Citation Needed - The Sash Weight Murder

Episode Date: April 20, 2022

Ruth Brown Snyder (March 27, 1895 – January 12, 1928) was an American murderer. Her execution in the electric chair at New York's Sing Sing Prison in 1928 for the murder of her husband, Albert Snyder, was recorded in a well-publicized photograph.

So, is he from the moon or just like, serves the moon? Neither, man. Why don't you just watch it? I'm not gonna watch it. No. Oh, man, fuck, damn it. Heath, why did I let you talk me into this? What?

No, this was all your idea. Guys, what's the freak out now? Oh, see, Tom, thank goodness you guys are here. So, you know how this week's episode is about the sash weight murder? Yeah, sure, what about it? Yeah, well, you know, Eli and I got to thinking about how much we could really use Noah's insurance money. And,

Pfff, we know it. Boom, we murdered him. Dude, you murdered Noah for some insurance money. That's fucking cold, man. Well, we regret it now. It actually turns out that neither of us is particularly good at podcasting. I'm gonna tell you that.

Okay, did you guys know that he does a diatribe like every week? Like who thinks of something to say once a week? Like an entire thing, just like an essay. Okay, yeah, also not to mention you guys did a murder. Yeah, I like all of a sudden you should think about that. Well, I certainly hope you learned your lesson. Ah, Noah, what?

You're alive. Hey, yep. Buddy. Yeah, see, you guys accidentally planned your murder on the Facebook thread that I was on. So I put that doll from the sixth day that Eli bought to prank Thomas in my bed instead of me. Simpals Cindy.

Yeah, no, yeah, Simpals Cindy, that's right. And moving forward, I hope you guys don't learn it. Yeah, no, yeah, Simpals Cindy, that's right. And moving forward, I hope you guys don't learn it. No, Simpals Cindy costs like $6,000. So expensive. Also, how are we gonna prank Thomas Smith now? Well, I mean, the point here is not man. Just when I thought this day couldn't get any worse.

Okay, what is a Simpals Cindy? Do not ask that time. Yeah, it is, but that's not to ask, bro. Expensive, that's what she is. So expensive. Expensive. That's what she is. So expensive. Worth it. Hello and welcome. Sitation needed. Podcasts were to choose a subject to read a single article about it on Wikipedia and

pretend we're experts because this is the internet and that's how it works now. I'm Cecil, I'll be running this investigation, but I'll need my team of detectives. First up, to crack sleuths, Eli and Noah. It's true. I can find crack in pretty much any public park after 4 a.m. Well, and that's true, whether you're talking about the drug or not, actually. It's true. He also joining us tonight to private dicks, Heath and Tom.

Okay, I'm a grower, not a show or Cecil, you know this. All right, it's a lot more private, a dick than like Lauren Bober's husband. I'm still allowed within a thousand feet of a school zone. That's all I'm saying. I guess that's true. Yes, that's true. Before we begin tonight, patrons, you are the dust to our fingerprints, the magnifying glass to our footprints and the dexter to our blood spatter analysis. I have no idea what that means, but if you'd like to learn how to join the ranks, be sure to stick around till it's going to show. And with that, oh, wait, tell us, Noah, what person-place-thing concept phenomenon or event will we be talking about today? We're going with an event today. We're going to be talking about the sash-weight murder. Oh, what was the sash-weight murder?

Sashweight Murder. Oh, what was the Sashweight Murder? In 1927, Ruth Brown's Snighter conspired with her lover, Henry Judd Gray to murder her husband, Albert. The crime caught the media's attention and the couple's trial became the first of the 1900s, many trials of the century. The National Obsession with the Murder Inspired the 1943 James M. Kane novel double indemnity which in turn inspired the 1944 film of the same name, which in turn inspired essentially the entire genre of film noir and has defined it ever after. So if you know the genre and not the crime, you'd kind of assume that this crime was calculated, complex and pre-saged by a bunch of meetings and dank alleys type shit. But if you knew the crime and not the genre, you'd assume the genre was a buffoonish type

of dark comedy. And of course, any story that revolves around both death and ineptitude is bound to wind up on this show eventually. Once they make the death in an aptitude category on iTunes, we will be crushing it. Or they could just rename the Christian podcast one and we'll be back at the top again. It's a way for everyone. So Ruth and Albert Snyder were a pretty typical middle class married couple for 1920s, New York.

He was the art editor at Motorboat Magazine. Okay. Great magazine, but all the articles are just. It was actually about motorized watercraft. If you can believe that time, I'd ask for like, fucking money. You subscribe to, you subscribe to, I subscribe to, I subscribe to, I subscribe to. So he's the art editor. She is a board is all hell housewife.

They met when she was a 19 year old secretary at the magazine and he was her 32 year old boss. After dating for a few months, they married in 1915. And a few years later, they had a kid and moved to a big suburban house out in Queens. This was what every woman at the time was supposed to want, but Ruth fucking hated it. Yeah. I mean, she was still like two years away from being able to buy enough box wine to wash down the pills. So sure. Right. Yeah. So yeah, but this moved away from all our friends away from the nightlife and into what was at the time, a pretty suburban area, well, removed from all the parts of New York that made it worth living in. They can't even smell the garbage from there. It's ridiculous.

You can't even see the peaks of the mountains from out there. Yeah. You can not the garbage from there. It's ridiculous. Yeah. Smell it. And do you can't even see the peaks of the mountains from out there? Yeah. And you can smell the garbage. You can smell it. Yeah. Peaks of the mountains. Oh. Oh.

Oh. Oh. Oh. Now, this was not the only reason the marriage wasn't ideal. Albert was also still hung up on his first fiance, a woman named Jesse Gushart, who actually, I guess, died right before they were supposed to be getting married. And apparently, Albert wasn't shy about his lingering infatuation. He hung a picture of Jesse and he and Ruth's first home. And later named his boat after her. He was also fond of telling a Ruth that Jesse was, quote, the finest woman I

have ever met. End quote. Okay. I feel like you're saying it's negative, but no, he's like, he's saying like, I'm saying you're the second finest woman I ever met. That's not like a compliment anymore. Like fucking feminist, is that my right? Second best.

Fuck you. Honey, honey, honey. Get your lane. What do you do to check? Where this death mask of my ex while we're fucking. Oh, and now you're crying. Jesse wouldn't have cried. Jesse didn't cry.

Yeah, yeah, don't we're going hard on the he had it coming angle. That's good though, actually, honestly, in this case. So come on, come on. Boom. Boom. at coming angle. That's good though, actually, honestly, in this case, so come on, come on. So Albert Ruth spent a decade in a, a loveless marriage that according to their daughter was filled with arguments and yelling, a mom wanted to go places and do shit. Dad wanted to stay home and tend to scarden. You know, maybe it was as the moralistic journalist of the time

concluded that Ruth was just an immoral devilish woman unfit for proper domestication. And maybe it was a kiddo with a 13 year age difference, but whatever it was, they weren't happy. So when in 1925, she met a charming and dapper corset salesman by the name of Henry Judd Gray. They started what would ultimately become a two year affair. It's like I always say just because you're on a diet. Does it mean you can't cheat on your diet? Both conspirators would ultimately go to their graves claiming that the other one was the

mastermind. So we really don't know whose plan this was, but at some point the two came up with the idea of offering Albert and divvying up the insurance money in the months leading up to the deed, Ruth forged a double indemnity insurance policy in his name worth almost $100,000 in the case of accidental death that's 1927 money. So we're talking about like a million and a half in today's money and then they set out to plot their Dastardly deed. Hmm, I think I'm starting to see why Noah keeps stalling on that keyman insurance policy everybody. Damn right. You damn right. You do.

So first of all, great figure. He's going to need an alibi. So he makes up an excuse to go to Sarah, use that weekend. Then it convinces a friend to his to stay in the hotel room that night. Apparently, he told his buddy he was sneaking off to have an affair and needed the hotel bed to look slept in the next day. What the fuck kind of friend is like, oh, you're having an affair. Oh, yeah.

Of course I'll help with that. Yes. It was 1927, Tom. So all right. That's fair. The friend's the great cats, the whole thing. The whole thing is cats be stuff this whole time. So so then he he sneaks back to the city and by sneaks, I mean, he took a fucking bus, like an idiot that multiple people could later identify him from, uh, then he heads to the Snyder house and he waits. He stands up. Hey, boss people, if you could just put your name and address on this sign and sheet,

so I could tie up any loose ends after this murder I am committing tonight, that would be totally cool. Thank you. Oh, yeah, no problem. No, bro, I actually have a sheet too for the same thing. Uh, okay, it looks like we all do actually. That's cool. Cool. We'll just pass it around in like a circle. We all have a murder too for the same thing. Oh, okay, it looks like we all do actually. That's cool. Cool.

We'll just pass around in like a circle. We all have a murder sign up sheet thing. Now, the plan is to make the whole thing look like a robbery. So you'd think maybe they'd break a window or kick in the door or some and Judd would take away a few valuables, but that's because you gave this crime more thought by accident than these two idiots did on purpose. In fact, after they murdered Albert, the only clue they left us to the identity of these killers is a socialist newspaper that they placed conspicuously on the coffee table, because,

you know, socialists are murderous thieves and they like to pause during their crimes to catch up on current events. So I Work nowadays. How would you like leave signing them up for Joe Biden's e news letter on a coffee table? That's amazing. I was going to make a joke ripping on socialists too, but then you just called them Joe Biden supporters. So I feel like that's been covered.

See Their man's confusing. You don't look at at least leave the paper somewhere plausible like in the bathroom. It's like, ah, what is Moida is giving me the tummy rumbles, eh? Hey, when you got it, shit, you got it, shit, right? Yeah. So the following morning, March 20th of 1927, Ruth calls the cops to report. I don't actually know if she called.

The phones were pretty bad. She reports to the police. Yeah, right. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. So she reports that the police. Yeah, right. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. So she reports that her house has been burglated and her husband has been murdered. According to Ruth, two men that she described as giant Italians had broken into the house, knocked her out, tied her up, murdered her husband, and stolen her jewel.

Giant socialist Italians. Yeah, well, yeah, exactly. And then she's like, been and stolen her jewel. Giant socialist Italians. Yeah. Yeah. And then trace and make balls everywhere. That's it. Until this joke is tailed, you're now Cecil giant Italian. Let's just let's just get it all out. Yeah.

Let's do this now. All right. So right away, police are suspicious of her story and not necessarily because the police were super smart or anything. Everything about her story raised their eyebrows, especially the parts where she kept offering up details of things that would have happened while she was supposedly unconscious. Okay, the part where the giant Italian socialist plumber wearing red jumped on your head and then popped your husband with a shell.

You said, bottom with a shell. I guess that makes sense, you know, ethnically, but timeline. You would be unconscious at that point. And then you saw the shell thing. So in addition to the out of body timeline, Ruth didn't have a visible wound and it didn't look like she'd been knocked out or tied up. And she certainly wasn't tied up when they got there. There were no signs of forced

entry. The value of the missing jewelry was way too low for the crime to make any sense. And also the method of murder was fucking nuts. Okay. So apparently the murderer first tried to chloroform Albert by sticking chloroforms soaked swabs into his nostrils. But yeah, but that just woke him up, right? At which point they tried to bash his skull in with a sash weight. They, it's a counterweight for drapes, right? But, but since that weighs as much as, you know, drapes, it didn't fucking kill him. You might as well be hitting him with drapes. Ultimately, they ended up strangling the guy with the wire from the back of a picture

frame. And while there's no typical method that murderous giant Italian socialist jewelry thieves used to kill people, this definitely was not the work of the stone-cold professionals that Rook was trying to blame it on. Is this like a TikTok challenge? You can't, you can kill him, but you can't use anything outside of the room. Like the guy died like a fucking objective on junkyard worst, man. Okay, see, it's like, I am guessing they may have brought the chloroform fair because

if not there is some weird bedroom shit. Just some really weird bedroom shit. Hold on a second. You first you're railing on because I'm Italian. Now you're railing on because of the fucking chloroform. Okay, so the chloroform in your nightstand didn't work. I'm going to shoot him with this gun. So yeah, this will work.

Okay, that's a foam dart with a suction cup. You have weird house roots. What is it? It's like a new house. So I have to oversold their intelligence, guys. I apologize. You've assumed that there was not a loaded gun in the bedside table. The satire. Amazing. Okay. So you grab for the orange dart gun. And then it's like, is this a pillow and bill? Why do you have an air? So the cops are unconvinced. They searched the house and they're immediately rewarded with yet more evidence that Ruth

is full of shit. They find the supposed of these Toledo jewelry under her fucking mattress. Wow, wow. So not only did she hide it in the fucking house, but she didn't even hide it well. And just to make the cops job easier, when they told her that the burglary was fake, she indignately replied, quote, what do you mean? How can you tell? Okay, just tell me the parts of the story you didn't believe.

And I'll change those parts. Hey, why are you arresting me? Go. Go. All right. So now in addition to being stupid, Ruth and Judd were also unlucky because of Albert's terminal obsession with his deceased X fiance, he had a pin with her initials on him at the time of his death. The police found that pin on the floor nearby, and they don't know anything at all about Jesse. So they decided to check those initials against Ruth's address book and damned if they didn't match up with a fellow by the name of Jud Gray. What? A fellow

who entirely by coincidence is her accomplice in the fucking murder. So the cops come back to her and they say, so what about this Jud Gray? And with all the four thought and cunning that we've come to expect from Ruth, she answers back. Why has he confessed at church? I mean, starch, Catholic. I murdered my husband to stab you. Okay, that's foam. That's a foam sort of. I never want to please interrogations is that the answer to has my accomplice confessed is always yes, right? So they say, yep, he sure did. He told us everything. You might as well just tell your side of the story. Now, at which point she admits that her and gray killed the guy and there were never any giant socialist Italian. Never. Cecil is right here. No. That's, I see you, Cecil.

I'll be rages. So within a couple of hours, the cops arrest Gray in a hotel in Syracuse, and they can barely get him back to the city before he's confessed as well. Of course, while both of them admit involvement, they both point the finger at the other as the mastermind and the actual killers. I don't want to seem sexist, but no woman is dumb enough for a nostril-based murder. My money is on great. I couldn't blame you if you thought that's the end of the story, right?

I mean, the killers are in custody. They both confessed, damn near, it's open in a shot at cases you can get without an eyewitness. But it turns out that the real story is just getting started, because if you think that the murder itself was a farce, just wait until I tell you about the media circus that surrounded the trial. Well, the lead-up, that fucked up, there's no way you're going anywhere, so just enjoy this little interlude we like to call apropos of nothing. This summer, a classic of film noir returns to the big screen. Hey, babe!

Y'all, babe? You want a fucking kill, my fucking husband? You know I fucking do, babe. Well, that was fucking easy. I didn't expect that. It was the perfect plan. If we kill him, it's gotta be fucking worth it. Well, let's off the life insurance so we could get a couple bags of menthols and some

mint-shelf gin. What do you say? That's why I fucking love you, Bay. You think of everything. Let's make out. MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM Step inside the dark minds of two murderous mastermind. Wait, would we say mind and then mastermind in the same sentence? Wouldn't we want to change the noun to different? Just read the script, Tony.

No, we fucking listen to this shit anyway. Fine, but it sounds weird. And also you're demeaning my craft, you know, whatever. Step inside the dark minds of two murderous masterminds. You gotta kill him with what's inside the fucking room! They gotta fucking know you! We did it, you fucking asshole! Look, does he know fucking word or long, hard mode, baby?

It just took a half an hour to kill this guy with the craftmatic of just a bit of bad remote. I'm actually not quite dead. When the batteries fell out of the remote, they fell out of the back, it lost a lot of mass. So, I'm just in some pain right now, but I didn't get to kill that. You stand up, I got it! Sorry. Marky Mark in. Double indemnity. Just sign here, Mr. Wongberg, and we'll add the indemnity clause.

Whoa, indemnity clause. Is that the fucking guy that gives you the insurance on Christmas? Don't tell him I beat up that Chinese. I'm not sure if I can get it. Add the Indemnity Clause. Whoa, Indemnity Clause. Is that the fucking guy that gives you the insurance on Christmas? Don't tell him I beat up that Chinese guy. Well, so far, we learned about the juicy small bit of insurance fraud murder. What happens next?

That's not it. All right, so to this point, you might be asking yourself, what makes this case exceptional? Right. I mean, the sale, it's were exceptionally dumb, but stupidity and crime are pretty common bedfellows and there have been plenty of sloppy attempts to cover up a murder in the past. Albert and Ruth Snyder weren't famous. They weren't important. The details of the crime weren't particularly gruesome by the standards of murder. And what's more, murdered my spouse for the insurance money is about the least inspired motive that you can ask for. So why does this killing merit our attention? Well, because the media fucking said so. See, in

the early 20s, there was a press war between the three big New York tabloids, the daily graphic, the daily news and the daily mirror. So as soon as one of them covered the story, they each tried to one up each other by adding ever more lurid and entirely made up details to suck the public in. So before news broke of gray and Snyder's confession, the papers had been making a fortune with a double homicide known as the Hall Mills case. Hall was at a Piscopal priest. Mills was a member of his choir that he was having an affair with. And though Hall's wife was initially charged alongside our brothers, they were ultimately acquitted and the actual killer remains a mystery. According to an unsighted claim on Wikipedia,

IER bread and butter, the case set a record for the most coverage any story had ever earned in the American press. But even that media feeding frenzy had to end eventually. And when it did, the New York press was looking for a rebound to murder. Gray and Snyder just happened to be the murderers that showed up on cue. Of course, what made the hall Mills case so interesting was the air of mystery, right? There are at least four prominent suspects in the newspaper has so much fun speculating on the guilty party that at least some of them had to have set all a few defamation cases before it was all over.

But with the sashweight murders, there's no mystery. Right. I would not any significant one. Both of the murders confessed pretty much right away. And yes, there were and still are some questions about whose planet was who actually killed Albert, et cetera, et cetera. But everybody knew in advance who the guilty parties were. So faced with a boringly ordinary murder to cover, the media basically made the ordinaryness of it

into the story. Like, it makes too much sense. Well, no, that's American epistemology right there. Yeah, obviously too much sense. No, but their angle was basically, hey, look, if Ruth and Arnold are just like ordinary boring people like your neighbors, maybe your neighbors are murderers. Oh, okay. Okay. Okay. ordinary boring people like your neighbors, maybe your neighbors are murderers. Okay.

Okay. You think that's shocking, lady, you find out how many of your neighbors supported an insurrection. All of mine. Too many. That's too many. So now there are two stories as to what happened here, right? According to Judd's account,

which he freely shared with the tabloids at every available opportunity, he was a sucker that got seduced by a coquettish temptress and succumbed to her villainy. He admits that, yes, he struck the first blow with the sash weight, but said that he thought better of it and couldn't go through with it. And then yelled, again, this is his own account. Quote, help me mom Z, at which point Ruth came and grabbed the picture wire frame and finished the job. The he was, oh, mom Z is his, his, his, his, his, his, his, his sexual partners is mom Z.

Okay. He doesn't understand at all, everybody. He does. No idea what you're talking about. He's, it's clarification. Why would you not even, you're not even doing the fake thing right? It's not that I like it. We're not getting into it. We're not getting into it. So it's incest that no, go ahead. No, we'll do. So that's just a count sister brother according to Ruth's account. She was seduced by a man whose literal job was tempting women. And then he started blackmailing her and threatened to tell her husband about the affair.

If she didn't pay him a ransom of cash and bootleg liquor. Now, yes, she forged Albert signature on the insurance policy, but she claimed that she only went along with that plan because she thought she could talk Judd out of killing Albert before he actually went through with it. Oh, this is like the tabloid version of when the guy with the monster energy hat marries the girl who pierced her baby's ears from your hometown. Yeah. She sure Sure. Sure. The fuck is.

So faced with these two competing and equally improbable accounts, the press decided to believe Judd entirely and uncritically. Press accounts at the time overflowed with sympathy for the poor, bespectacled five foot five inch patty beguiled by Ruth's irresistible charms. The detectives that arrested and told reporters that he was, quote, as nice appearing a gentleman as you'd want to meet end quote, the New York Harold Tribune pointed out that, quote, he was a Red Cross worker in the world war, but was an a situis worker for the Sunday school of the first Methodist church was quiet mannered in the

home and a local country club man end quote., that's mostly negative. Yeah. Even the district attorney who is summarizing the state's case against him called the dude a quote, decent red blooded upstanding American citizen. And quote, he wouldn't heard a fly mainly because he was using a sash weight. And that's a really impractical thing that swat flies with also a real and practical thing to kill guys with a turnts out there. Yeah, fucking game bonnet. I mean, to that point, just to paint a picture, you've got a short skinny dude smacking you in the head with a small paper weight while your wife is taking the Thomas Conqueta

part so she can like jump on your back and strangle you eventually. Yeah. Like if these idiots manage to kill you, that's at least half a suicide. 100%. Yeah. Okay, stop throwing bean bags at me. That kind of hurts. It kind of hurts.

And no, I don't want to start smoking today. What are you talking about? Is she weaving the rope up and right now? So faithless to say, press accounts of Ruth Snyder were somewhat less flattering. Um, and it's actually interesting. If you go back and, and look at the press accounts of the time, which to be clear, I haven't done, you can see this slow transformation of Ruth from a plain Jane housewife to a beautiful femme fatale and eventually to an inhuman monster who looks more like a beast than a lady like a Kardashian. I get

it. I guess there's a modern parallelism. Eventually, William Randolph Hearst's paper, the mirror brings in noted franalla just Dr. Edgar C. Beale, right? The whole reason I did this assay was so I could quote this guy. He examines three photographs of Snyder and declares that her flattened eyelids, which he compared to those of Brigham Young, were markers of a quote, polygamous disposition. End quote. What? Yeah. He also said her tapered chin suggested treachery.

Her mouth was quote, as cold, hard and unsympathetic as a crack in a dried lemon. End quote. And that her entire face was indicative of a quote, shallow brained pleasure seeker accustomed to unlimited self-indulgence, which at last ends in an orgy of murderous, passionate lust seemingly without a parallel in the criminal history of modern times. End quote. That's good stuff.

Apparently, Beale's chronological cred was so exemplary that pretty much every paper in the country from that point treated that profile as an established fucking fact. Yeah, and here I was thinking he came up with that Tinder bio all by himself shame on you, sir. Shame. You're not swiping right on that. Come on. Honestly, the chin, the treacherous chin, that's But honestly, the chin, the treacherous chin, that's tapered. You know, honestly, these orgies of murder really just distract from the self-indulgence. I've never been at time.

I've had the option for like sex and steak and been like, nah, I'm going to kill someone with a laundry basket or whatever. I'm going to speak for yourself. So when the trial began, it was a predictable circus. Every day of the trial, 1500 people would pack into an overstuffed courtroom with another 2,000 mobbing list reads outside. According to an article, I saw in history.com, hawkers were selling fake tickets for 50 bucks a pop and vendors were selling stick pins with little tiny sash weights for 10 cents each. Hey, based on the crucifix, you never know when a murder weapon is going to catch on.

No, that's fair. No, that's fair. Now, we don't know who did what, but it would be careless not to highlight the extent to which the era's sexism doomed Ruth Snyder from the beginning. So keep in mind that the only evidence she was involved in the actual murder was Grace Word, right? The word of the other murderer. Yes, she forged the insurance documents and yes, she lied to police afterwards, but those

are not the same offense as strangling a dude with a wire. But once it was established that Snyder was an adulterous woman, nobody cared about those little minor frivolous details. While Judd was allowed to expound at length from the witness stand to the all male jury. By the way, the judge repeatedly admonished Ruth whenever she elaborated beyond yes and no. And underscore just how institutionalized the massage she was, I should point out that even though both Ruth and Judd were married to other people, he was only tried for murder. She was tried for both murder and adultery. Wow. How did you do that crime solo?

I'm impressed. Right. Yeah. Now, after an hour and 40 minutes of jury deliberation, both defendants were found guilty in sentence to death by electrocution. Unlike the modern day where death row inmates are tortured with her impending death for years, while we dangle glimmers of hope in front of them. The state of New York got to killing Ruth and Judd pretty damn quick. The trial ended on May 9th of 1927, all of 50 days after the murder itself.

And the two were put to death on the same night in January of 1928. Jesus. Of course, the media circus. Same day. Yeah, both of them died. They died back to back. Just rolling guillotine into the courtroom. I don't see what happens.

It's fun. No, I'm sorry. The two of them were murdered. They say we're killed the same day as each other, not the same day they were sentenced. Of course, the media circus and its attendant massage, and he followed them all the way to the electric chair. Press reports of the execution described Ruth as a disheveled wreck and commented on how unkempt your hair was.

Whereas Judd, yeah, you do want to make your hair look nice for these things. Whereas Judd was, this is a quote from the New York Sun here about Judd, yeah, you can, you want to make your hair look nice for these things. Whereas Judd was, this is a quote from the New York son here about Judd, quote, going to his death with a controlled spirit. He crossed the threshold without the need of a supporting hand. His step was firm and assured. He walked upright with his shoulders thrown back slightly. There was no weakening of the knees, no trembling of the lips. And quote, okay,

that is some major shade. They are throwing at the hair situation. Like, yeah, I know, like if I'm ever barbarously murdered by goons of the state after being summarily convicted of a crime with no opportunity for appeal, like, I'm at least running a comb through my hair. That's I'm just going to run it through my hair. Take some pride. You, you're my hair. Take some pride. Ruth, you should really smile. Oh, that's easy.

That'd be great. Let me put on a little makeup. You're making our execution look really bad. Yeah. Fucking feminists. Am I right? Gross. So the execution was witnessed by 30 reporters, doctors and prison officials.

Again, all men, of course. And there was a rule against brand cameras into the viewing area. But one enterprising photographer from the Chicago Tribune managed to smuggle one in strap to his leg. When the switch was thrown, he lifted his payout leg and snapped a couple of quick shots, one of which ran on the front page of pretty much every newspaper in the country the following day. So yeah, as morbid as it is, you can actually see a photo of Ruth Snyder mid diet. Right. All right.

If you had to summarize, you learn in one sentence, what would it be? No, even the staunchest photos of women's equality seem to be okay with it when it came time to execute one of them. Oh, God. Are you ready for the quiz? I guess. Why not? All right.

No, so when the super racist white people decided to plant the socialist newspaper as evidence to frame some made up Italian guys, what were the other options they brainstormed and then cut and went with the socialist newspaper? A, a handful of loose spaghetti. B, a trail of chocolate gold coins. More Jewish killers or see a really big heel bone that probably fell out when the microphone was doing the murder. Oh, it's got to be see it's obviously see that it's correct. All right, Noah.

Door to door corset sales. It's pretty good gig, but it is a tough job to get. What's it? A, it's an incredibly tight job market. B, everyone is so straight-laced. C, you're always getting squeezed for better results. I'm going to go with A the incredibly tight job. Oh, actually, Cecil was right with the answer, secret answer, D. All right, well, he answered before I had a chance. So I get I get credit for his answer. All right. Noah, through modern lens, it seems pretty certain that this is actually the story of

a woman sacrificed on the altar of sexism for daring to be murder adjacent, but it's far from the least fair thing we've done to the fairer sex. What's far worse? Hey, the invention of thong underwear in 1974. That's pretty bad. Be not electing Hillary Clinton in 2016. That's pretty bad. Or see people tweeting mean things to JK Rowland. It's been or see people tweeting mean things to JK Rowling See is good. Oh, I'm I'm tempted to I think it's D the fact that you just called them the fairer sex even though it's not 1954 Wrong I win

Unfortunately because of the format of the show Eli wins. Yeah, thank you. Cecil rules that was an excellent turn of phrase. I would like to dive deep into Heath psyche by accident next week. So I want an S.E. by him. All right, Tabernun on purpose, buddy. You asked for it. Well, for Heath, Noah, Tom, and Eli, I'm Cecil.

Thank you for hanging out with us today. We'll be back next week and by then, Heath will be an expert on something else. Between now and then, you can listen to E.S.I. Keith and Noah on their other shows, Scaling Atheist, God Off, a movie, Skeptocrat, and D.M.E. or you can listen to Tom and I on our other show, Cognitive Distance. And if you'd like to help keep this show going, you can make a per episode donation at patreon.com slash citation pod

or leave us five star view everywhere you can. If you like, you can touch with us, check out past that was a connect with us on social media or check the show notes. Be sure to check out citation pod.com. She fucking did too. Oh, stop fucking erupting, you fucking fuck! Aw, fuck you!

Fuck you, you fuck! Really, really glad we're electrocuting both of you.