Let's Go To Court! - 64: Trapped in a Burger King & Eccentric Millionaire John du Pont

Episode Date: April 10, 2019

Curtis Brooner loved Burger King. In fact, he ate there almost every day. So it’s no surprise that on December 15, 2018, Curtis popped into Burger King for a quick bite. But before he left the restaurant, he went to the bathroom. Big mistake. Then Brandi tells us about John du Pont. John was an heir to the du Pont family fortune. He had plenty of money, but hardly any friends. Over time, he developed a passion for wrestling. He created a wrestling facility at his home, and became a sponsor for USA Wrestling. John had always been eccentric, but as years passed, his behavior became more and more concerning. 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: “Man sues for free Burger King for life after saying he got trapped in the bathroom,” Time Magazine Curtis Brooner vs Burger King Corporation “Burger King broke its promise of free-meals-for-life to Portland area customer, lawsuit claims,” By Aimee Green for The Oregonian “Oregon man gets $9,000 settlement after suing Burger King to regain promise of free meals for life,” By Everton Bailey for The Oregonian In this episode, Brandi pulled from: “A LIFE IN PIECES; For du Pont Heir, Question Was Control” by Jere Longman. Pam Belluck, and Jon Nordheimer, The New York Times “Blood on the Mat” by John Greenwald, Time Magazine “John E. DuPont Trial:1997” encyclopedia.com “John Du Pont And The Murder Of Dave Schultz: The True Story Behind ‘Foxcatcher’” by Mark Oliver “John du Pont” wikipedia.org      

One semester of law school. One semester of criminal justice. Two experts! I'm Kristen Caruso. I'm Brandi Egan. Let's go to court! On this episode, I'll talk about a man who was betrayed by Burger King. And I'll be talking

about John DuPont. That felt weird. I love it. Okay. Where are you at with that? I think I'm gonna do it. I love it. Okay. Where are you at with that? I think I'm going to do it. So I went to a writer's conference this weekend in Kansas City. It was not a great conference. But it did get me thinking more seriously about, like,

they did the whole thing of, like, you are a brand. You need to pay attention to your social media. And, like, I know I shouldn't be making these faces or these noises did the whole thing like you are a brand you need to pay attention to your social media and like i know i know i shouldn't be i shouldn't be making these faces or these noises because i know you have to do all that but it did get me thinking again like a lot of people were talking about their pen names why are you looking at me like that i mean i feel like this is all conversations that we've already had kristin yeah i know i. I'm bored by me too. I don't know why I've been so hesitant because Kristen Caruso will clearly sell more books than Kristen Pitts. And it sounds amazing. It's a

beautiful name. It is a beautiful name. I mean, you can't buy that name. And yet I married into it. Yes. So I think from here on out. Kristen Caruso. Kristen Caruso. I love it. I don't know if I'll legally change my name. That's fine. But that's for another day. Yeah. At the DMV. That's right. So there we are.

I like it. Thank you. I'm really pleased with this direction you're taking in your life Kristen. Tell me about it. Yeah, but you're right. We've already discussed it. I'm finally, I'm here now. Diving in.

Finally diving in. With both feet. Or am I? Or will this all get cut? Who knows? Because we've done this before. We have done this before. We've recorded almost this exact same conversation before.

Yes. Oh, on the cutting room floor. Can you guys believe shit gets cut out of these episodes? Seems impossible. Seems. Okay, so I need to start with an apology to the listeners. Oh, no. I just...

My case this week. It's going great well stop let's let's hold on before we make that assumption so i do i do just want to say i had this two-part series ready to go and not a two-part as in like a cliffhanger but it's like and maybe some people will be able to guess what series i have planned by this but the first episode was going to be about a lifelong child molester and the second one which was linked was going to be about a lifelong serial killer it may surprise you to know that i got very bummed out. Yeah, no shit. That is so not your thing. It was very depressing. It's all very interesting.

Yeah. And I'm going to do it at some point. Yeah. But then I had that writer's conference. Yeah. And then we. Oh, are you going to? I'm going to tell them. You got to spill the beans.

So anyone who listened to our April Fool's episode heard that we got a new house. I wouldn't. We had the inspection and the place was a shit show. It was terrible. Oh, it just sucked. Kristen, look into my eyes. Yeah. The perfect house is out there.

You will find it. It'll be better. It'll be cuter. You will love it more than that house. I promise. I don't believe you. Oh, the inspection was so sad. It was so sad.

Like, the inspector was taking us through stuff. And, like, he started with the garage. And it was basically like, hey, you know, this garage looks okay. But in reality, a strong wind will collapse. And I was kind of like, ooh, oh, boy, that's not great. But maybe we can work something out. And then he just added thing after thing after thing until we got upstairs to the master bedroom. And he pointed out that when you jump in a certain area, the floor jumps with you.

Great. That's not what you want. Apparently not. No. So Norman and I backed out of that house. That's all right. The search is back on. Yes.

The perfect house awaits. And I realized that, well, I realized yesterday as I was getting bummed out. So first of all, I was going to do the child molester case, then the serial killer case. I was like, that's too depressing. So then I started to look into why I did this. I don't know. Diane Downs. Oh, God.

Yes. And I had that halfway written up. Yeah. But then I was like, I can't. Okay, how many episodes have you half written? I have a shit ton of half written episodes. A bunch. Yeah, a whole bunch.

Nope. I'm jumping ship on this. Yeah. And I don't know why, but it's like. How did I not know that Diane Downs, by the way, for anybody who doesn't know, she shot her three children. And blamed it on. A bushy haired stranger. Yes.

A bushy haired stranger. Yes. And so I was halfway through doing that. And then I started finding all this stuff about like her past. And you know me. I like my bad guys to be bad guys. My good guys to be good guys. I don't want to hear that the bad guys were molested when they were kids. I just don't like.

So I abandoned ship. This is the longest intro we've ever done. And I'm so sorry to everyone. It's fine. This is a long way of saying I have a case this week. It's very lighthearted, very short because I just couldn't handle anything else. Thank you, Kristen. OK, we appreciate your your lighthearted fare.

All right. Although, you know, you might hear this and think that this is really tragic and gross. 50-year-old Curtis Bruner loved Burger King. What do you get at Burger King? I don't like Burger King at all. I don't like Burger King either. You don't? No.

Yeah, I'm not into it. I'm not into it either. Norman, big fan. I don't mind their breakfast croissant which pretty good see i i don't know that i've ever just gone to a burger king on my own thing like it would be a pure desperation move yeah because i mean if there's a burger king there's also like a mcdonald's and a taco bell exactly you're gonna get one of. And I am for sure going to Taco Bell. Taco Bell, yes.

Do you like McDonald's? Yeah. I mean, there was that time that McDonald's poisoned me with their iced tea. Oh, yeah. I think I heard something about that. Like Bed Bath & Beyond was involved. Should I tell that story? That's up to you, man.

You know what? I'm going to you, man. You know what? I'm going to tell that story. Remind me and I'll tell it while I'm telling this. Okay. Because it's, you know. Yeah. Okay. Okay.

So Curtis dined at Burger King almost every day. Why? Because it was delicious. Mm-hmm. And because it was convenient. Because it was delicious. Mm-hmm. And because it was convenient. Because it was super healthy. He'd get on the highway headed for work, and he could stop at the exit right before work

and find himself at a delicious Burger King restaurant. Why is he going to Burger King before he goes to work? Maybe he likes the croissant witch. Oh, you're probably right. Are you serious? You're like, the only thing i like is the breakfast what are other people doing here i thought it was my own private breakfast so it's no surprise that on december 15th 2018 curtis was at the Burger King restaurant located at... Okay, wait, wait. I can't believe I'm going to do this because it's just a Burger King.

I'm ready. 25, 55, Northeast, 238th Drive, in Wood Village, Oregon. Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. Hold on. It's coming very slowly. Uh-huh. Oh, I'm seeing it. It's just a Burger King. Looks like a Burger King. So glad we took the time to look it up. He went up to the counter, ordered his meal. He ate. And before he left the restaurant, he ducked into the restroom. It was one of those big single stall bathrooms. And like I said, it was a Burger King bathroom. So it was gross. Yeah. The place smelled terrible.

But you know, when you got to go, you got to go. That's right. Curtis used the restroom, washed his hands and went for the door. It wouldn't open. He got trapped in a Burger King bathroom? He tried again. Nothing. He tried again.

Nothing. The lock was jammed. He was trapped inside a Burger King bathroom. No! Curtis wasn't sure what to do. A pound on the door? I'm sure he did some of that. Yeah.

But he realized he had his cell phone on him, and he had his receipt from his meal. Oh, yeah, good call. He pulled out the receipt, dialed the number on it, and pretty soon one of the workers picked up. He explained the situation. He said, I'm trapped in the bathroom. You got to get me out of here. Pretty soon the BK employees were on the other side of the door trying to get Curtis out of his dire situation. They tried pushing while he pulled

nothing. They were like, maybe you need something to like wiggle the lock. So they pushed him a hard plastic edged card under the door, which I'm like, okay, is it a credit card? Like, why can't we just say that? You know, they yelled to him. That didn't work. Then. Oh, yelling to him didn't. Well, they yelled to him like instructions. Okay. They thought they were worth it. You're yelling and yelling, Curtis, but it's just not opening. You know, Brandy, the pen is mightier than the sword. Then they pushed a fly swatter under the door.

He was going to swat his way out? So they told him to squeeze it through the door in the door frame. And maybe that would like unjam the lock but here's the thing when he did that he cut his hand and so there he was bleeding and trapped in the burger king oh my gosh he later said it's the kind of place where you hold your breath go in and get out of there as fast as you can. That wasn't an option for me. Minutes ticked by.

Finally, the Burger King employees called a locksmith. Curtis wanted to get the hell out of that bathroom, but at the same time, he was very embarrassed. He could hear the burger king employees and the other customers outside the bathroom door laughing at him but what's there to be embarrassed about like is that you're just in the bathroom buddy well but you know you're locked in there you're trying to get out and everyone on the other side is laughing at you i mean it wouldn't feel great no no you're right to get out, and everyone on the other side is laughing at you. It wouldn't feel great, you're right.

No, no. You're right. Yeah, let's trap you in a Burger King bath and see how you hold up. Oh my gosh. We'll shove a Chris sandwich under the door. Gross! And I'll shout things to you. Just like words of encouragement.

You can do it! Eat the Chris sandwich! I believe in you! Here's a hard-edged plastic card. Curtis said, The cleanliness of the place was less than desirable. Highway bums use it as a changing room. It's not a pleasant-smelling place.

Being locked in there for over an hour, you smell like that when you come out. I bet you do. I bet you burn your clothes. After about an hour. You smell like that when you come out. I bet you do. I bet you burn your clothes. After about an hour of captivity, the locksmith showed up and Curtis was freed. He didn't immediately leave the BK.

He was pretty... What? He just hung out for a while? Yeah. He was like, what? He just hung out for a while? Yeah. I was like, what can I get out of this? Well. I need a whopper for my pain and suffering. Well, hang on, hang on.

So he said that he was like too shaken up. The whole thing was too traumatizing. So he just needed like a minute to just kind of. And three whoppers. He was too shaken up to drive, Brandy. Okay. So the employees seemed to feel pretty bad for the guy. They gave him a bandage and some ointment for the cut,

and Curtis said that a manager told him, hey, from now on, you can eat here for free. Forever? For the rest of forever? I mean, that's kind of how that sounds, right? What do you think? What do you think? I mean, you're in customer service.

You've been in there for a long time. Someone gets stuck in your bathroom for over an hour. What do you do? My bathroom is clean. It smells nice. Let's say it wasn't so clean. Let's say it was more of a Burger King vibe yeah no you have to set

some kind of limit to it it's just not indefinite right yeah cause that could be crazy yes because he's gonna try and come there everyday for three meals a day for the rest of his life which I'm not gonna finish that no go ahead.

Which... How long do you live when you eat? Exactly! You're eating three meals a day at Burger King. They could be like, jokes on you, buddy. Oh my gosh. So the manager was really nice about it. He says she told him,

we understand it's a terrible situation and we want to make it up to you. He was like, excellent. Yeah. I'm loving it. Wrong restaurant. So just as Brandy might have predicted, Curtis ate at Burger King every day for the next 13 days. With the exception of Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.

What? 13 days. Uh-huh. With the exception of Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. On two occasions, he ate his breakfast and his dinner there. Just as I suspected. Uh-huh. He's milking it for... Which, by the way, if you were that embarrassed... Yeah, you wouldn't be doing that. No, you wouldn't be showing back up. No. I think

if I got trapped in a Burger King bathroom I would not go back again. I think I've heard that R. Kelly song. Ew. No, you're thinking of No, you're thinking of that one song. I once got busy in a Burger King No, I once got nasty in a Burger King bathroom, right?

Crazy, allow me to amaze me. They say I'm ugly, but it just don't faze me. I once got busy in a burger king bathroom that is the humpty dance for anybody who's wondering and also just a note the humpty dance is your chance to do the hump the humpty hump watch me do the hump. The Humpty Hump. Watch me do the Humpty Hump. I'm so sorry. I like to picture in one group, like, the people who know that song and we're enjoying that. And then the people who have no idea what we're talking about and are horrified.

Yes. Yeah. It's a song. Do you want to break that down percentage-wise? That would be really interesting. It would be really interesting. I mean, I think it all depends on people's age. Yeah.

If you're like our age and older, you know the Humpty Hump. You know the Humpty Hump, yeah. Yeah. The song. You know, what you do in your personal time, that's on you. What you do in a Burger King bathroom is none of our concern. So, like I said, he's like killing the burgers at Burger King for like 13 days. Except for on Jesus' birthday. He rested.

Yeah. But when he went to Burger King on December 28th, expecting another free meal. Yeah, the manager was like, you've reached your limit. Sort of, yeah. They told him no. They said that district management had put their foot down and he wasn't allowed to have free meals anymore. How do you think he took the news? Not well.

I'm guessing that he said, let's go to court. Not just yet, Brandy. Oh, okay. Excuse me. Too soon. Too soon. Excuse me. Premature.

Premature. Let's go to courting. Curtis was outraged. He'd suffered a great deal in that bathroom, and he'd been offered free meals for life, and that's exactly what he wanted so he stomped his foot and he said you know what let's go to court because what burger king i was picturing him stomping his foot and you know what he didn't even do that to my knowledge. That was just added for fun.

What Burger King had done was very reckless. The bathroom door showed signs of distress. So clearly... From him? Me? I'm trying to gnaw his way out.

So he claims that there were signs of distress on that bathroom door before. And so clearly people had been locked in there before. They tried to get out. What? All right.

Here's what he said. They created an unsafe environment. Someone could have had a medical situation. You could have had a fatality. You could have had a child locked in there. Someone elderly. They're lucky it was me curtis sued burger king for well what do you think is reasonable oh um what do i think is reasonable or what do i think he sued them for

let's do both let's do and hang on because I need some chapstick. I do really like your outfit today. It's very cute. Thank you. Man. I thought I would get no compliments after the way you recoiled when Norman complimented me. It wasn't his compliment. It was the hand gestures that went along with it.

Well, for his hand gestures. It was really more of that went along with it. What were his hand gestures? It was really more of a gesture than a touch. But I felt very uncomfortable. Brandi was like, you guys know I'm here, right? And you guys had this unbroken eye contact at the time. Like, excuse me. I'm over here. Brandi, what can I say say I'm very desirable in my

blue button up top it's working for me yeah sorry listeners you just missed out on some serious chest chest popping that's right it's not thumping you're not thumping anything

okay anyway back to the case okay reasonable zero dollars chest popping yeah popping that's right it's not something you're not thumping anything okay anyway back to the case okay sorry what do you think okay reasonable zero dollars what unpack that why zero dollars he they didn't know that the bathroom door wasn't working he can't prove that they did know that so he was in there for an hour they gave him some free food get the fuck out come on buddy wow harsh what do i think he sued them for yeah for pain and suffering 25 million dollars oh let's see shall we okay so he sues burger king and he sought a court order that would require burger king to go back to their original agreement so he wanted free food forever yes yes so he wanted the court to order free food forever for this man but if the court would not do that, Curtis had a formula that he thought was fair.

Okay. Are you ready? Yes. Okay. Curtis is 50 years old. And if he eats Burger King three days a week or three times a day, seven days a week, he will live to be 54 years old. So I wish I could have been a fly on the wall when he talked to this lawyer. Because, you know, Curtis was going like every day, multiple times a day.

But his lawyer said, like, worked with him on this formula. So he's 50 years old. A Burger King Whopper meal costs $7.89. Assuming that he lives to be 72 years of age and consumes one Whopper meal for the rest of his life, that would amount to $9,026.16. So he's going to actual damages here. Oh, yeah. All right.

There's been some damage. Curtis's lawyer, Michael Fuller, said they arrived at that formula by figuring that since Curtis eats so many cheeseburgers, he probably won't live to the average lifespan of 77. Oh my gosh! So Curtis's position was either force Burger King to give me free food for life or make them pay me $9,026. And by the way, if Burger King refuses to honor our original agreement or if they try to say that our original agreement wasn't legally enforceable, guess what?

What? Then we'll start talking negligence. We'll start talking about how Burger King failed to maintain its premises in a safe and suitable condition. And we'll get into all that stuff, and we'll do it in front of a jury. And then we'll talk about punitive damages. To my colon. So for what it's worth. Do you want to talk about your colon? Is this the part where we talk about McDonald's?

I think it is. Okay. I mean, you said damages to his colons. And I did suffer some damages that day. Did I miss my opportunity to sue? I think you might have. Okay. And I'm sorry, if you don't like gross stories, then you're going to have to skip ahead. Yeah, hit that 30-second forward button a couple times.

A couple times. hit that yeah hit that 30 second forward button a couple times times so when i first moved down to north carolina i was dating this guy in new burn north carolina which is my favorite place i've ever been on vacation i did not go to the mcdonald's there though it shows because if you had you might have different feelings so i was dating this guy in newbern and i lived in elizabeth city which was like two and a half hours away and what i would do is every time i was leaving his place i would stop at the mcdonald's i would get a large unsweetened iced tea and a coffee for the road yes take off down the road this is not important but i'm going to clarify that it was my favorite vacation as a kid favorite adult vacation colorado continue i take off down the road and i notice almost immediately that the tea tastes weird

do i stop drinking it no no of course not i've paid for this tea and I'm going to drink it. Keep drinking it. And it's weird. I can't even describe how it tasted. Just that, like, if I were to taste it now, I would know. You would recognize that taste. It's almost like a moldy taste. Okay.

So I'm cruising on down the road. Peanut's in the passenger seat. She's a puppy at this point. And there's this spot between New Bern and Elizabeth City where, like, you're looking at a good hour-long stretch where there's just nothing. There's no gas stations. There's nowhere to pull over. And so I'm starting to feel a little rumbly in my tummy.

And I get to the last gas station. I'm like, I'd better go in and use the restroom. And just, you know, again, sharing way too much. I do not like to number two in public restrooms. Does anybody? I am a home pooper i am an at-home pooper so nobody's like looking forward to going number two at a gas station a lot of people seem to have no qualms about it i have many qualms so i pull into this gas station i get in there and it's one of these places where like you have to ask for the key which is fucking gross as if i want to touch some key that everyone else has

touched who went into that nasty bathroom i go into that bathroom was it like an outdoor access bathroom what do you think yeah yeah it was nasty it was nasty and i decided you know what i can make it an hour i'm too good for this i'm not going to the bathroom in here i'm holding it no way am i going in here uh-huh so i famous last words i brought the key back up to the counter said goodbye use the hand sanitizer slathered your body with hand sanitizer went back down the road i i kid you not i was on the road maybe 10 minutes when i was like this is this is not a drill this is happening this is not a drill. This is happening. This is not a drill. I should have gone in the disgusting bathroom.

And I realized, oh my God, I'm about to poop myself. I can't stop it. There's nothing I can do. I'm about to poop myself. And I'm like starting to wrap my head around like, what is happening to me right now? And I noticed up ahead on the highway, you know, it's just like a thing about the highway I was on was like there are trees surrounding it. But like it's a long way to get to those trees.

It's almost like this valley of grass. Yep. And I knew that's too far. I don't have it in me to run to the trees and then i saw a head and there was like i don't know like a probation cleanup crew guys in orange jumpsuits or whatever who were cleaning the road and i was like oh my god well i can't stop right there yeah so i pull off to the side of the road and i immediately have a game plan And I was like, oh, my God, well, I can't stop in front of these guys. So I pull off to the side of the road, and I immediately have a game plan.

I roll down the window. I take the McDonald's iced tea. It was a large, so it was huge. I throw that out of the car, keep the cup, obviously. Obviously. And then pull down my pants. I'm still in the driver's side. And then I lift myself and shove the cup under my butt but here's the thing the mcdonald's large iced tea is a huge cup it's a massive cup and so in order

to get my butt high enough what i had to do was, I realized my vagina was completely visible to oncoming traffic. So immediately I was like, oh my God, this is not going to work. And so I start frantically looking around the car. What am I going to do? What am I going to do? And the time is a ticket. You know, like there's, I've got no time. Code brown coming any second.

So then I spot a Bed, Bath & Beyond bag in the backseat of the car. And I just empty it. And I just go into the Bed, Bath & Beyond bag. And Peanut was very alarmed, right? And so well what's funny was that like peanut was still a puppy at this time and growing up we had a dog who like loved to roll and shit and stuff and so i didn't think peanut would be so alarmed peanut cried the whole way home and i like again there was no nothing to do with this bag of shit because I didn't want to like throw it out the window.

The road crew would have picked it up. And I don't, you know, those guys are probably just there on drug charges. I don't want to do that to them. So we drove all the way back to Elizabeth city. With a bag full of shit. And that's the story of when McDonald's tried to poison me.

And you missed your chance to sue them. And I missed my chance to sue them. And I was too snobby to use the restroom. So because I was too good for that restroom, I pooped in a bag in my car. Let's see. Oh, my gosh. Oh, I remember what I was going to tell you.

So, you know, like, that tea tasted bizarre. Yeah. Fast forward. So that was, like, ten years ago that that happened to me. So then, like, last year or the year before, Norman and I went to like some county fair thing. Yeah. And I got a glass of iced tea. It tasted like it.

So I never, I never complain in a restaurant. I never ask for anything to go back. I never do that. But I took one sip of that tea and I marched back through, cut the line. I was like, excuse me. I think I'd like a bottle of water instead.

Cause I knew drink that tea. You're going to shit your pants. I'm not going to poop my pants at the County fair. Oh my gosh. Thank you for sharing that story with our listeners. You know, my favorite memory is the first time I told you that story it was i thought you were gonna die i almost did well uh luckily there's not much left to this story uh so what

happened to curtis yeah so burger king obviously denied any liability of course uh but not long after he filed his lawsuit they reached out to him they wanted to settle they offered him nine thousand dollars twenty six nine nine thousand twenty six dollars and sixteen cents did he take it yeah okay good so his lawyer said burger king did the right thing they could have dragged this out for years and we're glad they didn't curtis still likes burger king he just doesn't go to their bathroom anymore um i wrote this down as a fun fact it's not a fun fact but i felt like just mentioning it okay uh curtis is a registered sex offender oh yeah that's not really a fun fact, but I felt like just mentioning it. Okay. Curtis is a registered sex offender. Oh, yeah.

That's not really a fun fact. No, it's not. You know what is kind of funny? I threw that in there thinking it would come up earlier because maybe we'd feel guilty about laughing about him being trapped in a bathroom. And so I was going to be like, hey, you know, he's a sex offender. But anyway. No, mine didn't actually feel bad for him ever. Served six and a half years in prison.

Wow. You know, I realize I did not tell a relevant bathroom Burger King story. You do have one. And I asked permission from Norman to tell it and he gave it to you yeah please tell us so it was family vacation and we'd all driven out to Minnesota and it was just myself Norman and my brother-in-law Jay in the car and we're you know we're just kind of talking doing random questions whatever to pass the time and all of a sudden without giving any explanation whatsoever norm pulls off on some exit and so jay and i were like what's going on and he's just like not answering at all. He whips into a Burger King and like the car was barely stopped.

Like he he was unbuckling his seatbelt as he was pulling into the parking spot, got parked, spilled out of the car and ran into the Burger King. And Jay and I were just sitting there like, what just happened? Like five seconds ago, we were on the highway and now we're like, you know, barely stopped at the Burger King. Okay, well. So for some context, the night before, we'd gotten out

for burgers and let me tell you how you'll know whether Norman will order a burger. If it looks like it's going to blow your colon out, he will order it. If it's got jalapenos on it, pepper jack cheese, like all kinds of that stuff. So he ordered that kind of burger the night before. Then we just stopped for lunch like an hour before. He ordered another one of those burgers.

So we got two in his system. When Norman came back out to the car, he explained to us that he'd had a bathroom emergency. And then we realized he had ripped his pants getting out of the car. had ripped his pants getting out of the car. He had this huge hole in the side of his pants. Oh. Oh, Norm.

How much toilet humor is in yours? Because I feel like I... There's zero. Well, damn. Someone didn't stay on theme. I didn't know this was the shit-themed episode. I must have missed that memo. Well, I did tell you I had a shitty case.

Yes! I loved it. I thought it was excellent. And I don't feel for curtis at all yeah i don't either i mean like i do feel bad for anyone who gets trapped in a burger yeah but you don't sue for that no no i mean you got you got how many meals out of that get over it let's calm down curtis are you ready to talk about John DuPont? Who the hell is that? Have you seen the movie Foxcatcher?

You know I haven't. Okay. Well, this is the true story of Foxcatcher, which has your dude in it. My dude. Channing Tatum. You love him. Speaking of Channing Tatum, have you seen his new look? No. What'd he do he went like all slim

shady he dyed his hair like oh platinum blonde are you making this up no it's real him oh no Channing Tatum oh my yeah I don't like it what should I be googling channing tan and blonde okay oh no no no are you looking at this picture no no no no is this for some it's's gotta be for a role or something, right? Yeah, it's got to. Yikes. Ugh. Ugh. I don't care for it. I can't believe you didn't consult me. Anyway, it's been a minute

since I've seen Foxcatcher, but if I recall, I think he has frosted tips in it. Ooh. Mmm. Do you remember the days of the frosted tips in it. Ooh. Do you remember the days of the frosted tips? Do I?

So this story takes place in the early 2000s, obviously. Does it? Yeah, if they had frosted tips. Frosted tips date way back further than that. Really? Yeah. Like early, like 90s. Like 90s yeah okay yeah like zach morris

he was pretty beautiful he was no ac slater oh come on that that jerry cole jerry curl mullet come on did you see the rest of him? Yeah, I'm not into the bag of meat like you are. Bag of meat. What the hell does that even mean? Like real muscle. I think that's a phrase people say. You're like just a small sack of meat. No, God. No, of meat. No, God.

No. Cut that. Oh, God. Oh, Lord. Anyway, I would like to start this up by giving a shout out to Dominic on Instagram for suggesting this case. Okay. Dominic, you had no idea what you were getting into on what episode you were going to be mentioned on. Poor guy. John DuPont was a weird fucking kid. But as an heir to the DuPont fortune, he had everything. Everything except for friends, that is.

that is born november 22nd 1938 john dupont was american royalty as a member of the family behind the dupont chemical company his family raised thoroughbred horses on their 800 acre farm in newton square pennsylvania i believe it's spelled newtown but i believe it's pronounced newton who knows i mean it's so tricky i know and he loved wandering the grounds of their property obsessing over birds and wildlife it was one of his only joys of an isolated childhood inside the mansion john dupont was an incredibly lonely child. His father was rarely at home. I believe he even left by the time he was like three or four. He left his John's mother for some tennis star. Oh, yeah.

And then he had siblings, but they were much older than him. They were grown and out of the house by the time John reached his childhood. And they barely acknowledged that he was in existence. Did he not have like other rich kid friends to hang out with? Yeah. No. No. Okay.

The only friend he thought he had was the son of his chauffeur. And he would later find out that his mom had been paying him to pretend he liked him. Oh, God. Yeah, really rough. Really rough. Brandy, it's at this point that I should probably confess to you. My mom's been

paying you this whole time? Yes. That's got it really racked up over the years. I'm doing quite well thank you but for what it's worth john was pretty self-sufficient because he was fucking weird and he didn't really care that much that other kids didn't like him i mean obviously it bothered him to some degree but he was very eccentric and managed to find his own fun. And by no fault of his own, he was also super fucking weird looking. He had these yellow teeth and these beady eyes and an odd nose. And he walked in kind of an odd

hunched over stance. So no friends, Creepy looking. And so he, of course, did what any guy matching that description does. Makeover montage. No. He came super uncomfortably close with his mother. Oh. He was really pulling for the makeover. I was really pulling for the makeover. Despite his strange relationship with his mother, he went on to earn a doctorate in natural sciences and founded the Delaware Museum of Natural History.

But still desperate for a sense of value in his life, John turned to wrestling. He was super successful, intellectually speaking. Oh, do you know who he is now? Ding, ding, ding, ding. Yes, yes. He was super successful, intellectually speaking, but it wasn't enough for John. He longed to be on the United States Olympic pentathlon team. Pentathlon is made up of fencing, equestrian show jumping, freestyle swimming, cross country running and pistol shooting. Weirdest fucking event I've ever heard of.

I was going to say, that's quite the combination. Yes. Super fucking weird event. Definitely, i feel like catered towards rich people oh you think um can it can just anyone try i don't think so i imagine there's like you know stepping stones so you have to complete you have to do a qualifier and then you have to okay so he wasn't just like some weirdo who's like no i'm an athlete now no no and i believe he made it pretty far in the process, but he

did not go on to compete at the Olympics. And so he turned his focus to wrestling. Here's a fun fact. Fun fact like he was a sex offender the whole time or like a real fun fact?

Closer to yours. John had been involved in a pretty terrible horse back riding accident when he was a child okay the nature of it is not completely known but what is known is that he sustained some kind of injury to his testicles oh no they became very infected oh god and were eventually removed oh no yes and so part of his infatuation with becoming an athlete was needing to feel masculine something Something that he didn't have because of that childhood accident. Yeah. The faces you're making right now. It's rough. Yeah.

It's really rough. Can you imagine what infected balls look like? I mean, I am now. Thank you. Because of this accident, he was actually not allowed to play any kind of contact sports or anything when he was a kid. Well, why not? He'd already lost his balls. I mean, what's going to happen?

What else is going to happen? I don't know. I don't know if it was like a rule of his parents or if it was like something the doctor said. I don't know. But that just made this infatuation with athletes and sports just grow and grow and grow. I want to know so much more. Right? Yes.

Yeah. Okay, continue. So in 1985, he opened a 14,000 square foot training center on his family's estate that he had renamed to Foxcatcher Farms. He poured himself into wrestling. He brought in all kinds of athletes. He became associated with the United States wrestling team. He poured over $3 million into supporting the United States wrestling team. into supporting the United States wrestling team.

He made everybody who came to this combine camp, whatever of his, call him coach, though he had very little to do with the actual coaching. Well, I mean, if you're going to pour that much money into it, I think you can be called coach, right? Yeah, for sure, for sure. He had really yearned for this like approval in the sports world. And so he took what he knew money and carried that over to sports. And the the wrestling community welcomed him with open arms. Yeah. I mean, you throw three million dollars at someone like they're gonna be pretty friendly about it yes exactly but he had this vision for team foxcatcher he wanted

to get a couple of really well-known olympic wrestlers in there to kind of run the show. So David Schultz was John's second choice for the face of Team Foxcatcher. At first, he'd hired Dave's brother, Mark, who was an Olympic gold medalist. But Mark didn't last very long in the position. He grew very tired and frustrated of the way John treated him. He felt like he was a toy that John had purchased for a $70,000 salary. 70. Yeah. And so. Well, yeah. I mean, John didn't really have social skills.

Right. All he knew was money. And so initially he had brought in Mark. He was letting him kind of shape the program and lead it and then also so this this relationship here between Mark and John is kind of the focus of the movie Fox Catcher yeah and he treated Mark a lot like he was like a pet of his he paid. He kind of got to do what he wanted. The movie hints at a lot of like homosexual undertones which

Mark claims is not true. But at the very least Wait, consensual or non-consensual? Consensual. Oh, okay. Yeah. But nonetheless Mark denies it. Says that that's not the case at all. But said very much that he felt like a piece of property to –

Sure. To John DuPont. And so eventually he backs away from it. He gets – like there's a lot of drinking and drugs going on at this compound, including from John DuPont. He had a lot of problems with alcohol and drugs. And so Mark takes kind of a step back and in comes Dave. Dave is Mark's older brother. So Mark and Dave were the only two brothers in sports history to win freestyle wrestling medals in the Olympic Games and the World Championships. Dave won in 1983 and Mark won in 1985.

They both men were honored by then President Ronald Reagan. They were kind of like national heroes in the wrestling world. Like they were big deal people. Sure. But despite being a seven time world Olympic medalist, Dave was like a super nice guy. Like he wasn't, like he didn't think he was amazing. Like he thought he was a great athlete, but he didn't. He was very humble.

He was super humble, yes. A friend and fellow athlete said, named Kevin Jackson said, there was no one else who carried himself like Dave. He was an ambassador for the sport, a one-of-a a kind someone, and someone a lot of people called a friend. So Dave had not had a super easy life. He was always a big kid, like which made him perfectly suited for wrestling. And he suffered from dyslexia. So he had been teased a lot. And it's believed that that is why he kind of latched on to John DuPont so well, because they immediately had a really easy relationship. They both understood what it felt like to be outsiders?

Absolutely. Absolutely. And Mark had warned Dave that it would be really hard to work for John DuPont, that he hadn't been able to do it. And he warned him what he was getting into and said there was going to be difficulty. But he, Mark, I mean, I'm sorry, Dave knew how to talk to John. He communicated well with him. He knew how to handle him because he understood him. Okay. Yeah. Dave Schultz turned out to be kind of a godsend for Foxcatcher Farms.

He definitely got the wrestling program back under control. Things had kind of crumbled when things fell apart with Mark. And he got John under control. In 1988, so three years into starting this kind of compound at Foxcatcher, John's mother died. And, you know, he had that super close, weird relationship. Backing up just a little bit, John had married at one point. Really? At the, like, insistence of his mother. He was, like, 43 years old.

He married someone much younger than him, and it lasted a very short time that poor she filed for an annulment after she said he threatened her with a gun and like shoved her into a fireplace oh god yes yeah yeah oh good for her getting out of that yes so things really started to crumble for john after his mother died like his sanity kind of started to unravel a bit to the point that he would insist that he could see Disney characters hiding on the property or hiding in the trees. He said that the trees would uproot themselves and march around the estate and then reroute themselves somewhere else. Oh boy. One time he opened fire on a flock of geese because he was convinced that they were using dark magic against him. I think I've heard my dad say that before.

At one time he also removed all of the treadmills from the training facility because he became convinced that the clocks on them were taking him back in time oh my yeah oh no so just things are really unraveling here at fox catcher farms he hired security contractors to check his floorboards for secret tunnels and his walls for hidden intruders. He set up like barbed wire, like razor wire inside the walls so that people that he believed were traveling inside his walls wouldn't be able to do that. Can you imagine being one of these contractors?

Right. Who's like, your job is to look in walls and see if there are people there oh my gosh i guess you'd just be like well he's paying me so sure exactly and it would kind of come in peaks and valleys like you know sure he'd seem very normal for a while and then he'd be abusing alcohol and cocaine and he would go off the rails yeah and it didn't stop with that like his his his kind of mania his oh fuck i can't think of the word pause okay what the fuck is the word where you are convinced that bad things are happening all the time? Paranoia. Thank you. Okay.

His paranoia, it all crossed over into the wrestling camp. He kicked out a couple of the wrestlers because they were African American and he declared Foxcatcher a KKK organization. Whoa, what? Yes. What year was this? Like the mid 80s. Holy shit. Uh, what? Yes. What year was this? Like the mid 80s. Holy shit. Uh-huh.

Yeah. So one of the wrestlers said of an interaction with him, he said, I was working out in the weight room one day and John came in and pulled a gun on me and said, don't you fuck with me. I want you off the farm in a very aggressive way. I could tell he wasn't in the right state of mind i cowered to him just enough to get him to back off then he left i told local police the next day and i went to the local courthouse to put in a report and then i took it to the county court as well he was definitely getting closer and closer to doing something

where somebody was going to get hurt. What did the police do with this information? Because John's super rich. Good grief. Yeah. Oh, that's just the friendly KKK man. Nothing was done about it. And he was right.

Somebody was going to get hurt. Well, no shit. And John was going to get hurt. Well, no shit. And John was going to do the hurting, I'm sure. Yep. So everybody knew that Dave was the closest person to John. John also had like a driver that he was super close to. But the driver did not interact with the wrestlers at all. Like there was some kind of like weird jealousy almost from like the driver and John had one relationship and John and the wrestlers had a different relationship and the two did not intertwine.

And so people think that the driver had a lot of influence on John and his actions and his spiraling out of control. Okay. But what everybody did know was that Dave was the closest person to John. He had like a calming influence over John. And he wasn't like a yes man. He would tell John when John would say that he saw things coming out of the wall. He saw the trees uprooting themselves. He would say, there's nothing going on, John.

It's all in your head. There's nothing going on, John. It's all in your head. There's nothing going on. Wow. Yes. And that didn't send John like flying off the handle? Maybe it did. Oh. Maybe it did.

A lot of people believe that it was that John had some kind of fear over the way Dave could speak to him that led him to take this next action. On January 26, 1996, at 2 p.m., John DuPont grabbed a.44 Magnum and ordered his security consultant, the driver, so he was like his bodyguard slash driver, whatever, Patrick Goodale, to drive him to dave schultz house so dave schultz lived in a house on the property on the estate with his wife and children john pulled up to the house dave walked outside he waved he said hi boss and dupont pulled his gun pointed it at his head

screamed you got a problem with me and open fired killing him immediately oh john i mean i'm sorry dave's wife watched the whole thing happen oh no yeah patrick the driver immediately leapt out of the car to go check on dave dave was shot in the head dave died immediately yeah so as a member of like John's security team, Patrick was armed. And so he pulls out a gun and pulls it on John DuPont. But John DuPont runs off. He jumps in the car, drives back to the house, and, like, barricades himself in the mansion. Oh, boy.

in the mansion oh boy and he stays there for the next two days while 70 police officers and an entire SWAT team set up outside they tried everything they could to negotiate with him to get him to come out of the house um but he wouldn't he wouldn't he would barely speak to him and then like they had this idea it was january in pennsylvania so they turned off the heat oh his house and he called them he was like it's really cold i'm gonna go need to check on the boilers i'm gonna need you guys to let me come out and do that and they're like yeah of course john absolutely come on out with your hands up that's right no problem we'll just let you go check on it no big deal easy peasy lemon squeezy but of course how dumb when he comes out they take, man. They take him into custody. Yes. So it was January 28th when he was taken into custody.

He was charged with murder and assault shortly after that. And in February, the court ordered a competency examination for him. That went on for months. It would be September before a judge would rule on his competency. And ultimately, Judge Patricia Jenkins ruled that John DuPont was mentally incompetent to stand trial. Wow. Yeah. And he was sent to a state psychiatric hospital for treatment.

I don't know why I said wow. I mean, the guy thought trees were uprooting themselves. Yeah. During that time when he was being treated, he saw several psychiatrists, and they diagnosed him as a paranoid schizophrenic and that he had a bunch of complicated conspiracy theories involving all kinds of things from Tibetan Buddhists to the CIA to Nazis to Jesus. I mean, it was all part of his mental illness.

And eventually the judge declared that because of his psychotic nature, their word, not mine, that he was unable to help his attorneys mount a rational defense. So by this time, he's 57 years old. And so they, the judge is like really upset about this. So she said that he needs to go get treatment. And the prosecution is trying to move forward with a trial. And the defense is trying to move forward with a trial and get him found not guilty by reason of insanity. And she's like, hold the fucking phone here. We need to focus on getting this guy help. Yeah, like we don't need to be focusing on a trial right now. Wow. Yeah. And so she ordered him to continue the treatment. And then there would be a hearing every 90 days to see what progress he was making.

And until she felt like he or the psychiatrist, I mean, it's not her own decision, but until she got a report from psychiatrists that he was competent to stand trial, then that's what they would. She would not move forward with the trial until then wow is this some rich people justice i'm guessing it's very nice i enjoy it immensely so finally a year after the crime so a year has passed he's been doing like he's been getting all of this treatment they're checking in every 90 days to see what progress he's making. He's found, finally, he's found competent, and the trial was scheduled to begin. It took place in suburban Philadelphia, and the defense didn't deny that he killed Dave Schultz, but they said that their client was insane at the time of the shooting and was suffering from severe paranoid schizophrenia. Sure. The prosecution, however, argued argued that du pont did know right from wrong at the time of the shooting and the

prosecutor pointed out that the fact pointed out the fact that du pont asked to speak to his attorney several times during the police standoff and said that was evidence that he understood what was happening what do you think about that i i always have such a hard time with these yeah because it's at the time that he committed the crime right and i think yeah afterward you can you can decide oh i'm in some deep shit yeah i need to talk to a lawyer and that doesn't necessarily mean that you weren't insane at the time yeah i think that it's very possible that he was insane the moment he went up to dave schultz house and shot him in the head and then as soon as his buddy driver whatever jumps out and it's like oh my god what have you done

you can snap back to reality unintentionalintentional Eminem quote there. Oops, there goes gravity. No, but I also think saying I need a lawyer doesn't necessarily mean that you know you've done something wrong. You can recognize that there's a situation going on. It can just mean I'm surrounded by police officers. Yes. And I need a lawyer. Yeah.

Yeah. You're right. Yeah. Case closed. So witnesses testified that John's behavior had started to change about the time of his mother's death in 1988. He had become extremely security conscious and had hired a firm in 1993 to protect himself and the estate. And despite all of those extensive security measures that we talked about, he still claimed on several occasions that they were being spied on and that his life was in danger. He actually accused Dave Schultz of being a spy at one point wow yeah yeah and dave just talked to him like he knew how to talk to him like yeah calmed him down he diffused the

situation yeah friends testified at trial i don't know friends acquaintances whatever people who were aware of his inner workings testified at trial about the razor wire that he had installed inside of the walls. They also testified about how he had hired excavators to come in and dig up the property at Foxcatcher Farm because he believed that someone had installed secret tunnels in his property. In his property. Yeah. And then several witnesses also talked about his increasing drug and alcohol problems between 1988 and 1995. They said that he was constantly under the influence of cocaine and alcohol, but he continued to manage the daily operations of his training facility during that time. He developed close relationships to some of the wrestlers and intense dislike of some of the others.

And there seemed to be no rhyme or reason behind it. And it could change very quickly. Right. The defense presented extensive evidence that John was paranoid and schizophrenic. This evidence focused on his delusional beliefs, particularly evident in his statements during the police standoff and at his competency examinations afterwards. I guess he made multiple claims that he was Jesus Christ reincarnated. He was the Dalai Lama. He was a Russian czar. Yeah, lots of claims about who he really was. An expert witness said that DuPont was legally insane at the time of the shooting.

But just like we always hate, experts for the prosecution said that they believed that DuPont did suffer from mental illness, but that he was not legally insane at the time of the shooting. I think that's so fucking hard for a jury. Yeah. You just get experts up there and they say, one says, yes, he was legally insane. And A, B, C, and D is why. Yeah.

And then you get another expert up there who's like, yes, he was mentally ill, but he wasn't insane. And E, F, G, and H are why. Yeah. That's so confusing. What was the logic? I don't know specifically, like, what the varying arguments were. Okay.

Yeah. Okay. But they just had these, yeah. Yeah. That's so tough. Yeah. So what does a jury do? If you were a juror, how do you?

what does a jury do if you were a juror how do you i mean i guess in that case all you can do is listen to both experts opinions and decide whose expertise you think is better which is scary because it's like well what the hell do i know about mental health yeah exactly i know about But not, I mean, not someone else's. Yeah. Yeah. So on February 25th, 1997, the jury found him. Guilty. Guilty of third degree murder. Oh. And simple assault under Pennsylvania's guilty but mentally ill statutory law. So in Pennsylvania, guilty but mentally ill means that a defendant who offers a defense of insanity may be found guilty but mentally ill at trial and that that person doesn't necessarily so was mentally ill at the time of the crime but was not legally

insane at the time of the crime so that's how they found him yes he was mentally ill no he was not legally insane okay he was sentenced to probably not much i mean third degree i don't know what 40 years in prison oh wow yeah that really surprises me i agree wow yep he actually died in prison on december 9th 2010 wow yeah oh that's a sad weird story it's really a dark one and like so the movie fox catcher if you haven't seen it like it sticks very closely to the story um so mark schultz he is played by channing chan in a minute his big complaint about it is the homosexual undertones which he said did not exist but he really felt the rest of it stuck very closely to the real experiences that they had there yeah and it's good steve carell plays john dupont yes yeah and it's a weird role for him but he's very good in it

well he's great and everything yeah yeah i've never i saw a documentary on this i never saw that movie yeah um it's so fascinating to me the role that money plays oh yeah because you think if he just not had money yeah i mean first of all people wouldn't have felt obligated or felt to get him to get him help right yeah but also he wouldn't have been surrounded oh you're exactly right people at all really yeah he would have been alone likely yes yeah not to say he wouldn't i mean surely he would have found someone else to exactly exactly oh wow yeah so um he was actually super involved in philanthropy he was a very generous donor to lots of things that he believed in he was also a an avid stamp collector that's your sign that he's a weirdo right there you think stamp collecting

that's super weird yeah i don't get it yeah why do you i know i don't get it. Yeah, why do you collect? I don't know. But I'm not a collector of anything. Mm-hmm. You, however. What do I collect? Kitchen scales. I do love. Have you seen your kitchen? I have seen my kitchen.

Okay, but like my collection, like there was like a specific number that would fit. So I have them above my cabinets in my kitchen. So there was like a specific number that would fit there and I don't keep getting them now. Like it's full and I'm done. I'm not like obsessive about it, but they're really cute. You're pretty defensive about it. I know. I just realized

that. You used to collect frog stuff. I did collect frog stuff when I was a kid. I also collected bells. Yeah, you did. Yeah. I did. You-huh. Yeah. I did. You know what's weird?

I was always kind of jealous of people who had collections. Because you weren't interested in anything? Yeah, I mean that's how I felt. It was like somehow that that meant you had a personality, but like the fact that I was not interested in collecting anything, you know. Yeah. I also, before I collected frogs, I collected Tweety Bird stuff. I was really into Tweety Bird for a hot minute when I was seven, probably.

Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Do you remember when people would get, like, the Tweety Bird tattoos? Yeah, and, like, women would get them, like, on their boob. It's like, that's not. It's a weird, weird thing. I'm not into that. No, thank you.

I just have the Garfield one on my back. Is he in his box and he's got the blanket around him? No, no. He's hanging onto my shoulder blade. Oh, I love it. I love it. Scraping down my flesh. It's beautiful.

Yeah, it's beautiful. Real work of art. Thank you, yes. Thank you, Dominic, for that case suggestion. I think that's deeply disturbing. scraping down my flesh it's beautiful yeah it's beautiful real work of art thank you yes thank you dominic for that case suggestion i think that's deeply disturbing yeah thanks a lot dominic yeah uh-huh i did my nice poop story granny did one on mental illness yes it's interesting because you want yeah he wouldn't have had the power that he had um and you wonder how his mental illness would have developed if he wasn't super wealthy. Yeah.

Yeah. And was it made worse by the fact that he was super wealthy? I think so. I kind of think so, too. I think it totally was. Yeah. Yeah. The thing about not being super wealthy is people don't humor you for no reason.

Well, that's exactly it. Yeah. So you, yeah. So you don't have the triggering behavior of like false affection and stuff like that, that somebody who's super wealthy like that would have. I've got some show notes if we're ready. I'm so ready. What do we got? So I wanted to talk for a minute about our April Fool's episode. Yes.

It was so much fun to do. And thank you to everyone who reached out to us. I mean, it seemed like people had fun. And for anyone who didn't listen, Brandy had this idea that we do court cases from movies. So I did Legally Blonde. You did My Cousin Vinny, which my cousin Vincent. Now I'm desperate to see that movie. And I just want to want to say this is embarrassing. And for a while I decided I was not going to say it. But then I decided, you know what, I need to come clean. So, you know, we had this April Fool's episode. I had it set out to, you know, go out

at midnight or whatever. So I woke up the next morning on April Fool's Day and I was, you know, literally I was still in bed. My mind was kind of foggy. I pull up my phone and Ron reached out to us on Twitter and he wrote, wonderful job on the latest podcast. It was like I could see the cases play out before me. Thanks for the great podcast. In that moment. You were like, oh my gosh, we have an amazing podcast.

We are amazing podcasters. You didn't get that it was a joke because we were talking about movies? Shut up, Brandi. So I forgot that we had that April Fool's thing. And I was like, wow, what a like we've never gotten a compliment like that before that like he could see the cases play out before. Man, what did we do in that episode that we can replicate? And so like an idiot, I wrote back, thank you.

And then it wasn't until later that I was like, oh, that was a joke. And then I was like, well, maybe other people will think I was joking when I said thank you. And now here I am. Yes. Spilling the beans. Pranked by my own April Fool's prank. That's right. Also, I have a correction.

I know people are pretty pissed about this, Kristen. Well, you know. People are pretty pissed about this Kristen. Well you know people are pretty pissed. I can't blame them. On the episode where we told fake stories I somehow messed up on my fake story. Jenny on Twitter said that was amazing. I do however have to point out that Elle's dog is named Bruiser not Brewster. Which I knew that. Why did I mess that up up okay when you said it

i was like i'm pretty sure that it's bruiser but i was not confident enough to correct you so i was so confident so those are my show notes um yeah i've loved the feedback we've gotten on the april fools day episode which um a couple of people were like oh this is such a funny prank you played on us putting up a fake notification about an episode no no folks it's a real episode the cases just are fake we put in the work we did the damn thing it was really fun um are you watching the act yes i've not started it yet i need to get on it because i because i hate that they're releasing it i do too so i wanted to get like a few so i can binge it because i'm not gonna i'm not gonna want to wait um i did not realize that they were putting it out like

when we did a time like cbs or something um so i watched the first two episodes and i'm like ready for the other one yeah and then it's like next you'll watch rick and morty and i was like and you're like i don't think i will i don't think so yeah i'm i'm really annoyed with them for making me wait a whole week but man the minute those episodes drop episodes drop, I drop everything. Yeah, I gotta get on it. And Norman, of course, is always like, this is the most disturbing thing I've ever seen. Why are we watching this before bed? Yeah.

And man, sorry, dude. That's the cost of being married to a true crime podcaster. It's the cost of being married to a woman who pooped in a Bed Bath & Beyond bag. I'm married to a man who ripped his pants open trying to get to a Burger King bathroom. So neither one of us should

be very judgy is what I'm saying. Glass houses and all that, right? That's right. Should we talk about our goal? We have a new goal? Yeah, we need to set a new goal. Oh shit, yeah, we should. We? We have a new goal? Yeah, we need to set a new goal. Oh, shit. Yeah, we should.

We need to set a new goal because we blew our 200 out of the water. We're already at 206. Thank you. Thank you, everyone. Yeah. All right. Next goal, 2000. Yeah, we never learn.

We always want the next goal to be massive. What do we do? 250? Yeah, 250. Is that crazy? No, I never learn. We always want the next goal to be massive. What do we do? 250? Yeah, 250. Is that crazy? No, I love it. Okay. 250 or bust.

Don't pop your chest at me, Kristen. You can't say the word bust to me. I can't handle all the chest popping. Yeah, I know. Oh, you know what happened? What? Okay. Yeah, I know.

Oh, you know what happened? What? Okay. So we made this great plan months ago that we were going to go see the Nell Donnelly musical. Yes. That was playing here in Kansas City. If you don't remember or need a refresher, Nell Donnelly was the seamstress, amazing dressmaker who had an affair with James A. Reid and was kidnapped. And he saved her.

He came to her rescue. She was this amazing, successful businesswoman. Yeah, super, super successful. So somebody made a musical about her and it was playing here in Kansas City. And we had months notice. Yep. And we waited until the last weekend and it was sold out. What the hell? What is wrong with us?

I don't know. We were so excited to see it we were so excited i saw the billboard yes i took a picture of it i even pulled it up like when when there were tickets available yes and then i like didn't bother texting you about what day do you want to do it so we didn't do it yeah i'm pretty bummed about it yeah Yeah, we're pretty lame. Super lame. So, I mean, if you guys would like to lift our spirits over missing that, you could head on over to iTunes and leave us a rating, leave us a review, help us get to that goal of 250. Yes, please. That we just set for ourselves. And then while you're at it, head on over to our social media.

We're on Facebook. We're on Instagram. We're on Twitter. We're on Reddit. We're on YouTube. Did I get them all, Kristen? You got them all. You have no idea because you've never had to say it ever. We're on Twitter. We're on Reddit. We're on YouTube. Did I get them all, Kristen? You got them all. You have no idea because you've never had to say it ever.

No, I was checking the boxes in my head. And I was thinking, I've been thinking lately, we do not plug YouTube enough. But we're getting some folks on there. Get on over to our YouTube. We've got more than 100 subscribers. More than 100 subscribers. We are huge YouTube sensations. Norman, look out.

And then, you know, be sure to join us next week. When we'll be experts on two whole new topics. Podcast adjourned. And now for a note about our process. I read a bunch of stuff, then regurgitate it all back up in my very limited vocabulary. And I copy and paste from the best sources on the web, and sometimes Wikipedia. So we owe a huge thank you to the real experts. For this episode, I got my info from articles in The Oregonian, Time Magazine, and the court case itself.

And I got my info from The New York Times, Time Magazine, Encyclopedia.com, and good old 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.