Criminology - Q&A Episode 2022

Episode Date: January 1, 2023

Mike and Morf answer listener questions from emails and voicemails. We thought this would be a fun way to bring the year to a close! You can help support the show at patreon.com/criminology An Emash Digital production Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey there, it's Wayfair here, where delivery and setup are as easy as a few taps on your phone. You're relaxing in an old hammock, scrolling Wayfair's app, when you spot it, a brand new patio set. Next thing you know, Wayfair delivers it right to your patio and sets it up. Oh, you need a new grill, too? All right, Wayfair's got you covered. With Wayfair's room of choice delivery and fast experts set up on qualifying orders, life gets a little easier. Visit Wayfair.com or the Wayfair app. Wayfair, every style, every home. Hello everyone and welcome to episode 238 of the criminology podcast. I'm Mike Ferguson.

And this is Mike Morford. Morph. How are you, buddy? I'm doing good. I'm excited. It's the turn of a new year here and excited to see what the new year has in store for us. How are you doing? Yeah, I know. I'm doing great. I would ask you how your holidays have been, but we are taping this weeks in advance. So it would kind of be disingenuous if I did. I'm excited about this episode though. I can tell you that. Yeah, I am too. Something a little bit different for us, a little bit more relaxed and maybe the audience can hear a little bit of a different side to us. Yeah. So we're diving right in.

This is our special New Year's Eve Q&A or Ask Me Anything episode, something we've been looking forward to. I think like we said, it's something that will be fun. It's a change of pace. We asked people to send us questions on social media and to leave us voicemails and we had a lot of great stuff come in. We'll do the social media questions and comments first and then at the end we'll play and respond to the voicemails we received. So right out of the gate, Charles Paxford set the bar pretty high, asked us a series of questions, eight and all, some pretty good questions from Charles. So let's take them one at a time. The first is when and how did we meet? And Charles wasn't the only one to ask this question. Becky Turner Neiman also asked this one. And this one's pretty easy. I think we both

remember this. It was what year? Morp, 2017, CrimeCon? Well, I think that's when we met in person, but we had been corresponding before that, maybe 2016. Oh, okay. Yeah. I see what you're saying. Yeah. And, you know, how it started out is I was a T-Cat fan. I was listening to the show and enjoyed Mike and Gibby doing our thing. And back then they were just getting started. So I was like, well, this is a really great show. And I listened. And I think I heard Mike mention the Zodiac on there one time

and how he was interested in the case. And I reached out to him. And we just sort of started corresponding. And somehow or another, the idea came up, hey, would you be interested in working together to do a show about the Zodiac case? And how could we do it? and that's sort of how the introduction came and we decided to do it. And here we are 200 and something episodes later.

Okay, I'm going to be very honest with you. I actually thought we met at CrimeCon. And that's how bad my memory is, man. I'm not kidding you. That's what happens when you get old. The details are dusty. But I do remember very clearly us talking, communicating and everything before doing the podcast. and then we actually met at CrimeCon in person for the first time.

Before that, it was over Skype and, you know, the way we do the show now. Gotcha. Gotcha. Okay. All right. Well, it has been five or six years. So the memory fades. And mine seems to be fading very quickly.

So I think we answered the second question, which is whose idea was it to do the show? I mean, it was kind of mutual, right? us talking about Zodiac and talking about how would we do a show, should we do a show. So I'll jump to number three, which was which case keeps us awake, hoping it's solved. And more if you start. Well, you know, none of them really keep me awake. I try and when I go to sleep, I try and clear my mind and not focus on the negative bad stuff we talk about so much. that takes up so much of our days,

but obviously being heavily invested in the Zodiac case and doing so much research for that, that was one that I would literally wake up at night in a dream state and write stuff down, stuff that I wanted to check out names that I had remembered that just popped into my head. And the same with the Golden State Killer case before it was solved. I would kept the notepad next to the bed,

and I would wake up in the middle of the night and jot stuff down. luckily that case was solved. But thankfully for me, I've been sleeping through the night and not waking up and nothing keeps me up at night as far as cases anymore. But there's definitely a lot of cases I want to see solved. Yeah, I think we both have done a number of unsolved cases. And we say that all the time, right? We hope it'll be solved. There are some that we think will be because they have DNA or this or that. You know, one of the cases that has, really fascinated me over the years. And I don't know if that's the right word, but one that I just

always wanted to know the truth about is John Bonnet. I mean, that's a case. And maybe I'm just picking high profile cases, but that's one where if you said, you can know the answers to one case. That might be the one I would pick. I want to know what really happened. I'm with you on John Bonnet. That's a case that you just, there's so many bits and pieces and rumors and what was true and what was not true that at the end of the day, if that case can be solved, we can find out really what happened, who's responsible. I definitely want to know that. But a lot of cases, thankfully that I did want to see Saul have been solved, you know, and primarily for me, a lot of child murders really stand out to me. There's April Marie Tinsley. She was murdered,

in Indiana in 1988. Her case was solved. Lindy Sue Beakler in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, her case was solved. They spent a lot of time researching on that, and they were able to solve that. And one that's still unsolved that I hope to see solved is Rachel Runyon.

We covered her case on criminology a long time ago, and she was a little girl that was killed in Utah, and I'm hoping one day to see her solve. So some of the ones I've wanted to see solved have been, but there's obviously ones that I still hope will be solved. And obviously Zodiac too, because that's such a huge mystery. It'd be cool to see who he was. So question number four, have either of us been in the military done police work or been an investigator? And the answer for me to all three of those is no. I have not done any of that.

The same for me. Although I give those men and women that do those jobs, kudos because it's not an easy job, but I appreciate the work they do. I did come close to joining the police force when I was in my early 20s. I put in, and there was a hiring freeze where I applied, and during that time, I took a job in sales. And then by the time the police had an opening, and they reached out to me, I had a successful job in sales, and the money was good, and I was doing well, and I was like, you know what, I'm, I think I'm okay with this. And then it was until years. later that I regretted that decision because I got burned out on sales and by the end of it, I hated my job. But then luckily I got into this line of work. So.

Well, the one thing I'll say is I have told a number of people, because that's a lot, a question you get a lot. If you could do anything, if you weren't podcasting, what would you do? If I could go back in time, I would probably do something in maybe forensics or be a detective or something like that. Yeah, I think it's a really fascinating career to be. able to solve mysteries and earn a living doing it and help people in the process. It seems like a real rewarding job, although, as I think many of us know, it can be take a toll on people who can cause them to burn out. It causes, you know, them to have family issues. So not an easy job. So that's why I give the men and women that do that kudos. So question number five is how do we spread the workout

out on the show. Yeah, we try to divvy up the work as much as we can. And I think people don't realize how much time and effort goes into putting out a podcast episode. And you've got the research, the writing, the editing, the recording. And then after all that, you've got to put it out. You've got to go to social media and respond to people there. So it really is a full-time job. And we try and split that up the best we can. Yeah, I mean, that's a great. great answer. We both do research. I would say for criminology, Morph does more of the writing. I do more of the editing. That's kind of how we divvy it up. I think at the end of the day, it comes out to be a pretty fair, a pretty equal share of work in it. We're happy with the end

result. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So number six is an easy question. What do we do for a living? And today, it is podcasting. You know, that that question would have been different, you know, four, five, six years ago, but circumstances have led to us today being able to podcast full time, which is an amazing thing. And for me especially, I think there's another question later on more if that asked what, what did we used to do or what did we do for a living before. So I won't get into that. But suffice to say, I got laid off.

a certain point, I got displaced. And luckily, by that point in time, the podcast had taken off to an extent where I was comfortable trying it. And I'm glad I did because it's been amazing. Yeah, I think we're both very lucky to be able to do what we do for a living and do this full time and we're able to work out of our homes. And so that's been good. Now, the downside for me, I actually work more now than I did when I was going back and forth to a job because you and I both do multiple podcasts and the time you put in from start to finish with, as I mentioned earlier, that recording, the research, the editing, the social media, at the end of the day, it might be 50 hours a week.

So eventually I'd like to scale down and, you know, as I get older, slow that pace down a little bit, but I'm sort of addicted to podcasting. I don't know about you. And I like to keep going and keep building stuff. And then I come up with these new ideas for shows. And I'm like, hmm, this seems like it would be interesting to do. And then you just sort of get into it. And before you know it, you've worked a lot.

But at the same time, you know, we're very fortunate to do what we do, I think. But I think that dovetails into question number seven, which is does the pressure of having to come up with a new episode every week, get to us. And I would have to admit that sometimes it does for me because, you know, it's an every week thing. There is an episode. So if we're talking about criminology, there is an episode that has to come out Saturday night. And there is pressure there to, you know, come up with the idea, do the research, do the writing, actually record it, and then edit it and put it out. I don't want to. I don't want to. to say it's a grind because that that has kind of a bad connotation, but there is definitely pressure

from putting out the show, no doubt about it, because your name is on it, right? Yeah, we definitely want to put the best product we can out and get it out when it's supposed to be out. And I know there's been a couple times, especially where I was sick and I lost my voice. And I think one time you did the show by yourself because it was so last second. And that's where I think we feel the pressure is if something happens with one of us and then all of a sudden we're recording a day later and we're up against the deadline, it can cause a little bit of havoc that way. But for me, I feel a little less pressure doing the weekly episodes than we did when we did the full seasons because they were, they were brutal and they took a lot of time out of me

personally. I don't know how you felt, but when I would write and researches cases, I would just feel everything we were writing, especially with the Golden State Killer season. I was so burned out after that and just wanted to, you know, to sit back and do nothing for a couple weeks. So the seasons for me were a little bit tougher, but you definitely have to pace your time here when you have a weekly episode. You've got a release. So then the last question. Number eight is if we could only listen to one piece of music for the rest of our lives, what would it be. Charles said that his favorite is Dark Side of the Moon by Pink Floyd. And I actually love Pink Floyd. But that wouldn't be my choice. Problem is, I don't know how I would choose.

It's like saying if you could only eat one thing for the rest of your life. If you could only watch one movie, one show, wouldn't you get tired of it at some point and want to throw your player or whatever it is, your phone, whatever it is, your phone, whatever it is, your, listening to it on into the ocean. I'm kind of thinking of a deserted island type scenario. Yeah, Tom Hanks and Castaway. I figured more if you would go, uh,

flock of seagulls because, you know, that, that seems to be your thing. That is, that song I ran by Fluck of Seagulls is still like my favorite. I looked on my phone before we started this to see what songs I play the most, and that was one of the ones I played the most. It's just so upbeat.

That's why I like it. it so much because when you listen to it, you could be having a really shitty day, and then you could just have a down mood, and all of a sudden you just feel, at least I do, excited and sort of invigorated. But I also was surprised that I have, in close second, is Hush by Deep Purple. That's another, that's another favorite song of mine that I love, and that's one that I have a hard time with the two of them, which one I'd rather be stuck with the desert island. Yeah, for me, it's just so hard to answer that question because I do listen to a wide variety of music. I listen to a lot of country, a lot of classic rock, and there's just so many

good songs. I don't even know how I would pick one, to be honest with you. Yeah. So those were some really good questions from Charles. So thanks for sending them. And the next one is from Morgan Murphy. and she's one of our awesome moderators in the Facebook group. And she asks, have you wrestled an alligator yet? And I assume this is directed at me. But, Mike, there are a lot of interesting things about you, so I don't want to assume that you haven't wrestled any alligators. But as for me, no, I haven't and I have no interest in it.

The only reason I would ever even consider wrestling an alligator is if one, God forbid, happen to try and get one of my pets or my kids or something like that, but other than that, I want no part of them. No, absolutely not. There are a few things that scare the you know what out of me. Alligators and crocodiles are on that list because they are just so scary. I don't know what other word to use. You know, you see some of the videos of how quickly they can launch.

And they're kind of silent, stalkers, they're scary, man. Yeah, and I literally, when I go outside at night, especially on the side of my house, because we live right on the water. And when I go out there, we have a fenced-in backyard, so I'm not worried about that part. But on the side, when I go out to take out the trash or something, it's dark over there, I'm looking all over the place. Even in the morning when I come out to go someplace, I'm looking under the car because

once in a while they'll get under the car. But most of the time, they try and avoid you. although just the other day somebody decided to wash her hands in the creek. I don't know why they would do that. And they were bit by an alligator on the hand. So, and yeah, no alligators for me. Thank you. Yeah, I don't have that problem in Ohio.

So this one is from Peter Thomas, who asks, if you two weren't doing true crime podcasts, what theme would you have chosen to podcast about instead? And it's a very interesting question. You know, I think for us, it was always going to be true crime if we were going to do a podcast just because of our fascination with true crime. But if I had to pick something that was not true crime, I probably would have gone the route of something along the lines of history. I've always been very fascinated with history, read a lot of books, watched a lot of shows

and documentaries about various aspects of history. So I probably would have picked something specific or some line and gone that route. Yeah, I like the history idea, too. I'm a World War II buff, so that'd be something I'd be interested. And I also love music and movies, so maybe something on those lines, specifically, the British invasion. I'm a huge British invasion, classic rock fan. So I think that or maybe even paranormal, ghost, UFOs, that kind of thing.

I think that would be sort of fun to do in something different. But here we are doing true crime, but maybe one of these days we'll get into those other realms. Yeah, yeah. So Helene Pinkis wants to know if you had the opportunity to explore a true crime case from the very beginning, interview the original detectives, check up the forensics, everything in real time. What case would you choose? Well, and I'll go back to one of my earlier answers. I think for me, it would be John Bonae Ramsey. Because, again, there's a fascination, obviously, with that case.

Or OJ. I think one of those two, now I'm flipping. I might be picking OJ. And maybe it's because those cases were so highly publicized. We got to know, or at least somewhat. know some of the people who were involved, the witnesses, the, even the investigators and people like that, if I could sit down and talk to them, interview them, grill them. Okay. I'm in. Sign me up. Yeah, the John Bonnet Ramsey case would be interesting, but I feel like I'd get

frustrated because I feel like they mishandled that case from the beginning, so I'd be a little bit upset with the investigators so that would probably not be a good idea. But yeah, but you're in the beginning. That was the question. You're in the beginning. Oh, okay. Yeah. So I guess then at the very beginning of John Bonnet, Ramsey's case, it was sort of out of

the norm to hear about someone coming into a house and allegedly abducting a child from the house. Of course, she wasn't abducted. It turned out she was in the house the whole time. but it was definitely a different kind of case. So that one would be interesting to explore from the beginning. But obviously, Zodiac, I'd love to go back and work on that case and obviously can't go back in time and put the cart before the horse,

but I'd love to go back with some ideas about the case now versus in 1969. And then also another one would be Jack the Ripper. I'd like to see how an investigation was done in those days. with so little in the way of technology and science, how they even started investigating a crime like that. And how do you, it's such uphill battle that they, you know, obviously in the 1800s, they had their work cut out for them. So many cases that we could pick, right? Obviously, there are a ton of them. Jennifer Frazier Gamble asks for both mics, how did you get started in true crime podcasting?

What did you do before you started podcasts? So I kind of hinted about this one earlier. So I was in the banking industry and with Gibby. Gibby worked for me back in the day. We worked together for a long time. And I don't know what happened, but I was at a point in my life, I think, where I was looking for something.

I was in a rut. I was, you know, at that point where I think a lot of us get where, you know, it's almost robotic. get up in the morning, you go to work, you come home. I needed something different. And I had been listening to some podcasts at that point. This was 2016. And I thought, I would really like to do this.

Obviously, I had a very high interest in true crime. So I knew I was going to go that route if I did it. And I just decided, I sat down with my wife and said, hey, I'm going to do this. Started talking to family and friends. They all thought I was out of my mind. They didn't understand it. They thought I was wasting money by, you know, kind of creating a studio and buying the stuff that I bought. But I did it anyway.

Sometimes you got to follow your, your heart. And if you feel something different in store, then that's what you got to do. Yeah, I mean, sometimes you got to take a risk, right? And that risk involves, especially this one, involved a lot of time. You know just as well as I do that, you know, we have spent so much time on these podcasts, but it has been well worth it. Yeah, it's a labor of love, I think. And yeah, I think that's, that's perfect, Morp.

That is the perfect description. Yeah. And for me, it was, you know, I was in sales for 20 something years. And it got to the point. where I woke up in the morning and I was like, I don't want to go to work. It was, it was just, I was so burned out on it. And I was like, I got to do something different. And I just so happened to go on as a guest on Generation Y a couple times. And Justin and Aaron, I got to talk with them a little bit. And I was like, wow, they get to talk about different true crime

things and make a show about it and, you know, somehow, you know, make a living. Back then, I wasn't trying to make a living. I just wanted something that. take a little bit of time from it. And then, obviously, I started listening to TCAD and a couple other ones, True Crime Garage, and the trail went cold. And I was like, wow, these guys do some great work. And I'd love to do something like that. And then, unfortunately, you and I linked up, and here we are five, six years later.

Yeah, very, very cool. In the suburbs of D.C., a woman fails to show up for work and is found brutally murdered. I wonder what's emergency. We just walked in the door and there's blood in the foyer. For the next two decades, the case remained unsolved until new technology allowed investigators to do what had once been impossible. A new series from ABC Audio in 2020, Blood and Water. Listen now, wherever you get your podcasts. If you love chilling mysteries, unsolved cases, and a touch of mom-style humor, moms and mysteries is the podcast you've been searching for.

Hey guys, I'm Mandy. And I'm Melissa. Join us every Tuesday for Moms and Mysteries, your gateway to gripping, well-researched true crime stories. Each week, we deep dive into a variety of mind-boggling cases as we shed light on everything from heist to whodontets. We're your go-to podcast for Mysteries with a Motherly Touch. Subscribe now to Moms and Mysteries wherever you get your podcast. So Mary Ann Carter Wilcox asks, I've just started listening to DNA ID podcast, and she covered a case, Pam Falcons, that happened in my town in 1990. Have either of you had a crime

or a murder happened in your town while you live there? If so, how old were you? And did you follow the case in the news? Or have a more personal experience with a crime within your family, close friends, et cetera? And thank you. That's a shameless plug, by the way. I produced DNA ID, which is hosted by Jess Bettencourt. She does a fantastic show, and I hope people will check it out. But I had a case that I had sort of a firsthand experience with where I grew up in New Jersey, there was a girl named Jody Myers. And her and I didn't date, but we, you know, we talked about going out a couple times. And she wound up linked up with a real psychopath, a real, real scumbag. And he actually murdered her and drove her to another state. And,

had her wedding dress on in his car and bragged to someone in a bar that, you know, my fiance is dead and she's out there and she's wearing her wedding dress. And they didn't believe her. She went outside and there she was in the car dead with her wedding dress on. Very, very disturbing. So obviously when that happened in my town, that was something that was very disturbing and, you know, sort of hit home as something creepy like that can happen here it can happen anywhere yeah i don't actually have any personal connections to you know any type of crime or murder or anything like that

when i was younger i don't know if i was 10 or 12 maybe somewhere around that age i lived in a fairly small town and a well-known police officer in the town murdered his wife It's actually a pretty big story. I covered it on a Patreon episode of True Crime all the time. The guy's name was Jim Barton. And it made, you know, all of the big news shows, you know, Dateline, 2020, all of those. So, but I wasn't connected in a personal way at all. Yeah, I think it's interesting when something happens close to you because it sort of makes you feel like, hey, this is my town.

and this is something that's connected to me in some way. And then I think it piques your interest. So Paul Lamas asked, have you had any sort of spiritual or profound emotional impact from a specific case? And, you know, it's out of the ordinary. If so, how?

For instance, maybe you had recurring dreams about a case you covered or something else. So more if you mentioned having recurring dreams or waking up about the Golden State killer, the Zodiac. I've actually had a couple of extremely profound emotional encounters after doing some shows. So the first one came pretty early on in the life of true crime all the time. We profiled the murder of a young girl in Texas.

And after the episode came out, her parents reached out to me on, Facebook. And I got to tell you the truth, man, I was so scared because I had no idea what they wanted to talk about. I didn't know if they were going to be angry about the coverage or the way it was presented. But they wanted to talk and they agreed to, you know, allow me to record it. And it was so unbelievably amazing. They just wanted to talk about their daughter. We all ended up crying. It was an experience I'll never forget. Yeah, that's when you hear from family members and they're pleased or they're thankful, appreciative, they give you an okay on something you're working on or you've done.

That means a lot. And I don't know about you, but thankfully, by an overwhelming majority, any family members I've ever heard from it, it's always been positive and there's been very few negative interactions. And I had another one that actually didn't happen all that long ago. It's maybe been two or three months ago, profiled a case on true crime all the time where the guy was a really nasty guy, but he hurt a young girl. She was 14 years old at the time. She survived.

She got away. The girl was never named in any of the research, obviously. So we didn't put her name. out there. She reached out to me. And we had about a 30 minute conversation on the phone. And again, ended up crying. And it was very emotional. She was extremely happy about the way that it was covered. But she also learned some things that she said she never knew. And at the same time, was able to share with me some things that were not in the research. So that was a pretty amazing encounter as well. Wow, that's pretty, that's pretty cool to have someone reach out and say,

hey, that was me or tell my story and to have that interaction and spend time with them. Well, and the other thing was she told me that her family didn't really know what had happened to her. And so, you know, she's probably now in her 50s. And she had her brothers and her siblings and everyone kind of sit down and listen to this episode so that they would. truly know what happened to her. And the details were horrific. They really were. Yeah, as for me, I haven't had really a spiritual or profound emotional impact from a specific case. Obviously, when I get in conversations with family members and survivors and stuff, it gets emotional and it's heavy. I try and not get way down with that because I feel if I take

a piece of that from everyone I talk to, it's going to really take a toll on me. So I try to distance myself from that. At the same time, one thing that really impacted me, though, was when we were doing the Golden State Killer case. I was so paranoid about going out of the house, about locking the doors and windows, about making sure the alarm was on, about warning my wife about different stuff. When we were doing that season, I know it sounds crazy maybe, but, you know, I was on the East Coast and the Golden State Killer wasn't caught yet. Wherever he was, was probably out on the West Coast if he was still alive. But I was so nervous that I, you know, I took security very seriously.

I'd wake up in the middle night, go out, check the doors. It was just, it took a toll on me. And I felt this relief when he was caught and this weight lifted off of me. That was one thing that really affected me was. that Golden State Killer season. Yeah, I do remember that. And the other thing about that season was you did the interviews. You did almost all of the interviews.

I might have participated in some of them. So you really got to talk to a lot of the survivors and the people that were on that show. So I know that must have been pretty amazing as well to be able to hear their stories and talk to them because there was a lot of really strong women that we had. on the show. Oh, absolutely. And if I felt that weight lifted when he was caught, I can, you know, I can't even begin to imagine what the families and the survivors of him felt. So hopefully they had some kind of weight lifted off of them as well. Oh, I'm sure they did. So the next question is from Car doll. And she asked if we will be at CrimeCon in Orlando in September,

And will we have another meetup like the one we did in Vegas? And the answer is yes, absolutely. Yeah, that was a good time in Vegas. We had a nice little spot out of the way. And the people that came out were fun. There was no drama. It was just a really good time. And CrimeCon in general is such a good time.

Yeah, I look forward to it. And to me, I look forward to the meetup, especially, because you actually get to spend, you know, someone on, one time with people, a group setting, sometimes small, intimate, and then you kind of pop around and talk to different people. It's really fun. It really is. Yeah. And we don't do a lot of live events or different festivals or anything like that. So for me, it's one of the only events that I go to. So I make it a, you know, a point to get there every year. And, you know, everyone that goes that I talk to, they just had so much fun.

And this wasn't intended to be a plug, but anyone that's going, please go, we'd love to see you there and use our promo code, criminology to save, you know, 10% on your standard badge. So more if we had a lot of listeners, Dora, Marie, Tom, and others, kind of ask the same question. What do your family and friends think of the true crime work you do? You must be very busy with respective commitments.

How much time do you dedicate? to this podcast. And so we've kind of already touched on that a little bit. What I will say, and I did mention it earlier, I think my family in the beginning thought that, you know, I was going through maybe a midlife crisis. They thought maybe I was losing it a little bit, that I wanted to to take this on. They didn't listen to podcast. They didn't really, you know, understand what it was going to be. And to be honest with you, I don't think I understood. completely what it was going to be with respect to the time commitment. I don't know that anybody does who actually goes into podcasting.

Once you get into it, and especially if it starts to take off, it becomes a little bit all-consuming. So I just, I started a laugh because the all-consuming that you just mentioned, that's definitely how I feel. So when you try to tackle that question of how much time do you dedicate to this podcast, sometimes I feel like I'm in the studio pretty much from the time I get up to the time I go to bed. Now, my studio is in the basement and, you know, I have my Xbox down here and I have a TV. And so I, it's, I do some other things as well. But it's, it's pretty all consuming. I will say that.

Yeah. And sort of like you, I was sort of burned out a midlife crisis. And I told my wife one day. I can't do this anymore and I want to do this podcast and eventually it turned to, I want to try and make a living doing this podcast. And she was very supportive. I'm very thankful to her for standing behind me and saying, go ahead, try and do it. And she's not into true crime, but she knew I was. And so she supported me and sort of told her friends about the shows I was doing and, you know, try to help bring some listeners and, you know, very thankful to her. for letting me do that. And, you know, sort of like you.

Sometimes I'm now in the studio until midnight, depending on, you know, you start editing and you don't want to stop because you don't want to do it the next day, so you just keep going. And all of a sudden, you look at the clock, it's like, I could go to bed. So, you know, I'd, again, I'd like to scale back at some point

and cut down the hours a little bit. But for now, it's just, it could be worse. I could be back in the career that I hated working, the same kind of hour. So I'm very blessed. Oh, I think about that all the time, especially, you know, when Gibby comes over to Tate because he's still working at the place where I used to work. So he kind of tells me what's going on. I'm like, okay, don't miss none of that. Not at all. Absolutely not. But, you know, you make an interesting point that, you know, your wife's not really into true crime all that much. My wife's not either. Now, my two girls are very into true crime.

So my wife will watch some of the documentaries with me, you know, like the ones that come out on Netflix or Hulu. She does find some of those interesting, but she doesn't listen to, you know, true crime podcasts or really watched Snap or 2020 or anything like that. She's more of a hallmark HGTV person. She likes to happier things. Yeah. My wife is the, uh, the, what's the code? Oh, the reality TV, uh, couples on boats and in, in houses and, uh, relationships and stuff like that.

I'm not thrown on an island. Exactly. Yeah. You know, again, I love her. Uh, just we, we don't have the same interests as far as TV most of the time. And I would say my wife and I are the same way. I mean, every now and then a show comes along that, that grabs us both. But for the most part, we have set, different.

interest in in television for sure now my daughter who's 12 does have an interest in true crime and she's like dad let's do a podcast together and I'm like I just there's certain things that you know we'd have to really you know PG 13 it down for me to take part in a podcast with her about some of the stuff we talk about but yeah maybe maybe one day when she's a little bit older maybe that's something we could do would be pretty cool yeah pretty pretty rough I think at 12 to get into some of the things that we get into for sure right, it's time for the voicemails. And we've got some really good ones. What made some of them cool is that they're not just from here in the U.S. We have, you know, some from Australia, the UK as

well. So it really shows the broad audience that we have around the world. And it means a lot to us, that we have people all over the world that take the time to listen to us. So I'm going to play the first voicemail and then we'll talk about it. Hey, Mike and Morf, I'm a big fan from down in Australia and listen to the podcast for a few years now and gets me through the day-to-day grind of work. And I just wanted to point out, I'm sure you get a lot of suggestions of what to do. But if you've ever thought about doing an episode or possibly a miniseries on Dennis Raider, aka the BTK Killer, who was quite notorious, I'm sure you know, he was featured in the excellent Netflix series, Mind Hunter, which you guys talk about a bit.

And I think you'd make a really interesting podcast or episode. I'm sure you guys get suggestions a lot of the time. So please disregard this if you don't want to talk about them. But yeah, just to let me put that out there and keep doing what you're doing. Really appreciate the podcast and the work you guys put in. It's fantastic content. Yeah, thanks. So thanks, Henry.

Appreciate that. Yeah, I mean, Dennis Raider, such a fascinating, diabolical. You can use a bunch of different ads. adjectives, you know, type of person. He's definitely on our list. I mean, I know we're going to cover him at some point. I did do what I think was a three or four parter on him on TCAT, but it was very early on in the show. And we really hadn't found our stride. I'm not saying they're bad episodes at all, but you know more as well as I do. It takes some time to find your footing, to find your voice, to figure out how the show is going to go.

Yeah, and Raiders definitely on the list. BTK crimes are very fascinating. And we could definitely get some material out of them. There's certain cases that they're sort of, you put up on a shelf and say, okay, we've got to tackle that. But then you've got to figure out how the best way to do it is and do you have everything you need

and how can you do it justice. So sometimes at least me, you leave them there until you feel you're ready to do it. And I know there's several cases, high profile cases that many other podcasts have done that we haven't yet. You know, John Bonae Ramsey, we've talked about her a couple of times. That's a case I'd like to do at some point, as I'm sure you probably would too. But I think BTK and a lot of other high profile cases we will definitely get to at some point. But here's the way I feel about the very high profile ones. They're hard to do.

From this standpoint, there's tons of information out there that you have to weed through. So crafting the narrative, the story, okay, that's one thing. The pressure is on to really get everything right because, you know, with some of these high profile cases more, there are listeners out there that know more about them than we do. You know, some listeners specialize in certain cases, kind of like you did early on with Zodiac. You know, if I had put an episode out, let's say on Unsolved about Zodiac and you would have listened to it, you would have said, well, you didn't talk about this. You didn't talk about that because you know more about Zodiac than most people.

Yeah, and I think that's the thing with big cases. you, there's so much information out there. You want to make sure it's accurate. You want to make sure things that are being reported are just not false because you want to do the case justice. You want to do the victims justice. And I think that's one of the things with tackle on a big case like that. Hey guys. Thanks so much for doing this. I really love coronology and I listen to it every week. And I also really love T-Cat and listen to that every week. And I'm wondering if you all would ever consider doing a joint episode where Mike, Gibby, and Morp all talk about a case together.

Maybe like, I don't know, every quarter, every three months, kind of putting it together. I think that would be so fun. You guys would have a great chemistry together. Have you thought about this? Let us know. Okay, so that was from Ashley Barnett. And, you know, I will say, Morf, we did it one time.

And it was probably one of the episodes that was for me, one of the most fun to do. You know, on TCAT we did the Amityville, Ronald DeFaio Jr. story. And then we did a crossover on Unsolved where we kind of did, we called it the Amityville horror, but we talked more about the haunting and the movies and the books and all that. And we had you on that episode. And I thought it was a blast. So we should do it again.

Yeah, I'm definitely game for it. It was fun. And I don't get to talk to Gibby that often. So every time I can, he's really cool. And I like talking to him too. So yeah, if we can make it happen, I'm definitely down for doing it. And it sounds like the listeners would be interested in hearing it. Okay. I will make it happen. So we have another voicemail from Ashley. I just recently started listening to the Casey Anthony documentary on Peacock. And I finished it last night. And I have so many. thoughts and my first thought was, what would Mike and the Morph think about this? I felt like her perspective put a lot of kinks into the cultural assumptions that she is a cold-blooded murderer. So have you guys ever thought about doing an episode on Casey Anthony? I think that your guys' perspective would be really valuable. And I'd love to know what you think, especially about the theories of her father accidentally killing Kaylee and the abuse that Casey suffered over the years. I thought that her perspective as a sexual abuse survivor was really interesting and how our

culture really just doesn't understand a lot about sexual abuse and its effects, the trauma on the brain and even how we respond to tragic situations like a missing daughter for a whole month. What do you guys think? Would you consider doing it? So I think this is in line more with what you said earlier. This case would be on that shelf, right? Casey Anthony, the murder of Kaylee. Now, I did watch that Peacock show and I watched it with my wife. I agree with Ashley that, you know, some of the allegations that she made against her dad

very interesting and could maybe shift the perspective of some individuals. here's my problem with Casey. I have a hard time believing her. And, you know, maybe it's just her history of lying. Now older, she even admits that she was just a liar. She just lied. It was kind of like her normal thing. So I think I watched the show with a lot of skepticism just based on knowing what she had done in the past. But there wasn't. There wasn't. the thought in my mind of, okay, has she grown? Obviously, she's older now. If she's telling the truth, if some of these things really happened, how does that change the story, the narrative? Does it change what people think of her? And for me, it was really tough watching it because, you know,

when someone comes out and says that they experienced sexual abuse, well, the first thing is, you want to believe them. You know, you and I do so many cases. And we talk about how sometimes police don't believe what victims come forward and say. So part of me felt bad for some of the feelings I had towards Casey. And, but some of that was she brought on for years and years and years of lying. So I'm conflicted. That's, I guess that's bottom line where I'm at. I'm very conflicted over this new doc because I don't know which Casey Anthony we're getting here. The truthful Casey Anthony who is revealing bad things that happened to her that maybe could change the narrative of the case or an older Casey Anthony who is still lying.

I don't know. And for me, in all fairness, in regards to this question, I haven't seen the show. so I can't really comment fully to what she said in it. I think, as you just mentioned, we always tend to want to believe a victim's claims until they're proven to be false. So I want to give her the benefit of the doubt, but as you hit on in the past, even according to what she said, she's lied about so many things. So at some point, you have to have a hard time separating what somebody's saying,

if they have a proven track record of lying, even by their own admission. So that would be troubling for me to try and get around that. And that's sometimes we talk about putting cases on a shelf and pulling them down when you're ready. I'd want to present this case with an open mind from a neutral standpoint. And I don't know at this point if I could do it

because I think there's too much in my mind about her in particular. that I don't feel at this point I would be totally impartial or neutral. So I'd have a hard time presenting the case that way. And I don't think that would be fair. So for me, this is a case that I think obviously we would want to do some time, but I don't know if I'd be ready to do it at this point. Yeah, we'd really have to get to that place where we were able to set aside kind of everything.

And how do you do that, man? It's just part of the story. I don't know. I felt bad about my. myself, to be honest with you, as I was watching this. But I will say this, my wife didn't believe a lot of the stuff that she was saying either. And my wife doesn't really have the same background knowledge that I had. So I don't know. I will say this. If what she's saying about her dad is true, it could change things. So I understand how this doc could change the minds of some people. I understand that part.

Yeah, and we're human beings, and it's hard not to have some kind of feelings or opinions about something. We want to present a case from a neutral place, but it's hard not to have some feelings, you know, on a personal level about the case. So I think that would be one of the issues with this case. Hi, Mike and Mike. My name's Marie. I'm from Brisbane, Australia, and I'd love to know how you first came to start the podcast together. how how that story started. Thank you. All right. Thank you, Marie. Appreciate that. So we did kind of already answer this one, Morp. And, you know, it was just, uh, you listening to TCAT, wanting to maybe

get into podcasting. We started talking. And the next thing you know, it was full bore, let's do Zodiac. Yeah. And sort of, you know, we expanded on it. And then it got to be, well, We had an opportunity to do weekly episodes and bring attention to a lot more cases and that sort of expanded from there. And instead of doing seasons and then taking three or four months down, we were prepared for another season, we said, let's try and take this to a weekly basis, which is how we started the weekly format. Hey, two might. This is May from Lincoln in England, long time listener, first time caller. I just wanted to wish you both a fantastic new year and I also had a question for you for New Year's Eve.

I wanted to ask, being from the UK, if you had a case that fascinated you from over the pond and it'd be great to know which one it is. Thank you so much. Keep up the great work, guys. Absolutely love criminology and also a massive fan of T-Cat. Cheers then. Happy new year. Bye.

All right. Thanks for that voicemail, May. more if I'll let you start. So there's some really fascinating cases from across the pond, and I had to put my thinking cap on when she asked that question. And obvious one that comes to my mind is Jack the Ripper. You know, it's a case that probably will never be solved unless there's somehow DNA is able to do it. But I doubt it at this point, but it would be great to really know the answer to that.

But one that perhaps has a more realistic chance of being solved is, the case of Andrew Gostin, and he disappeared in 2007, and we covered that case on the show, and, you know, there was this quick disappearance by him. There was surveillance footage of him, and it seemed like he, there were some things that hinted that maybe he had planned to leave before he disappeared, and then other things that point away from that. That's a case that I, you know, I really feel for his family. They've been searching for answers, and, I'd like to see some kind of resolution in that case. That's one that comes to my mind.

Yeah, there really is a lot of fascinating cases over there. Some that we've done, some that we haven't done. One that I'll throw out there that I've not done on any podcast is Dennis Nilsson. He's definitely on the list. That one fascinates me. But there's so many, Fred and Rose West, Ian Brady and Myra Henley, Peter Sutcliffe. I mean, you can just go down the line.

And our final voicemail is from LaDonna. Hey, Mike and Mike. This is LaDonna. My question is if and how your views of our justice system has changed since starting the podcast. All right. Short and sweet. I like it.

But it's a great question. And I'll start this one off more over six years that I've been podcast. I would say that my views on a lot of things have changed. Number one, I've learned a lot about a great many number of things, mostly from listeners writing in, helping to educate, you know, whether it's the topic of abuse and why women have a hard time leaving. I've learned so much about that as it pertains to the justice system you know one of the things that has definitely changed for me is the notion that I probably had when I was younger that you know if somebody was convicted they were guilty I think I had that way of thinking and now obviously we know that there

have been tons of people who have been convicted, who were not guilty, even many people who confessed. But it turns out those confessions were coerced or, you know, or whatever. So that's a, that's a big change for me. And then also that prosecutors and some people in those types of positions would do things in an unethical manner, just in. order to get a conviction. We've seen a lot of cases like that as well. For me, I've noticed, you know, a imbalance of there's sometimes people that have committed crimes involving drugs or possession or drugs, things like that that are in jail for a long period of time. And then you, you know, especially in the older cases we cover, somebody that abducts and

and sexually assaults a young girl, and then they're out of jail in a few years, and then on to the next victim, and they establish this pattern of doing this. And we say in so many episodes, how can this person be out on the street? They've been arrested three or four times, and they're getting these real light sentences. Now, I think the justice system has caught up more recently, and those hardcore offenders, those predators that show a pattern that aren't out in just a couple years when they do that kind of stuff, it seems like they get more harsh punishments. But when we were doing the Golden State Killer case, for example, we talked about a number of different cases, and some of the rape cases were tossed out when the statute of

limitations ran out because they couldn't prosecute anyone even if they caught them. And I think it was five years back then, and they'd have to toss these cases. And it was just bonkers to me how such little emphasis was put on punishing these people. So that has really jumped out to me in the cases we've done. And then also, again, that you touched on it, the wrongfully convicted, you know, I'm with you. I think we know there's a lot of people that have gone to prison. Some people have, you know, been there for a long time where they've been put to death. and I think now in this era of DNA, I'd love to see any case with DNA evidence be tested to make sure that the people that are in prison deserve to be there.

And if there's something that proves they didn't commit the crimes are accused of, I think they should get a chance to show their innocence and be released from prison. Yeah, and I think some of that has maybe changed my thoughts on the death penalty as well. not that I've gone to the point where I think it should be abolished, but the thought of putting someone to death who didn't really commit the crime, that's a scary proposition to me. So, I mean, for me at the end of the day, my thought is the justice system should be working to get it right. And I think in doing the podcast,

we've seen so many examples of that, hasn't always been the case. It's been more about getting a conviction or moving forward with a case even though there are large questions and contradictory things hanging over it. But yet they plow forward anyway. And that kind of rubs me the wrong way thinking that prosecutors should be out for the truth, not just for a conviction. Yeah, I agree with you.

If, God forbid, I had a family member that was a victim of a crime, I would want the right person held accountable. I wouldn't just want someone thrown in prison just to throw someone in prison. I'd want to make sure that the right person was being punished. So I think it's very important to be right when someone's prosecuted. And I think it also proves that the justice system isn't perfect. It should be always evolving and always improving. Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. But some great voicemails.

And this was fun, man. I knew it would be. Q&A episode, a chance for you and I to open up a little bit. Yeah, definitely a little bit of a different take on the show than we normally have. And I think it's fun. And maybe we should do one of these every so often. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. But as we always say, if you love the show and you haven't done so yet, rate, review,

Keep telling your friends. I can't emphasize it enough, but that word of mouth about the criminology podcast really goes a long way. If you want to find us on social media, we're on Twitter with the handle at Criminology Pod, or you can find us on Facebook by going to facebook.com slash criminology podcast. You can also join our Facebook discussion group, criminology podcast, discussion and fans. So Morph and I just want to wish everyone out there listening a safe and happy holiday season And we want to thank everyone for taking the time to send in the awesome questions and comments. We appreciate your support so very much.

And happy New Year, everyone. We'll see you back here next Saturday, January 7th with our first official episode of 2023. So for Mike. And Morph. We'll talk to you in the new year. Happy New Year, everyone.