Let's Go To Court! - 141: The Pitfalls of Being a Child Star & a Troubled Marriage

Episode Date: September 23, 2020

Jackie Coogan landed his first movie role when he was just an infant. A few years later, when he was performing the shimmy on stage, Charlie Chaplin was taken by his performance. He cast little Jackie in a couple of his films, and with that, Jackie’s career took off. Jackie became one of the industry’s biggest stars. By the time he was 12, he’d earned a million dollars. By the time he was 21, he’d earned four million. He was set for life. The money had all been set aside -- just waiting for him to hit adulthood. At least, that’s what he’d been told. Then Brandi tells us about a troubled marriage. Jennifer and Frederick Trayers had been married for nearly two decades. They’d been through ups and downs together. Frederick’s career in the navy took them all over the place, but they always had each other. But in 2002, Frederick began an affair. Suspicious, Jennifer installed spyware on Frederick’s computer. She began reading every emotionally-charged email between the two. She read and read and read, and eventually, she took action. And now for a note about our process. For each episode, Kristin reads a bunch of articles, then spits them back out in her very limited vocabulary. Brandi copies and pastes from the best sources on the web. And sometimes Wikipedia. (No shade, Wikipedia. We love you.) We owe a huge debt of gratitude to the real experts who covered these cases. In this episode, Kristin pulled from: “Coogan Case Spurs Move to Safeguard Wealth of Minors” by Martha Martin, The Daily News, 1938 “California Child Actors Bill,” entry on Wikipedia “Jackie Coogan,” entry on Wikipedia “Jackie Coogan wins fortune fight decision,” Los Angeles Times, 1938 “Mother of Jackie Coogan reweds,” The Pomona Progress Bulletin, 1936 “In life, as on screen, pathos marks career of the kid,” Frederick Othman, The Oklahoman, 1938 In this episode, Brandi pulled from: “The Love Triangle Murder of Lt. Commander Fred Trayers” by Bryan Lavietes, The Crime Library “Jennifer Trayers” murderpedia.org “Trayers v. Johnson” casetext.com

One semester of law school. One semester of criminal justice. Two experts. I'm Kristen Caruso. I'm Brandi Egan. Let's go to court. On this episode, I'll talk about the pitfalls of being a child star. And I'll be talking about a troubled marriage.

Hmm. Hmm. Aren't they all on this podcast? Mm-hmm. Kristen? Yes? Would you like to report a crime. Oh, shut up. No, not about you.

You can get a guilty conscience, Kristen. You know I do. Do we have to tell them? I mean, I wasn't going to. I think you outed yourself just now. Okay, you kind of set me up there. You guys, we had to delay recording because I farted and Norm couldn't even come near me to hit the record button. And then you say I've got to report a crime. What am I supposed to think? My crime that I was going to report was about our trip to a little frozen custard place just now,

which I wasn't sure that I was going to name, but I'm going to. Oh, boy. Here we go. The power of the podcast. Andy's frozen custard place just now, which I wasn't sure that I was going to name, but I'm going to. Oh, boy. Here we go. The power of the podcast. Andy's Frozen Custard. Boy, do I have a bone to pick with you. First of all, it was delicious.

We ate a delicious lunch first. Yeah. And then you and I were like, oh, Norm is happy to eat his little, his sad little chocolate orange. But you and I were like, oh, God, wouldn't it be great to go get some custard? Yeah, I really needed dessert today. Yeah. And, uh, yeah, after you ate that pile of weeds, yes. Okay, you guys, I had the kale salad again. Brainy made fun of me the whole time. Yeah, I had the grilled cheese again. It was so good. Anyway, so we go to Andy's. They have this big sign above the window. Pumpkin pie concrete. Every concrete has a

full piece of pumpkin pie. Oh, Norm and I are both like, that's what we're getting. Sold. Yeah. I go up to the window. Kristen orders first. She orders herself a key lime pie concrete. Delicious. Yeah. I get up there.

I'm next. I'm so excited. Yes, I would like a small pumpkin pie concrete, please. And the woman looks at me. She says, oh, we don't have that yet. I said, there's a big sign right there that says. Right above your head. It's like coming soon. Yeah, no, we don't have that yet.

So I then had to go back to the menu and find something else. I was pretty upset about it. I'm realizing now that yet. So I then had to go back to the menu and find something else. I was pretty upset about it. I'm realizing now that this sounds like I'm being a giant baby. Sounds like it? Oh, no, no, no. I did still get to eat delicious custard. I had a, what was it called? I don't know what you had.

It's called a snow something concrete. It was strawberries and then melted chocolate chips that then freeze and become like a chocolate ribbon throughout. It was pretty good. Yeah. Wasn't any pumpkin pie concrete, though. You guys, it was a real Karen situation. I immediately asked to speak to the manager. Brandy walked up there maskless, you know, the whole deal.

No, I had my mask on. We were outside. We were social distancing. Yep. I still didn't get my pumpkin concrete. It's fine. It's fine. It's fine.

Two weeks in a row I've been talking about pumpkin pie. Brandy. Still haven't had it. Here's the thing. The world is already so sad and now you come with this truly tragic tale.

Can people handle it, is the question. I don't think they can. Yeah. You better do a more uplifting story, like a troubled marriage. Oh, yeah, that's not real uplifting. Yours never are. Don't worry. No one's surprised.

No one died last week. What was your case last week? I never remember anything. The creepy gym teacher. Oh, my God. Brandy, that was a horrible story. What was your case last week? I never remember anything. The creepy gym teacher. Oh my god, Brandy, that was a horrible story. It was, but. It was horrible. But. Multiple people were raped. I'm assuming. I'm just assuming. I get a vibe. I mean, when you choose to focus on that, Kristen, yes, it does sound terrible. Yes, the case was terrible, but my point was that Ashley was an amazing survivor. Yeah, but that doesn't make it a happy story.

I didn't say it was a happy story. Okay, okay. I never said, hey, check out that real happy story I did last week. All right, yeah, because you could never say that ever. One time I've done a happy story, I think. Name it. I don't know. Exactly.

Misery at a Taco Bell. Okay, that was funny. Okay, we can't say anymore. That's it. That's all know. Exactly. Misery at a Taco Bell. Okay, that was funny. Okay, we can't say. That's it. That's all I can say. Okay. All right. Let's get the show on the road.

Enough of this chit chat. Yeah, enough talk about my farts and your terrible tragedy at Andy's Frozen Custard. Tragedy at Andy's Custard is right. All right. First of all, of course, shout out to my best friends over at the crime library. This this guy, not a guy I'm familiar with. I've never used an article by him before. But Brian Leviti's excellent piece on this case. I guess I'll just get started. What do you want to do? Want to tap dance for him?

I did say that I wanted Norm to dance for us while we recorded the whole thing. Yeah, but that'd be too alluring. I wouldn't be able to concentrate. You'd be too turned on to do the podcast. All right, anyway. Many a podcast has been taken down by people being too turned on. By Norm's sensual dancing. What if we sent Norm to the competition?

He's our Trojan horse. People are like, ooh, a dancing man. What a nice thing we've got here. All right. The way Jennifer and Fred Trier's relationship began was like a scene out of a rom-com. Oh, God. It was February of 1991, and Jennifer was working as a travel agent at the University of Notre Dame. Fred was a student there, and one day he came in to book a trip. Fred was a student there, and one day he came in to book a trip.

He was immediately taken by Jennifer and began finding any excuse he could to come into her office. Oh, I've got to go on another trip. Booking all kinds of trips, you know, coming in to get information about a trip he just booked. Oh, maybe I need some pamphlets. Uh-huh. Whatever. Coming in all the time. Fred asked Jennifer out over and over again. But she turned him down every time because she thought he was a, quote, geek.

Oh. Unquote. Oh, you seem very offended by that. Well, I married the gaming historian, so I get a little offended when the ladies are too good for the nerds. I get a little offended when the ladies are too good for the nerds. Eventually, though, Fred wore Jennifer down, and she finally said, Okay, if it will get you to stop coming to my work, I'll go on a date with you. Ew, no, I don't like this.

Well, like it or not, the two were soon a couple and closer than ever. Men are often coached to be persistent all the time. And, you know, there's times when you should just sit down, Fred. No means no, you geek. Wow, you're quite the turn you've taken on the term geek there, Kristen. Well, I just, you know, I don't like the, you know, oh, she's not interested. I'll try harder and harder and harder. I'll remember you said that. Okay.

Oh, God. So the two are soon a couple and they're closer than ever. And Fred lets Jennifer know that right before he had met her, he'd signed up for the Navy and was about to be leaving for flight school in Pensacola, Florida. After he finished flight school, though, he knew he was going to be stationed in San Diego. And so he was like, hey, why don't you come to San Diego with me? And she was like, yes. And so they decided they'd get married before he moved to San Diego because that's the only way she could really come with him.

And so he went off to flight school. She kept job for you know the time being and how long had they been dating at this point you know I'm not really sure okay but they met in February of 1991 and then in that was when they met for the first time like that's not when they went on a date so then um it was december of 1992 so more like okay you know almost two whole years later no all of yeah all of 91 all of 92 okay um they met up in denver and eloped and then they moved on to san diego they did have like a little family ceremony in 93 with their family and all of that i think i already said they had a family ceremony with their family sure anyway family only they got their family together had a little ceremony with their family and then the two were off to set up their life in san diego jennifer knew what she was signing up

for when she married fred she knew the role of a military wife meant that they'd be moving regularly because Fred would often get restationed. Right. I mean, in the Navy, you can sail the seven seas. In the Navy. I know how the song goes. And that's exactly what happened. They moved a lot, but Jennifer loved the traveling. I mean, she was a travel agent when they'd met. So and they moved a lot but jennifer loved the traveling i mean she was a travel agent when they'd met so and they moved to florida for some time and they ended up staying for a while in florida because that's fred decided that he would with the navy go through medical school oh and become like a doctor and an officer in the navy so while they're living in Florida, they stay there from like 2001 to 2005. Their marriage is kind of tested. While Fred was in medical school, he met this woman, Danielle, who I believe

did like, I don't know, she was involved in some research project with the Navy and somehow that overlapped with the med school thing. I don't know. Anyway, they became very friendly. But Fred swore that's all that it was. They did get pretty close. And then Fred went on a hiking trip with some friends and oh, Danielle came too. But Jennifer didn't. I don't know if that was like a by design thing or like, I don't know.

Anyway, Jennifer started to get really uneasy about how close her husband was becoming with this other woman. Yeah. And so it just became like a very tense environment. Danielle ended up coming to like the Traer's Thanksgiving and it was just like a really weird. That's weird. Yeah. Okay. It was super weird.

And so finally Jennifer may have, she may have said something to Fred like, hey, I feel like this is inappropriate or is something going on here. Either way, Fred ended up cutting off all communication with this Danielle woman. And things seemed to be better for some time. But Jennifer was maybe holding on to some resentment about how free Fred had been with this weird friendship slash relationship that he'd gotten into with this Danielle woman. And she quickly found herself having an affair um i initially i'll see your affair and raise you another full-on yeah like while she wasn't sure that fred had ever actually gone to the full-on step of like sleeping with this danielle woman she began spending a lot of time with this um man that she met working at a

timeshare company they were both working at the company together they started spending a lot of time together as co-workers and then before she knew it they were having a full-on affair and at first she was like yeah look at me i'll show him kind of like what you said and then fred called her on it and was like are you having an affair and she was just came clean she was like yes i have been and he's like oh my gosh this is all my fault you know i should have been paying more attention to you yeah this was fred's take on it and so she ended the affair like, it seemed that their marriage kind of was better than ever after that. So he did have an affair. You know, I—

To have that take— To have that reaction, right, don't you think? Yeah, because, like, if Norm came to me and was like, I'm having an affair, I wouldn't be like, this is all my fault. I'd be like, ah! Yeah. And then I'd subject him to my farts you would so they both end these extramarital goings on and they decide they're gonna focus on their marriage i think they do like a little bit of counseling whatever and then fred finishes medical school and they are about to be stationed back in California. They're

going to be in Oceanside, California. And they are going to start fresh, focus on themselves, focus on their marriage, really rekindle the fire and maybe start a family, which was all, you know, well and good. They got set up in Oceanside, which I believe is near San Diego. know well and good they got set up in oceanside which i believe is near san diego question mark okay they did like a vow renewal when it was their 15th wedding anniversary things were great and then fred got assigned to a um they called it a merc um a mercenary no they called it a a mercy assignment or something like that um basically he got assigned to a minnesota he got assigned to a floating hospital that would travel the world and i don't know that's it was planning to go to indonesia and guam on a naval humanitarian mission okay so he's stationed on this it's like 2010 now and while stationed on

the floating hospital he meets a woman oh coincidence only but her name is also danielle different danielle than the previous one we sure this is a coincidence maybe he's got a thing for these daniels but she's like 10 years younger than him but she's also stationed on this floating hospital and over the course of this they become very close and even exchange a romantic kiss as opposed to an unromantic kiss. So that's what the articles say. But there was like, they kissed one time, but both of them were very careful because they were, could be, because a Navy officer, which is what Fred was, who is caught committing adultery, would be, could be subjected to sanctions all the way, like, from anything up to discharge. Yeah, the military is really weird. Yeah, they take.

They're not so, they don't come down hard on sexual assault and stuff. No. But I guess you cheat on your spouse. Yeah. And so this was like a very secret thing that was happening on the boat. They only. The love boat. According to Danielle, they only shared that one kiss while they were aboard.

But after they both got reassigned, they then began exchanging lots of emails, lots of text messages, and their relationship continued to grow to the point that they were telling each other that, like, I love you through these texts and emails. And then Danielle was restationed in San Diego where Fred was already stationed. Okay. So they were about to be brought together. And yeah, I believe that's when a full on affair began taking place. At some point, Danielle wrote Fred this email, but the email, okay. The way this email was written, it's super weird. It's like,

it's a letter to Fred's wife. It's like, it's a letter to Jennifer talking about how wonderful her husband is and how she obviously doesn't appreciate. Oh, good Lord. It says, dear Mrs.

Wonderful. I apologize for the presumptiveness in telling you all about the man to whom you are married. You have daily access to an amazing person. One day, he'll be gone. And the only thing you will be left with is wondering why you didn't appreciate what you had at the time. Oh, fuck off, lady. I guess the point of this stupid letter is to remind you how lucky you are and to ask that if you can't see that, could you let him

go? Oh my God. Yeah. So she sends this to Fred. Uh-huh. I appreciate you so much. Yeah. Okay. Here's what Fred didn't know, though. That Danielle was a psycho? No. So when Fred got back from his assignment on this floating hospital thing, Jennifer thought that he was acting super fucking weird. Yeah.

And she had her suspicions that he was having an affair. It was just like a gut feeling. Yeah. And so in October of 2010, she installed tracking software on their home computer. Get the spyware going. So that she could see who he was emailing, what he was up to, who was emailing him. And so she started collecting all kinds of emails between Fred and Danielle. And she began becoming obsessed with this affair that was going on. When you're getting a letter that's to you, give me a break.

Oh, my God. Yeah. So she's, like, not sleeping. She's not eating. She's losing a ton of weight because she's just, like, anxious all the time and just obsessively checking the spyware. Like, what are they talking about now? She makes, like, backhanded comments to Fred.

Oh, yeah, you couldn't help yourself. Really, you have to. But he's denying everything. No, you're crazy. Of course. I would never leave you. I'm not having an affair. No, nothing.

And so she gets that email, that dear Mrs. Wonderful email. And it just, like, kind of pushes her over the edge. She's more mad than she had ever remembered being in her life and she again without she can't go to fred and say i know what you're doing i've seen the emails she's not ready to do it yet for whatever reason she doesn't want to admit that she's put the spyware on the computer i think there's probably like a little thing you're like, well, maybe it's not as bad as I think it is. Maybe this is all it is. Maybe it's just emails.

And then he like comes home one day and he's like super sweaty and he doesn't have his wedding ring on. Oh, my God. And she's like, where have you been? Uh-huh. And he's like, I was at the gym. Just banging it out. And he like won't give her a hug, won't give her a kiss until he goes and takes a shower. Yeah.

You remember that classic song? Let me smell your dick. Oh, that's classic Diddy. Do you remember that song? I do. So this is just building and building jennifer's like missing work because she's so obsessed with this yeah and fred is work at this point he is working he's been assigned to a hospital in san diego he's working all kinds of crazy hours overnight Overnight shifts, day shifts, you know, it all changes. Oh, I'm sure.

I'm sure he's working all kinds of hours. Yeah. Yeah, uh-huh. But it didn't work. She doesn't know, like, whether she's coming or going, when he's there, when he's banging somebody else. It's, like, it's literally just taken over her life, her obsession with this affair. Mm-hmm. with this affair.

On the evening of Friday, December 3rd, it would kind of all come to a head for Jennifer. Fred went to a Christmas work party, but didn't ask Jennifer to attend because he had to go work a shift at the hospital. Like he was only going to stop by the Christmas party and then go work a shift at the hospital. Okay. And he did. He went to the Christmas party. He went and worked his shift and but after leaving his shift he would never be seen alive again in the hours that followed

that christmas party and him working his shift jennifer carried on some like kind of strange communications so on saturday, December 4th, Jennifer's mom text her and like early in the morning, it was like 9am didn't get a response. That was unusual. And so she called a little while later and Jennifer answered the phone, but she seemed really out of it. And she said, I'm sorry, mom. You know, I just woke up when you called. Fred and I are sleeping in today. And her mom was like, oh, okay, absolutely. And she was like, yeah, Fred worked an overnight shift, so we're sleeping in. And her mom's like, yeah, just give me a call when you get up.

Right, right. No big deal. And then sometime around that same time, Danielle, the mistress, received an email from Jennifer through Fred's email account. Okay, okay, okay. The subject line was Mr. Wonderful. Oh, shit. And then it said, Dear Little Miss, grass is not greener on my side.

And then it, like, went on for, like, eight pages. Oh, God. and then it like went on for like eight pages oh god jennifer kind of rambled on about how all of her she listed out all of her husband's good and bad qualities and talked about how she knew that inventory well because they had been married for 18 years and she said that their marriage was strong until danielle had weaseled her way in there and that it was because of her that their relationship was struggling now. And then like in a weird I mean, obviously, the whole thing's weird. Yeah. Then she goes and like specifically describes their sex life. Oh, boy.

Yeah. I don't know. sex life. Oh boy. Yeah, I don't know. And then she ended it with a very weird passage. She said, I will have the joy of knowing

that I got to spend quality time with him. I got to travel with him. I got to sleep with him. I got to hear him say, I love you softly in my ear while he was hugging me i was the last person on earth he was with so why is she admitting all this in an email right yeah this would be is going to be brought up later as a clear sign of premeditation. Yeah.

Because she's speaking about him in the past tense. Right. She ended it by saying, you should feel guilty. You just ruined the marriage of a wonderful man. The career of a wonderful man. The future of a wonderful man. Well. Sincerely, Mrs. Wonderful.

Whew. Okay. Let's fast forward. Following these weird couple of messages, this email and this weird kind of conversation with her mom, no one heard from Fred or Jennifer for more than 24 hours. Fred was scheduled to work at the hospital at 11 a.m. on Sunday, December 5th, but he didn't show. Coworkers obviously got worried when he didn't come to work. They started calling him. They got no answer. And when nobody had heard from him still by Sunday evening,

a few people from the hospital drove to the Treyers house. They kind of walked around. They saw both the cars were there, both Jennifer and Fred's cars were there, but everything was fine. There was no sign of any, anything out of the ordinary. And so they continued to try and call and late that night when they still had been unable to reach them, they finally called the police. And so police went to the Treyers' home, located at... Okay, hold on. Okay. 3750 Grimm Avenue, Apartment 2, San Diego, California.

Grimm Avenue. I know, right? Foreshadowing. So there is a realtor listing for this, and I think a Redfin listing, so you can actually see pictures of the, well, it's not on the market now. You can see pictures of the place. It's two bed, two bath, 869 square feet. Pretty small little apartment.

You know what they've got here? Well, do they? What? I think they've got the tile countertop. I hate a tile countertop. I'm not a big fan of a tile countertop. Impossible to keep those clean. Yeah, how would you keep that clean?

You know? Yeah. You can tell they did a strong reno here in o2 exactly yep yeah cute place yeah yeah it's a cute little place okay so police officers arrive there late sunday night and they conduct a welfare check but they don't see anything they knock on the door no one comes to the door they walk around the residence they don't see anything they're like oh my gosh they've got the tile countertop how do they keep it clean terrible they did not make entry into the home at this time kristen what a weird way of putting it so everything was locked

up everything was quiet and so they left but they got more calls early the next morning that still no one had been able to contact Fred or Jennifer and Fred had missed another shift at work essentially yeah and so they decided they would come out again and this time they would force entry into the home it was officially from the article what they found when they did that shocked them. There was blood everywhere. Fred was dead. His body was like in the fetal position next to the bed. He was still like wrapped up in the bedding.

He had been stabbed in the neck, the back. He had knife wounds that had pierced his heart, his lung, his kidneys. It was clear that there had been an intense struggle. The bedding was saturated with blood. There were blood drops on the headboard and on the wall above the bed. And Fred had tons of defensive wounds. His hands and forearms were covered with cuts and gashes and wounds. And an autopsy would later find that he also had the prescription drug Ambien in his system. Though the amount was just like enough to have relaxed him, it would not have been enough to incapacitate him. Okay. In one of of the articles i read it was actually noted that this was like is super common ambience like super common for doctors to take because they work such

weird shifts like if they work a day shift and then have to turn around and work a night shift they'll take it so that they can get some sure sleep or whatever okay so he had a prescription you know nothing weird there then they found jenn. And while she was still alive, she was seriously injured. She was rushed to a local hospital where doctors... Is she going to try to say that someone broke in and attacked the two of them? Is she? Oh my God. She had 36 stab wounds to her chest and stomach. She had a partially collapsed lung and an artery in her upper gastric area had been cut. She had lost a lot of blood

and she probably would have died had the police not arrived when they did. Whoa. Yeah. Here's the deal though. when they did. Whoa. Yeah. Here's the deal, though. The condo was locked. There was no sign of forced entry. And police figured out pretty quickly that Fred and Jennifer were both the victim and the perpetrator.

But they weren't sure which one was which. Shit. Shit. Yeah. It became clearer when investigators found this neat stack of manila envelopes on that tile counter in the kitchen. Inside of them were hundreds of emails and text messages that had been printed out. They were the messages between Fred and Danielle. A doctor's assessment of Jennifer's injuries would back up investigators' beliefs

that Jennifer had murdered her husband inside their San Diego condo. You see, Jennifer's body lacked a single defensive wound. And all 36 of her stab wounds appeared to be superficial. To experts, that meant one thing. Well, not the one that nicked the artery, right? And punctured the lung? Yeah.

So even those ones were pretty shallow. So doctors looked at this and they said these wounds were self-inflicted. Yeah. Ugh. Jennifer was charged with the murder of her husband, Fred, and she was arraigned from her hospital bed and held on $2 million bond. The truth of what happened inside that condo, though, would not come out until Jennifer took the stand in her own defense.

Oh, my God. The murder trial of Jennifer Traers began on January 23rd, 2012. The prosecutor, Fiona Khalil, laid out the evidence. She said that this all came down to that final email that Jennifer had sent. Yeah. Yeah. That Jennifer had sent to Danielle. Admitting to the crime. Yeah. She highlighted the phrase, I was the last person he was with. That was proof that she had killed him. She had planned it. This was premeditated. Yeah. Premeditated. Both. Both. Premeditator and premeditated. Yeah. Premeditated. Both. Both. Premeditator and premeditated.

The defense's angle was a little bit different. They claimed that Jennifer had been put through an emotional roller coaster by her philandering husband and that the killing was a spontaneous result of Jennifer's sleeplessness, anxiety, and maybe it had a little bit to do with that Ambien that was found in her system as well. Oh my gosh. Well, you know, was it Roseanne who said the Ambien made her racist? Made her racist. That's right. Man, this Ambien's a hell of a drug. It doesn't become a big sticking point at trial, but do mention that she had ambient in her system and she brings it up a little bit in her testimony the defense argued that jennifer was guilty but a voluntary manslaughter not murder

this was a crime of passion one she had not intended to do. Bullshit. I agree. I think it's bullshit. I think she had every intent to murder him. Yeah, because why not just confront him? Yeah. Well, we'll hear it. Why not cut the crotch out of all his pants?

You know? Like, whatever happened to that? I had a friend once who rubbed garlic into the armpits of all of his shirts. Oh, so he just smelled terrible? She knew he had a sweating problem and he was very self-conscious about it. And so he smelled terrible all the time. He would smell terrible all the time if that was. Problem was they still lived together.

So she had to smell it? Yeah. Kind of backfired. Problem was, they still lived together. So she had to smell it? Yeah. Kind of backfired. The trial would last two weeks. Danielle, the mistress, got on the stand and she talked about the emails that she had exchanged with Fred during their relationship. Though she denied that their relationship had ever been sexual. Remember, she's also still an officer in the Navy, and so she probably... Well, is she an idiot, too?

I mean, you might as well just admit it. I know. You've got to. But that's the only thing I can think of, is that she thought that it would impact her career in the Navy, and that's why she said they'd never had a sexual relationship. I don't know. Okay. I don't believe for a second that that's true.

No. You're saying, I love you, back and forth in these emails and text know. Okay. I don't believe for a second that that's true. No. You're saying I love you back and forth in these emails and text messages. Right, it's almost weirder if you haven't had a sexual relationship. Yes. But obviously, the main event was when Jennifer took the stand in her own defense. She was up there for more than two days. She often lost control of her emotions while talking about the origin of their relationship and how it was once so good and how they've been through so much

and blah blah blah blah and then she finally told the story of what happened that day so while fred had been gone at that christmas party and then working his shift at the hospital, Jennifer had stayed up all night obsessing over the state of her marriage. She was obsessing over the affair that she knew her husband was having, but he kept denying it. During this time, she was like going through Facebook and whatever, you know, doing all the stuff. And she found that Fred had removed all of the pictures of the two of them from his Facebook. This was kind of like the final straw. Right. For Jennifer. She was going to confront him with the facts, with the email.

She got all of her manila envelopes all ready to go. As soon as he got home, they were going to have it out. So Fred comes home from work. It's like seven 30 in the morning on December 4th. And he talked about the Christmas party the night before. And he said, Oh yeah, there's going to be, you know, I'm sure people will post pictures on Facebook, you know, check them out. And Jennifer said, speaking of Facebook, what happened to, all the pictures of us that you used to have on your Facebook page? And he's like, I,

I have no idea what you're talking about. Come on. And she's like, there used to be all kinds of pictures of the two of us on your Facebook page. And all of a sudden they're gone. Right. And he's just keeps playing dumb and she's getting pissed. Cause he's like that's

insulting her like you know don't act like i'm crazy you've obviously deleted all these pictures yeah and so they go over to the computer and he again is like yeah i don't know i don't know how it happened here you happy now and he posts like three pictures of them together off and the way he said it to her jennifer said it just made her feel like he was disgusted with her for making some point over how he had deleted these pictures so he gets up from the computer he goes to the bathroom jennifer sits down and she sees that he has left his email account open on the computer and that there's like 15 new emails from danielle she deletes them all she doesn't read any of them and that's when she pinned that weird email well it must have been a hell of a shower if she did the eight page email. So she copied and pasted a journal that she had been keeping on the computer.

That's how she did it so fast. Yes. Well, doesn't that lead you to think premeditation? Well, it sure fucking does to me. But that last paragraph was apparently not part of the journal. I don't know. And it didn't mean that she was going to kill him. It just meant that their affair was obviously over

because she was confronting him on it, and that was going to be the end of that. You know, we talked about this. Okay, here's me not intentionally being a business cat, but being a business cat nonetheless. In the Patreon episode that we just recorded, we talked about this. How relationships are not a court of law.

In this case, like, she knows he's cheating. Yeah. Why print all this stuff out? Why do the manila envelopes? Why not just say, you're cheating. I know you're cheating. Yeah. Here's how I'm going to handle, and not kill him.

Right. My God. But just divorce him yeah exactly so that's when she sends that weird email to danielle and then she deletes fred's email account like shuts it down deletes it completely all the evidence kablooey she also sent another email to danielle apparently that talked about how it sent her a screenshot of his computer history where he looked at a bunch of porn and then also Googled what to do about herpes. Wait, so he was Googling herpes or she just did that? No, he was apparently legitimately Googling herpes.

Well, I mean, that's a pretty sick burn. I mean, to send that screenshot. Like, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. Then Fred comes out of the bathroom and Jennifer's like on him. Like, okay, let's sit down.

Let's talk. You know, we just talked recently about how we were going to be open and honest with each other and focus on our relationship and go to counseling and whatever. Well, that couldn't have been too recent. Like two days before or something like that they had had this conversation. Okay, but she knew he was cheating. Yes. So, like, she's as full of shit as he is. Right.

And so he's like, she's like, sit down with me right now. Let's talk. Let's get on the same page. Like, let's move forward. And he's like, he tells her, calm down. Uh-oh. Oh, boy. Oh, boy.

Never in the history of ever has that helped someone calm down. And so he says, calm down. Let's take a nap. Let's both get some sleep. That's not going to do it. And then we'll talk about all of this. And then he apparently crushes up some Ambien, puts it in a cup of orange juice, and they both drink half of it. I don't know.

So they both drink the orange juice. Fred's like, okay, I'm going to lay down and take a nap. You lay down and take a nap. When we wake up, we'll have fresh minds and we'll talk all of this through. Only, Jennifer doesn't feel like laying down. She's not calm. Right. She's just getting more and more pissed by the second.

As you would. And she's growing really anxious, which can be a side effect of Ambien, apparently. Really? Apparently. That seems really weird if it's supposed to set you off to sleep. I don't know. Okay. Anyway. Maybe if you, there's like all kinds of weird side effects that it can have if you fight

the urge to go to sleep. Oh. And so she's all ramped up oh okay and not going to sleep so i don't again there's not nobody nobody medically testifies to this okay so this is not a huge a huge part of the argument but maybe worth mentioning so instead instead she's super angry she grabs the envelopes and she goes into the bedroom he's like laid down on the bed and she like throws him at him and she wants to have it out right now and he's like no I'm not talking about this now I've taken my Ambien I'm going to sleep I'll talk to you at lunch. And so she walked out of the room and she says she is just more angry than she's ever been in her life at that moment. And she doesn't know what to do.

She doesn't know how to get him to take her seriously. And so she goes into the kitchen and she grabs a butcher knife. she goes into the kitchen and she grabs a butcher knife and she thought that if she threatened to hurt herself he would take her seriously and he would talk to her and so she went into the bedroom he's laying on the bed she gets on the bed with him and she holds the knife like against her wrist and she's like is this where I do it? Is this where I cut to slit my wrist? Oh, God. She said on the stand that she had no intention of killing herself or hurting Fred.

But she thought that this gesture would get him to take her seriously and talk to her and have a conversation with her. It did not do that. Instead, Fred began laughing at her. And he said, yeah, that knife's not sharp enough. And then he reached into his nightstand and pulled out a military knife and handed it to her and said, if you want to do real damage you'll have to use this do you think that's true that's what she says on the stand i mean nobody jennifer's the only one who knows for real what happened in that room that night

or that morning i guess but that's what she says he does and him laughing about this whole thing pushed her over the edge she said she grabbed the knife put the butcher knife down on the nightstand grabbed this military knife and she started poking at her arm with it on her wrist and she's like is this where is this where and fred said that if she really wanted to kill herself, she'd need to cut the artery that ran down her arm. And so then she starts poking in whatever area he gestured to. According to her testimony, she said, again, Fred wasn't taking her seriously. He continued to laugh and she just grew more and more angry. She started poking herself harder and causing herself to bleed.

And still, Fred was laughing at her. He thought it was funny. And so she held the knife to her chest and said, Should I stab myself here? Is this where I do it? And he looked at her and he said, Lower. And that was it. She said she remembers grabbing the knife he tried there was a struggle happened he grabbed her wrist at one point and then they were like wrestling and at some point in the struggle he like bent down and he reached for the butcher knife that was on the nightstand

and when he did that he exposed, the skin of his neck, and she stabbed him. She said, it was the first place I saw skin, so I aimed for it. And the butcher knife fell to the floor. Oh, my God. She said, after that, she blacked out. She stated that she doesn't remember stabbing Fred any more times than that, but remember he was stabbed like 11 times in total.

She said that she has no recollection of intending to kill him that morning. She said that even as upset that she was about the affair and as ready as she was to confront him about it she never wanted him dead and then she also i believe testified that she had no recollection of giving herself the 36 superficial stab wounds but she didn't contest that they were self-inflicted and she didn't say like i never did those he must have done those like she didn't contest that they were self-inflicted simply said that she had blacked out and didn't recall any of it after that initial stab. What do you think?

I don't know. I am, oh God, I feel like I could throw up. This is terrible. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, to me, it all comes down to that email she sent. I know. It sounds very premeditated.

Yeah. You're talking about him in the past tense, and you're saying, I was the last one to see him alive. Yeah. You write that out. Yeah. How are you saying it's anything other than premeditated? Funny thing, and I know people are going to hate this, is like, if those parts are true about her wanting to talk about the affair, wanting to get it out in the open and him being like, no, I'm going to take a nap. Yeah.

And then her trying to get his attention and him laughing at her. Yeah. I can appreciate how frustrating that would be. But the whole, I mean, it's clearly premeditated. Yeah. And so she's probably full of shit about everything, right? Yeah. I mean, honestly, I think so.

Yeah. I think we're getting, one article that I read said something to the effect of she gave enough of a confession to try and explain the bulk of the evidence. Yeah. Yeah. And then she matched her explanation to the evidence rather than giving the full truth. Sure. Yeah. Oh, I hate this.

Yeah. So in closing arguments, the defense urged the jury to find that she did this you know was a crime of passion it was you know a split second decision when she was angrier than she'd ever been in her entire life and on february 8th 2012 after roughly three days of deliberations the jury returned a verdict so she had been charged with first degree murder premeditated and the defense was asking them to find her guilty of voluntary manslaughter yeah they landed in the middle and they found her guilty of second degree murder okay they you know didn't feel like i don't know that they could say for sure it was premeditated, but it was more than just

a crime of passion, you know, voluntary manslaughter, apparently. In March of 2012, Jennifer was back in court for sentencing. And before her sentence was handed down, the judge said, the irrevocable tragedy of domestic violence here is unbelievable you lost the man you loved more than life itself and then she sentenced her to what do you how much do you think she was sentenced to not much 15 16 years to life yeah so yeah so much less than if it was first-degree murder. Jennifer made no statement at sentencing, but several of Fred's family members had sent in letters to the court, and the judge read portions of them aloud.

She read one from Fred's mother, Carol, who said that this was a really difficult thing to wrap your head around. She said she couldn't describe the anguish of losing her son and her daughter-in-law whom she had loved for 20 years. Yeah. She said, how can I just turn off the feelings that I've had all of these years? I will grieve for both of them all my life. Oh yeah. I don't know. I feel like I could turn off my feelings pretty easily. I agree. But I don't know.

I agree. I don't know. Jennifer appealed her sentence, basically saying that she felt the prosecution gave the jury incorrect information about what would be required to find her, like what mitigating circumstances would be necessary to find her guilty of voluntary manslaughter rather than murder. But her appeals were denied and she remains in prison. That's yeah. Wow. I think it's so difficult because Jennifer is the only one who knows what happened in that room that day. And she can tell the story however she wants to tell it.

Sure. Ugh. Yeah. I hate it me too i hate shit like that yeah yeah i doubt the story that she's telling is anywhere close to the full truth and it yeah i don't know. Whew. Rough one. Rough one. Thanks a lot, Brandi. Wait, before you do your case.

Yeah? I want to talk about something. Oh, something on your mind? Yeah. You know, we keep hearing from people that, you know, our show's great. There's just not enough episodes though and so do we keep hearing uh yeah okay they want us to put out two and three episodes a week which that's too much lgtc i have to tell you yeah even we are like yeah slow it down but for those of you that are thinking there's just not enough episodes you know where you can find more

patreon that's right tell them how to do it For those of you that are thinking there's just not enough episodes, you know where you can find more? Patreon! That's right. Tell them how to do it, Kristen. And sing the whole time? All right, I will. Yes. So guys, at the $5 level on our Patreon, you get a monthly bonus episode. We just recorded a new one this week.

I'm sorry, it's wild. We had two strong cases. May I tell them about yours? It's a secret. Brandy, I fucking knew you'd do this. What? In the shower today. That's right.

Go ahead and picture me naked. You're welcome. In the shower today, I was like, you know, and I guess be prepared to bleep this, Patty, because Brandy's so ridiculous. I was like, we should tell people that Brandy did her case on Patreon from. And I knew that, Patty, I bleep it right now. I knew you would not want me to say it because you're like, oh, it's a secret. It's a secret. But that will get people will hear that and they'll be like, oh, my gosh, I've got to join the Patreon. I guess you're going to have to take my word for it, people. It's really good. It's so good we had to bleep it.

Listen, guys, don't throw away your shot to join us on Patreon. That was excellent. At the $5 level, you can join our Discord, which is like a 90s chat room. You get those bonus episodes. What did Brandi cover? Who knows? Who knows? Join to find out.

Find out what you missed. And then the $7 level, you get all that plus a monthly bonus video. And you get a sticker and a card with our lovely autographs. And you get inducted on the podcast, this very podcast. Yeah. And at the ten dollar level that's the bob moss level i know it's not funny but you perfume smells like your daddy's got money that didn't work that's the ten dollar level that's the richie rich level okay but i i feel

like i've been much more subtle about i mean i'm just gonna say I think I've I've done a better job with these clues clues you know I mean if we're if we're setting out eggs for the easter egg hunt the kids are gonna look for mine and yours is just like oh there it is anyway guys ten dollar level you get all of the things we've said before, plus episodes a day early and ad-free. This is officially the longest Patreon plug we've ever done. You're welcome. All right, what are you going to tell us about? Are you familiar with Jackie Coogan?

A tiny bit. Okay. What do you know? Okay, well, Patty bleeped that, too. Jesus Christ. That's going to be a huge, just one solid bleep for, like, five minutes. It's like the Jerry Springer. Remember the Jerry Springer show?

It used to be just all bleeps. Yes. Okay, guys. So, first off, huge thank you to Corey in the Discord for suggesting this case. And also, big thank you to Martha Martin's fantastic article, which ran in the Daily News in 1938. What? I mean, that seems kind of spoilery.

Oh. Patty, please bleep that. Bleep that too, Patty. She said, Patty, we're really making you work for it this episode. Also, huge thank you to Friedrich Offman's 1938 article in The Oklahoman. And I'm not going to read the title of that because, as you've pointed out, there's spoilers aplenty. Here we go.ie was born in 1914 in la and he became an actor like the second he came out of the womb oh his parents lillian and

jack senior put him in movies and in vaudeville performances, like starting when he was an infant. And from the time that he was very young, it was clear that Jackie had real talent. He began performing at the Orpheum Theater, located at 842 South Broadway, Los Angeles, California. Mm-hmm. You see it? I do. Pretty cool, right? Yes. The Orpheum Theater was a big deal.

Judy Garland performed there. The Marx Brothers performed there. Ella Fitzgerald. Kansas performed there. That's the one in the Google image. Duke Ellington. And the Wikipedia list goes on. So there was Jackie, like three or four years old,

performing in this fantastic venue, and he was performing the hottest new dance craze. It was called the shimmy, and I'll explain it to you right now. Are you going to demonstrate it for me? Hold your body very still, Brandy. See if you can do this with me. But you move your shoulders back and forth, and when your right shoulder comes forward, your left shoulder goes back, and so forth, and so forth. You shimmy, shimmy, shimmy until somebody gets pregnant. My favorite thing was the Wikipedia article

told you in detail how to shimmy, as if, like, you don't know what a shimmy is. A shimmy was really popular and very steamy, like a sexy Macarena. Well, yeah, because if you had some dim titties, you could hear us. As you see before you today. Lube up dim titties first. Brandy, that's an out-of-context callback to a previous episode. People are going to think you're very strange.

Yeah, I'm the strange one. Okay. You're the one who brought it up. You're the one that said it. I'm sure we all remember such shimmy inspired hits as 1917's Shimmy Shawabble. And Shimmy She. 1917's shimmy shawabble and shimmy she and who could forget the classic 1922 hit i wish i could shimmy like my sister kate no oh i wish that i could shimmy like my sister kate just write that right now which of course of course, contains the classic line, She shimmies like the jelly on a plate.

Anyway, the point is that the dance was super popular, and Jackie Coogan, who was just a kid, went out on stage, and he did the shimmy. And the audience loved it. What? I mean, they were just... What? You don't like the shimmying? I don't, I mean... I just showed you the shimmying. They've got a little kid shimmying

up there. They were hard-pressed for entertainment, is what I'm saying. Okay, but think about it. How funny would it be to see a little kid doing this dance that, you know, is really this steamy dance for ladies? I mean, people would be enjoying it. I don't think it'd be that funny.

Unpopular opinion. Brandi, you laugh at everything and you think that wouldn't be funny? Unpopular opinion. I don't think kids are that funny. One night during one of his performances. Like, I never think it's funny when people are like, look at this cute thing my kid did. Really? Yeah.

I'm going to get hate mail for this. No, you know what you're going to get. You're going to be like, okay, I totally hear you, but look at this video. Look at this cute thing my kid did. And you're going to have to be like, oh, that's great. Because you're not going to be able to say to them, yeah, I'm not laughing. This is me not laughing. Yeah.

True or false? True. And you know what else I hate? What? When people post pictures of their kids with fucking food all over their faces. Well, that's funny. No! Yeah, like a birthday cake situation with cake all over the...

That's hilarious. It's not. I just spat everywhere. Are you grossed out? I just don't like it. You know, we got asked on our Patreon episode, our most unpopular opinion. That might be mine. Kids with food on their faces, not cute.

Okay. I mean, I beg to differ. Okay. There's an adorable photo of me from when I was like two with spaghetti all over my face. Oh, God. It's worse if it's spaghetti. That's the I was like two with spaghetti all over my face. It's worse if it's spaghetti. That's the worst food a kid could have all over their face. I tell you, I looked adorable.

I doubt it. So one night during one of these performances, a really big star was in the audience. And unlike you, Brandy, he could appreciate a child doing the shimmy. Oh, God, that sounds disgusting. Unlike you, he was a real creep. So this guy was, like, blown away by Jackie Coogan. He was like, I have to get that kid in my movies. Who was this star?

That man? Charlie Chaplin. Ooh! So Charlie Chaplin gave little Jackie a small role in his film A Day's Pleasure. It was not a great movie. But it didn't matter because it was a freaking Charlie Chaplin movie. Yeah. So of course when Charlie Chaplin offered four-year-old Jackie another role in his movie, The Kid,

Jackie, or more likely his parents, were like, hell yes. And man, The Kid was a huge success. It is now considered one of the greatest silent films of all time. Really? Okay, I watched a little bit of it because it's available on YouTube. Four-year-old Jackie cries on command. Real tears in the movie. How do you know they're real tears?

So I did kind of a deep dive, Brandy. I watched that. I was like, oh, my God, that's incredible. He's doing such a – he's acting his ass off. He's four years old. And then i watched an interview with jackie when he was older and he was talking about how charlie had done such a good job with him of like talking you look bored while i'm no okay so charlie did such a good job talking to

jackie and be like this is why you're gonna be so sad in the scene and he did such a great job storytelling that like jackie really felt it and so when the bad guys came and took him, he was really crying. All right, fine, fine. You're not as into it as I am. I thought it was great. I'm just saying that, yeah, that sounds really great when adult Jackie says that later. But how do you know they didn't just do, like, glycerin drops right there in the scene? I mean, maybe they did.

But the bottom line is it's really good acting from a four-year-old. I believe you. And I... Okay. I am critical of child actors. We are such assholes today. My kids aren't cute at all. I just hate it in some of these TV shows and movies where they get...

I know. Okay, okay, you know what I hate the most? The Olsen twins? No! You know how much I love Full House. They can solve any crime by dinner time, Brandi. That's not from Full House. I know it's not.

That's from the Mary Kay and Ashley Detective Agency. You think I don't know that? Anyway, the thing I hate is like when there's a kid actor and they give them all these really sophisticated lines. And it's supposed to be funny that like this kid is so smart. Hate it. Hate it.

Anyway. Does it make you feel uncomfortable that the kid's smarter than you? Absolutely not. Everyone knows how smart I am. I know about the S's in des moines so obviously i'm doing just fine thanks so this film made jackie coogan's career take off and it didn't matter if they were glycerin tears or real tears brandy you're right i'm being an asshole i'm sorry yes

absolutely i apologize for apologizing for all your misdeeds. Anyway, the next year, Jackie got the title role in Oliver Twist. Oh. Jackie was in so many films. Around this time, someone jokingly told Jackie's mom, don't teach Jackie arithmetic, because when he grows up, he'll want to know where all his money is. Oh. arithmetic because when he grows up, he'll want to know where all his money is.

Our fake laugh turned into real laugh. And Jackie's mom, Lillian, said, oh goodness, what hilarious foreshadowing. Jackie was a huge star. By the time he was seven, he'd become one of the biggest stars in the movie in i'm sorry in the movie in the movie that he was in i almost said in movie history and then i was like that's kind of stupid because movies hadn't been a long around very long but anyway you get the idea you get the picture. Jackie became one of the first actors to get merch deals. There was Jackie Coogan

stationary. Jackie Coogan whistles. There was even what are you making that face for? That seems weird. Stationary back in the day? This was before emails? Jackie Coogan on it? Well, okay, we won't buy a set for you, but other people enjoyed it.

Okay. You want to hear one that's way weirder? Yeah. Jackie Coogan peanut butter. That is way weirder, you're right. They had a real Jackie Coogan. And even back then. It's dark, Kristen.

It's real dark. And even back then, the public was kind of concerned about Jackie. They were like, who's getting all this money? Yeah. He's earning a ton, but obviously the money isn't going directly to him.

Can I see a picture of this kid? No, please don't look it up. I just want to see a picture of him. No, please don't look him up. Why? Because I'm afraid you're going to see something else. You about leapt over the table at me and slammed my computer closed. I'm very glad that you only know what you say you know about this.

Okay. Patty, bleep that. No, don't bleep it. That's like the most I've ever been like, no, did you? I was scared for a second. You should be. Yeah. I'm a maniac.

Maniac. And I'm shimmying like I've never shimmied before. No, excuse me. Bad reviews come at any second now. I wish that I could... No, see, I'll sing this, and then they'll be like, oh, I won't leave a bad review. I wish that I could sh share me like my sister Kate. Is that a real song?

Yes, it's a real song. How many times did you listen to it? I listened to it twice. It's not a bad song. Betty Grable does a cover of it. It's kind of cute. Okay, anyway. Cute little kid with food all over their fucking face.

You're not supposed to say fucking face about kids. I think it's adorable. I'm just telling you, if I ever post a picture of London with food all over her face, you will know that I've been kidnapped. You know what I want to do? Next time she has food all over her face,

I want to take a picture and frame it for you. No! I mean, she's my kid. I'd probably think it was pretty cute, but. Yeah. Yeah. But you would prefer one without food all over her face. Obviously.

And that's why I would do it anyway. You know, people are worried about this money. You know, where is it going? But his publicity reps were like, oh, don't worry. All the money has been wisely invested for him. And when he gets to the right age, he's going to be just fine. So worry about yourself, jerks. But people were like, do you know that video?

Yeah. Worry about yourself. But people were like, okay, but we're still super concerned about this kid. And the public just wouldn't let up. Jackie was in so many movies. People loved him, and they didn't want him to be taken advantage of. The rumors and speculation got so bad that when Jackie was eight years old, his parents, Jackie Sr. and Lillian, were like, okay,

we got to put a stop to all these crazy rumors that we're taking our kids' money. So here's kind of the funny thing. By law, they could have taken his money. Parents had the legal right to control the earnings of a minor. No. But they didn't want to do that. So they went to court and set up this thing where Jackie was But they didn't want to do that. So they went to court and set up this thing where Jackie was emancipated, meaning that everything he earned belonged to him. But his mom became his legal guardian.

And as his legal guardian, she would be in charge of the money until he turned 21. So, in July of 1922... That's pretty old. Yeah, I agree. Okay. Yeah. So in July of 1922, Jackie's parents created Jackie Coogan Studios. And all of Jackie's money just went into that company. Jackie Coogan Studios was later renamed Coogan Productions.

And fun fact, guess what? His mom was president of Coogan Productions, and his dad managed the money. They both took a healthy paycheck? Well, you know, they're working hard. And his dad managed the money with the help of Jackie's business manager and their good family friend, Arthur Bernstein. And thank God Jackie had his parents and Arthur looking out for his best interests Because by the time he was 12 years old, he had earned a million dollars Holy shit, adjusted for inflation

$14.6 million Shit By the time he was 12 That peanut butter was selling like hotcakes And they would put it on their hotcakes And they would write letters to each would put it on their hotcakes. And they would write letters to each other about it on their stationery, which no one thought was weird. Yeah, while blowing a Jackie Coogan whistle.

I'd forgotten about the whistle, and I was really worried about where that was going. But still, the public was still kind of concerned. This kid was in like three movies a year. Was the money really safe? And it was. By that point, it became public knowledge that Jackie owned about one and a half million dollars worth of L.A. real estate. And it was all in his own name. Except technically it wasn't.

Technically the real estate was owned by Coogan Productions, but that's neither here nor there, so shut up about it, okay? Okay. By the time he was 21, Jackie had earned between $3 and $4 million. Holy shit. Adjusted for inflation. That's between $56 and $76 million. Holy shit. Adjusted for inflation. That's between $56 and $76 million. Holy shit. His career had had some ups and downs.

When he was around 12 years old, he stopped looking like a cute little kid. Yeah, he got real awkward because he's 12. Right, but his parents insisted on keeping him in little kid clothes, and he had this, I know, it's upsetting. He had this long kind of page boy haircut thing that only little kids wore, but then he was like 12, and they're trying to hang on to his glory days. It's weird. It's weird. So kids started to make fun of him, and the movie roles dried up.

Hollywood people told his parents, Hey, you know, your kid had a good run. Why don't you take him out of the biz? Yeah. But Jackie didn't want to get out of Hollywood. He genuinely loved acting, and although he didn't have as many roles as a teenager, he still got some parts.

He played Tom Sawyer in the movie Tom Sawyer and Tom Sawyer in the movie Huckleberry Finn. Excellent. So he never completely fell out of the spotlight. But by the time he hit his 20s, his career had hit a major rough patch. He'd been this huge child star and he'd become kind of an awkward adolescent and now he was kind of an awkward grown man. He hadn't grown up to look like a leading man. He'd been so cute as a kid, but that

cuteness had not developed into stone cold foxiness. A little bit of a Macaulay Culkin situation, was it? Yeah, you know what? It makes me sad. Yeah. I mean, people are so mean. Right? Yeah.

Critics were awful to him. They said that he lacked masculine charm. And they said he lost his ability to him. They said that he lacked masculine charm. And they said he lost his ability to act. And they made fun of the fact that at just 21 years old, he was starting to lose his hair. Well, that's just rude. Yeah. He tried college, but that really wasn't for him. He wanted to be in the movies. Yeah. And so I guess people were like, well, maybe you should go to college since no one wants you in a movie.

He tried, but it wasn't his thing. He kept trying to hit it big again in acting, but he was a has-been. At 20-something years old. Right. But let's not cry too hard. I mean, he had this crazy amount of money. Yeah. He was going to be fine.

Or was he? As Jackie Coogan entered adulthood, he was set for life. In fact, he was probably set for, like, I don't know, 10, 20 lifetimes. I mean, $76 million. Yeah. It'd last me a couple weeks. And that was thanks in part to all of his hard work as an actor and the hard work of his father, Jackie Sr. Jackie Sr. had been an actor too. I mean,

obviously not nearly as successful as his son, but he had always helped manage his son's money. And he'd done a good job. He'd played it safe, hadn't done anything particularly risky with the money. He just made sure that it was all intact for when Jackie got old enough to take over the money. And, of course, he managed the money with Jackie's business manager, Arthur. So even though Jackie's career was at a bit of a standstill, life was pretty freaking great. a bit of a standstill, life was pretty freaking great. But then in May of 1935, Jackie was driving around in San Diego. His dad was driving the car. Jackie's best friend, Junior Duncan, was in the car. Their ranch foreman, Charles Jones, was in the car.

And so was another actor slash writer named Robert Horner. They'd all gone to Mexico together to go dove hunting. So they were coming back home. They were on a narrow stretch of mountain highway when a car approached them going way too fast on a hairpin turn. Jackie Sr. was forced to take the car to the side of the road and the car dropped off a 40-foot ledge. Oh my gosh. Of the five men in the car that day, Jackie was the only one who survived. Holy shit.

Yeah. It was terrible. This whole thing set off a series of lawsuits, but that's not really what we're here to discuss, but I'll just say... On our court podcast? Well, there's more legal stuff coming. Believe me, there's a lot of lawsuits everywhere in this thing. So some of the families of the victims sued because they claimed that Jackie's father had been drunk,

but Jackie went to court, testified that his dad hadn't been drunk, and yada, yada, yada. The families lost their lawsuits, and Jackie's father was vindicated. But this was an awful time for Jackie, because in addition to losing his father, he'd had to defend his dead father's name. And fun fact, just something for you to file away here, with Jackie Sr. dead, all the money went to Lillian, Jackie Jr.'s mom. And Arthur Bernstein, Jackie's business manager, of course, stepped up to the plate.

Good guy that he was and made sure that, you know, everything was fine. 1935 was one hell of a year. His dad had died, in addition to the other men in the car, and that year, on October 26th, Jackie turned 21. Mm-hmm. This was a big deal. Yeah, he gets control of her finances. Yeah, all the money comes over to him.

At least that was the expectation. Mm-hmm. Instead, Jackie's mom handed him $1,000 cash. Adjusted for inflation, that's about 19 grand. He was expecting 4 million. Yeah. So he questioned his mom and she was like, what? I gave you $1,000. What more do you want? The rest of my fucking money! She said, you don't have a cent to your name. I provided you with a home, an education, a mother's love. The money is mine. Fuck!

Jackie was stunned. This was crazy. He thought that if he just talked to his mom some, if he just reasoned with her, she would come around. But she didn't. She kicked him out of the mansion that they lived in. That he fucking paid for. Yup.

And Jackie struggled. Meanwhile, his mom and the business manager, Arthur Bernstein, started buying furs and diamonds. Were they banging? Oh, what? How dare you? Arthur was a married man. He started betting on horses.

So live your life. And even though Jackie Coogan had spent like basically his whole life receiving gifts from fans, all of a sudden there were no gifts. Yeah, they were all gone. It's not that Lillian and Arthur were keeping all the gifts to themselves. It's that the gifts just stopped coming suddenly and completely dunzo goodbye. Yeah. There was a lot of tension in the family. Jackie was like, Arthur sucks. He has my mom under a spell. He wanted to have a good relationship with his family, but it was incredibly difficult. But life went on. And that year he married actress Betty Grable, whose studio

famously insured her legs for a million dollars as a publicity stunt. Yeah. And, um, you know what's better than one love story? Two love stories? That's right. You'll be happy to hear that in December of 1936, a year after the crash, Lillian and Arthur Bernstein went to Las Vegas to get married. They were banging. You lied.

Arthur had been married until very recently, but I guess there was just something about Lillian Coogan that he just couldn't resist. All the money? No, it was just some mystique about her. Meanwhile, Jackie kept asking his mom about the money, and she was like, no, that's my money. Well, excuse me, mine and Arthur's money. Jackie didn't want to fight with his mom. In fact, he wanted to provide her with money. He wanted to make sure that his mom and little brother were set for life.

He wanted to give them the money to do that. But he couldn't because he didn't technically have any of his money to give away. Oh, my gosh. So when he turned 23 years old, Jackie made the difficult decision to sue his mom and stepdad. What choice did he have? Yeah, I mean, he didn't have a choice. He said it was embarrassing and unnatural to sue his own mother. I bet it was.

He really felt like if his dad was still alive, none of this would have happened. This was a huge scandal. But Lillian and Arthur didn't seem too embarrassed. Lillian famously said, no promises were ever made to give Jackie anything. And Arthur said, I just got a bruise from almost falling out of my chair that'll happen to the best of us what I'm not giving him anything he earned all of it you're stealing it from him no no no no he was a minor and so it goes straight to Lillian and her long-term friend, Arthur. Fuck right off.

And Arthur said, every dollar a kid earns before he is 21 belongs to his parents. Jackie will not get a cent of his earnings. Okay, I think it's so funny that he said, Jackie will not get a cent of his earnings. Yeah, they are his earnings. Yeah. You just contradicted yourself. Fucking, what's this guy's name? Arthur.

Arthur. Fucking aardvark. Then he said. That's the best Edsel you've got. You know, that's all I've got. You remember Arthur the aardvark? I do. He was so anxious for Arthur.

Then he said, his mother was entitled to all his earnings until he came of age. The young man is suffering from hallucinations. He has received everything he is entitled to and more. Fuck off. Uh-huh.

You know what Arthur can do? Fuck off. Eat ahuh. You know what Arthur can do? Fuck off. Eat a bag of dicks. Wow. By this point, Arthur was driving around town in a Rolls Royce. Of course he was. Jackie drove a Ford. And because every newspaper article from the 1930s mentions this,

you should know that Jackie Coogan was so poor. How poor was he? That his wife, Betty Grable, a woman, was the breadwinner in their relationship. No! Legend has it, his penis fell right off that day. It was a detachable penis situation. No one knows what you're talking about. Yes, they do. It's a real song. People have come to my defense, Kristen. Sure, everybody feels sorry for you. I mean, they're gonna photoshop images of that song playing on the radio both sides seemed certain that they would

win jackie was like i earned that money everyone knows i earned that money what court is going to side with my mom and stepdad and of course lillian and arthur who could barely speak because they were wrapped so tightly in furs and gold chains. They were like, the law is on our side and property and earnings of miners are controlled by their legal guardians. Boom Roosted. Fun fact, origin of the phrase. Boom Roosted. But was the law really on their side? it was actually kind of hard to say

um and by kind of i mean super hard to say because this isn't like unprecedented yeah kind of more like because there's just a bunch of conflicting stuff so california civil code had somewhat recently been changed to say that parents cannot control the property of a child. But did that apply to Jackie? If it had been recently changed? Right. And we're talking about money from like, you know, 12, 16, 20 years ago? Yeah.

That's a weird, weird counting. Yeah i i said 12 and i was like well no he made more money and then i was like well 20 because you know he was in the kid when you know anyway anyway you get the 12 16 20 years ago and under a different section of california Code, it said that the legal guardian does control the property of a minor. But the guardian was supposed to act under the direction of the court. So did that mean that the court could weigh in on the management of Coogan Productions? And another section of the law said that the court could ensure that a parent could allow for some allowance for themselves from the child's earnings as payment for past and future support. Okay, I do agree with that. Like, some amount.

Sure. Not all of it. Sure. But it's like, it's kind of clear as mud. Yeah, exactly. And this case had a lot of Hollywood parents just sweating in their britches. They were like, I really enjoy spending my kids' money. Yeah, it's not sweating in their britches.

What is it? When I wrote that, I knew it was wrong. What am I trying to say? Shaking in their boots. Shaking in their space boots. Well, not space boots. That's Austin Powers. austin powers it's actually dr evil oh my god real technical jesus christ anyway so all these hollywood parents are like i sure like spending my kids money i hope this goes the right way yikes soon the depositions began, and they were nuts. Coconuts?

Coconuts. In her deposition, Jackie's legal team asked Jillian, is it your position that all of Jackie's money belongs to you? And she said, I believe that's the law. Then she talked about how awful her son was He'd been a bad boy Is that how she said it? Well, not in a creepy sexual way

The way you're looking at me right now She's saying that's how you said it I didn't say it in a sexual way You like pulled the pencil out of your hair And shook it out Took off my glasses. And then. Headbutt. She'd tried

to provide him with a good education, but he'd been ungrateful. She said, I tried to make a man of him, but I haven't succeeded very well. And the first part of that sentence was sexual, which made it so uncomfortable for everyone present. She denied that anyone had ever told Jackie

that he'd get to keep the money he made making movies. She denied ever promising to create a trust fund for him. And Jackie's attorney, William Raines, was like, uh, okay, but we've got court documents from 16 years ago where you said you were creating a trust fund for him. The document clearly states that 50% of his earnings will go into a trust fund, quote, for the investment and preservation of the estate of Jackie Coogan. And she's like, yeah, that's fucking me. I'm the estate of Jackie Coogan. And she's like, yeah, that's fucking me. I'm the estate of Jackie Coogan.

Yeah. This is the first known record scratch in history when they produced those papers. So in early May of 1938, both sides made their arguments in front of Judge Emmett Wilson. And Jackie's attorney spelled out everything pretty plainly. Jackie had earned $4 million.

His mom had said a certain percentage of it was going into a trust. Money was promised to him. Blah, blah, blah. Bitch, give me my money. Hey, daddy. Okay, anyway, I won't sing anymore. I know you want me to, but I'm stopping. But the attorney for Lillian and

Arthur was like, yeah, hey, hey, we're willing to concede a ton of stuff. Sure, Jackie made a ton of money. Absolutely. But why are we here? The money isn't his and it never was and it never will be. And maybe they did promise him some money. Who cares? They had every right to change their minds. And plus, any promise they made wasn't legally binding, so maybe his mom and dad did say, oh, yeah, you're going to get the money, but who gives a shit?

Also, Judge, you should probably throw this whole thing out of court Because Jackie doesn't have a reason to sue in the first place I'm sorry, what? Failure to state a cause of action Nothing illegal happened, and so you can't sue Holy shit Right? Right?

Wow And the judge was like, uh-huh, uh-huh, uh-huh. Wow, I couldn't disagree with you more. And in this kind of first step of the legal phase, he said, I'm finding totally in Jackie's favor. Yeah. And he was like, also, I'm throwing in an injunction to stop you two shitheads from getting rid of any of your property. Yeah. Your property.

Yeah. Jackie's property. This court case dragged on and on and on. Jackie wanted a jury trial, but of course his mom and stepdad were like, oh no, thank you. We just want this in front of a judge. Because at this point it was very clear that Jackie was winning in the court of public opinion, of course. There was no way he'd lose in a trial, the court of public opinion, of course. There was no way he'd lose in a trial. But he might lose if it was just in front of a judge who was just looking at the law.

Yeah. Even though the trust fund thing, I'm like, I mean, I guess there's loopholes in everything. Yeah. But damn. At one point, Lillian complained to the judge that he needed to let her back into her money so that she could pay for the basics like food and stuff. And Jackie's lawyer was like, really? That's cute because you didn't care that your son never had money for the basics. And the judge was like, yeah, pipe down Lillian. Very good. He didn't really say pipe down, but you get the idea. Yeah. They set a trial date and they set a new trial date and a new trial date and at some point

arthur's ex-wife sued lillian for stealing her shitty husband but that got thrown out of court and ultimately uh this whole thing ended in august of 1939 with a settlement. No! Jackie had wanted $4 million. What do you think he got? $1 million? $150,000. Oh! No!

Apparently, his mom and stepdad had spent an incredible amount of money in a ridiculously short time, and there was only like $250,000 left. Oh, so Jackie got $150,000 and they got the rest. In other words, adjusted for inflation,

Jackie sued them for $74 million, and he got about $2.3 million of his own money. That's such bullshit. People felt really bad for Jackie. I feel terrible. Yeah, I feel terrible for him. I think it gets me, like, he appeared to have been such good friends with his dad and loved his dad so much. And then his dad dies.

And like six months later, he's 21. And all of a sudden his mom is doing this weird about face where she's like, no. Yeah. What are you talking about? We're giving you money. No, no, that's all mine. Oh, my gosh. No, no, that's all mine.

Oh, my gosh. The next year, he and Betty Grable divorced, and he got sued by some lady because he said his shitty stepfather was stepping out with her. It was actually kind of an interesting court thing that I didn't write down. So, you know, he sees his stepdad and this, you know, single woman out, and he made some comment, I believe it was on stage about like, oh, my stepdad stepping out on my mom. So this lady sued him and was like, you know, for defamation saying, you know, you said that I was stepping out with your stepfather. And so Jackie's legal argument was like, well, no, I meant that by the Webster's dictionary

definition of stepping out. I meant like putting one foot in front of the other outside. Oh, that's funny. Anyway, it seemed like the only way he could possibly make money was by selling his story. His sad, sad story. About his dad dying right in front of him and his mom and stepdad cheating him out of millions of dollars. Yeah.

It got so bad that eventually Jackie reached out to Charlie Chaplin and said, Hey, you know, I'm having a hard time. I need help. And Charlie was like, absolutely. And gave him a thousand bucks.

Oh, people felt really sorry for Jackie. They saw how his legal battle had turned out and it just did not seem fair. Yeah. And so in 1939, the California Child Actors Bill was signed into law. The law is known to this day as the Coogan Act

and it protects child performers from being exploited the way Jackie was. So the law requires that a child actor's employer put aside 15% of their earnings in a trust for the child and not for their shitty mom and stepdad, which is part of the law, not for the shitty mom and stepdad. And the money goes into an account that is commonly known as a Coogan account. Wow. Which 15% seems really small to me. I agree. It's very low.

I guess it's better than nothing. Yeah. There were quite a few loopholes in the law, but over the years, a lot of those loopholes have been, you know, tightened up to just, you know, real small. Tight buttholes. Oh, wow. Oh, I'm sorry. That's not what you were doing with that hand, that hand signal. I did set you up there. what you were doing with that hand signal. I did set you up there. Jackie struggled for a while after the lawsuit. After the attack on Pearl Harbor,

he joined the Air Force as a glider pilot, and after the war, he returned to acting. Really? He got a few TV roles, but, you know, it was never much. He did a few episodes of I Dream of Jeannie, The Brady Bunch, an episode of Andy Griffith, a few episodes of Perry Mason. And what the critics had said turned out to be true. He'd never be a leading man. And yeah, the poor guy went completely bald at a very young age. I mean, just cute bald. Yeah. But in 1964, Jackie Coogan, the has-been, landed his most famous TV role when he became Uncle Fester on The Addams Family.

Shut up! I was so happy that you didn't recognize the name. I had no idea! Yeah, he was Uncle Fester. Yeah. That's nuts. I didn't know that yeah isn't that so cool yeah i mean you would have never known well like i'm sure people in that in the day knew that like yeah he was this massive star when he was a child yeah and then he had this resurgence when he was much older and that's awesome you know, you know, his looks worked for the role.

Yeah. So he did become a successful actor as an adult. That's great. And to this day, thanks to the lawsuit he brought against his mom and stepdad, a ton of child actors have been protected from going through what he went through. And that is the story of a child actor. Holy shit. Okay, can I look him up now? Yes. Yes. from going through what he went through. And that is the story of a child actor. Holy shit.

Okay, can I look him up now? Yes, yes. See, I was afraid you were going to look him up and see a picture of him as Uncle Fester. That's why I nearly leapt over the table. You leapt across the table? Jackie Coogan. Oh, yeah, sure enough, there's a picture of him as Uncle Fester. Mm-hmm.

All right, all right. Yeah, he was a very cute little kid. He really was. Yeah. No food on his face, so. Not a scrap on him. Wow. Yeah, look at him as Uncle Fester.

Holy crap. That's crazy. I feel so terrible for him. Yeah. Can you imagine your mom treating you like that? No. That'd be awful. Look at him with Betty Grable.

I know. I know. Okay, Brandi, should we take some questions from the Discord? Of course we should. What do we got? First of all, what is this? What are we doing here? A Discord, you say? What do we got? First of all, what is this?

What are we doing here? A Discord, you say? The Discord is our 90s style chat room that you get in if you join our Patreon at the $5 level. It's a really good time. Only occasionally creepy. And that's usually because of us. Oh my God. Adjusted for Inflation wants to know, Kristen, would you rather walk through the snake house

or go out in public with no makeup for one week? Out in public with no makeup for one week? I mean, no question. Do you know how much I hate snakes? Oh my God. People can handle me without eyeliner. That's right. If you can't handle me without eyeliner.

You don't deserve me with eyeliner. That's right. That you can't handle me without eyeliner. You don't deserve me with eyeliner. That's right. That's what Marilyn Monroe said. Biden 2020 asks, any wedding plans, Brandy? Who are you going to get married to? The super hot guy named David. The father of my baby.

Real traditional choice there. Okay. I i'm not gonna say a lot okay but oh what we think we've locked down a venue we're very excited about it it's a bit on the unique side, which fits us perfectly. Hey, that Chuck E. Cheese is going to be great. I mean, who has thought about getting married in a ball pit before? That would be disgusting. That sounds so gross. Yeah. We should just piss right on you guys.

Instead of getting married in the ball pit, we're just going to have all of our wedding guests throw urine at us. Hey, that's probably going to be free. All right. My two tater tots. This is not a question, but thank you. She says Brandy London is freaking adorable. It's true. Thank you. Okay. Did you know when Lincoln was president asks, how is peanut doing? Good Lord. You guys, this dog. Yeah. So last week, we felt like something was wrong. We felt like something was wrong with her for a long time. She started acting kind of weird. She acted like afraid on our walks.

She was really tired. Then she had the old bloody poos. Yeah. And so we took her to the vet, and the vet was basically like, you know, ran a bunch of tests and told us it's either going to be medication or euthanasia. You know, that's kind of what we're looking at. And Norman kept trying to convince me not to cry my eyes out until we had the answer, but jokes on him, I can cry my eyes out anytime. So like for days, I mean, how long was it?

Oh, it was days. Yeah. We were waiting and waiting and waiting on the answer. And the answer turned out to be, huh, you know, she seems fine. You just got an old dog, a real old dog with health issues. And sometimes she's going to have bad days. Someday she's going to have good days. And now she's been doing fine. Yeah, she seems great.

That dog is giving me multiple heart attacks giving me the bloody poos i know i hope not bad bad real brat okay you're way better at screaming bad bad real brat Not like all those other fake Brads in the Discord. Bad, bad, real bad asks, Brandy, do you play fantasy football? I am not playing this year. I did play last year. And fucking won, obviously. How boring. No, I love it.

Okay, here's the reason I won, though. Okay. I had, Kristen, you could not care less. My quarterback was Patrick Mahomes, and my tight end was Travis Kelsey. Well, that'll do it. Great. Kristen just heard me talking like a teacher in peanuts. No, no, no.

Because those two are members of the Kansas City Chiefs, and that team, don't know if you know, won the Super Bowl this past year, guys. So that's the Sports Corner with Kristen Caruso. Oh, I love this. Ford F1 Green Picky has given us each a question. Yes. Kristen, yours is, if you had to write a biography about someone, who would you pick? Oh, God. I mean, it's hard to say. if you had to write a biography about someone who would you pick oh god i mean

it's hard to say but probably cassie chadwick yeah yeah the old timey con artist that i covered in episode eight million yes um actually i think it was episode eight like eight million episodes ago oh okay yeah yeah sure brandy they ask you if you could cut and style anyone's hair who would it be oh my god she's rubbing her hands like an evil barber what would be i've talked about it before who donald trump oh really oh god if i could get my fucking hands in there i can make him look maybe like a human being what unless like a this is a terrible answer to that question. Why? What if you give him a decent haircut and then people are like, huh, maybe he's not so bad after all. That

is not enough. For some people it might be, Brandy. Do you want that on your conscience? I'm just saying, I want to know what's under that cotton candy fluff. You know what's under it. A big bald head. I want to get my hands on it. Brandy, I'm not a professional and I can tell you what's under that dome. Well, under the dome is probably just like an empty space with like a walnut inside. I know. But what would you do to, I mean you just What would, okay, what would you do to this? I don't know because I need to assess the situation first.

You've seen the situation. It's dry, brittle hair that is swooped around like soft serve on the top of his head. Like cotton candy. It is swirled around like cotton candy. Don't you just have to shave it? No. Brandy. There's stuff you could do.

No, there's not. Yeah, there is. You don't want to be holding on to scraps. That's not a good look on anybody. I'm not saying that. What, are you going to spray paint the top of the head? No? Okay, give us some options.

It needs to be much shorter. Well, absolutely. Much shorter. Yeah. And a natural color. shorter and a natural color well what would be the more natural color you than orange well that's what i'm saying is like it matches his face his orange head like it would match his what would Oh, gross. That's disgusting. It's a quote from a movie. A film.

A film. Forgetting Sarah Marshall. They're sophisticated films. So do you think you'd give him just kind of a bit of a crew cut situation? I think I'd do like a fade situation. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, okay, I can kind of see that. But the thing is, you do this.

It's not enough, Kristen. What? It's not enough to change people's complete opinion about him. You don't have to change the complete opinion. You're just talking about... You're just going to give him a glimmer? You've just got those weirdos in the middle who are like... You think a haircut's going to be enough to push him one way or the other?

What if I... What if I give him a really bad haircut and it's enough to... Brandy, did you know... This is a true story. Don't give me a look like I'm giving you a fake story already. You haven't even heard. Did you know that when a likable person impersonates a president on TV? Yes, I did know this. It impacts their favorability ratings. So yeah, I do think a better haircut on Donald Trump might help him a little. Because we, as Americans, are stupid hoes.

It's true. I'm a stupid hoe. SNL made me like Elizabeth Warren more than I initially liked her. What was not to like about... It's not that I didn't like her. It made me like her more. Okay. Because you love Kate McKinnon.

Yes. Sure. Who doesn't? Who doesn't? All right. All right. Calm down. Very defensive about Elizabeth Warren, Kristen. more okay because you love kate mckinnon yes sure who doesn't who doesn't all right all right calm down okay very defensive about elizabeth warren i loved elizabeth and i'm really pissed that she went away

tickle me chill mo i don't even know what their question is. Tickle Me Chill Moe asks, if you could only vote for a serial killer for president, who would you vote for? Oh, no. Oh, no. Probably that Eileen lady who killed the dudes.

Just because she's a lady? It would be a groundbreaking decision. Well, okay, wasn't it true that she at least was starting out killing the rapey, rapey guys? Yeah, she did. So, I mean, at least kind of a Dexter situation. Yeah, she got her start in rapists.

So, I mean, well, I mean, you find me a better serial killer, Brandy. I challenge you. You don't want Charlie Manson with his race wars are a-coming. I do not need to tell you that he is not a serial killer, ma'am. Okay. Don't make me get technical. Oh, my God. You guys, she pushed the invisible glasses up higher on her nose.

Actually. Who would you vote for? You got to pick somebody. You can't do that. I don't know. Who's the least bad? I think I found her. Eileen.

That's fine. Come on, Eileen. Eileen Wuornos. Yeah. Huh. You don't seem real happy about her serial killer cousin. I don't like it at all. I mean, she'd probably be terrible.

I think she would be. Well, any serial killer would be terrible. She was also uneducated, so that's very alarming. Well, I mean, here's a... Do you want someone who's smart and evil or dumb? Well, that's what I'm thinking of. Like, Ted Bundy, very smart. A lawyer, very charming.

He would be way more qualified to be president. Okay, I disagree that he was so charming. Okay, but he was extremely educated. Yes. Yeah, he would be much more qualified to be president. Yeah, but could he do more damage? Yeah, probably. So then we don't give him the job.

I'm glad we're taking this so seriously. Brandy, you've had some bad takes on this question. Bad, bad, real bad wants to know, do you all ever disagree on what should or should not be edited out? Have we ever disagreed? Yes. When? When I have burped and you want to leave it in,

and I'm very protective of that, and I don't like it. You made me leave one in because you thought it was so hilarious. And I made you bleep it. Okay. You wanted to take out the bleeped version. Yes. And you only allowed it to be in because you tried to convince David to be on your side. And David was like, no, that's funny.

Leave it in. You're weird about gross stuff. I am. What's with you? I'm a lady. No, you're not. No, I don't think people need to hear me burp on the podcast. I don't think they do either.

That's why I suggested we bleep it. I don't find bodily functions nearly as hilarious as you do, Kristen. I think you do when it's coming from someone else. No, I don't think I do. Okay, okay. You didn't enjoy my shit in a bag story? I did enjoy your shit in a bag story. Okay, that's an extreme example.

I don't find, like, fart humor that funny in movies. Like, name a fart joke in a movie. Like, what are you talking about? There's all kinds of fart scenes in movies. Well, I don't know that you're, I mean, yeah. When I was farting before we started this podcast. No, I didn't think your fart was funny at all. Norm's reaction to your fart, very funny.

That's what anyone would say, though. Unless you were tall. Norm's eyes watered up. And he's passed out on the floor. Hasn't come to yet! Mm-mm, good. Wants to know, if both of you could watch only one TV show for the rest of your life,

which TV show would it be? Gosh, I felt like I had my answer, and then as soon as I read it, I was like, but never see Dateline again. I think I've got to go with my gut. Schitt's Creek. It's my favorite show that has ever been on. Hmm. And I can rewatch it, and I find it funny every single time. I've watched it all the way through like six times.

I think I would do The Wire. Oh, yeah. It's not funny, though. No, it's not. That's why I'm kind of like, ugh. But see, like, so my favorite show in general has always been The Office. But, I mean, some of those later seasons. Yeah.

Oh, boy. They're not great. I tell you what, when your your star leaves the show needs to shut down yeah and i also feel like i have watched the office so many times that maybe i'm tapped out for my lifetime you know going with the wire all right patience asks if i remember correctly brandy you were a softball player i was as well and a head softball coach what position did you play okay i played centerfield for most of my softball career except for one terrible season where my dad forced me to play

catcher because our catcher shattered her cheekbone and warming up the pitcher before our very first game. Oh, no. I hated playing catcher. There's way too much shit that you have to pay attention to. There's the ump and there's the batter. And then you got the pitcher throwing balls at you. It's way too fucking much. Well, and after you saw someone's cheek get shattered. She shattered her cheekbone. Did she get a new sexy cheek implant on both sides? I don't know what they ended up

doing with it. Plastic surgery idea. The podcast should pay for it. But, okay, you didn't mention the thing that I would be most worried about. That squatting position. That's a long time to hold a squat. But, I mean,

I've got some thighs, so there's plenty of muscle there to work on that. Hold me up just fine. And they make these things that you wear on the back. Little cushions. Yeah, they're like, well, it makes your legs into a little couch for you. Okay. Yeah, that was the least, the crouching was the least of my concerns. Did you try talking to your father and say, hey, I hate this.

Let me play another position. Well, of course. And he was like, you know, you got to play. You don't have anybody else to be the catcher. I can teach you to catch. So, man, I hated it. It was very scary. I was sure that every time someone was up to bat, they were going to hit me in the head with their bat.

Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. It sounds terrifying. Yes. That's why you should avoid sports at all costs. I would just, this isn't really a question, but. What?

I'm feeling pretty proud of myself. Oh, wow. Here we go. There's been a large number of people who have reached out to us and said that, yes, in fact, people do pronounce the S on Illinois all the time. And how have you never heard of that before, Kristen'm so alarmed so alarmed someone reached out and said that people in Illinois say Illinois it's like the Missouri Missouri yes I it's it's crazy to me so weird huge pet peeve of mine. I know. Yeah. Hate it. Don't get it.

Ooh, Sticky Situation wants to know, mac and cheese with macaroni noodles or shells? Mmm. Okay. What you got, Brandy? I prefer, my preferred mac and cheese is Kraft mac and cheese. The original blue box. You know what I like?

What? Kraft Mac and Cheese with shapes. Oh, yes. Yeah, because it holds the cheese better. The cheesasaurus wrecks. Sure. I remember the first time Norm came over to my apartment. He was surprised and impressed by my Scooby-Doo mac and cheese.

Norm would be impressed by that. Is that what you made him for dinner? No. No, he was just impressed that I had it in the home. Ooh. He was like, this is a lady with class and taste. David prefers Velveeta shells and cheese. Kind of a divided household.

It is. It is. It's a house divided. You sure you want to get married? Kristen, we've got something we need to talk about. What's that? We need to follow up about our Bob Moss basket. Okay.

You guys may remember a couple weeks ago we talked about a little charity project we were doing for Harmony Project KC. It's a really cool organization if you want to donate. They give free music instruction to local kids in our area in need. Mostly serves people of color. It's a great organization organization and we generously donated. We donated a little basket of LGTC stuff. The monetary value was like 50 bucks. It was just stickers. It was our first merch. So a couple t-shirts, some stickers

which we'll be selling soon. And then a shout out on the podcast. Brandi, tell them what happened. You guys went nuts for it. You guys were amazing. Yes. It was one of the most popular items in the auction. We were blown away and so excited. The winner of the Bob Moss basket,

which by the way, all of this stuff will come in a Bed Bath & Beyond bag, was Joellen. Joellen spent $490 that went to this awesome charity. $410. $410. Wow. Way to bring us down. Brandy's not appreciative, but I am. No, we are so blown away by the generosity. I think one of the most amazing things to me is that Joellen is actually one one of our earliest patreon subscribers she's been a supporter of our show for a very long time and uh it's just amazing to me thank you so much for um being that excited about the item that we donated and being that excited about giving to an amazing

cause so we did ask over email you, when you get your shout out, is there anything specific you'd like to us to say? And here's what she said. She said, yes, please also do a shout out to my grandma. Her name is Mary and she is the anti Karen. My grandma will go out of her way to find a manager just so she can praise the staff. And she'll take the time to write complimentary letters for service people that come to our house. She is the personification of light and kindness and she is a friend to everyone she meets. I love you, Grandma. I hope this could be a reminder to the listeners that they should reach out to their elderly relatives while they still can. That's amazing. We love your grandmother. She sounds amazing. Mary sounds like the best.

She sounds awesome. I love the anti-Karen. That's great. You know what? And that's a good reminder. Yeah. To go out of your way to compliment people and, like, tell their manager a good thing. Yeah.

Few people recognize good customer service and usually just take time to complain. Mm-hmm. Thank you, Mary, for just take time to complain. Thank you, Mary, for taking the time. And thank you, Joe Allen. For your very generous donation. Thank you so much. Well, on that note, should we move into some Supreme Court inductions? Of course we should.

You guys, this week we are sticking with your names and favorite books. Marissa. The Outsiders by S.C. Hinton. Mendy Boggs. Wild by Cheryl Strayed. Rowena. Don't have a favorite, but I cried reading Roots. Kathy DeBastos-Clemson. Belinda Blinked. Sam. Into the Wild. Nick. How to Ruin Everything. Essays by George Watsky. Annie. The Enchanted Life of Adam Hope by Rhonda Riley. Erin. Faithful by Alice Hoffman. Lucinda Florence. My Sister the Serial Killer. Karen. Laughter in the Dark. Jenna Gray. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. Jess Lapping. Bag of Bones. Alanna Bow Bowles Catcher in the Rye Admiralette

Three Men in a Boat by Jerome K. Jerome Natasha Z Childhood's End by Arthur C. Clarke Micah Anything by Harlan Coben Morgan Page F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby Jorge

As Meat Loves Salt by Maria McCann Eliza Anything by Diana Palmer Gatsby. Jorge. As Meat Loves Salt by Maria McCann. Eliza. Anything by Diana Palmer. Erica Bartley. The Viscount Who Loved Me. Say that? The Viscount Who Loved Me. What's a viscount? I don't know.

Welcome to the Supreme Court! Let's do the shimmy as we end this episode. Thank you guys for all of your support. If you're looking for other ways to support us, please find us on... I think I said fleas instead of please. Please find us on social media. We're on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Reddit, Patreon.

Please subscribe to the podcast wherever you listen and head on over to Apple Podcasts. Leave us a rating, leave us a review, and then be sure to join us next week when we'll be experts on two whole new topics. Podcast adjourned. And now for a note about our process. I read a bunch of stuff,

then regurgitate it all back up in my very limited vocabulary. And I copy and paste from the best sources on the web and sometimes Wikipedia. So we owe a huge thank you to the real experts. For this episode, I got my info from Martha Martin's fantastic 1938 Daily News article, Coogan Case Spurs Move to Safeguard Wealth of Minors. Friedrich Othman's 1938 article in The Oklahoman titled, In Life As On Screen, Pathos Marks Career of the Kid, along

with other articles from newspapers.com and Wikipedia. I got my info from an article for the Crime Library by Brian Levitis, Murderpedia.org and The Court Record. For a full list of our sources, visit lgtcpodcast.com.

Any errors are of course ours, but please don't take our word for it. Go read their stuff.