Last Podcast On The Left - Episode 339: Peter Kürten Part I - Papa Denke

Episode Date: November 3, 2018

It's Heavy Hitter time once again with one of the most monstrous killers we'll ever cover: Peter Kürten, aka the Vampire of Dusseldorf. Join us as we discuss the early life and career of one of the early twentieth century's most brutal serial killers, including his dogcatcher-influenced adolescence and his first few horrific murders plus a quick overview of Peter Kürten's German serial killer contemporaries. 

there's no place to escape to this is the last on the left that's when the cannibalism started what was that you normally cost a thousand dollars to secure yourself a grave plot does it really yep is that how we're gonna start the episode um? I'm interested. Um, excuse me. You're a very tall man. Uh-oh. Very tall man sitting so close to me. Yes.

The subway is so nice. Grandpa, what's going on here? He seemed to be stepping on my foot. Some people would find that to be some sort of inconvenience, some sort of social accidents on your part. But in fact, I have ejaculated.

Oh no! I didn't mean to make you do that! Oh, you did though. I'm sorry. This is the last podcast on the left. Everyone, I am Ben Kissel, Marcus Parks, right there. How you doing, buddy? I am doing great, how about you? Very good. And with us, in studio, together, but it's been so long. What's that song? It's been so

long since we've been together back together we're back together again my humps yeah something like that henry zabrowski oh yeah it is me and i'll tell you what as soon as i start reading this this super horrible details of the story i begin to have one oh i don't like it okay so why the german accent you might be asking we're going to talk about one of the worst germans in.S. history, which puts him as one of the worst human beings. Wait, we're going to talk about one of the worst Germans in German history, which puts him atop the list of maybe one of the worst people in world history. Peter Curtin is this man's name. Peter Curtin, a.k.a. the Vampire of Dusseldorf, is among the most sickening, reprehensible, straight up terrifying monsters that we'll ever cover on this show.

The very real representation of what an actual vampire would be. Peter Curtin is a man of nightmares. I think that when we cover him, I feel like a part of what you're going to see as we delve into the world of Peter Curtin. It's not a pleasant world. Incredible mustache. Honestly, really one of the best mustaches I've seen in a long time. H.H. Holmes or Peter Curtin, better stache who you got? Oh, I mean, H.H. Holmes.

H.H. Holmes has got a better mustache. I'm going to give it to the American. Thank you. Okay, all right. Very patriotic. Peter Curtin has sort of a diagonal Hitler, which is, it wasn't a Hitler at the time. It was a chaplain at the time. And so you can sort of forgive that.

The only thing you can forgive him of is wearing the Hitler mustache at the time. Okay, interesting. Well, the term vampire actually seems insufficient to describe Curtin. Efficient to describe Curtin. He is a true blood-sucking creature of chaos and death, killing without reason, pattern, or conscience. Scarier than even the most gruesome piece of folklore. He's living his hashtag worst life.

I see. Okay, so when it comes to vampires, we covered Richard Chase, of course, vampire of what was that? Sacramento. And now Curtin. When did vampires become sexy? Because neither of them, both of these guys are horrifying, and there were so many girls growing up in high school, I blame

Brad Pitt for this. Oh yeah. Being like, vampires are the sexiest. But this is what they look like in real life. And Rice is who to blame. And Rice. It started with Bram Stoker's Dracula. Because Dracula was a count, he was a fashionable man. Sure. They used that, they made him, he was old money. He was a fashionable man.

They used that. They made him. He was old money. He was mysterious. The movie did that. Bela Lugosi is actually the first one we can blame for turning Dracula sexy. Because at the time, yeah. I mean, now.

Yeah. Yes, his cigar-laden lips now are not attractive. But back in the day, he used to make girls snarch. Really? All over the place. But Richard Chase, I think is actually, they called him

the Vampire of Sacramento and I think it's mostly because of the blood play and his obsession with blood. But he is closer to a true folklore. Peter Curtin is closer to a true folklore version

of the vampire, which is something that is essentially a monster. It's also, we're going to hit again and again, it's somehow not European serial killers too, that fill out these sort of folklore type creatures. Because you remember way back in the day, if you get in your Wayback Machine, you listen to the werewolf episodes that we did.

We remember that the werewolf, the idea of that basically came from a description of old timey serial killers. And so now it's like, but of anybody fits the description, it's Peter Curtin. Now, I would actually go as far as to say that Peter Curtin is the cloth from which the more infamous serial killers of the 20th century were cut. He's got the brutality of Ramirez, the deadly charm of Ted Bundy, the sadism of Dennis Rader, and the erratic victim selection process that made Andre Chikatilo so difficult to catch. And he also has the jump shot of Larry Bird.

Little known fact. Great at one-on-one basketball. And you know why he remains in white man basketball history? Accuracy. That's all he had to have back in the day. That was it. But he also, for me, Peter Curtin's a creature of pure control. And I think that we'll get deeper and deeper as we talk about what seems to be the insynchronicities of his personal life and his life as a serial killer. I think it's all about total, complete control over every aspect of his personality and life.

Hold on a second. See, this is where every time you always lose me in an episode, you're telling me there's a German who wants complete control. Complete control. I don't know why the Germans make all the bad things. I like chocolate. They can own chocolate. They deserve complete control of chocolate.

And I will, as a 90-year-old man, I've told Natalie, if she does not kill me when I'm on my deathbed by smothering me with her vagina, she has to drown me in a bucket of Paul Lehner. Okay. I love Paul Lehner. Oh, it's a great beer. Well, the Germans do get a bad rap because before World War I and especially World War II, Germany was known as it was called the land of thinkers andets because it produced a lot of wonderful artists,

a lot of wonderful writers. It produced Albert Einstein. For the longest time, Germany was a very, very respected country when it came to intellectualism. Honestly, all we needed to do, get in a time machine, bring Al Bundy to that era in Germany, clean him up, get out of here, you thinkers and you poets. Al Bundy. Al Bundy. Al Bundy. An American hero.

If you were going to choose one person, because Al Bundy is a character as portrayed by another man. So you're going to take the actor. What's his name? You're going to take Ed O'Neill. Ed O'Neill. Ed O'Neill. Ed O'Neill. Yes.

You're going to take Ed O'Neill, the actor living comfortably, I imagine, somewhere in the Burbank or beautiful San Fernando Valley area of Los Angeles in 2018, and then you're going to bring him to pre-World War II Germany. World War I. Yes, absolutely. And clean it up. Get those thinkers out of there. Come on. Well, getting the thinkers out of there, that's how the Nazis came to power.

I'm going to say this. Okay, well, maybe that did happen then. I will say this, though. They did literally get all the thinkers out of there, that's how the Nazis came to power, dude. I'm going to say this. Okay, well, maybe that did happen then. I will say this, though. They did literally get all the thinkers out of there. That's what the whole thing was. Okay, I'm just going to say this, though. If everyone's like, I'm a thinker, just got to ask one question. What you thinking about?

Like, if it's something that happened in Germany that ended up happening in Germany, then you got to say you shouldn't think about that. I will say in Germany, it would have been better if we had a lot less doers. Yes. Well like Andre Cicatillo, Curtin killed women and children but Curtin was somewhat different in that he killed a few men as well. The only things that mattered to Curtin when he

selected victims was that he wouldn't get caught and the victim would have no chance of overpowering him. Peter Curtin even shares something with Ed Gein. Just as Gein inspired Psycho, Peter Curtin was one of the main inspirations for the very first true serial killer movie, Fritz Lang's masterpiece, M. And if you are, let's say you're one of the later generation millennials, it has a character actor in it, which you probably have not even heard of. It's a man named Peter Lorre, who's got one of the... generation millennials. It has a character actor in it, which you probably have not even heard of.

It's a man named Peter Lorre, who's got one of the, yes, thank you, one of the best voices in the world. One of the most fun, compelling actors in the world. So go back, go into your grandfather's closet and find one of these films and share a moment with an uncle. Share a moment with your papu.

Well, they would have to be an old uncle. Yeah, it would have to be like a decrepitely old uncle. Share a moment with your papu. Well, they would have to, you'd have to be an old uncle. Yeah, it would have to be like a decrepitly old uncle. That movie came out in 1932. Was Peter Lorre

ever in a Hollywood square? Was he ever one of the people in a Hollywood square? Actually, possibly. Because he was in Casablanca. He did a lot of stuff. We knew Peter Lorre

because he was in Looney Tunes a lot of times as a character. And he'd show up like this. And it's like, he just got a fun little voice. He's so funny. He's so tiny. And you know he fucked. I don't know. Now, while

Lang said that M was also inspired by two other German serial killers at the time, the main character, Hans Beckert, shares far more with Peter Curtin than any of the others in Germany at the time. And I say any of the others because Germany, before, during, and after World War I, had an explosion of serial killing totally unmatched in Europe, or so it seemed.

Is there like a sound for like, I'm the least shocked? Like, whoa. Well, reserve judgment for a little bit, but first, let's hear about some of these German serial killers. Karl Dinky, a.k.a. Papa Dinky. A.k.a. Stinky Dinky. I think we know that. That's funny.

Ah, ah, ah. I think we know what's going on. I hate this. I hate it. He killed and ate at least 30 homeless vagrants between 1903 and 1923. Vagrants denounce, denotes homeless. Right, right. Well, now, while very little is known about Papa Dinky's life because he hanged himself

two days after being caught, we know the number of victims and the length of his spree for two reasons. One, he kept a ledger that listed each and every murder. Fucking Germans. Just imagine your last words being like, come to Papa Dinky. I want to vomit right now. But you know, it's like, come to Papa Dinky. Like, he's like, I see him as a big Augustus Gloop style handlebar monster that's being

like, oh, look at your dirty feet. They are going to make some most delicious sausages. It's disgusting. Glistening, his skin all tight with nitrates. Like, sir, is your tub full of chocolate? That's not chocolate. I will tell you, you will not know for sure unless you get in. My little treat, my little chocolate-covered vagrant.

That's not chocolate, sir. That is not chocolate, sir. Papa Dinky's dookie. Ah, stinky dinky. The other reason why they knew he had so many victims was because when police searched his house after a homeless man ran out of his door with an axe wound to the head,

they found dozens of jars of pickled body parts and piles of bones that could have added up to as many as 42 people. Jeez. You know that if he really was in character, you'd have a couple, you'd have labeled like Kim Chi. You know what I mean? Like he would do like funny little puns, like Haunted Mansion style puns.

Yeah. Wow. Tom Ato Jam. So I don't know. I don't know. That's pretty clever, actually. This is horrific. How come we haven't heard about this guy before?

He ate more than Dahmer did. There's not a lot to Papi Dinky. There's very little known about Papa Dinky because he hung himself two days after he was caught. This is the early 1900s when a lot of this was happening, so there wasn't a whole lot of records kept. All they knew is that he was born, I think, in Eastern Europe somewhere. He moved to Germany. He played organ in the church on Sundays. I bet. I bet he did.

And he keeps bringing in stomachs. Oh, funny little jokes here, how I play the organ again for you. No one's laughing. Of course he did. Well, the worst part about Papa Dinky, though, is that he not only ate his victims, but reportedly he sold the flesh to unsuspecting customers in the local store he ran. Although there's no proof of that. There seems to be a lot of that in this time period in Germany, as we'll see as we get into the life of Peter Curtin and his childhood friends.

People just bought a lot of just like bags of meat without asking a lot of questions about where the meat came from. It is interesting, though, because I would like to see the Yelp reviews. I'm sure somebody loved it. That's how you know a real Yelp review is because that's what we've been doing recently. Every single time we say Yelp it, we go, Oh! That had to be somebody's favorite butcher. Well, there was another guy that actually did pretty much the same shit.

His name was Carl Grossman, a.k.a. the Berlin Butcher. He murdered up to 50 people during World War I and sold the meat from his victims at a hot dog stand that he ran next to a Berlin train station. So what you're telling me is it's a great time to be a cow. Like if this is like cow history, be like, we were totally safe. No idea what they were eating, but it wasn't us. So we were happy. It was the founders of Chick-fil-A.

They knew those happy dominance cows back in the day. My question is, I actually wonder we were joking that it may be people's favorite butchers, but people have said time and time again that human meat is very delicious in terms of like, it's got a lot of fat content, especially if they're big and they're sweet. So I actually wonder

if that is true. I wonder if it gets to a point where if you're buying a certain amount of meat, you're eating a hot dog. We don't know what the fuck's in a hot dog right now. I have no idea. It goes assholes and fucking knee meat, whatever the fucking else is around. A certain percentage of bug parts are allowed in it and poisons.

Well, and Germans have a lot of sweetbreads. A lot of meat and sweetbreads. It probably wouldn't taste that bad. I'm literally, I'm getting hungrier and hungrier the more we talk about it. Then, there was Johan Mayer, a.k.a. John Mayer.

I can't. Did he want to be a comedian? Like, oh my god. I can't even. Your body is a wonderland. What does that even mean? Body's a wonderland. She's like... Well, because Johan Mayer's left arm was amputated below the elbow, his actual nickname was Stumpfarm.

Sweet. I do like that. Old Stumpfarm. See, that is just so. Named right to the point. Right to the point. And it's so German to be like, it's not the one arm man. It's the one stump man.

It's like, we're going to focus mostly on the stump because that's the abnormality. And that's the thing we're all staring at. We're not even going to notice the arm. No, you go to Germany and a lot of people's nicknames I imagine are stuff like ugly face and fat belly. Whatever is the worst characteristic, lead with it. Oh, yeah. And fucking stump arm. He shot and killed five people in 1918, and in one double murder, he cut off the hands and heads of his victims

and switched them to, quote-unquote, disguise his actions. But there's still decapitated heads and decapitated arms, and the other bodies are over there. Yeah, absolutely. They kind of describe his actions more than disguise it. Also, doesn't he know anything? He's got to put a chainsaw on the stump.

That's what you do when you've got the stump bar. I will tell you, I was not one guilty of these crimes. Blames the stump. He always wanted knuckles. I did it. I'm seriously the stump. Oh, he's never talked out loud before. It's always inside my mind telling me to not do it, not do it, not do it.

Then, of course, was the one that many of you already know, Fritz Khamen, a.k.a. The Wolfman, who deserves an episode all of his own. He killed at least 24 boys and young men between 1918 and 1924, ripping out the throats of his victims with his own teeth in what he called his love bite. Oh, God. And that's not even mentioning Adolf Seafeld, a.k.a. Uncle Tic-Tac.

No, come on now. We can't have a Stinky Dinky and an Uncle Tic-Tac in one episode. I will say, Papa Dinky is a funny name. Uncle Tic-Tac, though, reminds me of the puppet from Saw. Like, it reminds me, Uncle Tic-Tac is like Babadook, where it's like a funny name, but it's a fucking very terrifying entity. Absolutely.

Yeah, his MO was among the most specific I've ever heard, as he exclusively poisoned little boys who were wearing sailor suits. Yeah, you know why? Because they were making fun of the uniform of our boys. Really? They're out there. They are appropriating sailor culture.

Right, sure. He killed like 10 of them. Gotta be. I would have nothing to do with it. What the hell? Can you imagine how much rage I would have created as a little boy if I just walked around in a sailor suit being like, Bet you can't buy me any candy because you're broke, old man.

They'd buy you some candy, I guarantee you that, just to get you to leave him alone. Of course, there's the question here. Yeah, you got him. I was ignored and it's why I am the way I am. Of course, there's a question here. Why Germany had so many serial killers in the early 20th century? And I'll admit that this was a question that's far too large for us to definitively answer. It requires a lot of sources.

Sources. But the thing is, we actually do have a couple here. Because, in helping me with the research for this, Carolina came up with a couple of possibilities. She's become a real Patty Hearst in your home. Oh my goodness. She really is just adopting. She just gave in and she flipped. Yeah, Marcus did it.

She flipped because she knew she had to get into it. She had to help because if not, she was going to go insane or Marcus was going to kill everybody. Fully indoctrinated. Interesting. Part of the reason why we worked is because she did this long before we even met.

Okay. Well, she came up with some possibilities. It's possible that Germany had no more serial killers than anyone else. What's more likely is that the Germans were just better than everyone else at catching them. There were a lot of super cops, it seemed like. Specifically, this one dude, Ernst Ganant. Cool.

He had a clearance rate of 90%. Now, do we know that he wasn't just arresting anyone i asked that same question okay because i could have a real if i'm a cop i could have a great record if i just like grab you like you're guilty you did it yeah we saw west benford's three it could happen again and again well there is actually not just that but this guy like completely redefined how policing was done in Germany. He came up with the partner system. He came up with the rotation system.

Starting in his early 20s, this guy was born to be a cop. This guy, he was one of the fathers of modern profiling. He even coined the term serial killer in 1930. He was the first one to use it, although he called it Zerlienmörder. Oh, cool. 1930. He was the first one to use it. Although he called it Zerlian murder. I think he was also the first cop to be solely fueled by horrible coffee and donuts. Actually, he was grossly

overweight and had to stop being a cop because he was too fat. That's the best retirement of all. It's the greatest retirement of all. Retirement by strudel. That's very, very interesting. I wonder where the basis for it comes from. I wonder why it's in Germany.

Why do they have the gumption? Efficiency. I mean, they are highly efficient and highly intelligent people. Again, what's the sound for least shocked? And what's the sound for least shocked? Well, the thing is, is that Carolina found an article that supported the fact that, you know, he probably did have a 90 percent clearance rate that was pretty clean. She found an article called Rethinking the Weimar Republic, 1916 to 1936. perception that serial murder was rampant in Germany during that time, there was actually a 40% decline in the German murder rate in the 20s. Not to raise too many alarm bells here, but...

Yeah, like how though, Marcus? It doesn't seem like there's anything to be alarmed about. Everything's really normal. The news cycle is really quiet and sleepy, and we're all just enjoying Halloween with no distractions. The news cycle is really quiet and sleepy and we're all just enjoying Halloween with no distractions. But Weimar Republic, Germany, where fascism was on the rise and the Nazis were coming into power, they were absolutely obsessed with true crime.

Not unlike America is in this day and age. Interesting. Let's move on. Yeah, because it's like it's a weird correlation between the entire government changing towards the worse and a bunch of people watching serial killer material as if it's sports games. Yeah. OK, interesting. But that is quite fascinating. the time is that despite uh things being the least violent than they that they ever were in germany the widespread perception was that crime was rampant crime was everywhere uh and people were absolutely obsessed with true crime so they talked about it all the time they uh wrote articles about it they wrote books about it which is why we which is why we read more about german serial killers than we would because essentially what i imagine is sort of like the pulpy magazines or that kind of – the true crime literature at the time would build up the ideas of all of these murderers and shit, which is why we're getting them now.

Yeah. Which is why maybe in other cultures, a lot of it had – the reason why we don't hear a lot about – I mean because the closest country we get to Germany is France. Yeah. But like we don't hear a lot about Italian serial killers and shit like like that because the monster of florence was a pretty big one in uh in italy but the germans they talked about it like how we know every time you hear a crazy story you're like that's florida but in reality that's also like wisconsin and arkansas it's just the sunshine laws and stuff like that yeah we just know all of the details in every single crime in florida because of the uh laws as to how much the newspapers can access criminal records in Florida.

And they were still doing, were they doing like newsreels when they went to the cinema? It was all newsreels, right? So this is probably pretty exciting stuff. Very exciting stuff. Keep the people in the seats. Oh, yeah. However, the monster we're covering today, despite Germany having that super cop, he was not actually caught by the police. His reign of terror was so erratic, yet so somehow controlled, that it was finished only when he decided it was.

was also a prolific criminal, impulsively committing assault, theft, rape, and arson for no other reasons than pure deviance and social misanthropy. And although Curtin's victims spanned a range of ages and included both men and women, Curtin didn't kill the less dead to satisfy his urges, like most serial killers do. Rather, Curtin killed victims who would specifically be missed he is a villain in all true uh in all true meaning of the word he is a guy that did every single thing he could to maximize pain terror and deviancy he is there was something about it it's like you know that if he did it he did it to then make sure he then did it as fucked up as he could do it. And then he loved telling everybody about it because he liked the look on their faces when they would register what he did.

And he would oftentimes speak to his victims while he in the mid murder. He would tell them like, I am the devil. I do this all the time and I will do it a hundred more times. You're just one. You're just one. You're just one. Calm German. Very scary. Always.

Very scary. So he went after the aristocrats and the wealthy and stuff like that? Every stripe. He didn't go to aristocrats and the wealthy. Not specifically. No. He didn't go for rich people. He went for people like children.

He went for young women. I mean, he went for, like, one of his victims was a fairly prominent man in his little suburb. He was a mechanic, but he was still a well-known mechanic. He was well-liked. He chose victims whose deaths would have the most impact on society at large. Absolutely, man. You killed a town mechanic. That is a huge, huge disservice.

But Peter Curtin, on his way was a missionary killer yes because he had he was then again then we're seeing pans ram a stripe of pans ram in this where he viewed all of society as his enemy yeah it was part of the point because besides the obvious sexual component in which you know curtain totally admits to this being an absolute sexual thing he believed that society had wronged him in the past. So therefore, society must pay with those most precious to it. So he just got super aroused every time he saw a broken down car. He's like, once again, the mechanic won't fix your vehicle.

I would put him up if there again, I don't want to talk about it all the time like this, but if Albert Fish and him were in a horny contest, I don't know who would win. I don't know how you measure it all the time like this but if Albert Fish and him were in a horny contest I don't know who would win I don't know how you measure who's the most horny I think you just show them round objects and then move to square objects if you're still getting hard but Peter Curtin used to get so hard

so often that it was a part of it it was his driving force like literally a driving force since he was a child well however although Peter Curtin was a child. Okay. Well, however, although Peter Curtin was a ghastly, repulsive monster on the

inside, he appeared to the world as the very definition of a well-put-together man. He was described as slim and good looking. He put great care into his appearance every day. He wore cologne and he kept his hair slick back full of pomade.

Yep, got that pomade. He looks really good and that's a part of, again, this is my feeding to my theory of his system of total control is that he wanted to make sure that he looked exactly how he wanted. He wanted to be beautiful doing it. Technically, that is sort of like the satanic

ideal. He wanted to be the monster. He wanted to be the monster. He wanted to be the monster, but I also can fool you. And I have a wife, and I have a house, and I have a job. But this whole normal side of my life is also a part of my sexual game. So very type A, complete opposite of our vampire of Sacramento. Definitely. And the appearance thing, that was the last ingredient that allowed Peter Curtin

to kill at least nine people, probably a lot more. And it allowed him to attempt to kill dozens of others. So, perhaps Peter Curtin shared more with the modern version

of a vampire than it seems at first glance. And he could turn into smoke. Ooh. Remember that movie Dead and Loving It? Yeah. What was that?

Oh, my God. Now I'm blanking. Leslie Nielsen. Leslie Nielsen was the greatest. That's why Dracula's dead and loving it. Leslie Nielsen is an enema. That's the only bit in it that works. The best vampire of all time, Leslie Nielsen.

But before we get into the story itself, let's acknowledge our two sources for this series. The first is Monster by C.L. Sweeney. Now while it is entertaining, it straight up ignores huge parts of Curtin's personality for the sake of a clean narrative and inexplicably changes the murder weapon in certain cases

despite concrete evidence that proves otherwise. It's a little sloppy. Why? It's very sloppy. They did that same thing with the Iceman movie. Why change this stuff? But this is non-fiction. It's supposed to be a true accounting, but he completely changes murder weapons

for I have no reason why. Okay. The other source, though, is perhaps the first modern classic of true crime, whose first printing is considered by some to be the holy grail of true crime book collecting. That is considered by some to be the holy grail of true crime book collecting. That book is The Sadist by Dr.

Carl Berg. Man, if you want a thorough German examination of a serial killer, this book is a fucking spotlight into this dude's life. And a part of it is, and what I like about it too, because again, what do we know, how do we know as much as we do

about Peter Curtin's murders from his confessions? Peter Curtin loved talking about it. But this is one of the first books I've read. And this is from fucking the 1930s where a doctor was like, I immediately assumed that he was full of shit because all he did was say all of these details.

And then Peter Curtin, it's like the taking back at the doctor saying that my confessions could be full of shit. He was like, it's true. Because of my history in the world of crime, I long and love to create false narratives of crimes. And you would talk about it. You talk about how you would also lie and then not lie and do whatever you want. It's great.

But it's a great book. It's crusadist. Okay. Oh, yeah. Well, the guy that wrote it, he was the medical examiner who worked the Carton case. So this guy had very extensive knowledge of the autopsies and of the bodies. And there are some amazingly gruesome pictures in this. Yeah, we just empathized with Carolina's life having to deal with all the true crime research of this show.

But imagine being that dude's wife. What a nightmare. She loves it. Because she goes, all day he's looking at stabbed, and all night he's stabbing her body. You know what I'm talking about? I don't know. Ba-boom, ba-boom, ba-boom, ba-boom, with the polka music playing in the background. Nothing is more romantic than a German couple deep in their 50s.

I don't know. It's a very interesting view of couples in Germany at this time. Well, the thing is, likery said like this had this book has extensive interviews with peter curtain himself and although he did lie uh like andre cicatillo like peter curtain had a near photographic memory uh and the things he lied about like he lied about his capture he lied about his relationship with his wife but a lot of his recollections more or less match up with both autopsy reports and the testimonies of survivors and that's even survivors who never reported their attacks and were tracked down only after curtain confessed and had no idea that curtain was involved and

didn't come to the police and say like hey i think i was a victim of peter curtain it was the police going out and saying like hey so what happened on this night? Did something happen to you? And they're like, yeah, something did. This is what happened to me. And the thing was that while the specific details didn't match up all the time with Peter Curtin, the general details did. He liked to play with the truth and he liked to play with storytelling. and he also there was a part of it is that because he would talk about the erotic quotient of his memories

yeah he said that he could come just remembering like he would go back to the scene of the crime and he would come his pants just sitting there remembering yeah and a part of what it was is that i think he liked to keep the true details for himself. Well, I mean, how many pair of pants did this guy have? I mean, that seems crazy. Just walking around Dusseldorf. I even forgot about that one. You got no idea how much shooting is going to be in this episode. No kidding.

A lot of that, huh? Jack Goulash. But you know what it is? I don't know if he played with stories, though. He's not Hans Christian Andersen here. I mean, it seems like he was just kind of a liar. I mean, storyteller. That's not Hans Christian Anderson here. I mean, it seems like he was just kind of a liar. I mean, storyteller? That's how we say it in my family instead of mine.

So, without further ado, let's tell the full story of Peter Curtin, a.k.a. the Vampire of Dusseldorf. If you want to be happy for the rest of your life, don't make a pretty woman your wife. I'm going to be doing a lot of dirty pokers.

Oh, okay. Peter Curtin was born in Germany's Mülheimlein in 1883, the oldest of 13 children. Didn't notice that also. 13. Unlucky. Interesting. There you go. He came from a family of alcoholics, and as such, Curtin grew up in grinding poverty.

And since Peter was the oldest, he'd get the worst of his father's drunken rages. Then, after the beatings, Peter would lay bloody in the corner of their one-bedroom apartment and was forced to watch his father rape his mother and sisters. And Peter would sometimes have to endure direct sexual abuse from his father as well. I will say in one of the only cases I've ever read this, the father ends up going to jail for incest later on. They actually, the sisters and also testified against the father. And you very rarely get that sort of there was some sort of justice. So considering Peter Curtin's upbringing,

it isn't much of a surprise that Peter's antisocial behavior began at a young age. He claims to have committed his first murder at nine years old. And there is some evidence to support that claim. Some people say that I've murdered, but I would say some

people don't like chocolate. Well, did you poison the chocolate? Many secrets. Nine years old. Nine years old. Was this a murder of an adult or another child? Well, here's the story. Peter had been invited out to a rafting trip on the River Rhine with two of his friends.

As they sailed down the river, Peter pushed one of the boys off the side just to see what would happen. Now, while that could technically be attributed to a kid just not understanding the consequences of his actions, what Peter said happened next shows definite premeditation. The other kid jumped into the river to try to save the one that was drowning, but when the kid couldn't save him, he tried getting back up in the raft. So Peter impulsively reached down and held his exhausted young friend's

head underwater until the kid drowned. Can you imagine that in the movies? Like the movie version of this? Like camera up through the water like in just his smile child like wolf face going Very creepy. Very creepy. So now, so both the water like in just his smile child like wolf face going very creepy very creepy so now so both

of those kids died yeah so his first murder was a double homicide I guess the first one would probably be manslaughter and the second one was I would say like a manslaughter murder and then he had to do the whole rafting trip alone oh yeah that's what he always wanted

but it was like what's his name remember the little girl that was in that movie the piano and she to do the whole rafting trip alone. Oh, yeah. Is that what happened? That's what he always wanted. But it was like, what's his name? Remember the little girl that was in that movie, The Piano, and she got nominated for an Oscar. Yes, and well-deserved. That was her first film. Yeah, well-deserved, yeah. And when Peter was found later floating down the river alone, he was crying, and he told the authorities

that the boys had fallen off the river in an accident a little while back. And the thing was, this happened. At the very least, two kids drowned on a rafting trip with Peter Curtin when he was nine years old. If this whole thing ends with it being proportional dwarfism, I'm going to be really upset. That's a reference to Orphan. Yeah, and the thing is that we really only have peter himself to vouch for the method of how the boys die and then we have the cover for problem child

four which is just him alone in the rack with the two empty life vests next to him well either way peter said that this was the moment he realized he could talk his way out of pretty much anything if only he showed the emotions that people were expecting to see. And if there was no hard evidence that he'd done anything wrong. I think it's the ladder that really, really helps you get away with it. Especially as a little kid. But it's like you can sort of imagine it because you've seen little kids do this.

She's like, and then he fell in the river. And then Bobby went in and got him out. And then I floated down the river alone. Horrified. Man, that's a really scary story. Yeah. A sociopath nine-year-old. Have you seen Facebook?

It's mostly, it's mostly. No, I don't even know what the kids are on anymore. Now, Peter Curtin didn't become the vampire of Dusseldorf all on his own. Like Richard Ramirez, Curtin got outside help in developing his eventual monstrous persona. Yeah, of course. You need to get the monster squad. He had the mummy. He had the werewolf.

He had... But in real life. But in real life. Okay. Well, besides the almost daily torments of his father, both seen and experienced, Peter made friends with a dog catcher in his apartment building in Dusseldorf. Well, I love catching dogs. Look what we got puffing right here.

I get little pets. It's so nice. It's a nice thing to get them on your lap, but they kill them. Yeah. Well, apparently back then, a German dog catcher didn't just roll around town picking up strays to bring him back to the pound. Dog catcher didn't just roll around town picking up strays to bring him back to the pound. Dog catchers back then would catch dogs, kill them, and butcher them for meat.

Selling the lard to doctors to, quote unquote, fix cobwebs over wounds. Can you imagine being in the urgent care, right? Like you just chop the tip of your thumb off while chopping garlic while screaming about your manager. Was that a personal story for you? And so you're in the area, but they go and they patch it up. They stitch it. And we're like, we just want to say, just like, you know, it's like, go ahead and we'll take your insurance. Great.

And it's like, and also you can think you're the fixing your injury to muffins. And the little picture of the dog that you got the lard from. Oh my goodness. Okay. Well, my goodness. Okay. Well, this sort of work naturally attracted a certain sort of person. What? I would think so. And it seems as if the dog catcher that lived in Peter's building was among the worst.

This guy tortured and mutilated his catches before killing them. And then, once they were dead, he would have sex with the dog corpses. What? All while laughing like he was having the time of his life. Oh, right. What is... Like, do the Dom DeLuise laugh as he's acting. What the...

As he's fucking his dogs. Right. Instead of getting his eyes in his lap. Dead dogs. What on earth? How do we know this? How did this evidence come to light? Peter Curtin. Peter Curtin. Oh, my God.

Yeah, and Peter said, like, he did all of this in front of Peter, and Peter was nine years old. This whole time, the guy's gleefully encouraging Peter to do this. All right. So Peter Curtin didn't have a chance in hell. He did not. Basically, right? No, no, no. I mean, this is brutal.

This is absolutely brutal. Yeah. Peter said the guy even showed him how to make a dog ejaculate. What every nine-year-old boy wants to know. And he said the dog catcher told him that after you did that to a dog, according to Peter, quote, An animal like that can't even be beaten away. You know what? I'm going to retroactively put gold star on this right here.

This is nasty. I did. I did forget. This is like a gold star. Like, this is like through and through gold star. Well, you're just springing it on us, Marcus. I did not have my gold star brain on. I could just imagine the dog catchers being like, you know, Peter, you're a fun guy.

You're a funny little kid. I know I'm 45 and you're nine. We're having a fun time, right? You're enjoying yourself. Yeah, I drink water. I drink beer instead of water because the beer is clean as is of water. Yeah, you see, we're having fun time. But I want to show you something special. Something fun. We've never

done this before. You know that dogs make horrible milk? Oh my god. How do they do it? I tell you, you pull on that udder. You pull on that udder till it squeals. That's not milk. Well, so after this, that began an adolescence of bestiality

for Peter Curtin. Now, this is actually a serious question. Sure. You grew up in a rancher's lifestyle. Yep. Well, I mean, in a rancher town, like the lifestyle was, I mean, it was fine. But yeah, a ranch town. Yeah.

With people that are surrounded by animals, how often and how normalized is bestiality? By the time I was a teenager, it was- If you end that sentence with had sex with 18 dogs, the podcast is over. In many ways, it's over. By the time I was 18. No, no, no. That was completely out of vogue. But back in the day, pretty prevalent.

So someone's having sex with a cow. They're like, it's pretty in vogue right now. You're going to want to do it too. It, pretty prevalent. So someone's having sex with a cow. They're like, it's pretty in vogue right now. You're going to want to do it too. It's pretty cool. Well, having sex with cows is so 1975. Oh, you mean it's out of vogue? Yeah. I had sex with a fish yesterday.

That's how cool I am. I'm a regular David Bowie. Wow. I've heard many, many a story. Well, if you really want to go mine through the roundtable of gentlemen episodes, I'm sure we've had a conversation. I'm not supposed to talk about it anymore. I'm just curious about whether or not it's like-

Yeah, it's pretty normal. But I mean, but in my, where I grew up, like you're talking about calves. So, you know, it's much, it's a larger thing. It got hooves. They're going to hurt you if you're not careful. Yeah, man. Yeah. You usually need to have help. Go read

The Last Picture Show. It'll tell you all about it. Okay. Wonderful. Great. Now I definitely am gonna race to fucking Barnes & Noble and get that. Gotta get it. Fantastic American novel. It's wonderful. Hit Barnes & Noble. Employ him. Look for the book with the guy who has sex with all the cops. The Last Picture Show.

Well, the thing is about Peter Curtin, it wasn't just dogs. Pretty soon, he moved on to sheep, as many young boys did at the time. But it was in this that Peter first made the connection between sex and violence. This was it. This was it. Or at the very least, violence done by him. He said that when he was 13, he had broken into a pen and was attempting to have sex with a sheep. The sheep, though, wouldn't sit still, so Peter stabbed it, and in that moment, he ejaculated. But it went far beyond dogs and sheep.

Good, yeah. Yeah, that's where I'm doing the episode, Marcus. Yeah, if it's just on there, he could have just been a guy that was with a lot of animals. I don't know. We're still in the animal kingdom here. Like, we're still, we're hanging around mammalia. Are we going to have a pink flamingo's chicken scene

coming up here any time soon? Peter Curtin said when he was 14, he broke a squirrel's neck, and in that moment, he ejaculated. Another time, he just saw a horse bleeding to death on the streets. And in that moment, he ejaculated. Did he really? Okay.

I'm saying, man, to be honest, to be this horny at a point has to be an inconvenience. Yeah, of course. I would think so. Especially for the animals. And this continued even during his murder spree. On one night in 1930, he was walking near the edge of a lake in Dusseldorf when he spotted a sleeping swan. He grabbed it, cut off the head, then drank the blood flowing from the stump. And in that moment, he ejaculated.

Okay, so that is... Saw that coming. That was no ordinary prize-winning story there. I saw that coming. I also think, is that the original ending to The Ugly Duckling? Whoa, how fucking dark that would be. That's if Darren Aronofsky redoes it in a movie. But do you think he looked at that swamp and he's like,

okay, what's the most mental fucking way I can fuck up this lake? Can you imagine walking through the park? Not having a good day in the park? Not anymore, bitch. Oh my goodness. All right. Yeah, just some maniac drinking blood from this long stump of a swan. I will tell you what, you can at least thank me for not using a straw.

I guess its neck was the straw that he was using, which is disgusting. Why is it this? So people knew he was doing this? No. They did not know this? No, people did not know he was doing this. Oh, right. Because if they did, theoretically, he would have gotten into some trouble, right?

Yeah, he wasn't a YouTuber desperate for content. Okay. All right. Good to know. Well, Curtin said that many times it wasn't necessarily the act of taking a life that made him ejaculate. It was simply the sight and sound of gushing blood. This is what he said to Dr. Berg during one interview.

You can imagine that, Professor, and you must try it for yourself sometime. How the blood rushes absolutely silently when you cut off the head of a goose. What a horrible day to be a janitor.

At that therapist's office, when he comes in, you just know in two hours, you got a lot of cleanup to do. Well, they put a tin underneath him. They put like a litter box underneath the chair. But I feel like professors in Germany, I mean, like, to be honest, it's like psychologists in Germany

or psychologists in general, it's like, don't get me wrong, there's gonna be psychologists out there. I'm gonna ask these questions quite a bit as we go, but I feel like psychologists would be like, yes. Oh, you got one? Like, this is a good story? Yeah, this is a good one, yeah. And by the way, as far as how Peter preferred his

ejaculations, he said spilling it out of a flaccid member was the nicest way of all. Oh, yeah, absolutely. Like, you're dropping your gum out of your mouth. There's nothing better than, like, at the end of the strudel soft penis just goes

just like when you got the toaster strudel and you got that one little like pea sized dollop of it left in and you're just trying to slap the packet until it gets all out the old one eye weep it is disgusting but again you can see

how it's being contrary. It's him saying this fucked up stuff. He is so contrarian, he comes soft? Yes. That's how you know he's contrarian? He is the most libertarian comer of all. Good lord. I don't even need to be hard.

You don't need to be hard. So when Peter was 16, he decided that he'd had enough of his family, so he ran away from home. His father had just set him up with a job at a local woodwork, so Peter broke in, stole 300 marks, and took off. And this is actually after his, that was his father's final, because they knew about the animal fucking. They knew about all this stuff as a little kid. And he said, that's what broke the stramble, that's the straw that broke the camel's back with his father. Because his father set him up with the job. And then he was just like, fuck you.

And he took money. Well, I don't think the straw that broke the camel's back is the proper analogy. We don't need to have any more ejaculate conversation. It's the dick that hit the camel's prostate. Right. But then his dad has no standing here to be ashamed of his son because his dad's a horrible piece of crap himself sure it was actually during the investigation into the theft that investigators discovered all of the rape and incest that was going on in the curtain home and that's how uh peter curtain's father got arrested and sent to prison okay a peter curtain was caught four days after the theft and thus began a life of imprisonment theft rape arson

and murder that would last for over a quarter century until his capture in 1930 from 1900 to 1904 peter was in and out of prison for a series of thefts then in 1904 he committed a string of barn arsons that earned him an eight-year stretch behind bars. Barn arson, how many times in a row you get a free sub over at Subway? I don't know, the old barson there. And prison was the place,

according to Peter Curtin, that made him who he was. Of course, Peter did not blame himself for committing these senseless crimes that had no real purpose. He blamed all his bullshit on authority figures, saying they, quote, caused him to be so dedicated at seeking revenge. Okay.

However, he never went into why that time was so awful. Although Peter was ready to talk to Berg about any of his horrific times, do it with a smile, the only time he'd get angry or really show any emotion other than joy was when prison was brought up. He said that they, the one thing that, a detail that I saw is that he said that they would use the, they would use the punishment of fettering more often than not. That doesn't sound good. But that is being chained to

a wall. So they said that they would use ankle chains. These fetters. They would chain them to a wall and they said that one of the only times that he was viewed by an outside person is that a local bishop came and saw him in the fetters and was so moved that his

punishment, he fell to his knees and kissed the fetters out of pure moved at his punishment he fell to his knees and kissed the fetters out of pure sorrow which is just like first of all disgusting he was just trying to suck that little boy's feet who knows so this is like we talk about the stew all the time we are in full on

this has got the childhood with the dad this is a slow cooker marinade of gabadouche. I don't know what the hell this is. So what I firmly believe, I'm sure prison, I'm sure they did horrible things. God knows what they were doing in German prisons in the early 19th century. Well, I mean, he said 20th century.

He said he did spend a lot of time in solitary, but he said that was the only time he really enjoyed in prison because he got a little alone time uh but mostly curtain said he spent all his time thinking about murdering the entire world again that's where you're gonna ask what you're thinking about what are you thinking but you never say anything you go nothing nothing that's how you know it's bad but i will say this has been the difference between pans ram and him right because i do believe he was thinking about murdering the entire world, but not in sort of that driven, I want him. I wish the whole world had a throat so I could crush it thing. I think it actually made him hard. Yeah.

I think he wanted to, because yeah, Panzram just wanted to take care of the world all in one fell swoop. Peter Curtin wanted to kill every person one by one. Slowly, huh? Yeah. He wanted to take care of it himself. In fact, he said this, quote, I'd think about attacking staff and inmates, setting the place on fire. I'd like to sabotage the railways to kill as many people as possible.

Yeah. If I had the means, I would have killed the masses. I would have caused catastrophes. Honestly, he sounds like a character I just friended in Red Dead Redemption. He sounds like a character I just friended in Red Dead Redemption, and that makes me really I'm going to talk to my character about geese.

And when we drive by a dead horse, I'm just going to look at him really, really close and make sure everything's okay. Oh, you mean floating slushies? McCurtain, he did his time, and when he was released back onto the streets, he made good on his promise to unleash chaos upon the world, hitting the ground running with his first confirmed murder.

Okay. See, when Peter was released, he went straight back to petty thievery, specializing in houses where the ground floor was used primarily as a business Now, the way he puts this, he did do this for survival. Yeah. Like, he was on the streets. He was living on the street. He had no other job.

I mean, obviously, he didn't try to get an honest job. But a part of it was that he was just stealing to eat as much as he could. Okay. He was just stealing to eat as much as he could. Okay. So on May 25th, 1913, Peter Curtin targeted an inn called the Wursthaus Peter Klein Schenke, owned and operated by who else but Peter Klein. On that night, Curtin moved from room to room, finding nothing to steal,

until he spotted 10-year-oldine klein asleep in her feather bed acting on a whim curtain entered her room strangled the little girl and sawed her throat open with his pocket knife he then masturbated and left and there's other details in there too i'm not going to talk about him i don't want want to talk about him. You don't want to hear him. If you have the burning urge to know the more horrific details of Peter Curtin's crimes, you can go ahead and check it out online. But I don't want to get into it. His ultimate in perversion, we'll just say it out loud. Just one thing.

He liked to degrade the bodies. That was his thing. That's what he would do. But for us to go into detail after detail, it's going to be a point where you're just going to drive your car into the fucking river. Right, exactly. We don't want, we cannot have dead listeners. So this was the first kill.

This is his first confirmed kill. He really jumped into the deep end here. That's why I don't think it was his first kill. Right. This is the part of it, because the idea of jumping straight from petty theft to full-on sex murder of a little girl on a whim is very interesting. And it's also the way he did it, too, because that little pocket knife would become a thing that he did again and again. He would purposely stab the throat with a little just to make the spurt come out.

Well, he did say that he attempted to strangle a woman in 1899. There was a couple of attempts before this. A lot of times the guys the serial killers, they don't go all in with the first kill even though they may commit some assaults and rapes before that. But Peter

Curtin, he went all in. He knew immediately what he liked. As soon as it happened, the thrill that went through his body was a thing that he said that he was trying to reproduce that feeling again and again and again. Right. So the next day after the murder, he returned to the scene of the crime and had a beer at a cafe across the street so he could bask in the misery he'd caused, later saying that all the horror and indignation did him good. Now, Peter thought that he'd left nothing behind at the crime scene, but it turned out

that he'd actually left a very incriminating piece of evidence. He dropped a handkerchief that had his initials embroidered into the fabric. Fucking Mr. Beaning it over here. Yeah. Unfortunately, though, PK also happened to be the initials of the victim's father, Peter Klein. So rather than drive the investigation towards Curtin, the handkerchief actually sent investigators on a wild goose chase that damn near got another man hung. Oh, my God.

Oh, yeah, dude. It destroyed the entire Klein family. Yeah. See, the night before, Peter Klein was seen having a very public altercation over money with his brother Otto in a local tavern. According to witnesses, the last thing Otto said before he left was that he was going to do something that his brother would remember for the rest of his life. Cut to him just double-deckering the upstairs toilet.

Just be like, exactly. I mean, he's always going to remember this. There's no way. He's going to laugh about this every Christmas time. And that's a classic prank. It's a great prank. Yeah, naturally. Now, even though Otto was just as distraught as everyone else, I mean, his niece was dead.

His beloved niece had been horrifically murdered. Even though he was just as distraught, brutal crimes, as we well know, often result in hasty arrests. So this poor guy was charged with the murder of his niece, which damn near added a second death to an already tragic murder. which damn near added a second death to an already tragic murder. Otto, though, was thankfully acquitted, but he was never the same and died in the killing fields of World War I just two years later. Yikes. Meanwhile, Peter Curtin's impulsive act of murder had only left him wanting more. In June, he began the first of his many phases

because throughout Peter's career, he experimented with a wide range of techniques and weapons, which is part of what made him so difficult to even identify, much less catch. And to me, that is a subconscious, almost bragging. Yeah. The way he would talk about his crimes later on, the simple and direct detail work. And he would talk also about upping his game. And he would talk about trying to add things to his toolbox. He would add stuff like talk. He would say he was searching for a new thrill.

He would do all this stuff. He would purposely try to make the crime a way that he would be easily caught. And then he would just manage to get away from everybody, like we talk about with A.J. Chomsky. So he was adapting, and I don't know if this will stay in or not, but you guys have a horrible idea about what's going to happen with Michael Phelps. And I want to say this. Speaking of adapting, Michael Phelps, Olympic hero, hats off, thank you, sir. All those gold medals didn't go unnoticed.

But you know what else is going unnoticed? His work in mental health. He is working in mental health now, and you guys think he's a sociopath and he is not. He's saving lives. I never thought he was a sociopath. That wasn't my opinion. That was Henry's opinion. My opinion is just saying because of fate and because people like watching our heroes tumble and because

of the pressure of that, I can see Michael Phelps just being in a scenario somewhere in his 40s where there's a dead woman in his pool. It's not him. It's not him. It's not him. He's involved. It's his buddy Craig.

Who? Craig? I never have a friend named Craig. No, that's not true. Craig Rowan is a wonderful friend of mine. Yes, he's a wonderful guy. Your pretty face is going to hell. Check him out on that show.

Michael Phelps doing some good work. He is doing some good work, and I applaud him for being open about his struggles with mental illness. Yeah, even making his fall even more ripe for the media to allow themselves to dance on his grave. Well, the first weapon that Peter Curtin experimented with was a hatchet.

At about 11 o'clock on a Saturday night, one month after the Klein murder, Curtin had left home with what he called his chopper. Get back to the chopper! He spotted a girl of about 20 about to walk into a building alone. Curtin said he walked up behind her just as she was entering, and he whacked her on the head with the thick side of the hatchet,

sending her crumpling to the ground without a sound as Peter ran away. Now, this is very common with Peter Curtin. He is not a, he sort of tracks his victims, but really spur the moment. He likes heat and it's all outside. He's like Chickatillo. Yes, it's all just whatever can come.

And that's a part of the reason why I think, I think that when you spend a lot of times doing the sort of stalking and doing all this you're opening yourself up to being investigated you're opening yourself up to being seen which is a part of the sexual play of people who spend a long time choosing their victims especially like BTK where he liked the build he liked doing up where Peter Curtin who was that he had an impulse he walked out of the door he saw somebody he murdered them immediately yeah well the next month Curtin walked up to a man sitting on a park bench just as the sun was setting. And Peter sunk the sharp edge of the hatchet into the man's skull, again causing the victim to silently collapse.

But this time, Curtin took cover nearby and watched as the blood flowed from the wound. And in that moment, he ejaculated. He ejaculated. Oh, I thought that was going to be different this time. No, no. Absolutely. I do wish he didn't say, did I do that? Every single time that he did that, because it's like, again, you know, because catch

graces wear thin, which is why I stopped doing Detective Popcorn for as long as I have. Right. Absolutely. Well, there was one more attempt made on a sleeping teenage girl, but a man jumped up from a nearby bed just as Curtin was about to swing the hatchet, so Curtin just threw it down on the girl's blanket and ran off. That last one is interesting

because there was actually a witness to corroborate the story. The man who jumped out of the bed was the girl's father, and he later reported that he did indeed find a hatchet in his daughter's bed one night after chasing a man away. But did he go to the police in this situation? It's so fucking difficult. They're

already sleeping in a tenement house. It's so difficult for them to piece all this shit together. What are they going to do? I don't know if it was lower income. I think it was like, you know, middle, like probably lower middle. I'm not sure exactly. But yeah.

So he got he's been sloppy since day one then with the handkerchief and now the X. Yeah. I mean, he's just kind of doing whatever. But it's also erratic. It's weird that it's so erratic because he seems like he's all buttoned up. He's got everything. All his shoes are shined. That's what I'm saying. He's wearing nice outfits, good mustache.

It's all about the packaging. All of it is on purpose. Each part of it. Him being super erratic is a part of the game. It's about seeing what he can get away with. Yeah. But that attempt on the teenager, that would be Curtin's last attempt for many years, because in 1914, things got a little hairy in Germany. Curtin?

What happened, Marcus? Curtin was conscripted for service in World War I, but predictably deserted before he saw a moment's combat. Because this is what Marcus and I were talking about a little bit, about how it i was just like well if he just held out because he got arrested in 1930 it's like he could have been a part of the fucking german government or he could have been a successful german business but you imagine someone yelling at him i think you just freak out that's what we said he's got yeah he's got a too much of a rebellious streak he couldn't he couldn't stand authority so he actually probably would have hated the nazis yeah probably yeah but for you know different reasons that everyone else doesn't like to be told what to do exactly he's like i'll be a nazi on my own i was already doing the nazi shit you're a bunch of fucking hacks stealing my bullshit

well because he deserted he was arrested soon after and he spent the entirety of world war one plus three years extra in a military prison and was released in 1921 after seven years. So he got to miss the whole war. Miss the whole thing. Yeah. Not so bad, actually, really. Kind of got exactly what he wanted in a way.

Following that, Peter reconnected with one of his sisters and joined her in a small town called Eltenburg, where he made the acquaintance of his future wife, Augusta. Now, Augusta had a bit of a checkered past herself. I think it's kind of fun. She had shot and killed a gardener with whom she'd had an eight-year relationship after he suddenly broke off their engagement in 1911, and she'd done five years in prison for the crime. That's sexy.

Prison sentences are quite interesting given the extreme crime. It's just like, you've got five years for the murdering of a stupid little garden it's not right it's not right but it's very interesting because he showed up at his wife's his sister's house he showed up at his sister's house and it's like a whole other guy showed up he showed up being like sister i'm here i'm going to bring the sort of house guest life back into this house i'm your sin bad yeah it's like when fester shows up in adam's family and you're like, I don't think he's really Fester. I don't know. And he didn't tell his sister that he'd been in prison the entire time.

He's like, oh, yeah, I was in Zavore. It kind of sucked, but, you know, I'm fine. I'm here now. Anyway, now back to dancing at the discotheque. But he met Augusta and she was like, because they were desperate to hook August up, because Augusta was a spinster because she sort of killed her last fiance. Kind of, yeah. Seems like it. Now, the romantic myth of these two that somehow got propagated over the years

was that Peter Curtin was a monster to the rest of the world, yet was a kind and loving husband to his wife, and he was never, ever mean to her, much less abusive. It is the exact opposite always this is the ice man narrative too these people are horrible it's the exact same narrative as the ice man because as we know like the monster in the streets sweetheart and the sheets trope doesn't exist in the real world you gotta flip that yeah a psychopath is a psychopath no matter what and they don't just magically leave their shit outside when they come home at night.

I mean, isn't the only one that I would push back mildly on is Dennis Rader? Because I heard, according to his oldest daughter, he was actually a really good dad. I'm going to bring this up again. This is the connection between him and BTK. And I'd love for a psychologist, a listener, to tell me if I'm right or if i'm wrong or their opinion about this is that i believe that that curtain same thing with btk all of it is the game yeah all of it is right so being a good dad was actually like a psychopathic victory for dennis raider being a quote-unquote successful husband what you're going to find out though he did repeatedly rape his own wife yeah he was very very abusive he was the terror to be around but a part of it is that is the outside of it a whole part of us it's like i how empty are

psychopaths yeah like and i mean like clinical psychopaths like right or can they actually feel the emotional love do they know what that means because love is about specifically about having empathy and understanding of somebody else's feelings and looking out for somebody else in their life so am I imagining it's like I can't for the amount of chaos and horror

that both of those men caused the idea that they would flip and be somebody else other people it's like I don't think so I don't think that's possible. Dennis Rader is the only one that stands out in my mind. Well, I think Henry is right about that, at least as far as Dennis Rader goes. Because you could see Dennis Rader providing for his family and his wife. I love you so much.

You're so good to us. You're such a good man. And him just thinking in his head, can't wait to get back to the garage. I got a brand new pair of panties in there. him just thinking in his head can't wait to get back to the garage and then i because you know what it is because people because when what i've read about psychopathology is that it's not evil it's shallowness yeah it's this thing it's that there's nothing there there is no peter curtain it's just a man operating like a robot in a in order to keep his shit together in society. Yeah.

Well, for an example, as far as Peter and Augusta went, they went out on a couple of dates when they first met. And when Augusta refused to sleep with Peter, he told her he'd stick a knife through her ribs if she didn't. By 1923, they were married and that pattern held until he went to prison. And for some reason, some people, like these writers out there, are trying to make it sound like, oh, Peter Curtin, that's the one thing I... How...

He loved his wife so much, and he sacrificed so much for his wife. Some people don't have redeeming qualities. Yeah, exactly. Some people are just straight-up pure monsters. You know what it is, though? It's selling a narrative. I can see why you want that, because a part of it, you want to say that it makes it more interesting that he has this double life.

That's why the Iceman was, you know, why they made the movie the way they did in the Iceman. Dylan Klebold, Eric Harris, same fucking bullshit. I hate that lie, that propagated lie over and over again. It's so bad. They're just bad people. Yeah. Well, the saddest part about Augusta was that she believed that she deserved her life with Peter Curtin because she'd killed her ex-fiance over a decade earlier and that anything that he did to her was just punishment for what she'd done. But at the very least, Peter Curtin did not immediately go back to a life of public crime following his release from prison like he had the time before. He kept his shit relatively under control for a full four years until he arrived back

in Dusseldorf in 1925. But he purposely sought out going back to Dusseldorf. Yes, he did. There was something about going back to the old stomping grounds that he wanted. He was like, because I wanted to go back and bring hell specifically to Dusseldorf. Right, like how Michael Myers goes back to Haddonfield. It's exactly like that. And that, in Dusseldorf, is when Peter Curtin's true reign of horror began in 1925.

He started by attacking women on the street, strangling and raping four between 1925 and 1928. And in that same period, Curtin committed, by his reckoning, 32 cases of arson around Dusseldorf. Those included two houses, four barns, one plantation, a forest, and a whole shitload of sheds. Jeez. A lot of sheds.

So many sheds. So hard to put up a shed. You gotta plank it all down. And you know what it is, too, and then Curtin said it, because his favorite part, it wasn't about the fires and stuff, it's like, he loved the chaos afterwards. He loved seeing all the people struggle to go, and all he ever did was hope that somebody was inside, that they would die.

So he's doing horrible things to people, horrible things to anything around. Yeah, anything around him. Yeah, in One Night Alone in 1929, he set fires in ten locations, and all this was building back to the act that Curtin had first supposedly committed when he was just nine years old. Murder. Murder.

Murder. Honestly, he and Varg Vikernik may have been good friends. Didn't Varg burn down a bunch of churches? Oh, yeah, of course. They'd have a great time, yeah. Well, the first true attempt at murder in Dusseldorf came on February 3rd, 1929. murder in Dusseldorf came on February 3rd, 1929. During Peter's lunch break from the factory that day, he decided that after his shift ended, it was finally time to kill again.

And it was going to be either a woman or a child. Whichever one he came across first. Do you think that he had a calendar that he just went in and he would just go through the days and he just randomly wrote them in like like, kill again. On February 3rd. It was on his lunch break. He said he was walking around Dusseldorf and was just looking around and thought, like, today's the day. Alright, let's do it after work.

No, my lunch break's almost over, so I don't have enough time to fidget in before... It is interesting, but I've got to go to work. My boss is going to yell at me if I'm just five minutes late. But it's so important to tell other people your goals. Be held accountable to it. So I made sure I told the man that is the bathroom attendant at the factory.

I said, well, today I'm going to kill again. And he went, okay, sir. My goodness. Yeah. So after he got off work, Curtin wandered the streets until he found a young woman named Maria Kuhn. He grabbed her from behind by the lapels, pulled her behind a bush, and brought out a pair of scissors. He covered her mouth with one hand and stabbed her 24 times with the other, then he ran away. However, Maria Kuhn survived. Now, Swinney, for some reason, wrote wrote in monster that curtain let her live in the hopes

that she would tell the police about what happened but it was a foregone conclusion that she was going to tell the police and that doesn't really make much sense anyway because peter curtain didn't want to get caught he wasn't he wasn't a guy that wanted attention necessarily like not to him completely if he got caught then he wasn't able to do anything else to make people feel weird. In fact, that claim is actually contradicted by Curtin himself. He said that he was surprised when he was cleaning the attempted murder weapon because he found that only 10 millimeters had broken off the sharp end of the scissors. And he was surprised because he was like, I thought I stabbed much deeper than that. But I guess not. I guess I did not. It's like when you're planking

for a minute and you check the clock again and you think, oh, I gotta be almost done. And it's like, you've only been doing it for like 25 seconds. Yeah, it is like that, Henry. It is indeed. Yeah. That is interesting. So this, and did he use the scissors because it was another

random thing? He just wanted to. So he's got the hatchet, did he use the scissors because it was another random? Just wanted to. So he's got the hatchet. He's got the scissors. He looked at the scissors and thought, wouldn't that be fun? I mean, that was his entire thought process. He'd look at a weapon and he'd think, boy, that'd be a lark, wouldn't it? So let's use the scissors this time. All right.

Don't they teach that in the Masada and stuff like that where it's like you can kill people with a soda can, you can kill people with a chair? I don't mess with Masada or Krav Maga or anything like that. Those guys are, that's a different level altogether. Yeah, they can just do that though. They can just grab stuff and kill you with it. Yeah, they can sharpen a strand of hair and poke it through your neck. No!

I'm not my hair now. I only have so many laughs. I know. Well, Curtain would not make the same mistake with his next victim and this one would be far crueler than the last and i think yeah let's go let's say gold star on this one yeah it's all rough yeah well i would say that yeah this whole like just no throughout this entire series like there's gonna be some pretty fucking rough murders here. On February 9th, Peter Curtin spotted eight-year-old Rosa Olinger playing alone in her front yard.

He snatched her up, covered her mouth, and took her to the nearby woods where he choked her unconscious. Then he stabbed the child 13 times, including once in the left temple. Curtin then pressed his lips

to the temple wound and drank the blood that flowed forth and thus the vampire of Dusseldorf was truly born. Then, he went to the fucking movies. He does this a lot. It seems that after crimes, he'll go and fucking grab a beer.

Yeah, grab a beer. He said he went to the movies because he still had a free ticket in his pocket like he discovered that he had a free ticket and he's like oh that sounds like fun let's go do that that's how blase he was about this okay but also keep in mind that the blood sucking is just what peter curtain said he did uh there was rumors in one of the autopsy reports that is like well that could be a bite mark it might be a bite mark. It might be a bite mark, but we can't confirm that. And also, like, it's hard to believe that a man could pull off something like the murder of Rosa Olinger or the attempted murder of Maria Kuhn without walking away completely covered in blood.

Right. But rather acknowledging that, you know, this is a near impossibility, Curtin turned it into what seemed like a point of pride he said that he rarely got blood stains on his clothing he also remember people wore more clothes then yeah well that's the way he would even describe it too he would remove his jacket he and then he would cover himself up he would do a thing it's a little bit but i can also see the way he did it because the way it seemed to be is that he would knock them unconscious, get them on the ground, stab them while they're on the ground. Yeah.

So he's up above and then carefully doing it as much as he can because, again, wants total control. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. And, you know, that's the thing. Peter almost always committed his crimes outside. The wounds match up with what Peter said he did and the timelines match up as well. And he knew shit that only the killer would know,

so he wasn't taking credit for the crimes of others. And yet, no one ever saw Peter Curtin walking through the streets of Dusseldorf obviously looking like he'd just killed someone. But either way, even after the murder, Curtin was not yet done with Rosa Olinger. After the movie, Curtin filled up a bottle of petroleum and returned to the body of his victim

with the intention of setting it on fire. But since it was the evening and too many people were out and about, he went back home. He woke up the next morning at 6 a.m., told his wife that he was going to the bathroom, and just left the house. I mean, he's gonna do what he's gonna do. Yeah.

You gonna tell him not to? Because you've seen what he does when you tell him not to do shit. He flips out. He returned to the crime scene, poured gasoline on the body, and set it aflame. He said he felt no sexual charge from this act in particular, and the only reason why he did it was to cause excitement and general indignation. Yeah, dude. So you can watch it across the street.

He went and he got a beer across the street and watching the whole scene unfold. Just sit and watch all the cops come with a burning body sitting there and then it died down. So he wasn't aroused with all the fires and stuff like that? Oh, yeah. He was aroused. It was just this one in particular. Oh, I see. Yeah, there was another one.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, he was definitely, the fires definitely aroused him, but not in the same way that it, it's really strange because it's not in the same way that it it's really strange because it's not in the same way that uh it um makes uh guys like david berkowitz how kind of how arson made him hard uh for peter curtain like it wasn't about just watching the flames it was about the chaos that it caused all the cops showing up and yeah so he's just watching and then he gets to be his god he he's like they don't even know that i'm the one who caused all of this and all of that kind of stuff he He would then insert

himself into the investigation. Yeah, because when the police started interviewing guys in the area, Peter just kind of threw out a little bait so the police would question him. He was just kind of standing there acting like he had some important information, but he was just too shy to share. You're going to have to maybe give me a little

bit of chocolate. But he would go and he would talk to the police like our old You're going to have to maybe give me a little bit of chocolate. Oh, my. But he would go and he would talk to the police like our old friend Bumblebutt. Oh, yeah, like old Ed Kemper. Yeah, we've talked about this before. And you see that in the, I think we've mentioned the first 48. Whenever someone's like, I got to tell, I'm innocent. They're like, who are you?

Why are you here? I didn't do it. I didn't do it. That's for sure. Yeah. Peter Curtin, he extracted as much information as he could from this police officer. Because it's all about getting someone to tell your own story back to you. So Peter Curtin's just listening to the cop being like, what do they know? Yeah.

How close are they? Do they think it's me? And it's like, well, not do they think it's me. But it's not even necessarily about seeing how the investigation is going. It's seeing how much information you can get about the crime from the cop also hearing the details yeah of what you find out what they know about the body would get him visibly erect like we keep saying like the hard thing like it's me being funny saying hard it's it is he said that he wouldn't understand how he could speak to a police officer.

And he was like, I'm sitting here with a full erection speaking with the officer. And no one says anything because everybody's too, I guess, polite or different social standards. Yeah, but I don't know. How many times are you talking to a dude and you like happen to look down at his crotch? I don't look down at people's crotches. If you had a boner right now, I wouldn't be able to tell. I certainly don't. I don't know.

I mean, certainly don't. I don't know i mean certainly no i don't know interesting whoa yeah and peter said the entire time he was talking to the police officer he's just sitting there fantasizing that he was fantasizing about killing him oh yeah that was fun because he was a rookie yeah that was a problem he talked this like fucking goobery dude he's like well there's a lot there's a lot of contingencies in a police case but as it was just like i knew how easy it would be to kill this police officer right in He was like, well, there's a lot of contingencies in a police case. But as he was just like, I knew how easy it would be to kill this police officer right in front of me in the rush of that. It engorged me watching his little Andy Rooney lips slipping back and forth in his hat, wobbling on his tiny little head. Andy Rooney lips.

Andy Rooney was classic. What was the name of his segment? Let me tell you something. You're being mean to me. What was the name of his segment? Let me tell you something, Murph. You're being mean to me. What was the name of that one? This is terrible. Andy Rooney, the 60 Minute? Yeah. Is that him? Who was the one that was in the cop show?

Are you thinking of Mickey Rooney? No. Mickey Rooney was in the Little Rascals. Andy Rooney. The one with Don Knotts. Andy Griffith. Andy Griffith. Andy Rooney would be like, why is there still a thing around cigarette packs? What is it, going for a swim? Like he was angry about everything.

Yeah, Andy Rooney just sounded like a really serious Jerry Seinfeld. Yeah, exactly. Well, Peter Curtin, for his next murder, he changed his victim profile yet again. Three days after the Olinger murder, Peter traveled to the Dusseldorf suburb of Flingernord. Just making up names. We'll call it a Flingernord with any luck it'll stick. There, he followed a popular local mechanic named Rudolph Scheer out of a beer house after Rudolph had tied one on. He was on his bike. Yeah.

a beer house after Rudolph had tied one on. He was on his bike. Yeah. Curtin approached Shear on the side of the road and stabbed him 20 times, including the temple, which would turn into a calling card of sorts for Curtin until he switched his methods once again. Okay. And just like with Olinger, Curtin stuck around until Shear's body was discovered the next morning.

Then, in order to build a tolerance back up, Peter Curtin took a summer vacation from murder. And that's where we'll pick back up for the conclusion of Peter Curtin. Oh my God. I'll tell you what. You can take a vacation from murder, but murder can't take a vacation from you.

That's right. Look at that. Remember that, everyone. Be safe on your vacations, but that's not until next summer, so forget about it for now. What? How did this become about vacations? I will say

this. I don't know. If you're thinking about murdering, you know what I think you should do? No. Don't do it. Number one. Get a pumpkin. Get a pumpkin, Carvin. You can stab the fuck out of a pumpkin. We had a great time carving our pumpkin this week. Yeah, go ahead and get yourself.

I mean, even though this episode's coming out like after Halloween is over and done with. But you know what? Just go out. I bet there's a bunch of pumpkins out on surplus. You can buy some like old pumpkins. And then you still got a pumpkin for a couple of days. Stab it, stab it, stab it, stab it, stab it. Do something creative with it.

And again, it was the true crime boom in Germany. This was horrible what happened there. If you want to make it on our show, find an alien. That's the only way. Or a ghost. Aliens or ghosts. That is the only way you're going to do it. Only way.

We will not. If we find out you're a listener and you're a serial killer, we're not going to cover you. No. I'm going to tell you this right now. We won't. We absolutely will not. We'll think about it. Out of principle. I want alien footage.

Alien footage would be wonderful. But thanks everyone for listening. We'll be back next week with Peter Cartman part two, but we're going to be on tour next week. We're going to be coming to Dallas, Austin, and Oklahoma City next week. We still got tickets available, so be sure to

come on out for that. Go to lastpodcastontheleft.com to buy your tickets. That is November 7th in Dallas, November 8th in Austin, and November 9th in Oklahoma City. And we got tickets available for OKCity and Dallas. Go get those tickets. They are going to sell out. We're going to have a good-ass time. Ooh, yeah.

Don't wait until the last minute. I know a lot of you guys are waiting until the last minute. Uh-oh. Don't wait until the last minute. I know a lot of you guys are waiting until the last minute. Uh-oh. Don't wait until the last minute. Don't you fucking do it. Don't wait until the last minute. Don't you fucking do it. Don't do it. Can't wait to see everyone in Texas again and Oklahoma City.

I've never been, and I am really excited. Baby. It's nice. I've heard it's nice. We are going to get some fucking steaks. Yeah. In OKCity, baby. Oh, yeah.

I already know that we are already planning on it. I'm already finding us a place. Really? Don't fucking worry your little cholesterol-leveled head, boys. We're going to get so much animal fat injected into our holes, we're not going to even be able to do that show. Oh, right. It's canceled. And, of course, we're also coming to Indianapolis

on the 30th, on November 30th. That's going to be our warm-up show for our big Chicago double shot. We're going to be filming a special. We're going to be getting the lead out also with our double shot. We're going to be going out to Indianapolis on November 30th. We're going to be warming up for our double shot in Chicago. So we'll see everybody out there in the Windy City.

Coming up next, we've got Detroit Rock City from here. Oh, man, I thought Man cow was going to be on. K.U.I.J., Rock 108, Abilene's only rock. Eli, thank you for embracing what people like to insult us by saying that we're shock jocks, but guess what, man? We like it. I don't know. Yeah, we kind of grew up listening to that shit.

That's what we do, and guess what it just means as far as I'm concerned? You're just mad that we have energy. There it is. Yes, there are plenty of places if you like. Peter Curtin, the Vampire of Dusseldorf. Now, isn't that an unfortunate series of events? Honestly, it was so funny. I was just thinking about this story.

But seven or eight years ago, I met with the dude at NPR. Really nice guy. And I was touring. Do you want a bottle of water? I was just touring the studios. And I think it was Lear, Jim Lee, or someone was doing a show, and he looked so sad. They were like the sad guy in Howard Stern. Are you talking about Tom Lehrer? Yeah, he's great.

I love Tom Lehrer. I love him, too. But I was like, we don't do that kind of radio. And then I remember I was like, yeah, man, I really love radio. I think we're doing a lot of good work. And I sent him Roundtable of Gentlemen. And I don't think that that's really for NPR. You sent Tom Lehrer Roundtable?

No, the main guy. Oh, the main guy. He was in charge of programming. I was like, I think he's going to love it. He didn't email me back. I remember you telling me about that. You were like, dude, I just made this great contact at NPR. Going to send him Roundtable. Which episode of Roundtable do you think I should send him? I was like, dude, I just made this great contact at NPR. Gonna send him around. Which episode of Roundtable

do you think I should send him? I was like, dude, I don't know. What about the one where they drink all the four locos or like the other ones? Well, thank you guys so much. Please give to our Patreon if you so choose. And thank you to everybody who already gives to our Patreon. If you feel like we

deserve a little bit of a compensation for the show, you can go to patreon.com slash last podcast and love and you also get a bunch of cool bonus stuff uh including interviews t-shirts stickers uh depending on how much you uh donate so thanks to everyone who already donates uh and thank you in advance to anyone who plans on and support all the shows here on lpn all right everyone hail yourselves. Hail Satan. Follow LP on the left for all the bullshit. If you want to do that. Okay. And how can you?

Hail me. Magoose delicious. Halloween has passed, but these spirits still live.