Let's Go To Court! - 31: The Many Losses of Marybeth Tinning & the Cannibal Cop

Episode Date: August 29, 2018

When Marybeth Tinning’s infant daughter Jennifer died, friends, neighbors and medical personnel felt sorry for the grieving mother. A few weeks later, Marybeth’s young son died, too. People couldn’t believe it. How many losses could one person withstand? Then another child died. And another. And another. In total, nine of Marybeth’s children died over the course of 14 years. In that time, people’s reactions evolved from sympathetic to suspicious. Then Kristin tells us the story of Gilberto Valle, a.k.a., the cannibal cop. Kathleen Valle knew her marriage wasn’t going great. But when Kathleen figured out exactly what her husband Gilberto was doing online, her blood ran cold. Her NYPD policeman husband had been chatting online about torturing, raping, killing and eating her. But the horror didn’t end there. He talked about carrying out these plans on many women. Authorities took action, but Gilberto’s defense was strong. He hadn’t actually carried out any of these plans. He claimed he was just fantasizing — with no intention of ever harming anyone. This case had people everywhere trying to draw the line between fantasies and criminal intent. 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: “A Dangerous Mind” by: Robert Kolker for New York Magazine “Gilberto Valle, ex-New York police officer, talks about his cannibalism fantasies in film,” New York Times HBO Documentary, “Thought Crimes: The case of the cannibal cop” “Ex-officer’s conviction in cannibal case shouldn’t be reinstated, appeals court rules,” New York Times “Cannibal Cop’s wife takes the stand as horrific details of former NYPD officer’s twisted bondage fetish emerge in first day of trial,” New York Daily News In this episode, Brandi pulled from: “14 years and nine tiny corpses later, authorities finally took action on murderous mother” by Mara Bovsun, New York Daily News “Baby Killer” by Mark Gado, crimelibrary.com “Baby killer Marybeth Tinning leaves prison” Albany Times Union

One semester of law school. One semester of criminal justice. Two experts! I'm Kristen Pitts. I'm Brandi Egan. Let's go to court! On this episode, I'll talk about the case of the cannibal cop. And I'll be talking about Mary Beth Tenning, a mother who suffered one horrific loss after another. And now, a word from our sponsor.

That's right, folks. We got another sponsor. Holy hell. Two weeks in a row. This is nuts. We have sponsors. This is nuts. I'm going shopping.

I'm buying all the fur. What would I do with fur? You all should know that right now we're just covered in diamonds no clothes just diamonds no we're so excited because uh this sponsorship comes from andrew lippins who has been listening to the show since like day one yeah yeah big supporter of the show we're thrilled for him because he's uh he's been working really hard on this new album.

And we hope you all will check it out. Yeah. So Demo Reel is an eight-track instrumental album that pulls from different genres that have influenced his musical tastes. It's $4 on Bandcamp and can be found at andrewlippens.bandcamp.com. That's Andrew spelled exactly how you spell Andrew. Lippens, L-I-P-P-E-N-S at bandcamp.com. Don't leave out the silent G. The album was composed, arranged,

and performed entirely by Andrew Lippens. We've both listened to it yep enjoyed it very much yeah um one of the things that i thought was cool about how he did this was he was like first listen to it if you guys like it then you know let's do a sponsorship if not don't worry about it so we are we are doing this because we need more diamonds and but also because we genuinely enjoyed it it's all instrumental so it's great for like studying working out just kind of relaxing i had it on while i was doing some research and it was awesome yeah definitely really enjoyed it that's andrewlippins.bandcamp.com four dollars what better way is there to spend four dollars

there's not. Exactly. The end. Do you know? No, I just feel suspicious immediately. You're suspicious of me. So you wanted to confront me about my opinion. So our most recent episode has been out for a mere matter of hours, Kristen. Yes, yes. And I've already received two strongly worded messages. People are pretty upset with your take on the Andre the Giant documentary.

Yeah, so we were talking about how all HBO documentaries are amazing. Yeah, so we were talking about how all HBO documentaries are amazing, and I shared my opinion that I was just not a huge fan of that documentary on Andre the Giant. Yeah. And I ended up looking it up later. It has like a 97% rating, so clearly I am in the tiniest minority. You are in the 3%. Yeah, my mom and my sister both text me today, and they were like, the Andre the Giant documentary was amazing! And then Casey was like, Kristen must not like wrestling.

And I was like, I assume she doesn't like wrestling. I don't really know. How dare you? I'm a huge fan of the Hulk. Of the Hulk. He doesn't go by the Hulk. That's the comic book guy. Oh.

Hulk Hogan. Yeah. Okay, fine. So I don't know much about wrestling. All right. So let me tell you. I'm feeling... I've been feeling

pretty bad about last week's episode. Why? I don't want people to think that I phoned it in because I did such a short case. Okay, you are so weird about this. That was a good case. I was very intrigued. But you were, like, paranoid.

I am, yeah. The minute you came over last week, you were like, oh, I did a terrible job. Because I really liked the case, but then I listened to it today, and I was like, I talked for like eight minutes on that case. I didn't use a stopwatch. That's not an accurate time. But I want people to know that I love doing this podcast. I was not phoning it in.

So I've got a hefty one for you today. So you better, I don't don't know get comfortable put your barka lounger in a fully reclined position did you see the tweets we got about your episode less no no people hated it they were like i see how it is you guys ask to get to 50 ratings on itunes we do it and then brandy just phones it in no it was great it was fun i liked it but okay so you got a hefty one i got a hefty one today you don't know the story of marybeth tenning no my gosh, I'm so glad. Okay. Okay. I'm going to start out by saying that I pulled the majority of this episode from an article by Mark Godot for crimelibrary.com.

Excellent. Okay. Let's get into this one. Let me stretch it out. Okay. I don't know why I needed to stretch to listen but i'm right there with you need some q-tips clean out your ears yeah i feel like that's how you get ready to listen right for me it's like big cotton like those american gladiator okay marybeth tenning was born marybeth row on september 11th 1942 in dwainsburg new york

a small town about 10 miles south of schenectady fucking killed it while not a ton is known about her childhood it seemed to be generally unremarkable. Her father worked as a press operator at General Electric. Her mother also worked outside of the home. So Mary Beth and her younger brother were often shuffled around to be watched by extended family. Reportedly, during this time, one elderly family memberarybeth that she was an accidental child and that her birth had been unwanted oh that's great you should definitely share that information this

seemed to have a huge impact on her because later in life she would repeatedly tell her brother that he was the only wanted child i mean she was a small child when this was said to her, and it's something that just like stuck with her for her whole life. I think this is a PSA. Graduating from Dwaynesburg High School in 1961, Mary Beth had aspired to go to college, but she'd been an average student at best, and it just never happened. After high school, she had taken on several unskilled, low-paying jobs and finally settled on being a nurse's aide at Ellis Hospital in Schenectady. This next paragraph is a description of her that I pulled directly from the article by Mark Godot.

Is it about to be super flattering? The views and opinions expressed here do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of the hosts of this podcast. Oh my about to be super flattering? The views and opinions expressed here do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of the hosts of this podcast. Oh my, what do we got? As an adult, Mary Beth was a woman of average appearance. Photographs of her over

several years show a person who was attractive to the camera at times. On other occasions, she did not fare as well. She was five feet four inches tall, had blue eyes, blonde hair, and a trim, though not sexy, figure. Mary Beth kept her hair short and maintained a neat, proper appearance. Oh, to be a woman. She looked attractive sometimes.

She was trim, but don't be mistaken. She was not sexy. You just hit on my favorite part. Props for keeping it tight. Not doing a great job. Do we have a minute for a quick tangent? Yeah. This is reminding me of the time.

Did I tell you about when I went to the gym one time? This was a long time ago. And this annoying guy came up to me and started like kind of hitting on me and just being obnoxious. No. Okay. So he starts kind of hitting on me being obnoxious. And I hate that because like when you're on the treadmill or on the elliptical, it's not like you can literally run away from this dude who's like,

So at one point he was like, hey, do you have a sister? And I was like, yeah. And I was like, but she doesn't go to this gym though. And he was like, oh, because like I thought I saw someone who like looked just like you here like on Tuesday and that's when I realized that I was at the gym on Tuesday

but I hadn't been wearing makeup and like I'd been wearing these really gross sweatpants with a droopy butt. He's like, there was like a less hot version of you here on Tuesday. Here's what he said.

He goes, she looked just like you. Like she was really tall and everything, but not nearly as attractive. Oh my gosh. So yeah, in some photographs, the woman looked lovely. In others, not so much. So in 1963, Mary Beth was set up on a blind date with Joe Tenning. Joe was a shy, mild-tempered man with a quiet but upbeat personality. He worked at General Electric, General Electric, just as her father had.

And the two got along reasonably well. So they married in 1965. That's what I look for in a life partner. Wait, are we going to get a long summary of his looks? Like, reasonably well. When I met Norman, I'll never forget it. I was like, eh, he's fine. He's fine.

I guess you'll do. The Tennings settled into married life well, and in the first five years of marriage they welcomed two children first a daughter they named barbara in may of 1967 followed by a son they named joseph jr in january of 1970 it wasn't until late 1971 and early 1972 that things began to unravel in Mary Beth's life. In October of 1971, her father died suddenly from a heart attack. Then on Christmas day, Mary Beth gave birth to her third child, Jennifer.

She was sickly from the moment she was born though and the tennings never got to bring her home. She passed away still in the hospital on January 3rd, 1972. The cause was meningitis and multiple brain abscesses though she wasn't described as like a happy person or even it seems like a well-adjusted person uh lots of friends and family described her as strange the deaths of her father and jennifer in such a short time span really affected Mary Beth. Her friends described her as strange.

Yeah. Ouch. So Mary Beth was affected by these deaths, as anyone would be, obviously. And she became even more withdrawn than she typically was. And overall, she just seemed fragile. But things wouldn't be getting any easier for marybeth anytime soon 17 days after the death of jennifer on january 20th 1972 she took joseph age two to the ellis hospital emergency room she reported that he'd had some kind of seizure

they observed the boy for a couple of hours but when they couldn't find anything wrong with him, they sent him home. Several hours later, though, Mary Beth rushed through the emergency room doors, clutching little Joey. She told doctors that when they'd come home from the hospital, she'd laid him down for a nap. And when she realized later that he'd been down for an unusually long time, she went to check on him and she found him tangled in his blankets his body was blue oh my there was nothing the doctors could do for him joey was dead the cause of death was listed as unknown but no autopsy was why not you know i don't know okay i don't know um just six weeks later no uh-uh marybeth was back at the same emergency room this time with her daughter barbara now four years old she told doctors that barbara had gone into convulsions but doctors much like in the case of little joey couldn't find anything wrong with her this time though they wanted to keep barbara overnight for observation

marybeth insisted on taking barbara home though several hours later they were back in the emergency room this time barbara was in a comatose state it was like a horrible case of deja vu. The next day, Barbara died in her hospital bed. Her death was attributed to Rye syndrome, a rare and rapidly progressive brain disease in children. In a period of nine weeks, Mary Beth and Joe Tenning had lost all three of their children. It was devastating and highly unusual. Even if things like Rye syndrome and SIDS were to blame, the deaths were a shock to everyone in the Tennings' lives, especially Barbara and Joey's,

because up to the time of their death, they'd been happy, healthy, active children. Many speculated that there must have been some kind of genetic explanation, some kind of disorder that passed on from mother to child. But the Tennings didn't really seem worried. In early 1973, Mary Beth became pregnant with their fourth child. On Thanksgiving Day, she gave birth to Timothy, a small but healthy baby weighing in at just over five pounds. That is a small baby. Yeah, really small baby.

On December 10th, just three weeks after his birth, baby Timothy was rushed back to the hospital. Mary Beth told doctors she'd found him unresponsive in his crib. Timothy was dead. But doctors could find nothing medically wrong with him. His cause of death was officially listed as SIDS, Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. Really? Kristen. The doctors don't have a chart on this lady?

This mother is suffering horrible losses here where's okay where's my dude joe in all this what's what's he doing is he coming into the hospital too is uh so it seems that you know joe is is there he exists he exists he's not present during the actual um discovery of the unresponsive children okay but uh yeah i mean he's showing up at the hospital he's grieving for his lost children but you know somebody's got to make money i think mary beth is stay-at-home mom at this point so he's you know got a job to do and he's a very like systematic man and he sticks to his routine okay so it would be another two years before mary beth would give birth to their fifth child but 1974 wouldn't be entirely incident free that year joseph tenning was admitted to the hospital with a near fatal case of barbiturate poisoning what he received medical care in time though and

fully recovered later both mary beth and joe would admit what's what's barbiturate poisoning so i don't know barbiturate is why don't you let me finish the fucking paragraph and then you might fucking know, Kristen. My God. You know, I'm just so intrigued. This is so much better than last week. I'm just like really into it. So he's got a near fatal case of barbiturate poisoning, Kristen.

I totally know what that is no need to explain barbiturates are a drug okay um he received medical care in time and fully recovered later both marybeth and joe would admit though that this incident had occurred during a time of great marital turmoil they'd been having marital troubles. They'd lost four kids. It just really takes a toll on a marriage. And Mary Beth had just, you know,

crushed up some pills she'd taken from her friend's epileptic daughter and put them in Joe's grape juice. Joe refused to press charges against his wife, though. Yes. Okay, but by this point he knows she's killed all the kids she tried to kill me kristen these poor sickly children are dying of natural causes how dare you suggest something more sinister. Is Joe... dumb? So he's like, this was a really hard time in Mary Beth's life. You know, we've lost all of these kids. It's just a natural thing that someone goes through.

You know, that much lost, you're going to try and kill your husband. Oh. Oh, God. So he refuses to press charges and the tennings keep on keeping on on march 30th 1975 easter sunday marybeth gives birth to a beautiful blonde haired blue-eyed baby named nathan but on september 2nd marybeth showed up St. Clair's Hospital with five-month-old baby Nathan in her arms. He was dead. Oh, God.

She was driving and Nathan was in the front seat next to her. Oh, the 70s. Because nobody was alarmed about that. Now your kid's like 12 years old and still has to be in a booster seat. So he was riding in the front seat, you know, probably smoking a cigarette. Drinking a bottle of bourbon. And Mary Beth looks over and noticed that he'd stopped breathing. So she rushes him to the hospital.

But again, doctors can find no explanation for his death. This time his cause of death is listed as unknown. Friends and neighbors were shocked. How could this be happening? Five of Mary Beth's children had died, and four of them were in her exclusive care when they went from healthy, happy children to not so much anymore. Were they really shocked, though?

Because I feel like I'd be shocked if the kid lived to 12. Genuinely, people were like, how horrible this poor woman is going through loss after loss after loss it was horrible it was scary and it was unbelievable and it wasn't over yet no no no in 1978 the tennings were in the process of adopting a baby boy no how i know who's fucking giving them a baby that is they can't keep the one their own alive you're gonna give them somebody else's baby that is incredible i mean i just i think it has to go back to it's the 70s these babies had all kind of been like between a few different hospitals.

And so not everybody's sharing records. Oh, my God. They're in the process of adopting this baby. And then Mary Beth gets pregnant with her sixth child. Oh, my gosh. So rather than cancel the adoption, they decided to keep both babies. than cancel the adoption they decided to keep both babies in august of 1978 they received a baby boy named michael from the adoption agency and then two months later on october 29th mary beth gave birth to a girl they named mary francis now you're not gonna believe this but in january of 1979 mary frances had some kind of seizure wow and mary beth

rushed her to the emergency room at st claire's hospital which was directly across the street from the apartment they were now living in convenient doctors were able to revive the baby this time but on february 20th mary Mary Beth came running into the same emergency room with Mary Frances's lifeless body cradled in her arms. The story was the same. She'd found the baby dead in her crib and had no idea what had happened to her. When an autopsy again failed to find a medical reason for the baby's death. It was attributed to SIDS. Oh, my. Following Mary Frances's death, Mary Beth wasted no time getting pregnant.

On November 19th of the same year, she popped out her seventh kid. A boy they named jonathan meanwhile their adopted son michael is now 13 months old and seems to be doing okay so far okay for now anyway yeah in march of 1980 marybeth fucking walks into the st claire's hospital with an unconscious four-month-old Jonathan. No. Again, doctors were able to revive him. And this time, they weren't fucking around. Because of the family's history.

Oh. And all of these fucking babies dying. Wow. They sent Jonathan to Boston to have him checked out by the best pediatricians and experts available. But again, they couldn't find any medical explanation for what had happened to him. So Jonathan was sent back home to his mother. No. Oh, my God, no. Days later, though, Mary Beth was back at St. Clair's

with an unresponsive baby Jonathan. He was declared dead on March 24, 1980. Almost exactly a year later, on March 2nd, 1981, Mary Beth showed up at her pediatrician's office with her adopted son, Michael, now two and a half years old. He was unconscious and wrapped in a blanket. She explained when she'd gone in to wake him that morning he'd been just kind of out of sorts she said he was responsive to a point but he seemed lethargic and had gone limp in her arms she'd rushed him to the car but for some reason she decided not to take him to the emergency room which was directly across the street from her apartment well they were suspicious and instead

she'd driven him to the pediatrician's office across town. Sure. By the time the doctor examined the boy, he was already dead. Oh, my God. An autopsy revealed traces of pneumonia, and while it didn't seem like enough to cause the death of this otherwise healthy little boy, the official cause of death was listed as viral pneumonia.

otherwise healthy little boy, the official cause of death was listed as viral pneumonia. Michael's death was a turning point of sorts to many close to the tennings. Okay, what number was this? I don't know. Fucking seven? Like seven? Ugh, come on.

The theory that there was some kind of genetic defect resulting in their children's deaths was now out the window. And the fact that Mary Beth hadn't taken him to the emergency room, wasting precious time driving him across town, was alarming to say the least. Though many had been skeptical about these deaths for years, theicism grew after michael's death fucking finally yeah about time and again joseph is just like hanging in there thinking they've got the worst luck yeah i guess yeah damn another kid gone jesus but the tiddings could not be bothered by the rumors and questions swirling around them about the deaths of their children. If you tell me that she got pregnant again.

They were still banging on the reg. And in early 1985, they announced that Mary Beth was pregnant with their eighth child. How old is she at this point? Yeah, like 42. Okay. Yeah, like 42. Okay. As Mary Beth's belly grew, people became more and more worried about this new little life.

Yeah, yeah. Would she suffer the same fate as the others? Hmm. How long is this one going to last? People reportedly asked behind Mary Beth's back. Yeah. They probably should have asked it to her fucking face. I was going to say, that seems like a borderline kind question.

I know. On August 22nd, 1985, Mary Beth gave birth to Tammy Lynn. Like her eight siblings, though, she was destined to have a short life. On December 19th, Mary Beth called her next door neighbor, a nurse named Cynthia Walter, in a panic. Cynthia, get over here right now, she cried. Cynthia rushed to Mary Beth's aid, but what she found was a purple Tammy Lynn laying on the changing table. She wasn't breathing. She had no pulse. Emergency crews rushed Tammy Lynn to the hospital, but it was too late. The the little girl was dead a nurse will be the end of this story nurses nurses are no bullshit people a nurse i'm just putting

it out there mary beth told the same story she'd told before she'd gone in to check on tammy lynn and found her tangled in her blankets not breathing an autopsy again failed to find any medical reason for the baby's death and it was officially listed as sid's again how thorough are these autopsies you know i don't really know is it like the technologies they're dead i I don't know. You know, it's the 80s, the 70s and 80s. The technology is not the same as what we have now. I don't know. Why don't you know?

This time, though, hospital staff had apparently pulled their heads out of their asses and suspicion quickly fell on Mary Beth. Wow. Quickly? I don't know that I'd use the word quickly. Police first questioned Mary Beth the day of Tammy Lynn's funeral.

And when Detective Bob Imfeld Imfeld When Detective Bob Imfeld showed up to question her, Mary Beth said, I know what you're here for. You're going to arrest me and take me to jail.

Wow. It's not a great start. But this interrogation didn't really lead anywhere. She claimed she had nothing to do with the deaths of her children. I'm shocked she said that. Yeah.

I am too. Huh. So a short time later police investigators from several departments met in Albany to discuss the bizarre tenning family history. The deaths of the nine children, along with all the existing evidence in each case, was carefully reviewed. Medical reports were scrutinized, statements were reexamined, and the available autopsy reports were studied. Statements were reexamined and the available autopsy reports were studied.

Even with the mountain of paperwork, which spanned a period of 14 years, there was a consensus that a successful prosecution still could not take place without additional evidence. It was decided that Mary Beth had to be interviewed again. Yeah. decided that Mary Beth had to be interviewed again. Yeah. On the afternoon of February 4th, 1986, Detective Bob Enfeld and State Police Investigator Joseph Karras went to Mary Beth's home to ask her to come into police headquarters for questioning. They told her she was under no obligation since there was no arrest warrant, but

that her cooperation was needed if she wanted to clear up the suspicions about her children's deaths. Man, that's such a good way of putting it. Yeah. Mary Beth went with them, and once at the station, she was Mirandized, but she waived her rights and agreed to talk with investigators. Mary Beth spoke about her life as a child growing up in Duanesburg. She stated that she grieved over the deaths of each of her nine children and denied any role in what happened to them. With the exception of Jennifer, whose cause of death was an infection, she assumed her children died from SIDS or genetic problems. Concerning Tammy Lynn's death, Mary Beth said that on the night of December 19th, 1985, she put her daughter

to sleep in her crib like she normally did. Tammy Lynn was crying that night, she said, which annoyed her because it made her feel like an unfit mother. She said she watched TV for a while and when she returned to check on the baby, she discovered she wasn't breathing. She said she picked up the baby and made an attempt to revive her, but nothing worked. She then woke her husband and called for the ambulance. But police weren't buying it. It was too similar to the previous deaths that took place in the tinning home. And why was Mary Beth always the only one present when discovering the lifeless babies? And multiple deaths attributed to SIDS?

One SIDS death in a family is a tragedy. Two is a statistical anomaly. But three or four, the odds against that are astronomical. Experts weighed in. They said this is not possible. There's no way that they have this many deaths in one family attributed to SIDS. Yeah. So they continued to press Mary Beth.

The interview at police headquarters went on for hours. The questioning spanned a period of 14 years, and the facts as Mary Beth remembered them didn't always match the facts known in the case. A certain amount of confusion was expected, though. Many years had gone by. This mother had suffered a lot of loss, and this was a stressful situation. And when investigators initially confronted Mary Beth with their suspicions that she had something to do with the deaths of her children, she initially denied it. But investigators pressed on. And after several hours of persistent questioning,

Mary Beth broke down. Whoa. She maintained that she'd never done anything to most of her children. But there were exceptions. I did not do anything to Jennifer, Joseph, Barbara, Michael, Mary, Francis, or Jonathan, she told investigators. Just Timothy, Nathan, and Tammy. I smothered them each with a

pillow because I am not a good mother. I'm not a good mother because of the other children. What? So I think what she's trying to say there is because of the loss of her other children what so i think what she's trying to say there's because of the loss of her other children it made her not a good mother okay so at this point police called in a stenographer and together while investigators asked questions and marybeth responded they compiled a 36 page statement in it marybeth admitted to suffocating three children, but continued to insist that she never harmed the others. That's so weird. Wait, do you think that's true?

No. I don't either. No, I mean, to me, the weird thing is, why not just admit to all of them? Yeah. She told police that on the night of Tammy Lynn's death, she was sleeping on the living room couch. I was about to doze off when Tammy woke up and started to cry, Mary Beth said.

I got up, went to her crib and tried to do something with her to get her to stop crying. I finally used the pillow from my bed and put it over her head. I held it until she stopped crying. and put it over her head. I held it until she stopped crying. Then she took the pillow, she said, and put it back on the couch to convince Joe that she had been sleeping. I screamed for Joe, and he woke up, and I said,

Joe, Tammy isn't breathing. I did do CPR, stupid as it sounds, but I knew that she wasn't alive anymore. When she was asked why she killed Tammy, Mary Beth responded, because she was always crying and I couldn't do anything right. After signing her statement, she was arrested and charged with the murder of Tammy Lynn. Mary Beth was indicted only for the murder of Tammy Lynn because prosecutors felt it was the single case that held the strongest evidence. Investigators had exhumed the bodies of some of Mary Beth's other children, Tammy Lynn because prosecutors felt it was the single case that held the strongest evidence. Okay.

Investigators had exhumed the bodies of some of Mary Beth's other children, but it had failed to yield any further evidence. So they moved forward only in the death of Tammy Lynn. Whoa. Yeah. As Mary Beth's trial date neared her defense team worked to try and keep her 36 page statement to police out of court, claiming that she was coerced into providing it. Without it, the defense knew the prosecution had very little evidence.

Oh, they had like nothing. Nothing. Yeah. But at a pretrial hearing in December of 1986, investigators testified that Mary Beth had waived her Miranda rights and had agreed to talk without an attorney. Additionally, the stenographer that took Mary Beth's statement down testified that Mary Beth had not been under duress and had not been forced to answer any questions. She also testified that Mary Beth had seemed relieved after getting everything out in the open. But Mary Beth disagreed with their version of the day's events. She told the court, they were telling me what to say. And a lot of time, the police made the statement and then I

just repeated it. She testified that the police yelled at her and threatened her and that any statements she may have made were in response to that intimidation. I was just tired. I didn't want to go on. I knew what they were doing was wrong, but it would appear that they had me in their clutches. She said that she resisted the suggestions of the police for hours but finally broke down when they threatened to dig up the bodies of her children they said that if i did not tell the truth that they would take my kids out of their graves and rip them limb from limb oh what you don't think the police said that kristin here's here's what I'm struggling with. I believe that there are coerced confessions.

Yes. I believe that there are police officers who will use bad tactics. Yeah. But you also believe this lady killed her kids. Yeah, for sure. For sure. And was this at a time period where they were videotaping these things you know i don't know okay i don't know if there's videotape of it okay so what do you think do you think a judge is going to allow her confession in court

yeah of course ultimately a judge determined that marybeth's statement in its entirety would be admissible at trial yeah yeah good the murder trial of marybeth tenning opened in schenectady county court on june 22nd 1987 in his opening statement norm was 10 days old when this trial started i was one year and 10 days old you're so old Ew. In his opening statement, prosecuting attorney John Porsche told a jury of seven men and five women, once you have heard all of the evidence and assimilated it, you will come back with a verdict of murder in the second degree against Mary Beth Tenning, who murdered her child by smothering it. In his opening statement, defense attorney Paul Callahan challenged the prosecution to prove a cause of death. This is going to be very critical, he told the jury. How did this child die?

Yeah. I mean, really a great point. Yeah. Because they don't have medical evidence. Exactly. The medical testimony at this trial was complex. It involved several doctors, all experts, who held different opinions on the disturbing tendencies of the tinning children to die suddenly and without explanation. So they did talk about the other kids who died?

They did. Yes, they did. They brought about the other kids who died? They did. Yes, they did. They brought up the other children at trial. Interesting. Dr. Bradley Ford, who examined Tammy Lynn when she was an infant, advised the Tennings that in view of their family history, a crib monitor should be installed. The device would sound an alarm if Tammy Lynn stopped breathing.

Curiously, though, Mary Beth refused. The monitor was recommended, he told the court, but the parents elected not to use it. Shocking. Ironically, the doctor did not insist on the monitor. So he's like, you guys should really get this monitor. And they're like, I don't think we're going to do that. And he was like, all right, I guess that's fine. He didn't insist on it because the baby was in such good health.

Next, Dr. Thomas Orem testified on the cause of death. He denied that Tammy Lynn died from SIDS. I'm saying, in essence, that I came to the definite positive conclusion that this child was smothered dr oram told the court this would be the only thing that would answer all of the evidence so basically this is a perfectly healthy kid yeah there's no other explanation for her death yeah the defense called several physicians to the stand to refute that allegation and to offer evidence that all the tinning children suffered from a genetic defect. Hospital, told the court that it was his belief that Jonathan, the seventh child, had died from Wernig-Hoffman disease, a genetic disease that attacks the spinal column. When pressed on that assertion, he was unable to state that Tammy Lynn had the disease as well.

Next, Dr. Jack N.P. Davies, a well-known pathologist, went a step further. He claimed that the affliction that killed all nine children was unknown. Frankly, he told the court, I think this may be a new syndrome, a new disease. Bull fucking shit. Yeah. I'll tell you what it is. It's fucking Munchausen by proxy. Nothing new here. Nothing new here.

Nothing new here is right. However, to refute the defense's claims of genetic diseases, the prosecution called Dr. Marie Valdez-Depena. Depena, probably. There's no tilde on the N, but I'm just guessing. Yeah. A nationally recognized expert on SIDS. Good. Good. Okay.

Noting that Tammy Lynn had a perfectly normal spinal column, she said, it's highly unlikely that this is a case of Wernig-Hoffman disease. Rather, she believed that there was a stronger probability that this was suffocation with a soft object in light of the family's history. Yep. Yep. Totally on board with you, Dr. Marie Valdez-Depena. Mm-hmm. Following Dr. Valdez-Depena's testimony, the defense was allowed to call further witnesses to refute the prosecution's medical experts.

It became a battle of the doctors, with both sides calling six pathologists, all who had different opinions on how Tammy Lynn died. Which I think would make things really tough for the jury. I was just thinking that. I was just thinking that. I really think that's a bad tactic on both sides. We don't know. No.

No. It's a good tactic for the defense. Yeah. Bad tactic for the prosecution. But the prosecution can't do anything about that so it's like but yeah that would be basically horrible the defense is like presenting all of these ideas how she possibly died and they defense has no choice but to or i mean the prosecution has no choice but to call these different people who refute that yeah and try to just cross-examine the hell out of them. Yeah.

Yeah, that would be, I've thought about that a lot for jury trials, where you're getting two different experts who seem to be equally well-respected in their fields, and they're saying opposite things. How do you decide who you're going to blame? I know, exactly. Yeah, it's crazy. Dr. John L. Emery had the most interesting observation. He said, I'd like to investigate the family. The ideal experience, no, the ideal experiment would be to let her have more children and look at them biochemically. Which I like where your brain is, dude, But let's not give her any more kids.

No, no. Not one has survived. I like the idea of looking at it from, like, the biochemical side. That is such a scientist's answer. Oh, it completely is. Well, we just need more time to study this. Give her some more kids. No.

is well we just need more time to study this no we don't kids no in closing arguments district attorney porsche stood on the facts of the case and relied on the jury's common sense i don't think there is any question that the prosecution has proved this case he told the court i don't think there's any other thing we could offer to substantiate that Mary Beth Tenning killed those children. Defense counsel Paul Callahan appealed to the jury's sense of fair play. Don't be led into the conclusion that there are inferences and innuendos that are proof that she may have killed Tammy Lynn, he told the jury in his summation. killed Tammy Lynn, he told the jury in his summation. If she didn't cry at the right time,

if she laughed at the wrong time, does that mean she is guilty of murder? Or does that mean that she's a human being with emotions? Hmm. What do you think about that? I mean, I don't think the defense did a bad job here. I don't either. And I didn't really go into it before now, but there were people in the Tennings' lives who were like,

she didn't seem that upset after each child died. Yeah, and I think that argument of different people grieve different ways is totally true. Absolutely. So I don't always put a lot of stock in that whole, oh, she didn't seem to upset thing. So, yeah, I think the defense is doing a good job. I think they did pretty well.

Yeah. Considering what they had. Yeah. I mean, they're going against a confession. Yeah. And I think they held their own. Mm-hmm. The jury deliberated for three days.

Really? Yeah. 20 hours over three days. Oh, no. Oh, no. What do you think they they found they had to find her guilty they found mary betsy guilty of second degree murder so they later came out and were like we i think we would have convicted her without the confession really or like it wasn't the stick like that wasn't the the deal for. That shocks me. Because the evidence really wasn't strong. The prosecution's medical testimony was enough in that it would be too damn big of a coincidence for this to happen.

They also said that they deliberated so long because they misunderstood some jury instructions in the beginning. And then once they, like, got it it cleared up they really quickly agreed on a verdict that is so human yes i've lost my place went off script and i can't find where the fuck i was after the verdict was announced marybeth covered her face with her hands and began to weep. Joe Tenning was his usual stoic self and appeared unmoved. I can't really complain that they didn't think about it, he said. Wait, what?

Days later. I'm talking about the jury. They deliberated for three days. So he's like, can't really complain that they didn't think about it. They did their job. I just have a different opinion on things that's his response to the verdict i do not get this guy at all at the sentencing hearing on october 2nd 1987 the prosecution asked the judge to impose the maximum sentence of 25 years to life this woman knew the consequences of all of her acts. She is a wicked woman, Prosecutor Porsche told the judge. The defense asked for the minimum sentence of 15

years. When the judge asked Mary Beth if she had anything to say before he imposed his sentence, she read from a prepared statement, which read in part, I want you and the people in this courtroom to know that I'm very sorry that Tammy Lynn is dead. There's not a day that goes by that I don't think of her. I miss her very much. I just want you to know that I played no part in the death of my daughter, Tammy Lynn. I will try to hold my head high and accept the punishment that society and the court requires for the crime I was convicted of. I did not commit this crime, but will serve the time in prison to the best of my ability. However, I will never stop fighting to prove my innocence. The Lord above and I know I am innocent.

One day, the whole world will know that I am innocent, and maybe then I can have my life back once again, or whatever's left of it. Immediately following her statement, Mary Beth was sentenced to 20 years to life. Amid shouts from the gallery such as, baby killer and bitch, she was taken from the courtroom and remanded to the county jail.

Though the district's office district attorney's office promised additional prosecutions for the death of the other children. It never happened. In August of 1989 Mary Beth was indicted for the murders of Nathan who was six months months old, and Timothy, who was 16 days old. However, charges were later dropped due to lack of evidence. Yeah, yeah. Tammy Lynn was the only murder of which Mary Beth was ever convicted. Wow. Mary Beth Tenning became eligible for parole in May of 2007.

She was denied six times until finally, inuly of 2018 oh her parole was granted oh my and in some crazy coincidence or i don't know kismet i don't know marybeth tenning was released from prison yesterday what oh god is that not fucking crazy oh no okay i had no idea about this when i started researching your case i was inspired to do this case because of your case yeah last week and then i'm you know doing away doing my research and last night i'm like oh i knew she was i know she oh granted parole great when she get out fucking, my God. She was released from prison fucking yesterday. Oh, my God. Yikes.

Oh, my God. The conditions of her parole include a curfew, domestic violence counseling, and she must get a job or seek vocational training. And she will be under parole supervision for the rest of her life. She's 75 years old now. Okay. As for her husband, John. Wait, they stayed married? He has stayed by her side this whole time.

Wait, his name's John? I thought it was Joseph. Oh, yeah, it is Joseph. You're right. Sorry. As for her husband, Joe. See, I'm seeing if you're on your toes there, Kristen. I am. His name is Joseph. Good call. Thank you.

They are still married. He frequently visited her in prison. And they are expected to settle back into a quiet life in Duanesburg. Weird. Yeah. That's the case of Mary Beth Tidding. Ew. Yeah, that's the case of Mary Beth Tidding. So there's no official diagnosis of Munchausen here, but that's definitely the belief. Because, okay, so there's a couple of theories.

The first theory is that Jennifer was the only one that was actually sick, that she really did die of natural causes. Okay. What? But they might not be completely natural. Yeah. Okay. So remember that Mary Beth's father had died. Yeah.

In October. And then she gave birth to Jennifer on Christmas Day. Right. And Jennifer was number three? Jennifer was number three, but she was the first Christmas Day. Right. And Jennifer was number three? Jennifer was number three, but she was the first to die. Right. Okay. So nurses suspected when she came into the hospital in labor that she had induced labor with a wire hanger.

And that that wire hanger had injured Jennifer and led to the infection that killed her she it's believed that she wanted to give birth on christmas day in honor of her father oh god yes so i don't know if you'll if you picked up on this but several of the other births of her children were correlated to major holidays no i had a birth on thanksgiving day she had a birth on easter sunday oh my god no i did not put that together at all yeah whoa so apparently after all of this came out like several nurses who had been in the hospital that day that she had given birth to jennifer were like we fucking knew when she came in that that was a that was a wire hanger birth we knew it you know fucking people want to have their babies on holidays well all this stuff

yeah so they believe that that led to the infection that ended in jennifer death. So then she gets all of this attention from losing a child. And she just became addicted to that attention. Is the belief of why she continued to murder her children. So technically she's only convicted of one death. But she's largely described as a serial killer for killing all of her children. Ugh. Boy, that was good. That was real fun.

Oh, my God. That was horrible. Yeah, it's a rough one. I've got a really bad one, too. Oh, good! Do you know mine? No. Okay.

I'm going to be so interested in how you react to this one, because I am struggling with it big time. Big time struggling. I'm excited. Okay, so I got most of this from the article A Dangerous Mind by Robert Kolker for New York Magazine. Excellent. New York Magazine? Yeah. Okay.

That's a thing. It sure is. All right. So it's 2009. Kathleen Mannigan has just moved to New York City to take a job with Teach for America. She gets there. She's new in town. She makes a profile on OkCupid. Pretty soon she meets this cute guy, Gilberto Valli. They call him Gil. All right. He was a cop in the West Harlem precinct and he was a total gentleman, You know, pulled out chairs,

opened doors, the whole deal. Yeah. They had this immediate connection. Pretty soon, they moved in together. They got a pet bulldog together. Excellent. Love it. So far, you're totally on board

with this couple. They just generally had a great time together. But then Kathleen got pregnant, and everything changed. Ooh. When she told Gil, the first thing he said was, I can't do this. Ooh.

But he eventually recovered and he said he would do the right thing, which meant marriage. That's what you want to hear. Yeah. We're talking a lot about romance here. And when a guy looks at you with a sad face and says, I guess I'll do the right thing. I guess I'll do the right thing. Like, oh, just what I've always wanted. Then he got down on one knee and he said, I guess I'll do the right thing. So they move into a bigger apartment.

Kathleen gave birth to their daughter. And nine months later, the couple got married. But marriage did not fix anything. Shocking. I know. Kathleen later said, the wedding was nice. The marriage was not. Ooh.

Yeah. That's rough. Should we take a moment? Like. Are you going to give marriage advice? I don't know. I just feel like sometimes people get like really wound up about the wedding. Yeah.

And who gives a shit about the wedding? I know. We did have a really nice wedding. Well, congratulations. It was beautiful. But the marriage, man. I mean, you got the bulldog. You got...

So, marriage was not... We didn't have a donut bar at our wedding, but... The donut bar was fantastic. I bet. No, Norman and I had, like, the perfect wedding for us. That's great. It was, like, just family and, you know, very, very low key because we're both introverts

and we didn't want, I don't know, like the idea of standing in front of a whole bunch of people and saying shit. I mean, there's a reason that we're just doing this, the two of us in my living room. But you're more like the, you're more extroverted. Oh doing this, the two of us in my living room. But you're more extroverted. Oh, yeah. I don't talk to anybody. You really can't.

You could talk to a tree stump. Oh, for sure. And they'd get up and leave, probably. Pull up roots. We had a good-sized wedding, like 150 people. That's a good-sized wedding, yeah. Yeah. I mean, like 80% of it was family.

I have a giant family. You have a record-setting family. Yeah. And you're not Catholic, so I don't know what the deal is. I mean, it's just, you know, there's a lot of divorce in my family, so I got lots of, you know, step, you know, all of that. Step folks. I got a bunch of parents. Zach has a bunch of parents.

It's just a lot yeah good thing we have is that we have a lot of people who love us this is true you got a good family yes so now back to this really sad story um i'm sorry this is the weirdest segue from talking about your loving family to this. Excellent. Kathleen and Gil. Much like my family. Fill in the gap. Oh, no.

Kathleen and Gil rarely had sex. He couldn't finish. And he would end up running to the bathroom. What was he doing in the bathroom? What do you think? I don't know. Finishing. Huh.

What's the end of some weird shit? Hmm. Couldn't. Much like your family. What? This seems to be a theme in your episode. Okay. In my defense,

I had no idea when I picked this that there was weird sex stuff in it. I really didn't. I knew there was some weird stuff. Let's just take stock

here for a second. I know. I know. John Robinson. All kinds of weird sex shit. And I knew that. Gypsy. all kinds of weird sex shit. And I knew that. Gypsy, all kinds of weird sex shit.

Did not know that. And then now this case, apparently weird sex shit. What I appreciate is that you have forgotten some of the other ones I've done that involve sex. I know. I mean, the Kellogg brothers, that guy was like anti-masturbation. Yeah. What else do we got? What other weird sex did you have?

I did the Hulk Hogan sex tape. Oh, yeah. You did a whole sex tape episode. I did the boner pills one. Oh. Okay. I stand by my, I mean, I made this claim very early on in the podcast. Mm-hmm.

Kristen Pitts, obsessed with penises. Yes. Shout out to my loving family who also listens to the podcast so gil spent a ton of time at the computer kathleen was just devastated your face right real concerned about what he's looking at on the computer you should be oh no uh and kathleen was concerned too so but she kind of thought initially the problem is me she was like i'm not pretty enough i don't clean the house enough i need to cook more all the reasons it was just funny because i like at first i was like oh the i'm not pretty enough

like oh gosh i don't know that i've ever been like my problems are because i don't clean the It was just funny because at first I was like, oh, the I'm not pretty enough. Like, oh, gosh. I don't know that I've ever been like, my problems are because I don't clean the house enough and I don't cook enough. Yeah. It would never occur to me. So Gil was disengaged, but she knew what he was doing. Anytime she'd walk by him on the computer, he'd be on like ESPN or some message board for NYPD cops. you know he was really into baseball stats so you know that's what he was brandy that's what he was looking at that's like the window that he brought up anytime she'd walk by and what's in the background uh but then in 2012 just a little while after they got, she got online and saw that there was no search history.

Mm-hmm. Cleared that browser history. You don't want people to know how often you go to ESPN. It's just embarrassing. You got to clear that. But then one day she got online and noticed that he'd forgotten to log out of his account. So she's in his account.'s like all right and she sees these two image files she tries to open them but the images won't load but she could see the url yeah so she typed that into her browser and it brought up this site called Dark Fetish Network.

It's pretty disturbing stuff. The image on the front page was a dead girl. Oh my gosh. And that was kind of a turning point for Kathleen. She was like, whoa, whoa, whoa. You know, I know BDSM is kind of a thing now, Fifty Shades of Grey, but this is next level weird. If you're keeping a running total, this is the third episode in a row

that Kristen has mentioned BDSM. The third? Yes. Okay, well, last week it was... Oh, you're... Oh, no, you're right. You fucking weirdo. I just want someone to talk to about it

so at this point Kathleen's freaked out and she what would you go to like a list of like BDSM crimes and you're just

pulling from it you know what's what's worse is that i mean maybe you can't call it an accident it would almost make more logical sense if i had a list it's just what i'm into so kathleen installs spyware on the computer. The next day, she's like, what did the spyware find? First, she sees all these websites like girlsinabind.com and fetlife.com.

And she sees this email account that she didn't know he had. She pulls that up. She enters her name into the search bar. And what she discovered was deeply disturbing. She found emails of her husband corresponding with other men about tying her up by her feet, slitting her throat, and watching the blood gush out of her. She was terrified. Yeah.

One of the messages said, I want her to experience as much pain as humanly possible through her ordeal. She is going to suffer incredible pain. The rape will be the easy part for her. Yeah. Oh my gosh. So Kathleen knew things were bad in her marriage but she had no idea that her husband was having these conversations with people that he was like fantasizing about wanting to kill her yeah she did not hang around kathleen grabbed her baby immediately booked a flight to her parents' place in Nevada,

and once she was safe in Nevada, she logged back into the spyware. And she found even more disturbing stuff. She was able to see what he'd Googled. And he had Googled how to kidnap a woman and human meat recipes. Oh my gosh! Yeah, this is gonna get bad. Oh gosh. I mean, this is going to get bad.

Oh gosh. I mean, it's been great. Yeah, it's really good so far. She found images of women being tortured and sexually assaulted. She read more emails and discovered that he talked to multiple people about how he might stalk, kidnap, rape, and eventually cook and eat women. Oh my gosh. And not just any women. Why eat?

I don't... I mean, I like that that's the part I can't... I'm fine with everything else. I'm fine with the stalking and raping and killing, but do you have to eat? I mean, I guess you'd be hungry after all that. But has he tried a burger? This is so terrible. So not just any women.

He wasn't talking in generalities. He was talking about killing her. He was talking about killing a former co-worker of hers, one of his bosses in the NYPD, a teenage girl who went to his high school, his former high school, and a bunch of his female friends from college. Oh, my gosh.

Kathleen was like, nope, I'm done. She called the police and told them everything. They start looking into it, and they find all these emails where he talked with people in detail about how he'd kidnap and kill and cook these women. A lot of this happened over message boards. Yeah. With one guy, he even talked about... Sorry. May I read you directly from my notes? Uh-huh. With some people, he even talked about negotiated a kidnapping fee. Then they figured out that he had used his work computer to access special databases

that are only available to law enforcement to get information on some of these targets. Oh my gosh. So on the afternoon of October 24th, an FBI agent called Gil and said, hey, I just want to let you know that someone hit your car that you parked outside. called Gil and said, hey, I just want to let you know that someone hit your car that you parked outside. And Gil's like, oh, OK. So he comes out of the apartment into the hallway and he's immediately surrounded by all these agents.

One of them said, everything's going to be OK. And Gil responded, I don't think so. Oh, my gosh. Man, these two cases today, they got good lines planned when they get arrested. Yeah, it's kind of movie-like. I gotta say, I gotta come up with the line I'm gonna use when I get arrested. I came up with my serial killer name the other day. What was it?

The Laugher. I think that's like the perfect serial killer name. Yes. Yeah. And can you imagine if there was a- The Laugher strikes again. And like you're alone at night and all of a sudden you hear the laugh. The laugh, yeah.

That would be terrifying. Fucking terrifying, yeah. I'd be the ear. The ear. I think that we'd be caught immediately. I be the ear. The ear. I think that we'd be caught immediately. I think the ear is already taken. Oh, damn it.

Oh, yeah, Esterior Rampus. Oh, God. Oh, my God. Yeah, he for sure took it. I don't know what I'd be. I have always thought, though, that I could never be a killer for a number of reasons. But one of them, I feel like I don't blend into crowds well enough. Well, okay. So, yeah, I could never, you know, the obvious reasons why I could never become a serial killer.

But the biggest one for me, this is so dumb, is that, like, the idea of hiding somewhere, like, waiting, you know, stalking my prey. I would have to pee so bad. Oh, me too. Yeah. Do you ever get that? Like when you remember when you were a kid and you're playing hide and seek? And like when you're waiting to be found, you just like have to pee so bad. There were times when I would just like cough, you know.

Like I'm done. Like the pressure is too much on my bladder. I've thought about like with cops, how they have to stake out a place. Yeah. I've always thought about like, do they have a cooler of snacks? I don't know. I've thought about, like, with cops, how they have to stake out a place. Yeah. I've always thought about, like, do they have a cooler of snacks? I don't know. I would need a cooler of snacks. Oh, yeah.

Yeah. I don't know. Okay. This is why we're not serial killers or cops. I guess I'll never become the laugher. Pass that torch on to somebody else. Okay, so he goes out. He gets a call. His car's been hit. And so he goes out he gets a call his car's been hit and so he leaves his apartment

and then bam there's everybody to arrest him and they're like everything's gonna be fine he's like i doubt it he's like oh i'm a big creep so he was charged with conspiracy to kidnap he faced a maximum of life in prison and a maximum of five years for accessing the National Crime Information Center database inappropriately. All right. Some places called it illegally, but, you know, whatever. Potato, potato.

He was appointed a lawyer named Julia Gatto, and she said that she was a little freaked out about having him as a client initially. Yeah. She said it was the first time in her career that she thought about keeping him in handcuffs during their first one-on-one meeting.

But she starts looking hard at the case and she realizes that they're sort of in this murky area of the law. Yes, what Gil did was very scary. But he didn't technically do anything. It was all about what he thought about doing.

Yeah. It's all hypothetical crimes. This is why I struggle with this one. So a little, very brief history lesson. It wasn't until the early 1900s that attempted crimes were even criminalized. I find this so fascinating. So it used to be that if you tried to rob someone and they didn't have money, no crime. No crime, because you didn't actually get anything.

Yeah. All right. You down with that? No, I mean, it's good that we've changed that. Yes. So that obviously changed. In the 60s, a bunch of lawyers got together and they created the model penal code uh which was basically a penal what that's that's how you say it

they also created the model penis code and that's just like what they prefer you know how penis models should look. Which is great because in the early 1900s there was no guideline. There was no guideline. All shapes and sizes. And under the new guidelines the standard became, did the person basically

think the bad thing and take some sort of action. Gotcha. So here's the thing. That rule was created in the 60s. Things have changed since then. Thanks to modern technology and email and Google searches and browser history, it's suddenly sort of easy to say, oh, this is what the person was thinking. Whereas before, it's a lot harder to figure that out.

So prosecutors start building their case. And they had some, like, I cannot begin to tell you how disturbing these emails and chat logs and all this stuff was. Did you read them? Yeah, and I didn't include all the stuff because it's so gross. Yeah. I can tell that disappoints you. No. But I am going to go into quite a bit of it so gil didn't include all of it but i've included six pages buckle up so gil corresponded um with three people on the dark

fetish network about specifics one of the guys he talked to was Michael Van Hise. He sent Michael pictures of Kathleen's former coworker and he said, I'll kidnap her for five grand. And Michael's like, could you do four? Oh my gosh. And Gil says, I'm putting my neck on the line here. If something goes wrong somehow, I'm in deep shit. 5,000, and you need to make sure she's not found. She will definitely make the news. Oh, my gosh. He also talked to this guy.

Okay, but here's my question. Okay. Is this the thing? Like, is this the turn-on, just talking about it? Or is there actual intention behind it that's the question so if you ask gil this is just his fetish the whole thing that's the fetish just talking about it he he says i would never hurt a fly i'm not a violent person. I just have this fetish. Yeah. I can almost see that.

Really? Yeah. Okay. This is going to be really interesting. Fetishes are fucking weird, Kristen. Take it from Brandy. No, don't take it from me. But do you want me to tell the balloon anecdote?

Yes, I do. For sure I do. Go for it. Okay. Okay. So, this is how I know the fetishes are weird. Okay. I'm at work one day, just, you know, in my salon doing my thing. I don't have a client in my chair. This guy comes in and he's obviously not there. Like we do tanning in hair. He's not there to tan. He doesn't have a hair appointment. And so

the receptionist and I are both standing there and we greet him and he's like, Hey, I have a favor to ask of you guys. And we're like, yeah, sure. What's up? And he's like, I have a friend. It's her birthday today. And she's going to come here later today. And what I'm doing is I'm going around to all of these places that she's going this afternoon and I'm leaving a balloon for her so that by the end of the day she'll have all these balloons for her birthday it's gonna be great it's gonna be so exciting for her is it okay with you guys if I leave a balloon here for her and we're like of course we're excited we're like oh my gosh what a great idea that's so. Of course we'll participate. And so he's like, great.

I'm going to go out to my car, get the balloon. I'll be right back. And so Jenny and I are like, Jenny's the receptionist at my salon. And we're like, oh, my gosh, how fun. How exciting is this? And so we're like picturing him bringing in like a Mylar balloon. And imagine that she's going to have like a bouquet of balloons at the end of her afternoon. How nice.

We all want a friend like this. Yes. This is a great idea. What happens in reality, though, is this man brings in the largest latex balloon I've ever seen in my life. I mean, I could not put my arms around the entire balloon it's this giant yellow latex balloon that he's blown up with his mouth and i can tell you this because it was full of fucking spit ew so he brings this balloon and we see him like walking up holding this giant balloon and jenny and i just look at each balloon and we see him like walking up, holding this giant balloon.

And Jenny and I just look at each other and we're like, oh, shit. This just took a weird turn. And so he comes in and he's like, here's the balloon, guys. He's like, let's put this somewhere where we'll make sure it, you know, won't get popped. And I was like, yeah, OK, great. Thanks. And so I go to take the balloon from him. He's like, well, you, great, thanks. And so I go to take the balloon from him. He's like, whoa.

You know, I'm taking a picture everywhere that I'm leaving the balloon today. I'm making a big collage. We're having a party tonight for my friend's birthday. And so I'm going to have all these pictures as part of the collage to show her all these people who participated in her birthday surprise. I got 60 of these giant balloons blown up in my basement right now we're calling it balloons balloons balloons i'm sorry oh my god and we're like okay but me see this is my problem you're too nice i'm too nice i'm too far in i can't be mean to this guy and so i'm like great okay and so he's like let's take a nice i'm too nice i'm too far in i can't be mean to this guy and so i'm like great okay and so he's like let's take a picture i'm gonna take a picture of you guys with the

balloon and so jenny and i pose for this picture we're we're each on one side of this balloon kind of holding it between us and he's like no no no no really get in there really hug the balloon ladies hug the balloon and so we're standing there hugging this balloon and he pulls out, no shit, a digital camera out of his pocket. Not his fucking camera or not his fucking phone. He pulls a digital camera out of his pocket and takes like 10 pictures of us holding this balloon.

Oh no. And then he thanks us and he leaves and his friend showed up and she was so excited his friend never came there was never any friend it was all a weird fetish apparently and i believe i am now on a latex fetish website somewhere. And that's the story of how I know that fetishes are weird, Kristen. That is like, that is the weirdest story. So fucking weird. It's so gross.

Yes. And I totally identify with the, this has gotten weird. Yeah. But I gotta be nice. I gotta be nice. Why were we raised like that? Have you ever, okay, are there for real latex fetish websites? Yeah, I'm sure. I believe so.

Have you ever looked for yourself? I have not. Too scared. I was fully clothed, just for the record. He was like, now take your top off. And you're like, well, I don't want to be mean. I don't want to be rude. It'd be rude not to get fully naked with this balloon.

Yeah. You done talking about this? Yeah. You seem real done. I'm over it. Yeah. I'm not over it at all. What'd you guys do with the balloon afterward?

Oh, okay. So my mom came into the salon that same day. And when I explained what happened to her, she's like, well, of course he was a fucking creeper. You didn't know that from the minute he came in? And then she popped the balloon and she got his gross spit all over her so served her right for acting like I was the dummy

for not knowing from the beginning that it was all a creepy ploy oh god okay so back to yeah

our other fetish boy, Gil. He also talked with this guy, Ali Khan, who apparently lived in Pakistan. Gil started talking to Ali about his wife. And Gil says, maybe I could take her on a trip to India. And the two of us could kill her and eat her for dinner. Then he sent Ali a picture of his wife in a bikini. And they also talked about killing one of Gil's college friends. He said, it's personal with Andrea.

She will absolutely suffer. I'm in the middle of constructing a pulley apparatus in my basement to string her up by her feet. Sorry, I struggled because I spelled pulley apparatus like so horribly. Then he starts talking with this guy in the UK. Did, is Gil the one that said he was constructing the pulley apparatus? Yeah. Was he? No.

Man. I feel like that's proof in his favor. Well, I'm assuming no, because I feel like the prosecution would have for sure. Yeah. Oh, they would have for sure. I'm just, I'm not on this guy's side. No, no, no. I'm just saying.

I'm glad you're saying the things that you're saying. Yeah. Because we'll get into more of this. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. Okay. because um we'll get into more of this but yeah okay okay so then he starts talking with this guy in the uk who went by the username moody blues excellent band he's like i have a place in the mountains where i could bring my college friend kim sour and then he emailed the dude a document titled Abducting and Cooking Kimberly A Blueprint. Oh, gosh.

And of course, he ran a lot of these women's names through the NYPD database and prosecutors were like, sweet. He was thinking about it and he did something to show he was serious. He entered their names into the database and he did research on them.

Mm-hmm. Oh, and hey, it turns out in late July He entered their names into the database and he did research on them. Oh, and hey, it turns out in late July, I changed his name to Geraldo. I'm sorry. Okay, I went from Joe to John. I went from Gilberto to Geraldo. I'm sorry. So they're like, hey. So Geraldo Rivera shows up.

He's got the full stash. So they're like, Gil went and visited a bunch of friends at his alma mater, the University of Maryland, where he saw Kimberly. And he later described her as mouthwatering to one of his creepy little friends. Clearly, he went there to scope her out. But Gil was like... No, I went there for an alumni event. Yeah, and it was like... No, I saw...

I think he saw, like, five different people he met from college. Like, they had... He brought his wife and kid. Yeah. They had brunch. Yep. Mimosas. Wait, did I say they had he brought his wife and kid yeah um they had brunch yep mimosas wait did i say they had brunch no they okay no they actually did have brunch that was weird no they did have brunch um but the thing was like he did tell he told his guys before he left that he was going to find out like where she worked and stuff and he did text her when he figured out what building she was at he was like hey is this the building you work at

so the prosecutors were like what what do you think i just don't think it proves anything okay i so far it's all fantasy okay do you disagree with me no i don't disagree um i've been debating like when to insert my opinion on this but i think so the defense is big fear this whole time understandably was we are gonna get jurors who are just so freaked out by this whole thing that they're going to be like, lock him up. Yeah. And that's me. I think.

I think that's me. Yeah. The not cool thing about having this opinion is that you kind of get into like the minority report territory. That's exactly what I think of. Yeah. Yeah. Do I think it's creepy as fuck and gross? Yes.

Yeah. Do I think that he's broken any laws at this point? Other than the accessing the database without, you know, approval or whatever? I don't think so. This is just one of those things that i think like so this information comes out and then he goes and kills somebody and eats them and we all go well no fucking shit yeah um um this is why i hate this okay i'm gonna go ahead i don't know if i should say it. It's going to be an unpopular opinion.

Just say it. This is the whole reason that I have a problem with the Catch a Predator show with Chris Hansen. Because no crime has actually been committed. Oh, that is unpopular. Oh, I know it's totally unpopular. I think the guys are totally fucking creeps. They think they have talked to, you know, a 14-year-old girl or whatever. But they never actually have.

That's a big sticking point with me. Oh. How is that the same? It's that they thought it was the same. And they took steps. They went to that house. But they never actually talked to a 14-year-old girl. They never went to a 14-year-old girl's house.

Well, thank fucking God. I know. Thank fucking God. I totally agree. I totally agree that they're total creeps. I wonder if any of that is prosecutable, though. Because no crime was actually committed it was an attempted crime though and the way you do it is like they they search people out online they went

and searched for people they thought were children and they took the extra step they drove however many miles you know those creeps always show up with, like, condoms and, like, beer and stuff. Chicken Alfredo sometimes. Ew, what? I think one guy showed up with Alfredo. Was he trying to seduce me? I mean, what's the deal? I just, I want to know the next step.

How does that hold up in court? Because no crime, no actual crime was committed right but i'm saying like the way you do it is you try to prove that he took these steps like that he was going to do it and i think part of the steps is he he knows okay in his mind he knows there's a 14 year old here yeah her parents are out of town and I've had all the sex talk with her, blah, blah, blah.

So he shows up at that location. But the reality is that there was never a 14 year old girl on the other end of it. Who cares? It's, it's, what matters is that he thought he was going to do it. He took steps to commit the crime.

He was like, totally going to do it. And then Chris Hansen walks out in the kitchen island and he's got the stack of chat logs. I just, I. You want some kids to get molested? No, that's what I'm saying. That's why I hesitated to say anything because it's not at all that I think these guys are getting a raw deal. Hide your kids.

That's not the point that I'm trying to make at all. It's that how does it hold up when no actual crime was committed? You know, I think we're going to get some new fans of the show. Sex offenders or big fans of Brandy. No. No, that's not what I'm saying. I am not pro-sex offender. These guys are just real nice guys.

They were just please please admit that you understand that that's not what i'm saying at all because i don't want it to come off like that one bit no and i'm so glad that you have this opinion because like one of the things i looked at for this was this hbo documentary that's really good yeah and uh not andre the jack Like, one of the things I looked at for this was this HBO documentary that's really good. Yeah. And, uh. Not Andre the Giant. No, so this one's called. Wasn't that shitty Andre the Giant?

And I'm a big fan of wrestling and even I wasn't into it. I think it's called Thought Crimes. I'll say it at the end. Okay. Um, so it's called Thought Crimes. And obviously from the title of that. Yeah. You know, I just. the end okay um so it's called thought crimes and obviously from the title of that yeah you know i just so i'm just glad that you have this opinion yeah because i think part of me

a big part of me understands that yes for the right kind of society that we want to live in we shouldn't the government shouldn't prosecute us for our thoughts yes but at the same time i read those chat logs and i'm just freaked the fuck out and there's a part of me that's just like you know what fine lock them up i don't care you know um but we can't have a bunch of people like me running around otherwise like everyone would be locked up for everything so uh yeah i don't know i just don't know no but to revisit i know you're not being creepy i i get it so my family we love to catch a predator yeah to the point that like you know how when they have the decoy person it's always like a woman like in a hat and yeah and she's always kind of dressed

like a kid and she'll say to the guy come on in i just made some tea yeah it's always tea oh yeah to the point that anytime we make tea in my family we always say come on in i just made some tea just a fun thing we do not a strange family at all where were we we went off on a tangent. It was a pertinent tangent. It was a pertinent tangent. Not like my story about me being at the gym

and some guy thinking I was hot, then terribly ugly on Tuesday. So meanwhile, the defense is looking at their case and by this point gil has a defense team uh and they're like they're basically like exactly what you're saying they're like yeah yeah we're pretty grossed out by some of this stuff yeah but these were just fantasies the guy has a fetish there's zero physical evidence to show that he was actually going to do anything to anyone. Yeah. Okay. It was all a show.

He didn't have a place in the mountains. He didn't have an oven big enough to hold a human body, which was one of the things he bragged about. Oh, my God. Yeah. He didn't have homemade chloroform which was another thing he talked about i what i think that's all pretty strong for the defense's thing that this is all just the fetish the talking about it is the fetish the fact that he has he's bragged about having all this stuff but he doesn't actually have any of it.

That's proof to me of fantasy. See, the thing about the oven, though. I feel like a lot of I mean, how do you know that a human body's going to? I know. I know. I'm getting on a weird tangent here. But I mean, what have you ever tried putting a body in your oven? That's what I'm saying. You know, it's not going to fit in there. That's what I'm getting on a weird tangent here. I mean, have you ever tried putting a body in your oven? That's what I'm saying. How do you know it's not going to fit in there?

That's what I'm saying. It's a weird argument. This is a weird case. Was this one too weird weird should I have abandoned it but my other thing is like okay yeah what if he's getting off from the talk what if he's like it's all about the talk but what about eventually moving into

doing it because eventually talking might not so I do agree with that. Like once, like at some point the fantasy will get old. Yeah. And he'll have to move on to something else. Does that mean putting the fantasy into action?

Or does it mean, you know, now he's into balloons? I don't, I don't know the answer there, but. Did you catch the guy's name who came into the salon? He did not.

Looked like a Geraldo to me. But I... I still... Well, I agree, yes. Yeah. The escalation of the fantasy is terrifying. Mm-hmm. But has he committed a crime until it escalates?

You're right. You're right. It has to. Yeah. Okay. Okay. So the other thing the defense is talking about is, like, he didn't even know the real names of the guys he was talking to online.

Yeah. So how believable is it that they were going to get together and do this thing? Yeah, yeah, yeah. If he really wanted to work with these guys on an actual real life plan, wouldn't he have needed that basic information about them? Yeah. I don't know. What, you think he's going to call him Moody Blue?

Hey, Moody Blues, what's up? I kind of think that when you're doing a crime like that maybe it's a little better yeah yeah he's a law enforcement officer so that yeah plausible deniability unless you know the better yeah all right yeah right yeah all right and here's some proof that he was just fantasizing. When people asked him, hey, are you serious? He almost always said, no, this is just pretend. But sometimes he said it was for real.

I was going to say something really gross. What were you going to say? I'm not going to say it. Say it. No. Come on. He only did that when he was like really close to finishing. No. Come on. He only did that when he was like really close to finishing. Gross. He ran to the bathroom.

I love you at the beginning of this episode. You're like, what was he doing in the bathroom? Like, oh God god i have no idea grandma brandy can't possibly comprehend now listen to you then there was the other thing of like all the stuff he said he said that three women were going to be kidnapped on President's Day. Did he do that? No. Then he switched it to Labor Day. Did he do that? No. In February 2013,

jury selection began. And it was really tough to find jurors. I bet. So, each potential juror was given a questionnaire. And I wish I could have... Have you ever dabbled

in the... Here's the thing. I would love to have seen this questionnaire. Yeah. They were shown images, too, and they were basically asked, can you handle

seeing the sort of stuff we're going to be seeing here? Yeah. Can you keep an open mind in the face of really dark fetishes? Kristen would have been out. I would have been like, goodbye! Even though you know it's my dream to be on a jury.

I know, you would have been like, he did it 100%. It does make me wonder, like, would I lie so that I could get on the jury? I hope I would know. That's illegal, Kristen. Well, then strike this from the podcast so setting up a case for jury misconduct

so about 90 people were questioned yes and like a third of them were like nope i'm out yeah i can't handle it and also by this point you, you know, this made big news. And the media dubbed him the cannibal cop. So some of the people were just like, look, I've read too much. This story has been too fascinating. I've read all the articles and I believe he is guilty 100%. So the defense

team basically did their best to get jurors who were difficult to shock. A little while later, the trial begins they try and like whip them see how they meld up against it do they flinch but pliers on their nipples no they just hold up the pliers and they hold up the clamps and they're like what do you prefer which one would you prefer so in opening statements defense attorney julia gatto said look this was all a fantasy he was role-playing with other people

who were also into this stuff and by the way a lot of people are into it dark fetish net or whatever it's called it has like thousands of users. What's your username on there, Kristen? What would my, what would it be? And you know, those usernames always have numbers in them. I know, I was going to say, BigEar69. Listen, when it's for a fetish website, you don't lead with your insecurity. Yeah, I think like you're looking for people who are secretly into big ears. Oh, I never thought. To fuel into big ears oh i never thought to fuel your insecure yeah to i never thought your insecurities i i've always just thought well keep

my hair down no one will be the wiser what would your username be i would never be on a website like that. Oh. That's the right answer. So the answer is not to think about it? Alright. So Julia's like, this was fiction? Think of it like a stephen king novel yes oh come on i agree okay i'm not defending this guy i'm defending the basis that the or the precedent that this sets for prosecution.

Are you seeking political office right now? I am not. I think this guy's a fucking creep. My heart was racing fast at the beginning when you were first describing this. I think he's a fucking creep. But when it comes down to it, I do not think that he's broken a law outside of accessing that database.

Okay. Prosecutor Randall Jackson it i do not think that he's broken a law outside of accessing that database okay prosecutor randall jackson was like no this brandy's wrong this guy's he was like brandy's way off this was all fantasy that he wanted to turn into reality how does he know prove it prove that he wants it to become a reality. Maybe he will. So the prosecution detailed everything. How Gil had used the National Crime Information Center database to get info on potential victims, and they shared the graphic emails that he sent

where he negotiated a price for kidnapping and talked about stuffing a woman into his oven, which apparently was not large enough for the woman but how the hell would you even know that anyway and they also said hey hung up on that oven christian well i just see you're saying this is a weird argument for me i say it's a weird argument for them because like we're talking about something, you know, like by that point in someone's dead, they could be chopped up. You really thought this through.

Well, I just think that's a weird thing to be like. The thing where this really falls apart is because he's got a small oven. Your username would be oven lady 634. Big oven 634. I don't know. I feel like I wouldn't get a lot of responses.

And they also said, hey, he acted on this. Where? The woman who he said he'd kidnapped for five grand? He went to her street. I also think that's dumb. I do. For the record, I feel like in a city like that, being on someone's street, I mean, I'd have to know more about that. But, like, I'm on a lot of streets.

Did you run by Mary McElroy's house? Not yet. I need to map it out. You planning on kidnapping her? I'd have to run by her grave. Right. Right. Oh, so just because she's dead, it can't be a crime, huh?

No, that would be grave robbing, which is absolutely a crime. So arguably the prosecution's best witness was Gil's estranged wife kathleen over the course of two hours she walked the jury through everything from meeting on ok cupid to getting thrilled and him to getting pregnant and him not being thrilled sorry i mixed those words up she got thrilled she got thrilled. She got thrilled. And he got pregnant. She talked about everything. To feeling like something was off and installing the spyware on his computer. And she sobbed the whole time.

I bet. To the point that the judge had to call breaks so that she could just kind of compose herself okay wait i have the question that's gonna determine if this was real or not god i hope i can answer it they had a child uh-huh which means that he could have eaten the placenta it's an acceptable practice in parts of the world i feel like if this guy's trying to eat somebody there's his opportunity no because he wants to see the suffering he he gets off on like the torture too you didn't call him the torture cop listen i'm not the one who made up the name no like the whole thing is like he likes the stalking, the kidnapping. I see that you understand his fantasy very well, Kristen.

I'm just saying, like, that's a real shortcut. Clearly your username would be Cannibal Cop Lover. Ew, no. 832. How did you arrive at those numbers? I figure there's 831 other cannibal cop lovers. And they're all going in order out of respect. Yeah.

Kind of line up. So for what it's worth, Gil was crying too. Kathleen talked about the horror of seeing these awful plans where she was the target or her friends were the target. Seriously, I cannot imagine. That would be terrible. Then it was the defense's turn to cross-examine her. And Julia is like, tell me,

why have you resisted speaking with your husband's defense team? And Kathleen was like, you represent the man who wants to kill me. I do not want to talk to you. That's fair. Yeah. So the defense took a bit of a gamble they'd had gill examined by a very well-respected psychologist and the psychologist said hey this guy seems fairly normal so they could have actually had the psychologist take the stand and maybe even

had gill take the stand to try to explain the fetishes and to show, hey, I've got these dark thoughts. I've never acted on them. But the defense decided, no, we're not going there. They actually thought the prosecution's case was so shitty and that it basically all came down to these emails. Yeah. And that basically if they tried to explain these fetishes to the jury,

it would just get weird so fast. I feel like it could easily muddle it. Yes. Yeah. Would you like to know what set off the fetishes? Yeah. Okay. Do you remember the classic film The Mask starring Jim Carrey?

Yeah. And Cameron Diaz? I thinkrey, yeah. Cameron Diaz. I think it was like introducing Cameron Diaz. Yeah, yep. Okay, there is a scene in that movie where Cameron Diaz is tied up. Apparently that's what excited Little Gil back in the day. Set this whole thing up.

Isn't that kind of weird? Yeah, that is weird. Yeah. Interesting. That's like a perfectly normal thing that turned into this weird fetish in this guy. So instead of trying to explain fetishes to the jury and get super detailed, the defense team was like, instead took the stance of, hey, you can be disgusted by what Gil has said to these people. I'm disgusted. But there gill has said to these people yeah i'm disgusted but

there's been no crime right so in the documentary which yes is called thought crimes they also talked i thought this was interesting they talked about the time gap between when he searched for these women in the police database and when he started about started talking to people online about that. And there was actually a really big gap, like a year gap. Wow. And so I think it was a journalist who was talking, and he was like, yeah, what he did was creepy. But maybe it was just one of those things of, I've got the hots for so-and-so. I'm going to look her up in this database. Yeah. the hots for so-and-so i'm gonna look her up in this database yeah

the other thing they mentioned was that in these chats he never mentioned the women's last names although he did talk about like he shared photos about he shared photos said their names yeah um in his wife's case i think he mentioned her weight and like yeah that's uncalled for that's the part that offends you about this whole story yep um and send him to the chair he also didn't give up their addresses sorry that was a bit hasty. Now he has committed a crime, and it's the crime of revealing your wife's weight.

He did give a 10-pound range. Oh, excellent. Yeah. Leave a little something to the imagination. In her closing argument, Julia said, his foolishness on the internet, his insensitive, ugly thoughts have cost him everything. The conversations are preposterous. They are disturbing.

They are disgusting. We should be upset that people are thinking these thoughts. But they are not criminal. I completely agree. You ready for the closing argument from the prosecutor? Yeah. Okay. Think about your favorite restaurant got it if you wait are my eyes supposed to be closed it seems like they should be but i do want to i do want you to play along with okay all right i got it okay

think about your favorite restaurant If you were to find out that the chef at that restaurant had a deep-seated fantasy of poisoning all the people in the restaurant, and that night after night he was engaging in conversations with other people about how he could poison the restaurant goers

at his restaurant, and that he was researching online the different poisons, and that he was communicating with people the names of certain other people who come to his restaurant and that he was researching online the different poisons and that he was communicating with people the names of certain other people who come to his restaurant all the time and saying, I can't wait to see this person drop dead when they taste this cyanide filling up in their throat. If you found out about that and he said, oh, this is just my fantasy would you continue to eat at that restaurant of course you wouldn't i still would i think that's a great way to argue it but it's not the same thing talk some more

i think i think for this for me again i totally see where you're coming from. Yeah. I see where the defense is coming from. Yeah. I see why people like me will lead us into a minority report situation. But, yeah, I mean, some stuff just freaks me out so much that I'm kind of like, you know what? stuff just freaks me out so much that i'm kind of like i just i just think gosh it's it's so much bigger than this one trial you're right it is because if we oh my gosh if we're trying to control every part of every person's life, you can't have any thought no matter if one person thinks that.

What if he thinks that feet are disgusting? What if Gil thinks that feet are the grossest thing on the planet, right? Okay. He's like, feet are disgusting. I never want to be touched by somebody else's feet i don't want anybody touching my feet right okay okay so then this i'm like where are you going it's a it's a weird uh a weird analogy that i'm doing here okay then somebody over here has got a foot fetish okay they love feet feet are amazing he wants to cut off everybody's feet and rub them on his face

that's his fantasy has he committed a crime what what steps has he taken in addition to just he's got he's got his his hard drive is fucking full of feet of feet just nothing but feet hard drive it's fucking full of feet just nothing but feet he's looked up that's not enough how to cauterize a wound after after cutting a foot off is that enough i'm getting there i'm telling you i like i'm too freaked out i just think it's i don. I just think it's, I don't know. I think it's just like a slippery slope. I agree. I agree. I also think it's a slippery slope in the other direction. I agree, too.

We're standing on a mountain. We are. Yeah. That's covered in Vaseline. Gross. So the jury went into deliberation, and they found him. What do you think? Guilty.

Yep. Yeah. I would think that I'm probably in the minority here. Well, the defense was devastated. Julia claimed it was thought prosecution. I agree. He was going to prison for his thoughts. Yeah.

But a juror said it was darker than that. He said, clearly we believed his fantasy was going to step into reality but it hasn't hang on i think yes that's the natural thought that yes this could progress into reality but it has not yet he has not committed a crime i think you're preemptively saving the world from creeps i accept your compliment he went on to say before he was so rudely interrupted by Brandy. I think like an addict needs a larger and larger dose,

he was needing things that were more and more real, and he was progressing. He was bringing it into real life. I don't disagree with that. But it needed to get more real before. Before, yes. Um, okay, I'll bring this point up later. Never mind.

Okay. The defense was like, we can't live with this verdict. We've talked to Brandy about it. Yeah. Brandy's upset. So we've got to do more. So they start petitioning the judge to throw the verdict out. I just want to make it clear that I'm not upset for Gil.

I'm upset for what this, this, the precedent, this sets. Yeah. You want like more women to be kidnapped. No! And my feelings are not. Brandi,

we all get it. We all get it. My feelings are not specific to this case. That's what I'm saying. Are you feeling like sorry for Gil because he doesn't have a big enough oven? So they start petitioning the judge to throw the verdict out. Ooh, I like the sound of that. Sure enough, on

on June 2014. Excellent. In June 2014, Judge Paul Gardifee Gardifee? Judge Paul did exactly that. He said that

the evidence showed that it was just fantasy role play. The judge wrote, no one was ever kidnapped, no attempted kidnapping ever took place, and no real world, non-internet based steps were ever taken to kidnap anyone.

Hmm. By that. Okay. All right. Hmm. Sounds like somebody already made that point on this podcast wow brandy you are brilliant you know what as a little present for you being right i'm gonna send you on a five-day vacation with kill into the mountains let me reiterate i think gill's a fucking creep no your your points are all good i i'm just messing with you

but for real uh let's see by that point g Gil had spent almost two years in prison. The lesser conviction about the database still stood, but he got time served for that, so he was released. The prosecution was like, you're fucking kidding. No. Their thought process was... We're not, buddy. Look at you.

Their thought process was, it's not the judge's job to be like the 13th juror so this made me think of your case from last week where the judge was like i don't agree so i'm overturning this they were basically like who cares if the judge didn't agree with what the jury decided that's not what he's there to do yeah so they took steps to get the original verdict reinstated the case went to the court of appeals so the case went before a three judge panel and the decision oh my god what the hell is wrong with me i wrote the decision wasn't anonymous which of course by that i meant the decision wasn't unanimous listen they had to use their real names when they did that

but the majority wrote that they didn't want let me start by saying gil won and the majority wrote that they didn't want, quote, to give the government the power to... What's happening? I had a total breakdown in this paragraph. I'm going to take it from the top. Excellent. So Gill won. The case went before...

I'm going to start again. God damn it. The case went before a three-judge panel, and Gil won. The decision was not unanimous. Excellent. Really? I would think you'd want it to be unanimous. No.

God, this is a mess. You need to, like, retype it real fast. I need to rewrite thistype it real fast. I need to rewrite this whole thing. Let's start over. Yeah. Mary Beth Tenning. Was born September 11, 1943. Can you imagine?

So the majority wrote that they didn't want the government to give the government the power to punish us for our thoughts and not our actions. Yeah. Thank you. Oh, my God. That's what I've been saying this whole time. Because foot guy that I mentioned earlier, he's not trying to kill anybody. He's even looking into how to cauterize it so they can survive just fine, Kristen. Foot guy lives only in your mind. I bet he's even looking into how to cauterize it so they can survive just fine kristen foot guy lives only in your mind i bet he's out there

so they said fantasizing about committing a crime even a crime of violence against a real person whom you know is not committing a crime yeah they also reversed the charge that could be a judge oh god they also reversed the charge that he illegally gained access to the police database yeah i don't think that's fair i think he probably did illegally gain access to it i agree yeah he was cleared of all charges. Worth noting, so this was the thing I wanted to flag earlier. They've gone after a few other people who were on this dark fetish site. And in those cases, they did more than just get the Internet stuff. They met with them.

I think in one case they had a guy put together a torture kit you know like they i think they learned from this case and they were like okay we've got we've got to get them to do more steps or they've got to do more steps before we can prosecute where are they now kathleen and gill are divorced no fucking shit obviously the nypd fired gil no no fucking shit after the legal battle was over gil wrote a memoir titled raw deal the untold story of nypd's cannibal cop that's a gross name oh why do you say that he's just because he couldn't fit it in his oven he has a really touching gofundme page where you can go donate and i know you will brandy raw because he couldn't fit it in his oven. He has a really touching GoFundMe page where you can

go donate. And I know you will, Brandi. He's a couple hundred dollars short on that big industrial sized oven. Hey, he's just thinking about it. No, see? Here's the deal. Had he bought an industrial oven, that would have been a step into making

it reality. Or maybe he just wanted to create more baked goods. Earlier this year, he wrote an extremely violent horror novel called A Gathering of Evil. Self-published? I don't know. I actually did not look into that. Why didn't I look into that? I'm sure it is self-published i don't know i actually did not look into that why didn't i look into that i'm sure it is self-published i mean come on it's like you're not a fucking writer well technically i've not written i've not published my novel so

um so yeah the documentary was was really good They showed a lot of I think they got a little cheeky with it. So they would like splice in interviews and then like scenes of him cooking. So like one scene is him like taking bacon out of the oven.

One scene was him like stirring up some red sauce pasta. His poor mom was featured heavily in in this thing i mean i don't know i uh i just feel like it's really necessary right now for me to reiterate no it's not you've that i don't think i'm not on gill side. I think he's a fucking creeper. It's about more than this case for me. What this means

is that Brandy has the same fantasies as Gil. I knew you were gonna say that! She doesn't want to go to prison and who can blame her? It's fine, Brandy. Just don't make me

a target of your crimes. That was a really good case it it freaked me out that's really fucking creepy yeah on to brighter things yes i have a couple of of uh updates that we want to give on the uh on the podcast here at rhoda yeah yeah update number one i feel so official okay go ahead uh my mom did not take me out for ice cream but she did text me and offer it we've just been unable to make our schedules match uh-huh so instead she sent me an ice cream emoji how do you feel about that brand? I did not enjoy it one bit. And then I checked the

LGTC email and my mom sent us a gift card to Cold Stone. Which is amazing. We are very excited. Norman seems to somehow think that he will also go with us, but he forgets that Cold Stone is like a million dollars. The next update I'd like to give think that he will also go with us but he forgets that cold stone is like a million dollars um the next update i'd like to give is that we got a little email and i'm doing this

just for you kristin they confirmed that in the video in the video game episode, Norm and I made fun of you for saying glommed. Glommed on. And it is a real phrase and people say it. Oh. And Kristen was right. Oh. One more time. Kristen was right.

Glommed on is a real thing that people say. So, an apology? Right. Glom'd on is a real thing that people say. So, um, an apology? No, I'm not giving you any funny apologies. Zach would like me to send you a message. Oh, God. To stop beating up on Eagle Scouts. Hey, I just want Eagle Scouts to stop beating up on all of us.

Oh, somebody had asked us and I answered this person on our social media. They asked for an update on the Anna Stubblefield case. Oh. Because we predicted the future that she would be sentenced to time served. We are psychics. And then have to register as a sex offender. But at the time, that had not happened yet. I know. I said on the podcast, I said registered for a sex offender.

It was really funny. It was very funny. Kristen, this is a serious segment on the podcast right now. I'm sorry. I had no idea we had a serious segment. I'm just kidding. So we did correctly predict the future. She was sentenced to time served and she does

have to register for and six for and as a sex offender that would be a real punishment last bit kristin found the house where mary mcelroy was held when she was kidnapped we talked about this on the podcast that i had looked for it, but could not find it when I was researching that episode. I glommed onto your case. Kristen's a psychopath and has not forgotten that case. Can't let it go. And so she found it and it is disturbingly close to my house, just as we suspected.

It's still standing. Okay. The thing I want to know, the people who live there now, do they know? I'm going to go knock on their door. Would you please? Yeah, I'm going to do it. Are you really?

I'm going to go by there because it's like real close to my house. It's real close. No. Is that too much? Yeah, don't get me. It's not like my fucking next door neighbor. Okay, but I'm just saying, like, protect yourself.

And if they're outside, maybe I'll, you know, say a little something. You got any notes? I see you don't have a notepad there. Oh, God. Well, I didn't realize we were going to pretend we're talk show hosts now. You got, like, your little note cards. So, I didn't realize we were going to pretend we're talk show hosts now. You got like your little note cards. So I hear you did some time in Vegas. If you have any notes for us, find us on social media.

We're on Facebook. We're on Twitter. We're on Instagram. Send us an email. Send us a case suggestion. Send us a love note. We have an email. LGTCpodcasts at gmail.com.

And then please leave us a rating and a review on iTunes. Even if you don't listen to us there, it really helps us out. 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 New York Magazine, the New York Times, and the New York Daily News.

And I got my info from Crime Library, the New York Daily News, the Albany Times Union, and a scotch from Wikipedia. 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.