the craft of violence when it was done just right. And that is what Kuklinski responded to. Now initially they didn't talk about murder at first. Obviously that would have been a huge red flag if they got together and were like, so tell me, how do you like to murder? No. Instead they talked about chemicals. They asked he asked Kukulinski if he'd ever worked with poison That's when he talked about cyanide who Kulinski would say things like it's good because it's quiet and they go down right away

No struggle. You just don't you just get it near them. Don't doesn't take much just going over the logistics What kind of gear he used, what kind of car he preferred for jobs. And Kuklinski remained calm and methodical. He liked vans with sliding doors and opaque windows. He liked duct tape. He liked being able to freeze a body to mess with the timeline. Quote, throw them off. They think you're doing it last week, but it was last year and they don't know what to look for. It wasn't a boast, it was a lesson. And Dominic pretended to listen by asking the right questions and taking a bunch of mental notes, but most importantly, he kept the recordings rolling. Every word Kuklinski said, it's just wild to like not have the self-awareness to know

that you're implicating yourself in like murders. Again, yeah, you're the mob. So why wouldn't you use like mob, you know, like it would be crazy if something would happen to that guy. Like why don't you talk like that instead of I killed him. You want to see the body? Yeah. So, and I, I think you're right on the money, obviously. Like this guy isn't talking like somebody in the mob. Again, if we go back to Tommy Patera, what brought him down was a fake, like a friend

through the family he had known for like 20 fucking years. And you watched at the end with Tommy Petera, like spiraling into a paranoia that even the Iceman never comes into this guy speaks more like fan fiction of what it would be like if he was this guy that he wishes he was rather than what it's like. And you can look at Tommy Petera as an example of somebody who was living that life as an actual serial killer at the same time, who did have double digit bodies, you know, like that is, it's, it's interesting because we already covered somebody who lived that life. And yeah, it's all almost just like a show for him. Who Klinsky has like, like the vibes of like the violent psychopath. It's like that. Yeah.

But it's like that person in the chat who's like you're playing a game and they're like trying to tell you how they've already done Everything in the game. Yes, and how hard it was but they are you know, I had a little trouble here But it was like you ended up being a piece of cake is a one-upper. He's a lot upper He's your classic one-upper. I don't know how the killing got in there like do you think do you think he's addicted to the one-up or do you think he's addicted to the To the death. I think he's what's what one up or do you think he's addicted to the to the death? I think he's what's what's I was called a process killer. I think he enjoyed the methodical setting up of an acting. I don't think he cared or wanted the body. I think the body

was not something he was after. I think he was after the process of doing the killing and he enjoyed and it was a way from Dick expresses rage. Probably it wasn't a sexual thing for him at all. Like not all serial killers do it for sexual reasons, right? By the way, like I think a lot of people have this assumption that serial killer means sexual perversion It makes it easier to compartmentalize it in your brain But I think it's worse absolutely true of a majority of them that we know of but it is absolutely does not exclude you from being one You know like it's it's just what it is absolutely does not exclude you from being one. You know, like it's it's just what it is. And he was a serial killer in a different way. We will cover other serial killers in the future who are not sexually motivated by it. It's more of

this is like a puzzle for them or something that they enjoy doing or it's an emotional release. A lot of the ones that you've gone over, at least in the history, it's not that they're addicted to killing. They just like are fucking assholes who just kill people because they don't care. They're all mediocre nobodies that have literally done nothing remarkable in their lives. So they take it out in the most dumb way possible. And I have been myths get created around them, which is what I try to fucking push against, you know, which has a myth. So we go through the myth, but it's worth learning the myth because these things have cultural relevance, irrelevance.

It's not just that he's a murder addict, right? Which makes the other, the movie also even worse, just on another level of like, because it, because it changes the real story, romanticizes him and puts him in a light where I think serial killer admiration. Yeah. It seems kind of cool to. Yeah. Yeah. Like there's already serial killer groupies. They exist. We try to avoid making more of them. Hopefully. I don't anyway, I as he's, as he's recording all this stuff weeks past,

then months past, they would meet at diners. They would meet at gas stations, parking lots, wherever they went. It was all very carefully scouted. And Dominic always came wired, always played the role perfectly. And Kuklinski began to speak more freely. He talked about people he'd already quote unquote taken care of. He talked about the guy shot in the forehead with a crossbow just to see if it would work. He told stories about feeding the people to the rats, about freezing

bodies and meat lockers, and some of it investigators knew lined up with real cases. Some of it couldn't be verified though. But all of it painted the picture of Kane that Kane had long suspected that Kuklinski wasn't a mob killer. He was something different, maybe worse, a deliberate serial killer. And here's where it's difficult to parse fact from fiction, because what evidence we do have of the kills he's made do point to he was wildly methodical, extremely clean and did everything he could to not get

caught. If these are the five he caught, why would we expect there not to be others that were just very well clean? Now I'm not saying he killed over a hundred. I do not think he did, but I also don't think it's out of the line of possibility that he was the low level, like mercenary hitman that they would go for for kills that were like, maybe not something they wanted the family attached to or whatever, but it wasn't common work. It didn't happen all the time.

And he was likely more of a serial killer where he probably did kill homeless people and other people that cops didn't go looking for. I still don't buy the annihilating people on the sidewalk as he walks past them for giving them a dirty look and just leaving a dead body there. Shooting him in the car? Yeah. Shooting him in the fucking head from one car to another in broad daylight while he's

driving? That goes against everything we know about how he does murders, about how clean it is and all that stuff. So yes, I agree with you But there's there's likely if this is how clean he was with the five they found I guarantee like I was there to be more Yeah, I'm with that so getting a bunch of recordings and let me actually play you a little clip It's gonna be hard to hear cuz he's he's not he doesn't enunciate very well But I'm gonna play you a clip of him talking on wire

About some body disposal stuff. It's only a few seconds here. I am getting a little. Snee. He tripped and fell in the door. We had all of that. They had a heart. The heart pocket food. He was only dead.

Do we. So, yeah. And then I thank you, Amy, for the bump. You couldn't really hear him hear me saying, yeah, so then I threw him in the river. I stabbed him and pushed him in the alley. And that was that, you know, nice and clean. He's just very bluntly talking about how how he goes about his jobs. And there's a ton of this audio out there.

You can go listen to it. But I recommend looking listening to it with subtitles because very hard to like make out what he's saying. Sounds like the Iceman is pretty chill. You needed sunglasses and I need to hear. Yeah. So after enough time passed over months of a past, it finally came time for the proposal dropped down on one knee, pulled out the ring and asked Kuklinski if he would marry him. No, he proposed, obviously, that it was time to maybe propose a contract for a hit.

Dominic told Kuklinski that he had a business partner who was becoming a bit of a problem. Someone who might talk, and he simply asked, can you handle that? And Kuklinski didn't even hesitate, just said, if the money's right. They agreed on a price. How much do you think they agreed? How much do you think he went for for the hit? 50 bucks. What year is it?

$50. What year is it? 1986. Yes. Yes. 1986. We're about to. Yeah, we're about to end in 1986 and go into 1987. $2,000.

$2,000. Yeah. Okay. You're both well off. $25,000. For the hit000. Yeah. Okay, you're both well off $25,000. The hit in 1986. Who the fuck was it? It's fake. It's not a real hit. I would also have to I mean, I'm just saying like blitz hit. Yes, that's what I'm saying. Like, if I'm a hitman,

I know how much hits cost is $25,000. That sounds like that sounds like there's that very famous case that happened recently from meatball got paid $500. That's what I'm saying. That's exactly right. Famous cases right now of people trying to hire hitmen, but they actually hire government agents where they're like $20,000. And that's today money. Listen, if you're going to hire somebody to hit your, if you're going to kill a fan kill it has to be minimum 500 grand. All right. I guess it's not I guess it's not that much. That's 75 minimum.

But Matt, I don't think you should be saying how much bodies are worth my dude. I'm just going off the average cost of hitman between now and in 1986 in time taking an inflation and just trying to put an average price, you know, on if you're going to get your own like business partner hit flags, red flags everywhere. Yes. Obviously don't hire a hit man. Good Lord. Obviously. Do you know when a hit contract is only worth 45 cents when the victim is 50 cent and also nickel back. Holy shit, bro. That is that's rough. I don't. That's a perfect commercial break spot. I actually like.

God damn it. Well, yeah, hopefully the ad was for better help. But I'm. Um, yeah, yeah. Twenty five thousand dollars for 1986, where he had been paid supposedly a decade earlier $500. That should be like, that's too good, you know, but again, more evidence that maybe he wasn't really as connected to the mob as 75 grand seems like actually about what I would imagine you would kill somebody for in 2025.

I don't really know. Maybe I don't know what the risk is. I don't I actually have no idea. It's silly to it's silly to speculate. Yeah, it's silly to speculate, but keep doing it. Let's see. No, the mark obviously wasn't real. The ATF had created a complete legend, fake name, fake address, fake backstory. They even came up with a fake photo. You can't rely on blind faith to get the pregnancy support you deserve. Ritual's Essential Prenatal Multivitamin

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or prevent any disease. This guy, they just needed Kuklinski to accept the job and describe to them how he would do it. And fucking, of course he did. Of course he was immediately. He explained in exacting detail. He would find the man's home, wait until he pulled into his garage, walk up behind him, spray him in the face with a fine mist of cyanide.

He said the man would collapse immediately. There would be no sound and no witnesses. Then he would move the body to a pre-prepared barrel, set it on fire and walk away. And obviously that entire confession was being recorded. And on the morning of December 17th, 1986, the trap was set to snap close. And it was cold as fuck in New Jersey, north of New Jersey. Kuklinski left his house in Dumont as if it were any other day. And to his family, it was another routine day.

He got dressed, said goodbye, got in his car. But in reality, he believed he was heading off to commit a murder, another payday. What he didn't know was that every step of his plan had already been anticipated, and the moment he turned on Route 46, he was under tight surveillance from multiple angles. He wasn't going to meet a client, obviously,

and he was driving straight into a controlled operation, and Cain had coordinated with the ATF and the Bergen County Prosecutor's Office Office and a tactical arrest team was set and made. They didn't want to chase. They didn't want to stand off. Kuklinski was known to carry multiple weapons already and had a long history of thinking well ahead. So the arrest had to be clean, sudden, with zero room for improvisation on any of their

parts. So as Kuklinski pulled into a pre-arranged parking lot near a warehouse in Bergen County, where he believed he'd get the final payment and intel for the hit, his car was instantly surrounded by cops. Agents moved in fast, weapons were drawn, and Kuklinski was ordered to step out of the vehicle.

Much to their surprise, he didn't resist. Didn't even flinch, really. According to multiple officers on the scene, he showed no surprise, no anger. He simply stepped out, raised his hands, and simply and calmly said, What's this all about? They said he sounded almost detached, but his vehicle told the truth. Inside the car, investigators found everything that he had discussed with Dominic. A nasal spray bottle filled with cyanide, a rope, duct tape, gloves, a loaded 38 revolver, and a barrel in the back lined and prepared for the body disposal as they discussed.

It was an execution kit. Every detail matched the plan he had outlined to the undercover agent in the recording. It was textbook premeditation and there was irrefutable evidence. A barrel to burn the body in? Yeah. That is, that is like comical evidence for, defined on a murderer's person in his car. He's like, the barrel that he's going to burn the body in. That's like, I don't know, there's something like cartoonish about that to me. This whole, his whole story is cartoonish in a weird way.

Yeah. Does anyone immediately when you say what they find in the trunk, think about that clip from always sunny in Philadelphia where he's like, tools, my tools, duct tape, zip tie gloves. I have to have my tools. Dennis. That's all I can think about is him being like, what do you mean? They're my tools! Nasal spray bottle, rope, duct tape, gloves. Barrel?

Tinder? Kindling? I have to have my tools! So they arrested him, brought him to the station, and as they processed him, Kuklinski just remained composed. He made no admissions. He requested an attorney. Behind the scenes, the dominoes had already

begun to fall, law enforcement now had recorded conversations along with the physical evidence and a clear timeline of a murder conspiracy, and over the next several days, agents executed multiple search warrants. To give you an idea, Operation Iceman in total took 18 months from beginning to end. Over a year of this was going on. Now in the crawl space of his home, they actually did find more weapons, handguns, rifles, silencers, and plastic files that they tested for, uh, for cyanide, but the results came back inconclusive. Um,

they uncovered bulletproof vests. They found a police scanner and several sets of license plates from different states. Now Barbara's wife was interviewed and released that day. She hadn't known the full truth, at least not. I mean, I have a feeling she may have probably known but you're in a situation that something's syndrome like even if you knew, do you really like you go to the cops? Do you are probably thinking you're gonna come home and he's gonna kill you like he

knows because that's how we operate this. How do you believe you tried to escape to Florida once and he literally hunted you down and found you. Why in God's name would you ever like go against him again? Exactly. Yeah. The children were removed from the home temporarily during the search. Later they would the kids themselves would describe like the surreal nature of that day. One moment, their father was home,

being kinda awkwardly quiet as always. The next, when he was gone, and men with badges were combing through their closets and walls. The Kuklinski house on Sunset Street had always been just a quiet home on the outside, but now, with police tape set up everything, it just looked like a stage set

from any true crime show. The law enforcement didn't stop with conspiracy charges either. With Kuklinski in custody, the focus shifted to cold cases. Kane had been waiting for this moment for over two years, rather for many years, but this case in particular of Operation Iceman just about a year and a half. For years, he'd been filing away names Hoffman, Masge, Smith, Depner, Malabrand, all victims.

Now, with the help of the recordings and the follow-up interviews, they started stacking charges. In the end, Kuklinski was indicted for a total of five murders. George Malaband, who was shot and killed during a business deal that went wrong. Gary Smith, who was poisoned and strangled in a motel for reasons unknown. Daniel Depner, whose body was stuffed in the barrel. Paul Hoffman, the pharmacist who disappeared in 1982, also from a business deal gone wrong because he was doing that illicit dealing in the back end. And Louis Masguer, the TV salesman, frozen

and dumped two years after his death, also likely assumed to be from a business deal gone wrong with Kuklinski. And prosecutors didn't charge him with everything. They didn't need to. These five would be more than enough. And as the case moved toward trial, Kuklinski made a decision that surprised no one who understood this guy's pragmatism. He just flipped on himself. I guess because he likes to brag. So the best drag is to get it all on paper and say all this crazy shit. That's exactly what I'm saying. After his arrest in December of 86, Kuklinski was initially charged with five counts of murder. The evidence compiled by Detective Kane, the ATF, the County Prosecutor's

Office was strong, especially in the context of Kuklinski's own words recorded on over the months prior. Kuklinski had gone undetected for decades and most of his alleged crimes were all cold cases lacking physical evidence or reliable witnesses. The recordings made by Dominic were crucial, but they dealt with a planned murder, not a completed one. The prosecutors understood that to secure a lasting conviction, they needed more than just the tapes.

They needed Kuklinski to turn on himself. And he fucking did. Sometime not even that long after the arrest, Kuklinski signaled through his lawyer, Paul Klein, that he was open to negotiation he What followed was a prolonged series of interviews debriefings and ultimately a plea agreement Kuklinski agreed to plead guilty to two counts of murder in exchange for avoiding the death penalty specifically the 1980 murder of George George Malab, who had been last seen getting into a car

with Kuklinski over a failed business deal, and Malaband was shot twice in the back of the head and his body was never found. And then in 1981, the murder of Daniel Depner, whose corpse was discovered stuffed into a 55 gallon drum and dumped near a state park. Depner had reportedly owed Kuklinski money and was living with a woman connected to one of his criminal associates. Now, Kuklinski provided and was living with a woman connected to one of his criminal associates. Now, Kuklinski provided detailed accounts of both murders during the plea negotiations and his version of events aligned with what police already knew.

The precision of his descriptions, the weapons used, the sequence of events, the post-mortem handling all matched existing forensic details further solidifying the credibility of his confession. And in March of 1988, Kuklinski stood in court and formally pled guilty. He was sentenced to two consecutive life terms with no eligibility for parole until 2046, by which time he would have been over 110 years old.

Damn. But it doesn't stop there. After his sentencing, Kuklinski agreed to speak with law enforcement in a broader capacity. These weren't like courtroom confessions. They were post sentencing debriefings, interviews that took place at Trenton State Prison, often with detectives, FBI profilers, and eventually, obviously the main source, author Philip Carlo. Now, in these sessions, Kuklinski spoke way more freely

Sometimes for hours at a time. This dude would just fucking talk He described murders that spanned decades some were already known to investigators. Others were completely new He claimed to kill Paul Hoffman as we talked about the pharmacist Gary Smith Louis Mazge all of them that he got found guilty for over time and as we talked about the pharmacist, Gary Smith, Lewis Mazge, all of them that he got found guilty for over time. But he kept going after that. In the years that followed, Kuklinski's accounts expanded dramatically. During conversations with law enforcement and the author,

he began to link himself to high profile killings, including the murder of Jimmy Hoffa, which is what we talked about last week a bit, where he claimed he transported Hoffa's corpse from Detroit to New Jersey in a trunk, then crushed it in a car compactor. And then he obviously said he was part of the Castellano-Ballotti hit outside of Sparks Steakhouse in 1985,

alleging he was involved as backup and personally killed Castellano's driver. And then contract killings, he said he had, and they said he was involved in contract killings for the CIA including hits over in Europe and Central America. He said he shot JFK from a glider? Yeah yeah fucking like it just got insane. Do you think that potentially like all right I'm in mob, one of my hitmen is taken out. I send the mob lawyer to the prison and during the interview I have the conversation, hey

man, just take credit for a bunch of kills. Get them off our back. You got it. Now, it's interesting, Jesse, because we'll get to that. We'll get to if this is maybe part of that. Interesting, okay. They're obviously for these claims were not corroborated by evidence,

but we've seen from the kills that we know were his, again, methodically clean. He's very good at what he fucking does. So maybe there wouldn't be evidence of his killings if he was involved of like getting rid of the cult corpse of Jimmy Hoffa or the mob came in and said, take the fall. Regardless, none of the claims were corroborated

by any evidence. Kuklinski was never charged in connection with any of these events. So if that was their goal, it failed. And investigators who worked the Hoffa and Castellano cases did not have Kuklinski even on their radar prior to his own confessions. So they weren't even part of like-

They weren't like maybe it was him, yeah. No, not even once No independent verification of his alleged CIA involvement ever surfaced fucking obviously But Kuklinski and would you even look that up like what database do you look? I guess you would FOIA document for anything with the name Kuklinski in it or Richard Kuklinski in it That'd be your best bet maybe But even then when they were denied, he insisted repeatedly over and over in his interviews, which totaled, by the way, the number of hours Philip Carlo, the author interviewed this guy. How many hours do you think he was interviewed for?

A hundred and fifty thousand. Like, I think like 250 hours. You're so damn, over 200 hours. Yeah, I feel like it's like. Over 200 hours. He described dozens of other killings in that time. Some involved people investigators could name, others didn't. He talked about feeding people to rats, he talked about throwing a man into a cave and videotaping the rats as they devoured him.

He claimed he left, once left a victim to die in a freezer truck while listening to country music. Some of these stories tracked with some forensic detail though. And others, none in law enforcement and Philip Carlo had to walk a line. They didn't disbelieve everything he was saying. That was the part that was that they were struggling with. There was clearly he spoke with experience, but he, they didn't believe it all either.

Like some of the shit was so insane, like he had to be killing constantly. And the thing is Kuklinski had a gift for detail. I think that comes from the amount that he probably did kill, and then he fantasized and thought about over and over. Here's the thing. It's not that hard to do that. Like, it's not that hard to be like, just to's not that hard to be like just to be like, okay once upon a time like Me and my buddies like it was like just after high school and we were like just tired

We didn't have any jobs So we just like decided to get in the van and like go out to the river like none of this happened But you could just go forever when we were on the way Just think of like little do like on then I didn't realize how low on gas we were so we had to stop gas along The way some weird dude was there. And if you have that like down, which is not that hard. And you're like a guy who spends all his time sitting around jaying off to fucking like sweet kill cams, you know, like, you know, that's where you're going to end up, you know?

So, but it definitely puts the cops in a weird place because how much of it is he being honest about, you know? And that's, that's, they, you know, it, it had to figure out what line that, what line that was for them. And he was detached as well. No matter what he spoke about crimes that he death, they definitely knew he killed or ones that they weren't sure of. He spoke of exactly the same without so much of a hesitation or any

inkling of emotion, but by the early 1990s, many investigators began to believe that Kuklinski's post-conviction persona, this ice man as the public spectacle had become, was something that he began leaning into, which I'm just like, yeah, no shit. The man who once prided himself on secrecy now saw the value in the notoriety he was getting.

People were writing him, people were coming to interview him, news stationsiety he was getting. People were writing him. People were coming to interview him. News stations. He was getting attention and that got him out of probably solitary as well. Like that probably was a was a huge like relief for him too. And what the fuck? He had nothing left to lose anyway. Yeah. He's only anything to gain. He got what he wanted, not the death penalty. Yeah. So what does he have to lose? Nothing. He gets to try and control the narrative. And that's what he tried to do in the HBO documentaries Particularly the Iceman tapes confessions conversations with the killer they've got some up

Yeah, they gas them up and they gave him the first glimpse of this guy where he had already spent years Probably thinking about how he would come across on camera when the day came and it inevitably would. He wore prison khakis. He spoke very clearly. Didn't blink when describing how he killed. There was no sense of performance. There was just calculation saying things like I was the nicest guy in the world, but I did get a little carried away or there's a certain calmness to it. Like lines, like lines, like bits. This is, yeah, this is just what he's saying. Like, it's like the perfect documentarian bait

where they can take that line and then they can cut, you know, and you know what they're doing with it. And then he said things like, there's this certain calmness to it. I don't know if I'm saying this right, but it's like you're God, you know? And then boom, cut, dull, and then boom cut doll in deep a boom sound effect move over to victims like it's it's almost like he thought about

this and obviously it worked the viewers were disturbed but they watched ravenously and Kuklinski fucking knew it at one point asked how even one point asked how many people he'd killed he said said, I'd say over 100, maybe 200. I stopped counting at one point. It didn't seem important. Yeah, exactly. But there's no evidence to support a number that high. Law enforcement officials attribute the five murders to him, obviously. Those tied directly to the physical evidence, but none other. At this point, he was no longer just a prisoner.

This man was a public curiosity, a subject for academic study, a criminal legend that made pop books written about him constantly. And as he aged in prison, the edges kind of lessened a bit. By the time Kukulinski was serving his life sentence in Trenton State Prison, the man who had once built his reputation on absolute silence had become one of the most prolific storytellers behind bars. His interviews, first with law enforcement, journalists, all that stuff, they were just, he thrived on them. And as he thrived, as he realized how much that he was thriving on them, they just got more and more and more entertaining sounding.

The deeper Kuklinski leaned into his own legend, the more the people who had built the case against him began to speak privately about a problem they hadn't anticipated. They had caught a killer, but in doing so, they created a fucking spectacle and this wasn't what they wanted. And now they had a new question. How much, what, like, what do we do with them at this point? And they found the answer was going to be ended up a layered one. Obviously they had the five kills that they could put them away for, but outside of those

five as the lines got blurrier, one of the first major claims he made about Jimmy Hoffa, they actually didn't know what to do with it. So they did go talk to all those people who were investigated, who had never heard of Kuklinski, like I said earlier, and had them genuinely dig deeper to see if there was maybe the connection. Somebody could bring up Kuklinski at all. No, there was nothing. They could find nothing about this. Now Hoffa vanished in 1975,

and him claiming the Hoffa thing is in the 90s at this point as well. So like, and he had been in prison for almost more than half a decade at this point when he started. So he started to have years and years. And the FBI even chased hundreds of leads, interviewed scores of mobsters and

reviewed thousands of pages of surveillance report Kuklinski's name had never appeared in any of it. Not once not a confidential informant briefing, not in wiretap screenshots or transcripts for other non field reports. His name was effing nowhere for somebody who supposedly worked for all five crime families to have no mention of him in anything that they could find was a telling Piece of non-evidence of how important this man actually was when he made the claim the veteran investigators

Were asked for comment and privately and publicly they just kind of like openly dismissed it with just like a nonchalance. Like, no, he was never involved. No, that's ridiculous. Then they went and looked into the Sparks steakhouse shooting in December of 85. Paul Castellano, head of the Gambino crime family, was assassinated in broad daylight alongside his driver, Thomas Bellotti. They had been orchestrated by John Gotti and carried out by trusted member of his inner circle. I think and I should have went back and I meant to, and I forgot to, I think Tommy Patero was involved in this. What is the names? Uh, Thomas Bala, Tommy, Thomas Bellotti, uh, Paul Castellano, John Gotti. Um, it was a

huge size. I mean, I remember, yeah, I remember John Gotti. These are familiar, right? Yeah. Like, uh, and this was a seismic event in New York for New York organized crime at this time. The FBI had extensive surveillance crew on Goddys crew before and after the murder and later when Sammy Gravano flipped, he walked prosecutors through every detail of the job. Now, who can't Kuklinski claimed that he had been involved. They had served as backup down the block and that he had fired the final shots into Bellotti. He said nothing about it during his arrest or trial, but years later in interviews, he began to place himself at the scene. Again, zero evidence whatsoever. Gravano never even mentioned Kuklinski.

None of the shooters mentioned him. And FBI files contained, again, no reference to him in connection to the Castellano hit at all. Even Kuklinski's own criminal background, though violent, had no direct tie to the men. God, he used that day. This is satisfying to me right now.

This is satisfying me. I'm glad, I'm glad. That's what I, I want to build that those two episodes of this. I'm satisfied. Yes. It just, it just sucks because it sounds like for a guy who's arrested,

for a guy who got caught For putting a bad guy away. It does sound like he still got what he wanted. He absolutely variety fame He's more important than he ever was and he gets to tell crazy lies and what people gonna do nothing And now he's got document like it's just I kind of hate it. Yeah Yeah Yeah What at the end of the day with no direct ties? like it's just, I kinda hate it. Yeah. Yeah. At the end of the day, with no direct ties,

investigators concluded that he had clearly added his name to the story, not because it was true, but because it just couldn't be disproven. Which we see all the time nowadays in all aspects of like our online arguments. It's like you put an argument forward that can't be disproven. I do it in alien episodes on purpose

to piss Jesse off sometimes. Good faith is dead Yeah, exactly like but like that's how easy it is if he knows if he's like well I was a block away and Everybody left when I came around and put the final bullets in like how the fuck is Anybody gonna be able to prove that you can't I was there and they didn't pay me. I was just there Exactly, but Lahti looked to be wrong in the final most bizarre claim of all. I shot him while driving by. That's why you guys didn't see me.

Remember that he claimed that he worked for the CIA. Now he said he had performed black ops hits overseas, eliminating targets in Latin America, Eastern Europe, and even on US soil. He spoke of a handler named Phil, a diplomatic cover of missions buried by the intelligence community. Now I'd say there's no record official or unofficial of Kuklinski ever being affiliated with any branch of the US military or intelligence services at all. He never held a security clearance. He had no known passport. My mans couldn't even speak more than one language, which you think would be very important to travel to Latin America and make hits across the

fucking ocean. Like, I don't understand that is gone to the tuck in. Don't you see it is international travel if it occurred at all left no trace, no journalist, no researcher intelligence offer, nobody uncovered anything. The CIA is a matter of policy now obviously does not comment on personnel, but multiple former agents when asked off the record laughed when they got asked about that, just laughed at it. God damn. Yet Kuklinski didn't back down.

He stuck to it, repeating the story across years of interviews. People ask him like, nobody says you've done this. What's the deal with that? And he says it was all buried. It was all buried. You're not going to get evidence because he was like the secretive system. And that goes back to the math this bit. Like you can't prove it.

So you can't prove it in an effort. How dare you? That's the yeah. And Kulinski didn't back down. He stuck to it, repeating it over years. The pattern was very clear. He'd spent his life in the in the, and now he got to reposition himself at the center of every fucking headline.

And just like you said, Jesse, got what he fucking wanted. But not everything he said was false. When Kuklinski spoke of Roy DeMeo, he spoke with clarity. His relationship with DeMeo, though never formally documented by the Gambino family, was at least partially confirmed. Kuklinski had moved in the same circles. He had done business

with DeMeo's associates. And while DeMeo is known to be extremely cautious about who he worked with, multiple law enforcement sources have acknowledged that Kuklinski may have been used quietly for a few freelance jobs. He was an outsider and that's exactly why he was valuable for the freelance jobs and nothing more. Remember we talked about last exactly why he was valuable for the freelance jobs and nothing more. Remember we talked about last week. He was peddling porn. That was Kuklinski's thing. So maybe he's just like a solid, solid snake Stan who like was weird enough to get a mobster to do some hits one time. And then he just like got gassed up by that until the Iceman finally had a meltdown. Oh, you're correct. Yeah. His

in his connection to Carmine and meatball Genovese, who is the long come on man, who was a low ranking member of the Decavo Conte family in New Jersey is better Substantiated police reports and witness accounts place the two men together and Kuklinski's descriptions of his early contract killings for Genovese Aligned with like no events. Yeah. Yeah, including the torture and decapitation of a used car salesman in Newark Now unlike his more theatrical claims these stories had grounding in police files and homicide reports. He was so he wasn't lying about everything, but he definitely wasn't telling the truth fucking either either. He was curating it and in the book, he even once said to Carlo, I've made a I could have made a fortune writing fiction, but nobody would believe it. That's weird because everybody did believe it Yeah, I know even worse right like and in the end the law believes what it could prove five murders handful loose

close associations and the Chilling recordings that they were captured themselves Then the rest of the CIA missions the Hufflepuff body all that shit remains to spend in the space between Like confession and performance most of them landing squarely in the performance world. Now, after his conviction, Kuklinski was transferred down to Trenton State Prison, now officially known as New Jersey State Prison, where he would remain for the rest of his life.

His prison ID we actually know was 86167. He was housed in a unit for high risk inmates, including violent offenders and those with potential gang ties. But despite his notoriety, Kuklinski maintained a quiet profile on the inside of prison. He apparently kept to himself. He liked to read. He exercised.

He was polite to guards, according to the interviews. And when he spoke, it was always in that same measured tone. Unlike many lifers, Kuklinski didn't engage in appeals. He never expressed an intention to prove his innocence. And from the moment of his plea agreement, his legal strategy was one of finality. He had avoided the death penalty. That's all he wanted.

He knew he was never getting out. And in that space, I think he enjoyed that because now he could also let go of the paranoia that was eating at him when he was on the outside. He agreed to participate in multiple psychological evaluations, most notably one with Dr. Park Dietz, a forensic psychiatrist known for his work with high profile criminals, including Jeffrey Dahmer and John Hinckley Jr.

This gassed him up so much. Absolutely. Exactly. Now, Dietz's assessment was clinical of him. He said Kuklinski was a diagnosed, anti-social personality with psychopathic traits, capable of extreme compartmentalization and emotional disconnection.

He had no visible remorse and no signs of internal conflict over his actions, but he was also very intelligent and unusually articulate for someone who spent his life outside formal systems. Kuklinski spoke at length about his childhood abuse, he described the beatings from his father, all that shit we went over in that first episode. And in those sessions and in interviews he often implied, not quite said it though, that what he became had been set in motion long before he ever picked up a weapon.

But when asked directly whether that excused what he did, he never pretended it did. He literally said, I'm not sorry I killed people. I'm sorry I got caught. Very simply. Fair enough. Between 91 and 2002, Kulinski gave three major recorded interviews, two for HBO and one in support of Philip Carlo's biography. Each time his tone remained consistent.

Again, he was very the same. He didn't smile. He didn't embellish. By then investigators and journalists had basically seen the gaps in his story, the contradictions, and they began to see that Kuklinski had perfected more than one skill. He hadn't just been a killer, obviously. He'd just become a professional storyteller at this point. And the shine of the Iceman was being lost around this time.

Still, it didn't stop him from getting hundreds of letters in prison, some from true crime fans, others from aspiring writers, a few people asking him spiritual questions, even forgiveness. He rarely responded to any of them, but when he did, their responses were short and direct and often strangely polite, supposedly. He remained married to Barbara Kuklinski for the rest of his life. She continued to visit him in prison for several years though less frequently as time passed. And in public interviews, she was honest about the

terror she lived under and the complicated grief she felt after his arrest. She would say things like he was two people and I still don't know which one I married in the late 90s. I have a pretty good idea. Yeah, me too. In the late 90s, Kuklinski's health began failing. He suffered from what was called Kawasaki disease, which when I looked it up is something that often only occurs in young toddlers, which is a rare inflammatory condition that can affect the arteries of the heart. And he also had congestive heart failure and diabetes.

Now in October of 2005, he was transferred from Trenton State to St. Francis Medical Center in Trenton under armed guard. His condition deteriorated rapidly and he died on March 5th, 2006 at the age of 70. Now here's where things get weird. According to hospital records, Barbara Kuklinski had been scheduled to sign a do not resuscitate orders shortly before his death, like 24 hours beforehand. However, it was made very clear by Kuklinski that he did want to be resuscitated if he went down,

if he died, and on the day she was meant to finalize them, Kuklinski died. Now there's varying reports, and I was able to figure out what the truth was. There was supposed reports that an autopsy was done on his body and that it was figured out that he died from congenital heart failure, uh, congestive heart failure, however, that's not true. After he died, he was not any autopsy performed and they cremated his body within a day. They instantly cremated him.

Don't you fucking tell me he died of cyanide gas sprayed in his face at a close range. Can you please tell me that his wife killed him? Because that'd be amazing. Now we don't know. It was supposed to have an autopsy should have been done. And the reason we even think there's an autopsy that was done is because there was a doctor who looked at the medical records of him and then said what he died from that, which was Dr. Michael Baden. He reviewed the circumstances surrounding his death, but there was no autopsy.

And instead he just reviewed the medical records and then said what the cause of death was from that. We don't know if he died from that, but here's the interesting part. Kuklinski was set to testify against a mob member the next day. Interesting. Yo, that would be ironic. Yeah. Uh, and because he died, the individual did not get charged.

I wish that was there was their hinge point. And because of that, that trial didn't even go I didn't even have like nothing happened I should have saved my meltdown joke for right now Just so you know for right now. I should have saved it for right now So the legal answer is he died of congestive heart failure and probably created from the Kawasaki disease But we will never know the truth We don't know it is we just the circumstances surrounding his death Crazy dude and that she was so his wife was supposed to sign the do not resuscitate orders

Just before he died, but he died before she could sign them And so he should have been resuscitated because that was his desire, but it did not happen Fish fishy. And exactly where I and it sucks that that he gets that ending in my mind. Like in my opinion, he doesn't deserve that ending because it does give him more leverage to some of the same reason. We told not in the CIA hit man or the Jimmy Hoffa or any of that shit. But if he was going to testify against a mob member, and then he died the day before, that's that feels not

not related. You know what I mean? Sure. Yeah. Um, but we'll never know. And that's just he died in 2002 or 2006, the age of 70 got to live out his stardom life from prison. And when he died, that was the end of Richard Kuklinski. That's it, man. Nothing was ever really done written about it. His legend crazy dude is made and I don't know like, I'm curious how you both feel. Now you know the honest truth like I cuz I genuinely think he probably

killed maybe over 10 people. I don't know if he ever hit 20. Not like Tommy Petera, but I do think there's more to him that people, I think people wish it was he was, or he wasn't working for the mob and he did or didn't commit more murders than the ones we know. And I think it's a gray area and I'm curious how you feel about that? I don't want to give him the cred because it's too dumb. No. With that said though, it made for three entertaining episodes. So like, yeah, you hate to see, you know, I mean, he was a storyteller and I feel like most of the stuff he said was lies, but he very clearly was also a killer.

So it's, it's a difficult thing to think about because you want to be like BS, you didn't kill those people, except he did kill people. So like, and it was clean every time. I think the most realistic thing is he was probably like they said with Meatball Genovese, like he was a low level mercenary, like low hit for hire for people that were just like, He just plused up a mid career, right? I would even say he was mid, man. If you were mid, you get recognized by the family. I mean, mid like, he's like, yeah. I don't want to give him more credit than his due, but yes, you know? Yeah.

But that is the complicated and why I think it needed to be three part story of Richard Kuklinski because there's basically two versions of him out there and the reality lies more toward the less excessive one, but still more than that one like leads. Now you're starting to think like Alex episodes. That's what's going on here. Right? Yeah. The legend is the truth. So thank you all for being with us for 300 episodes and allowing us to celebrate 300 episodes with like a sequel series, Tommy Pitera.

Crazy. It's been one that I've been wanting to do since we've done Tommy Pitera. So thank you all so much that we, the fact that we've been 300 episodes is always crazy to think about. Yeah. We're off to go do a mini-sode.

We will be back next week with a brand new episode. We appreciate you. We love you. Oh, go to the eddy.com slash jim minotti. Buy some buy some stuff. I used to be addicted to soap, but I'm clean now. Hello everybody, welcome back to the Jaluminati Podcast. As always, I'm one of your hosts, Mike Martin. Joined by the... I don't know who they are. There's two... What?

Terrence Hill and Bud Spencer. No! Neo and Trinity. No! I don't understand and I probably never will. Let me just tell you right now that there's two... Leon Kennedy and Claire Redfield. I'm telling you, I think he literally just looked up famous duos.

Cheech and Chow. And it's been going through the list ever since. I'm trying to dig deep. Which one of you is Dick Powell? Me? Your name's Jesse Cox! Who is Dick Powell? Me? Your name's Jesse Cox!

Hahaha! I want my money back I want your Illuminati I want your Illuminati Hello everybody, welcome back to the Jaluminati Podcast. As always I'm one of your hosts Mike Marhen joined by Alex and Jesse. Like a shooting star across the sky that's actually a UFO. you