Dateline Originals - The Man in the Black Mask - Ep. 5: Trick or Treat

Episode Date: December 23, 2024

After Twitchell is arrested on Halloween, a city debates whether he is a monster or a master manipulator. This episode originally published on October 29, 2024.

Ask his movie friends. They would have told you. It's all made up. Of course it was. Just a clever bit of spooky nonsense conjured up in the most unusual mind of Mark Twitchell. Man's whole life was devoted to make believe, scary stories. He was a strange fellow in his way, if also harmless. Even his friends and colleagues would tell you that. Them and the curious reporter who checked him out. He was in that kind of clique of people that would go to, you know, Star Wars conventions or they would dress up for the premiere of a movie. You know, everyone's got someone like that in their family who's just, you know, a big sci-fi nut or whatever. But does that make you a nut?

Or just a person who enjoys pure, clean fun? The point was, Mark Twitchell loved it all. Loved writing the stories, loved making the movies, loved dreaming up a universe of dark and dangerous characters. A would-be master of misdirection is what he was. Mind you, it was true that some guy named Johnny Altinger was missing and possibly dead, and police thought it was curious that he, Twitchell, had bought the man's car. But that was about it.

Nobody else had come forward to complain about him. Anyway, when the events of this tale occurred, it just happened to be Halloween, Mark Twitchell's favorite day of the year. For months in between filming this and that, he'd been hard at work creating what might have been his best Halloween costume ever, a very respectable Iron Man get up. Sadly, he was forced to put on the finishing touches at his parents' place after his wife

discovered he'd been having an affair and kicked him out. But for now, for one grand night, all that could be forgotten. In a few hours, he'd make his big entrance to a huge Halloween party, where he would surely wow them all. But first, that afternoon, there was business to attend to. A meeting with a group of potential investors at a nearby coffee house. Investors? So hard to come by.. These seemed to drop down like

manna from heaven. So Mark Twitchell had been led to believe by the friendly and persuasive man who called him. But of course, investor was not quite the right word for that caller. More like investigator. Our guy pretended he was going to invest in his movie making business. So if he wants to give you 30, $35,000, come and meet me. Yeah, come and meet me. And so with a light heart and a jacket

to ward off the autumn chill, Mark Twitchell sauntered down the sidewalk toward the coffee shop. And in swoops the tactical team and takes them down by surprise. Thrown to the ground by members of Edmonton Police Services SWAT team, who slapped a pair of handcuffs on Mark Twitchell and drove him downtown and charged him with the murder of the still very missing Johnny Altinger. No Halloween party for Mark Twitchell. Instead, there was a press conference

at which a senior police officer announced Twitchell's arrest but never said why. Only that investigators believed Altinger had been murdered. And that Twitchell had... Put a lot of thought into it, a lot of work into it. A press conference thin on detail. Except for one. Oddly, about Mark Twitchell's TV viewing habits.

We have a lot of information that suggests he definitely idolizes Dexter. What did that mean? I'm Keith Morrison, and this is The Man in the black mask, the podcast from Dateline. Episode 5, Trick or Treat. It really just exploded on Halloween. That's the voice of Steve Lillibuen. Steve covered the police beat back then for the big paper in town, the Edmonton Journal. But he'd never encountered a story like this before.

The arrest of the local filmmaker and the suggestion that he idolizes Dexter on Halloween, no less. Crazy. Assignments were handed out. There was work to be done. One of the first things we did in the newsroom is we just went to Mark Twitchell's Facebook page, and we saw a person who was incredibly driven, a person who had a lot of charisma,

and was really into this, I guess you would call it like a geek culture. You know, he was into Star Wars, he was into Sci-Fi stuff, he was into making costumes, but nothing sinister. Certainly didn't come off like a cold-blooded killer, let alone a Dexter type. He looked like a really clean-cut guy. He had a schoolboy haircut and he could be anyone's son. So that was almost part of the extraordinary part about it was just how normal Mark Twitchell did look and how horrendous these allegations were coming from the police and the two didn't look to add up.

It seemed like, well, seemed like the plot of a movie. So this idea that you would have what the police was alleging, a filmmaker who would randomly pick total strangers and that they would become a victim of a horrendous crime. And in a way that was replicating actual Hollywood, you know, mythology, this idea of a horror film, it was just extraordinary. It didn't seem like it could be real. And maybe it wasn't. Because a bit more digging turned up a few salient facts about Mark Twitchell. The sort of things that could make a reporter sit back and contemplate the possibility. Somebody made a mistake. A lot of people thought this was a hoax.

And why would a lot of people think that? Mark Twitchell was known as a prankster. He loved pulling pranks. He loved telling jokes. He loved pulling someone's leg. And with that, the police told us that they did not have a body. So the obvious question was, how are you going to prosecute someone for first degree murder with no body?

And here this guy is a prankster. And he's a filmmaker, maybe it was some kind of prank with the film. That's something his own friends were wondering and talked about quite often. Like the actor, Sean Storer. I thought he was just trying to hype this new movie that he's going to do and he'll be found not guilty and at the end of the day he walks away not guilty, but he has all this publicity around him and what better way to start a movie off than to have your name on the tip of everybody's tongue.

So maybe the police had been duped, totally pranked. Why would they feel silly when they figured that out? No way Mark Twitchell could actually pull off a complicated, Dexter-like murder scheme because as Sean couldn't help but notice, Twitchell was not exactly the brilliant director he seemed to think he was. He had no idea what he's doing. He just doesn't have a clue.

It's not that he doesn't have a clue. He just didn't have the skills. He didn't have the ability to bring it all together. If you didn't have the smarts to pull off a movie with a really low budget, you don't have the smarts to pull something like that off. Murder somebody that is in some horribly clever way that avoided detection, but blunder into a prank gone wrong? Well, sure, said friends, that sounded just like Mark. As for Twitchell himself,

he would do his talking through a lawyer, he said to those policemen who arrested him. I'm fine, said the detectives. But they kept asking him questions anyway, as was their prerogative, according to the Canadian Charter of Rights. They kept at Mark Twitchell for six hours that Halloween night. Here was Detective Bill Clark. We're going to explain to you what's going on here today, Mark, okay? Why you're here?

The room in which they were sitting, Detective Clark and a mute Mark Twitchell, was tiny, six feet by six feet. Suspect Twitchell was wearing a simple green t-shirt and black jeans. He faced Detective Clark head on. No choice, really. You know that you're charged with first degree murder? That's what the charges will be laid on you tonight. Their talk began just after 6.30,

while excited kids took their loot bags door to door, and Mark Twitchell's fans gathered to watch him come strutting into that costume gala clad in his handcrafted iron man outfit. Instead he was closed off in a room the size of a closet, while an energized Bill Clark fired off one question after another, loaded with implied accusations. Did you film this murder? Are we going to find that on all those tapes and the hard drives we've taken?

The look on Mark Twitchell's face suggested he had grown to dislike Bill Clark. One of the things that we notice in people who are sociopaths, which I really think you're a sociopath. In response to that broadside, Twitchell slouched in his chair, arms folded across his chest, motionless, staring straight ahead, as Clark continued to chew away at him. I mean, this is all modeled after Dexter. You know that, Mark. You know, eerily, you kind of look like the guy.

I look at that picture, I saw that one on your website, and you guys kind of even look the same. Sometimes as everybody knows a face will give clues to what's going on inside. Twitchell looked, well certainly not scared, not even defensive. If anything maybe annoyed, bored, put out by Clark's aggressive performance certainly. And the horrible timing of the arrest it being Halloween night after all the only thing twitch will had to say to Clark was I won't be saying anything the stalemate of sorts but then another detective entered the room to take twitch was dinner order well now that was a different story. What would you like to eat?

Sub sandwich, hamburger, what would you like? Well, I don't know where you get it from. We can get Mr. Sub Subway, McDonald's, whatever's on the street. Oh, okay. Whatever, Sub, I guess. Okay. What would you like? Chicken, turkey? Steak and cheese. Steak and cheese, Sub? Sure. Do you prefer Subway or Mr. Sub? Subway, I guess. Okay. And what do you like to drink? What do you like to drink? What do you like to drink? What do you like to drink? What do you like to drink?

What do you like to drink? What do you like to drink? What do you like to drink? What do you like to drink? What do you like to drink? What do you like to drink? What do you like to drink? What do you like to drink?

What do you like to drink? What do you like to drink? What do you like to drink? What do you like to drink? What do you like to drink? What do you like to drink? What do you like to drink? What do you like to drink?

What do you like to drink? What do you like to drink? What do you like to drink? What do you like to drink? What do you like to drink? What do you like to drink? What do you like to drink? What do you like to drink? He tore into it like he hadn't a care in the world, as if he was on the set of one of his low-budget movies, taking a break between scenes. And then Detective Clark started in again with his pesky questions and annoying comments.

You made a lot of mistakes. You never considered the fact that your victim would email his friends and tell them where he was going. It went on like this for hours. Less an interrogation than a monologue. Certainly not a dialogue. Mark Twitchell said, nothing. Then sometime in hour three, Bill Clark left the room.

His aggressive questioning wasn't getting them anywhere. And in his place, a detective named Paul Link settled into the chair facing Mr. Twitchell. By comparison with Clark, Detective Link was practically chummy. You're obviously a bright guy. You're very intelligent. You know, you're in the movie industry,

trying to make a goal of it. And some scripts. People are accepting your work. You're getting people to work for you. And that script, by the way, that SK Confession story, said Detective Link. Well, that was boffo, a work of art. It's a fabulous script. It's actually fascinating. OK.

And that's what I'm saying when I talked about this being a movie. You could send this off and get your foot into the door, whether it be at Paramount, Fox, Warner Brothers, whoever. I mean, you could send this to the Dexter people. Maybe this will be an episode. ["Skyfall", by Mark Twichell plays in background.] Mark Twichell linked his hands behind his head and stared at the far wall.

Silence. So Detective Link started reading SK Confessions out loud, like a creepy bedtime story. This story was based on true events. The names and events were altered slightly to protect the guilty. And that's when Mark Twitchell finally decided. It was time for a word or two from him.

Crammed into an interrogation room not much bigger than a storage closet, Detective Ball Link began reading SK confessions to its presumed author, Mark Twitchell, hoping it might trigger some sort of reaction. And for one brief moment, it did. This story was based on true events. The names and events were altered slightly to protect the guilty.

This is the story. This is fiction. You're saying that's fiction? Was Twitchell about to reveal that all of it, the disappeared man, the apparent attack in a goalie mask, the homicidal ramblings in SK confessions, that all of it was a hoax? A publicity stunt?

There was a pause. Twitchell seemed to be concentrating. Detective Link broke the silence. The fact that, you know, I was one of the guys that said, this could be a hoax, okay? There's a lot of investigators in the office that thought this was just a hoax that was going to be a movie. Let's say it was a hoax, okay? There's a lot of investigators in the office that thought this was just a hoax that was gonna be a movie. Let's say it was a hoax, okay?

And you get arrested, you're charged, and the police do a thorough investigation, all of a sudden Johnny Altinger appears on the scene. That would make a pretty good movie as well, right? Now, Twitchell leaned forward, picked up the bottle of Coke sitting on the table, slowly unscrewed the cap, took a swig, and then just as slowly screwed the cap back on

before placing the bottle back on the table. And then he asked a question. Just out of curiosity, does a person not get in trouble for the hoax as well? Absolutely, yeah. Why do you ask? Oh, it's... Yeah, there'd be a couple charges.

Struck justice, public mischief would be another one. Hmm. Hmm, he said. And then, lapsed again into silence. motionless, chin still resting on his hand. Seeing that Mark Twitchell had no more to say, Link changed course. It's not done, Mark. The script's not done. How do you want this to end? And you want me to tell you what happens at the end? Mark, the police, they go out happens at the end. Mark, the police they go out with the person responsible, they go to the body.

And that's what we're going to do. Mark, you need to finish the script. We can do this tonight. We can bring some lights. We can do it the first thing in the morning. It's up to you." Trichell uncrossed his arms, looked at the fingernails of his right hand, and then said something, well, kind of surprising. Don't get me wrong, I respect you guys, I respect what you do, I understand what this is about. I just can't say anything. You think sitting there waiting to know is going to make a difference? Maybe, maybe not.

So there were two options now, said Detective Link. Option one, wait for the lawyer, continue to say nothing. Let's just hear legal right. Or option two, tell them the end of the story. What happened to Johnny Altinger? You move on, you're accountable, you finish what you started. Don't look like a fool. Comes down to two options, Mark.

Trichell stared at the floor and literally twiddled his thumbs. Detective Link pressed on. Mark, I'm asking a question. What do you wish to do? What do you want to do right now? 28 minutes later, Mark Twitchell finally broke his silence. Man, you're preaching to the choir. Option two is where I'm leading, but I just can't do anything until tomorrow after I talk to my lawyer.

So that's where it's at. Do anything until tomorrow after I talk to my lawyer so It's option to your receptive option to I Just need to consult first and Basically it Okay Like I said before so I don't know what happens now. Okay, so option two would mean We go out during daytime hours, cover the body, put a closure to it, and then move on and finish the script and then it's done. You're okay with that, Mark? Twitchell laced his fingers atop his head, stared at the ceiling, and said nothing more. Had he just admitted to murder? The evidence in that garage suggested that poor Johnny Altinger had been killed and cut up in ways eerily reminiscent of, yes, Dexter. Did this mean

Trichell would cooperate now, officially confess, and show them where he dumped Johnny's body. Tantalizingly close now, Detective Link got up to leave the room, and then turned to Twitchell and asked, Would you like some water? I'll make it up. You got water. No, I'm good, yeah. By then, it was about midnight, and sensing success, Detective Link arranged for a bigger

room and a bed. Any questions about anything? No. Concerns? Issues? We'll see you in the morning. Have a good night's sleep. Okay.

Okay. Then Detective Link shook Twitchell's hand and walked out of that tiny room, hoping that within a few hours, Mark Twitchell would take him to Johnny Altinger's grave. Early on the morning of November the 1st, Edmonton homicide detectives pulled Mark Twitchell out of jail and put him in the back of an aging Crown Victoria, pointed a camera at his face and said, okay Mark, take us to Johnny Altinger's body. And in response, Twitchell said to Clark, well, if I got to go with you, I'll go with you, but I'm not helping you out. Just like that. The man had apparently changed his

mind. Unless the almost not quite confession of the night before had been just a ruse all along. A Halloween trick designed to get him out of that tiny interrogation room and into a bed. Whatever it was, events in the morning made it clear there was no deal. Twitchell was admitting to nothing, but Detective Bill Clark, who was now behind the wheel, wasn't having any of it. He decided to take Twitchell on a this-is-your-life kind of drive around town. To all the locations mentioned in that series of horror vignettes called SK Confessions, hoping Twitchell would crack,

give himself away. We just took him for a drive. He says, you're going to show us where the body is. You're going to show us where Johnny is. It was pretty unusual to do that, isn't it? Yeah, I mean, for what we did, it was unusual. We're just trying to think outside the box and see what something might trigger him. First up, Trichell's childhood home, which is where we later spoke to Detective Clark

on the blustery fall day. Drove right here, parked right in front of his parents' house and... No reaction from the dad? No reaction at all. Detective Bill Clark said Twitchell didn't seem the least bit concerned about the possibility his parents might come running out of the house at any moment to see what was going on. Instead, still wearing the clothes he had on the night before, along with an orange windbreaker, he leaned back, rested his head on the night before, along with an orange windbreaker. He leaned back, rested his head on his seat back, closed his eyes, and tried to nap. Then Clark said this to him.

Oh, it was here. Twitchell opened his eyes, looked outside the window, and saw a TV news crew. They'd been hoping, apparently, for an interview with Mark's parents. Unbelievable timing. What is it? They don't even know who we have in the back of the car. Oh.

Clark stepped out of the car, leaving another detective inside with Mark Twitchell. It's the media, Mark. There's nothing we can do about this. It's entirely coincidental. They have a right and a... You didn't call them? No.

They have a freedom to be here. And there's nothing I can do about it. We can leave if you tell us where we should go. Let's go back to HQ. Mark Trichell scrunched down in his seat, tried to hide his face behind his handcuffs. Didn't work. Seriously, let's just go back to the station.

When you think you can do that? Two minutes later, Clark was back in the car and ready to go. Where do you want us to head to, Mark? Station. The station? Body's not at the station, Mark. Where do you want us to head to mark? station The station body's not at the station mark. Where do you want us to go mark? Which way? We need to get this done

Do you know where I? Shouldn't say that bad question. You know where it's just where do you want us to go? Tell us what direction But twitch'll said nothing. He just stared out the window like a petulant teen, forced to go on a road trip with his annoying parents, who had control of both the car and the radio. In this case, the local news talk station, which repeated one particular story again and again.

UPS homicide detectives have arrested and charged a suspect in connection with the disappearance of John Bryant Attinger. The 38 year old Attinger went missing on October 10th from the area of 40th Avenue and 57th Street. Charged with first degree murder is 29 year old Mark Andrew Twitchell. Twitchell was arrested yesterday without incident

at a home in North Edmonton. Alarm CNP continue in... This is just the start of the media frenzy, Mark. And it's going to continue on until the body surfaces. It doesn't end. So we can put an end to it today. Next, they drove to the apartment complex where Twitchell's sister lived. Which one's your sister, Mark? This one?

Next one. And again they encountered a TV camera. God, you're kidding me. What are you afraid of, Mark? Nothing, I guess. It'll work for 20. Twitchell's sister refused to come outside to talk to her brother. So again, Clark started the car, and 45 minutes later turned down an alleyway and pulled into a gravel driveway

and parked next to a detached two-car garage. So here we are back at the killing garage, the Dexter garage, the Alberta productions, Alberta film industry productions of Dexter. Here, police believe, was a very place where the murder of the man The Dexter Garage. The Alberta Productions, Alberta Film Industry, Productions of Dexter. Here, police believe, was the very place

where Johnny Altinger met his killer. Look familiar, Mark? It's returned to the scene of the crime. At which, Mark Twitchell turned to the policeman beside him and said, He's just hungry? Hungry? You just ate. You know what? I think we'll go take a look at the kill garage.

Nice. All four got out of the car this time, three detectives and Twitchell. They ducked under strands of crime scene tape and walked into the courtyard separating the garage from the house. Do you have any memories? You want to tell us where the body is now? We can get this over with, get you back to the station. There was no response from Twitchell.

Okay, let's go to another address. So back into the car. Where do you want to go, Mark? Your choice. No answer. So Clark just started driving and got Twitchell's girlfriend on the phone to see if she could convince him to give it all up. Hi, Tracy, how are you?

You wanted to talk to Mark? Okay, it's up to you. I'll put him on the phone. Okay. Hello? Hello? Okay. Oh, I can't see anything at the moment. Then Twitchell handed the phone back to Clark,

who was now fresh out of ideas. The parents, the sister, the girlfriend, the crime scene, none of it worked. Absolutely showed no emotion at any time, was almost disgusted that we were wasting his time. Or maybe not quite. There was that one thing, Twitchell said, a question, really, that indicated how he was going to spin the

entire case it was well he was being questioned by detective link that Halloween night when it was almost like a light bulb went on and mark twichle's head just out of curiosity does the person not get in trouble for the hoax as well what'd he you ask? It does. Oh, it was just nothing, is what Twitchell was suggesting with a casual shrug of his shoulders. Oh, but it was a very big deal, because Mark Twitchell may have just figured out how to end his story happily.

Happily for Mark Twitchell, that is. Coming up next in our final episode of The Man in the Black Mask... I watched the live blog that they had and I was screaming my head off at home. You liar. You liar. Were you afraid the jury would believe him? Oh yeah. The Man in the Black Mask is a production of Dateline and NBC News.

Vince Sterle is the producer. Brian Drew, Deb Brown, and Marshall Hausfeld are audio editors. Justin Ratchard is field producer. Leslie Grossman is program coordinator. Adam Gorfain is co-executive producer. Paul Ryan is executive producer, and Liz Cole is senior executive producer. From NBC News Audio, sound mixing by Katie Lau, Bryson Barnes is head of audio production.