Killer Stories with Harvey Guillén - Working Late Pt. 1: Police

Episode Date: September 6, 2021

This is the first episode in our Working Late series, where we'll be taking deep dives into the most popular jobs among serial killers. We'll look into what makes each of these six professions so perfect for killers, and explore stories of the monsters who twisted their day job to suit their darkest after-hours pursuits. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Due to the graphic nature of these killers' crimes, listener discretion is advised. This episode includes discussions of murder, assault, and sexual abuse that some people may find offensive. We advise extreme caution for children under 13. Alexandra didn't usually hit up a bar after work, but it had been an especially tough day, the kind that makes your head feel heavy and your shoulders sore. She sat down next to an off-duty police officer who seemed to be in similar, shape. In fact, he asked if she'd want to do a shot of vodka before ordering her first drink. Alexandra took him up on the offer a couple of times. Before she knew it, it was nearly 10,

and she was drunk on an empty stomach. Clearly, time to pack it in for the night. The officer concurred and even offered to drive her home in his patrol car. Alexandra accepted, thankful she wouldn't have to wait for the bus. The officer escorted her to the patrol car and helped her into the back seat per protocol. But instead of asking where she lived, he just started driving north, the exact opposite direction of Alexandra's home. And when she pointed this out, he didn't seem to hear her. Panic set in as the car drove out of the city and toward the forest that encircled the town.

Alexandra begged the man to let her out of the patrol car, but the amenable cop she met earlier had disappeared. Now he was stone-faced and calculated. unflinching as Alexander shook the metal grate between them. It was then that her stomach turned. This man was well practiced. Whatever he was about to do, he'd done many times before, and he wasn't afraid of getting caught.

Hi, I'm Greg Poulson. This is Serial Killers, a Spotify original from Parcast. Every episode, we dive into the minds and madness of serial killers. For the next few weeks, in commemoration of Labor Day, we'll be taking a look at how some of the world's most infamous killers made ends meet. When they weren't committing murder, they worked a 9-5 like everybody else. I'm here with my co-host, Vanessa Richardson. Hi, everyone.

You can find episodes of serial killers and all other Spotify originals from Parcast for free on Spotify. Today, we'll follow two serial killers who made their living as policemen. They hunted their prey at night, then returned to the scene of the crime, pretending to uphold the law. Both of them went undetected for years. In the weeks to come, we'll take a look at some of the other most popular jobs for serial killers. After this series, there's a good chance you'll never look at civic employees the same way again. We've got all that and more coming up. Stay with us.

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Somehow I lost eight whole hours. Listen now on Spotify or wherever you get your podcast. If there's one thing many serial killers have in common, it's an interest in law enforcement. Unlike killers who are motivated by thrill-seeking or lust, police work tends to attract control killers, the ones who get a rush from stalking their prey, carefully designing the abduction, and choosing exactly when and where their victim will die. Before we continue with the psychology for this episode, please keep in mind that neither Vanessa nor I are licensed psychologists or psychiatrists, but we've done a lot of research for this

show. Thanks, Greg. Dr. Scott A. Bond describes control killers as meticulous planners, unflappable, and patient. They're usually charming and intelligent. able to sustain jobs, families, and hobbies outside of their killing career. They present as upstanding citizens, longing to be seen as respectable, important authority figures. And so they charm their way into careers like law enforcement, which allows them to have control in almost every situation.

Over the years, we've covered many of these killers on our show, but today we'll talk about two of the most famous. The Werewolf Officer Mihail Popkov and Officer Joseph DiAngelo, These days known as the Golden State Killer. Both killers operated for decades, partly because their colleagues couldn't believe a fellow cop could be responsible for heinous murders, and partly because they were often the ones covering their own crime scenes,

able to covertly destroy any evidence that might give them away. But as they say, the truth always comes out. Before he was the subject of Michelle McNamara's best-selling book, I'll Be Gone in the Dark. Joseph DiAngelo seemed to be your average retiree living near Sacramento. He was an honorably discharged Navy veteran who served in Vietnam and lost half a finger to show for it. He was also a former cop and father of three daughters.

Granted, he was also an irritable curmudgeon, the neighbors nicknamed Crazy Joe. That nickname took on a whole new meaning on April 24, 2018, when DiAngelo was arrested at his home in Citrus Heights near Sacramento. DNA evidence linked him to 13 murders, around 50 rapes, and a string of break-ins throughout Central California in the 1970s and 80s. At first, he denied everything and refused to cooperate with police, but eventually he looked at the charges and told police, I did all that. On Monday, June 29, 2020, he pled guilty to 13 counts of first-degree murder and 13 counts

of kidnapping. And while that's a horrific resume to tout, it's hardly the extent of DiAngelo's crimes. To get the full story, we have to go back to almost 50 years earlier. Joseph DiAngelo joined the Exeter California Police Force way back in May of 1973 as part of the Anti-Burglery Task Force. He spent that first year learning the ropes, specifically how to navigate a crime scene. The next year, in 1974, nearby Vysalia, California, fell victim to a string of bizarre break-ins. Unlike most prowlers, this guy didn't seem interested in valuables. Instead, he'd dismantle the house, but only take one earring from a pair of two, or rip up a few family pictures.

It was clear his only mission was chaos. He broke into dozens of homes in the following months, earning the name the Visalia Ransacker. DiAngelo likely enjoyed the feeling of unrest that was rippling across town. And because he was on the burglary unit in Exeter, it was easy to go undetected. The morning after he ransacked a home, he was often the officer called to investigate the scene. The ransacker almost never left evidence behind, and his former partner is certain that DeAngelo destroyed any evidence they could collect. DeAngelo was good at what he did and loved the feeling of outwitting his colleague. and moving like a chameleon through town.

Things escalated on September 11, 1975. In the early morning hours, DiAngelo crept into the home of 16-year-old Beth Snelling. While she slept, he lunged on top of her and covered her mouth. When she was startled awake, he threatened to hurt her if she made a noise. With a handgun pressed against her back, he moved Beth out the rear door of her home. As they made their way across the yard, Beth heard her father clawed yell, Hey, from the upstairs window, then Claude came tearing after her. DeAngelo shoved Beth to the ground and fired two shots at her father, killing him.

Then he kicked Beth in the head three times before fleeing. Police were certain that this was the work of the Visalia Ransacker and poured all their resources into unmasking him. They'd been fearing this day when burglary was no longer enough to hold the ransackers' interests. But DeAngelo didn't try to attack another woman in the... the Visalia or Exeter areas. Still, he continued the break-ins until 1976 when he resigned from the Exeter Department and moved to Sacramento.

That year, he was hired to the Auburn Police Station about 35 minutes outside the city. Shortly after the move, he started casing neighborhoods, planning the ransackers return. But as his former colleague's guest, DeAngelo was no longer interested in mere mayhem. From 1976 to 1979, he was a new guy. He raped between 48 and 50 women in the Sacramento suburbs and nearby Bay Area. We won't go into the details of every incident, but we know that his first attack took place on June 18, 1976, in Rancho Cordova. His victim was a 16-year-old girl, who he threatened to kill should she scream for help.

He infamously said, Make one move and you'll be silent forever, and I'll be gone in the dark. Less than a month later, he struck again, this time in Carmichael, California. By October 1976, police officially announced their search for the East Area Rapist and offered a $2,500 reward for information leading to his arrest. Which DiAngelo loved. He thrived on terror and relished the idea that he had the entire town on edge. Not only that, he enjoyed outsmarting his coworkers. For one thing, because he grew up in the area and patrolled these neighborhoods,

regularly. He knew the city like the back of his hand. He specifically targeted homes that lined the many man-made canals around Sacramento, knowing his colleagues would have a limited ability to patrol them. He attacked single moms and women who lived alone, then jumped the fence in the backyard to escape through the canal. He was extremely agile and equally depraved. Detective Paul Holes later referred to him as a psychological sadist. He wouldn't just bind and attack women. He'd spent hours in their homes. He'd either ransack a different room or raid the kitchen, making himself a full meal. He would also stand above his victim's stone silent for 30 or 40 minutes. He waited until they believed he was gone, and right as the woman would move, he'd run the tip of his knife

down her back. It was the mental torture that really motivated him. His signature move was stealing trophies from one victim than leaving them at a different victim's home. He wanted to weave a complex puzzle across Sacramento, one that his colleagues would be unable to solve. But eventually, some of Sacramento's finest began to suspect that the East Area rapist was one of their own. For one thing, a victim recalled that when she first saw the man in her doorway, he raised a gun and said, freeze or I'll shoot. Another indicator came in November 1976 when police held a community meeting to discuss the serial rapist case with concerned citizens. One man criticized the police investigation and essentially challenged the East Area

rapist, saying that no one would hurt his wife while he, a real man, was home. Six months later, DeAngelo attacked the man and his wife while they slept. The newly formed East Area Rapist Task Force didn't know who the rapist was, but wondered if he was at that meeting. A short while later, their theories were confirmed. DiAngelo always wore leather gloves so as not to leave fingerprints than his victim's home. But during his first few attacks, he took them off while assaulting the victim. Figuring the skin-to-skin contact wouldn't leave any incriminating evidence. But his ammo changed when police developed a way to lift fingerprints from a victim's body.

This is remarkable science. When we touch others, we leave fingerprints on their skin. But they fade very quickly. As such, it's difficult to get prints off our body. organic material, so when police successfully lifted DeAngelo's print from one of his victim's arms, news spread around the station like wildfire. After that day, police noticed that the East Area rapist never took off his gloves again. But while they suspected they were dealing with a cop, only one officer had an inkling

that it was DeAngelo, police chief Nick Willick, and unfortunately the breakthrough came a few days after Willick could do anything about it. Willick remembers DeAngelo being difficult to work with. He violated people's personal space and constantly touched whoever he was standing next to. He seemed to be a master at quietly assuming control over any conversation. Not that he was respected for it. In fact, he was an outlier within the Auburn Police Department. His co-workers called him junk food Joey,

as he always had candy or vending machine food in his hands. Three years after starting at the station, in 1979, DiAngelo went shopping in a hardware store and attempted to steal a can of dog spray and a hammer. The shopkeeper confronted DiAngelo and called the police. So it fell on Chief Nick Willick to fire him, just days before Willick was set to retire. DeAngelo didn't take the news well. On his way out of the station, he threatened to kill Willick. A few weeks later, Willick's daughter came running into his room in the middle of the night,

saying she'd seen a man staring at her through the window. Willick jumped up and ran outside, sickened to see a pair of footprints outside his little girl's room. But Willick and his former colleagues never suspected the quiet and withdrawn DeAngelo. That vital mistake allowed DeAngelo to assault and murder dozens of people for years. In a moment, we'll learn the strength of DeAngelo's victims. Imagine living with a secret so big

that if anyone ever found out, it would change everything. Imagine carrying that secret with you every day, desperate to one day get it off your chest. Do you think you could take a secret like that to the grave? I'm a Stefania Higman, host of the new podcast series, Deathbed Confessions, the show where we dive deep into the most explosive things

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Tickets on sale now at Yamava Theater.com, only at Yamava Resort and Casino, celebrating its 40th anniversary. You in? Must be 21 to enter. Now back to the story. Between 1976 and 1979, Joseph DiAngelo attacked around 50 women in the Sacramento and Bay Area's. He then called them for weeks after, extending their anguish and renewing their terror. But the more he tried to torture his victims, the more pathetic he experienced. exposed himself to be. Perhaps the most courageous of DeAngelo's victims was also the youngest.

A 13-year-old Sacramento girl will call Jane. Like most girls who grew up playing Bloody Mary and light as a feather, Jane had an interest in the macabre and became obsessed with the East Area rapist case. She read about the assailant and as victims in every newspaper she could get her hands on. So on November 10, 1977, when she awoke to a blinding light, she knew exactly what was going on. A man wearing a ski mask and leather gloves was shining a flashlight in her face.

One of DeAngelo's signature moves. He bound and blindfolded her, then left her bedroom. Lying still on the bed, Jane could hear as the man entered her mother's bedroom and tied her up as well. Jane then listened to him move into the kitchen and start pulling plates off the shelves.

This was the East Area Rapist's calling card. usually he attacked young couples and stacked plates on top of the husband's back. He'd tell the husband that if he heard the plates so much as rattle, he'd kill them both, the wife first. In this case, it was Jane's mom who received that warning. The courageous 13-year-old knew what was going to happen to her. She steeled herself for what was coming and told herself, you're going to be okay. As of yet, the East Area rapist hadn't killed a victim,

so Jane guessed that ultimately she'd survive. She also knew that he thrived on fear, the one thing she could control. As he threatened her, she told him simply, I don't care. Throughout her ordeal, Jane never panicked. She did her best to seem apathetic, never giving him an ounce of satisfaction. Then, once the act was over, DeAngelo fled into the night. Young Jane's stoic, nonchalot attitude during the attack, probably through DeAngelo, who at the time was largely targeting minors.

Police believed this was because he thought children were easily intimidated. And make no mistake, these victims were children. Six of his first ten targets couldn't legally drive. A few of them had yet to experience their first kiss. Praying on them showed a level of depravity that's hard to fathom, but such is the work of a coward. In 1979, police announced that while the East Area rapist was still at large, He rarely broke into a home where a man or a large dog was present, encouraging listeners to

invest in one or the other. DeAngelo saw the announcement as a challenge. After that, two-thirds of his attacks targeted couples. He'd tied the men up and put plates on their backs, just as he had with Jane's mom. They'd be helpless and blindfolded with nothing to do but listen. He also continued to call his victims, sometimes for weeks after the attacks, either breathing into the phone or threatening to kill them, the effort he put into breaking these women is unfathomable. At that point, the Sacramento and Bay Area PDs started firing on all cylinders, pulling out

all the stops to catch DeAngelo. They over-extended their budget to fly helicopters over DeAngelo's hunting grounds night after night. They hoped to spotlight him, perhaps while trying to break into a house, but instead of flushing him out, the helicopters chased him away. Veteran of the Vietnam War, DeAngelo was triggered by the sound of the helicopters. And shortly after July 5, 1979, he went dark, never to be seen in Sacramento again. Sometime between July and October, 1979, Joseph DiAngelo decided to move.

And like many soon-to-be serial killers, he found refuge in Los Angeles County. Between October 1979 and 1986, he attacked and killed 10 people. But at the time, police didn't make the connection between these attacks and the ones that occurred up north. Police departments in SoCal began referring to him as the Nightstalker. He was later renamed the original Nightstalker, since the media began calling Richard Ramirez the Nightstalker, while he was active at the same time. DeAngelo, the original Nightstalker, was most active between 19, 1979 and 1981, attacking and murdering nine people.

He then went quiet for five years, the reason for which is unclear. In 1986, he attacked and killed his last known victim in Irvine, California. Because DiAngelo was good at police work, authorities were never able to identify who was behind his crimes. It wasn't until 2001 that Sacramento's former chief of forensics, Detective Paul Holes, ran a search on previously untouched samples from the East Area Rapist and learned it matched those from the original Nightstalker. He was shocked, saying, this, I think, is an unprecedented predator.

But even with that tremendous breakthrough, there was little information to go on. Holes and the rest of the task force delved back into the case, retracing every step and trying to forge new pathways, but they were backpedaling through well-trod ground. Then, in 2011, Seven, a true-crime-obsessed blogger named Michelle McNamara became fixated on the case and started to conduct her own armchair investigation. At the time, the killer in question was known as Irons. That's East Area Rapist, original Nightstalker.

McNamara was the one to rename him, the Golden State Killer. Her blog drummed up public interest in the case. The Iran's task force, who'd been working the case for years, started receiving calls and tips from people who were. finally ready to talk. For the first time in decades, the task force received an increase in funding and had more avenues to explore. In April of 2016, around the time police adopted the name the Golden State Killer, McNamara passed away. Among the writing she left behind was a promise that the Golden State Killer would soon be unmasked. And sure enough, in 2017, the task force working the case used the DNA collected in the 70s and 80s to create a generic profile, which was uploaded to a genealogy database. The DNA matched a relative of the killer,

and the task force quickly narrowed down their suspects to DeAngelo. Covertly, police recovered a piece of discarded DNA like a cigarette butt or coffee cup tossed in the trash to finally tie DeAngelo to the crimes. He was arrested on April 24th, 2018, at 72 years old. Chillingly, DiAngelo spent 32 years living in the community he terrorized. After his arrest, a shocked neighbor admitted that she was terrified of the original night stalker in the 80s and only moved to DiAngelo's neighborhood because it felt safe. DeAngelo confessed to his crimes without much coaxing. He blamed his behavior on an alter ego named Jerry, saying, I didn't have the strength to push him out. He went with me. It

was like in my head. I mean, he's a part of me. I didn't want to do those things. I pushed Jerry out and had a happy life. I did all those things. I destroyed all their lives. So now I've got to pay the price. Indeed. The Golden State Killer is currently serving several life sentences in a maximum security prison. In a moment, we'll turn our attention to Siberia, where a werewolf policeman spent two decades on the prowl. You tell yourself, no one wants your college-era band teas, but on Deepop, people are searching for exactly what you've got. You once paid a small fortune for them at merch stands.

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While Joseph DiAngelo may have blamed an alter ego named Jerry for his crimes, our next serial killer knew exactly what he was doing. Now called The Werewolf. Mihail Popkov is not only Russia's most prolific serial killer, but one of the most deadly the world has ever known. We know almost nothing about Popkov or his early life. He was born in Russia in 1964 and is believed to be the world. the child of an abusive mother and absent father. While we're unsure of his hometown, we know that by

the time he was 20, he was living in Ongarsk, Russia, 2,600 miles east of Moscow. We also know that between 1992 and 2007, he killed at least 78 people. Before his killing spree, Popkov's record was clean. In fact, he doesn't have much of a record at all. In 1987, when he was 23, Popkov married a 20-year-old woman named Yelena, and by all accounts, the union seemed happy. The following year, they welcomed their daughter, Icaterina, into the family. Over the next five years, Popkov seemed to be the model husband and father. He was charming and loving, an ideal family man. In 1992, Popkov joined the local police force in Ankarsk.

His wife, Yelena also worked for the police department in some capacity, though she wasn't a cop. Popkov proved himself to be a capable and well-liked police officer, gaining the confidence of everyone on the force. And unfortunately, this facade worked to his advantage for decades. One night in 1992, Popkov was on his way home in his patrol car when he stopped off at a bar for a drink. As he was getting ready to leave, he met an intoxicated woman in need of a cab. The woman who was short in stature, full, figured, and drunk, reminded him of. of his alcoholic mother. Rather than let her wait outside by herself, he offered to drive her home.

He claims he had innocent intentions at the start of the drive, but at some point was overwhelmed by the sudden urge to kill her. Instead of taking the woman home, he drove her to a secluded patch of woods on the outskirts of town where he raped and strangled her. After he choked the life out of her, he abandoned the woman's body in the woods and returned home to his loving wife and daughter. Popkov later told investigators that he considered himself a cleaner, that it was his job to rid the world of amoral women. This is problematic for a myriad of reasons, but we'll stick to exploring the two most pertinent.

First, most of Popkov's early victims reminded him of his mother, the person he was truly trying to punish. Second, Popkov wanted to kill, plain and simple. He, like many killers before him, chose to hunt women he deemed in his. immoral because it helped him justify his own compulsions. In other words, instead of recognizing and addressing flaws within himself, he took his anger out on women who were minding their own business. His crimes are even more devious because he used his position as a policeman to lure victims into his patrol car. After work, he'd drive to a bar somewhere in Angarsk and ask a woman if

she'd like a drink. If she said yes, she became a target. He believed that women who drank were of loose moral character and probably sex workers. No verification needed, apparently. He'd offer them a ride home in his patrol car, then drive them to wherever he planned on disposing of their body. On three occasions, women turned down the drink, thus passing the morality test. All three of these women made it home safe and sound. Popkov even allegedly helped one carry her bags up to her apartment. But the less fortunate women met a fate that no one deserves.

And over time, the violence involved in these slayings heightened. Popkov later said that he loved watching his victims, reveling in their pain, feeling it vicariously through them. And if that weren't creepy enough, he also became known for necrophilia and unusual torture. He often stabbed his victims so many times that it looked like they were torn apart by an animal. One of his victims was decapitated, another was found with her heart ripped out of her chest. Which is how he came to be called the werewolf. Local papers also called him the Angarsk Maniac, a name he likely relished. Mihail's victims were mostly between 18 and 28 years old, though his youngest victim was only 16.

As we mentioned earlier, the early women all resembled his mother, but Angarsk only had so many petite brunettes. So eventually all types of women became targets. Amidst his killing spree, Popkov shot his singular male victim, a policeman he picked up and promised to take home. It's unclear why Popkov chose to kill this fellow officer. Whatever the reason behind it, this murder was initially pinned on the local mafia. Since thus far, the werewolf had only killed women, so Popkov got away with it easily. Then in 1998, Popkov quit the police force to become a security guard, though he continued to abduct and kill women for another two years.

Within that time frame, what of Popkov's victim survived? She remembers him driving her to the woods, dragging her from the car, then slamming her head against a tree. When she woke up, she was naked lying in the dirt. Through some miracle, she'd survived the night and the sub-zero temperatures of a Siberian winter. Luckily, a morning commuter spotted her and rushed her to the hospital. The woman told police she knew who her attacker was,

but they didn't believe it could be Popkov, a well-respected former cop, especially once his wife Yelena provided an alibi for her husband's whereabouts the night before. It's unclear whether Yelena knew that her husband was the werewolf of Angarsk or whether she helped him because she genuinely believed he was innocent, Either way, her lie allowed Popkov to murder another dozen women. He only stopped killing in 2000 because he caught syphilis, which left him impotent. A singular win for venereal disease.

By the time the werewolf fell off the map, police had the killer pinned for 22 murders and had spent nearly a decade trying to catch him, but they were no closer to unmasking him than when they started. This is partly because his victims were chosen at random, making it hard to connect them or follow potential leads. But the bigger problem was that police refused to entertain the idea that the murderer could have been one of their own. A breakthrough in the case finally came in 2012, when police were able to narrow down the type of car the killer used to dispose of his victims. A Russian off-road vehicle called a Niva. These were typically used as ambulances, military vehicles, and police cars. At that point, they were forced to face facts.

Police collected DNA samples from every NEVA owner in the area, including 3,500 current and former police officers. One quick database search later, and Popkov was arrested. Once in custody, Popkov not only copped all 22 murders, but acted as a tour guide around his former crime scenes, explaining in detail what he did and how. He claimed that he was driven to kill after his... wife cheated on him in the early 90s, but for some reason he targeted women who looked like

his mother, not his wife. You don't have to be Sigmund Freud to see that this reasoning didn't add up. Then, in an Olympic-level pivot, Popkov abandoned the affair angle and simply said, any society condemns the behavior of a debauched woman. One might think 22 murders was enough for any one person to cop to, but Popkov suddenly considered himself an honest person and decided to clear the air. While in custody, he admitted to an additional 59 murders, though he was only ever convicted of 56 of these. At 54 years old, Popkov earned the unique distinction of being one of the few Russians ever given two consecutive life sentences.

Not that he didn't deserve it, but in Russia, just the one life sentence is usually good enough. He was sent to the Black Dolphin, Russia's most infamous prison. It's one of the oldest and most strict in Russia, and it's considered escape-proof. Popkov joined 700 fellow serial killers, cannibals, terrorists, and pedophiles who inhabit the prison. The Black Dolphins' hallmark is 22 hours and 30 minutes of isolation every day and near constant surveillance to ensure the prisoners can't take their own lives. But while that should have been the end of the Popkov show, there was an unexpected second act. Even after his confession, Popkov's wife and daughter maintained his innocence and went on a press tour boasting as much. As recently as 2015, Yelena Popkov said,

If I suspected something wrong, of course I would divorce him, I support him, I believe him. His daughter, Eccaterina, backed up her mother's claims, insisting she was still a dad. both women were convinced the allegations were nothing more than fairy tales at least that's the word they kept using popkov's mother Antonia further touted her son's innocence offering some sound reasoning she said I cannot believe he walked alone to the forest in a police uniform where was the blood his clothes should have been covered in blood or if he had tried to wash the blood away the clothes would have been wet his wife would definitely have noticed all that

She later added that he was a good student and excellent at making pancakes, which made it impossible for him to be a killer. After all, who has time to murder when you're busy making brunch? Popkov's daughter, Icarina, promised to try and solve these crimes herself to exonerate her father, though there hasn't been follow-up on whether she's pursued any leads. She claimed she wouldn't believe her father committed these crimes until she heard it from his mouth. It's clear that the women in Popkov's life can't accept what he's done. And given how ridiculous those claims sound to us, we can only imagine the anger of his victim's families. Since his capture, Popkov has admitted to being a murderer and has even worn a smile during interviews, seemingly without remorse.

Yet for whatever reason, his family could not accept that reality. In July 2020, he confessed to two additional murders. He agreed to lead police to their bodies because he, quote, wanted a holiday from prison. Even still, there's no guarantee we know the full story. Some speculate Popkov could be guilty of as many as 200 slayings, though it's unlikely we'll ever know for sure. What is clear is that the killers we cover today found ways of using their role as law enforcement officers to manipulate and abduct their victims.

Their former colleagues have to live with the knowledge that a killer not only walked among them, but even investigated their own crime scenes. Officers vowed to serve and protect. So when a bad apple chooses to brutalize instead, it's an acute kind of betrayal. But that phenomenon is hardly unique to law enforcement. In fact, almost every corner of civil service has harbored serial murderers, who, for all we know, might still be operating undetected. Thanks again for tuning into serious. We'll be back next time with the next episode in our Working Late special series. For Part 2, we're hitting the road to peek inside the minds of serial killers who made their living

and their killings working as truck drivers. You can find all episodes of serial killers and all other Spotify originals from Parcast for free on Spotify. We'll see you next time. Have a killer week. Serial Killers is a Spotify original from Parcast. Executive producers include Max and Ron Cutler, sound designed by Carrie Murphy, with production assistance by Ron Shapiro, Trent Williamson, Carly Madden, and Joshua Kern.

This episode of serial killers was written by Aaron Lan, with writing assistance by Giles Havseth and Joel Callan, fact-checking by Cheyenne Lopez, and research by Brian Petrus and Chelsea Wood. Serial Killers stars Greg Paulson and Vanessa Richardson. beloved 75-year-old man washing up getting ready for bed is brutally beaten and killed. Despite an exhaustive investigation, the killer avoids arrest and then strikes again. I'm Global News crime reporter Nancy Hicks. You might listen to a lot of true crime podcasts this year, but they're not crime beat.

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