MrBallen Podcast: Strange, Dark & Mysterious Stories - Bosom Black as Death (PODCAST EXCLUSIVE EPISODE)

Episode Date: May 15, 2023

In January of 1994, two teenagers were sitting in a bedroom in Texas studying for their one of their classes. At some point, one of the teens picked up a copy of Shakespeare's play called "Hamlet," and began reading lines out loud. And at some point, the teen who was reading read aloud a particularly famous section of the play that deals with death. And at this point, the teen who was listening started rocking back and forth before finally starting to sob. The teen who was reading stopped and asked what was going on. And in between sobs, the teen who was now very emotional said that the play had reminded them of a horrible thing that they knew about, but had not told anyone about. and now, after hearing those lines from "Hamlet," the teen said they just had to get this secret off their chest. And so, they would. Months later, the secret that was uttered inside that bedroom between two teenagers would make front page news across the country.For 100s more stories like this one, check out our main YouTube channel just called "MrBallen" -- https://www.youtube.com/c/MrBallenIf you want to reach out to me, contact me on Instagram, Twitter or any other major social media platform, my username on all of them is @MrBallenSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Hey Prime members, you can binge eight new episodes of the Mr. Ballin podcast one month early and all episodes ad-free on Amazon Music. Download the Amazon Music app today. In January of 1994, two teenagers were sitting in a bedroom in Texas studying for one of their classes. At some point, one of the teens picked up a copy of Shakespeare's play called Hamlet and began reading lines out loud. play called Hamlet and began reading lines out loud. And at some point, the teen who was reading read aloud a particularly famous section of the play that deals with death. And at this point, the teen who was listening started rocking back and forth before finally just starting to sob. The teen who was reading stopped and asked what was going on, and in between sobs, the teen who was now very emotional,

said that the play had reminded them of a horrible thing that they knew about, but had not told anyone about. And now, after hearing those lines from Hamlet, the teen said they just had to get this secret off their chest, and so they would. Months later, the secret that was uttered inside that bedroom between these two teenagers would make front-page news across the country. But before we get into that story, if you're a fan of the strange, dark, and mysterious Delivered in Story format, then you've come to the right podcast because that's all we do and we upload twice a week, once on Monday and once on Thursday. So, if that's of interest to you, please offer to install a sliding door lock on the Amazon Music Follow Buttons bathroom door, but install it so that the latch doesn't quite reach the other side. Okay, let's get into today's story. Hello, I'm Emily and I'm one of the hosts of Terribly Famous, the show that takes you inside the lives of our biggest celebrities.

And they don't get much bigger than the man who made badminton sexy. OK, maybe that's a stretch stretch but if i say pop star and shuttlecocks you know who i'm talking about no short shorts free cocktails careless whispers okay last one it's not andrew ridgely yep that's right it's stone cold icon george michael from teen pop sensation to one of the biggest solo artists on the planet, join us for our new series, George Michael's Fight for Freedom. From the outside, it looks like he has it all. But behind the trademark dark sunglasses is a man in turmoil. George is trapped in a lie of his own making,

with a secret he feels would ruin him if the truth ever came out. Follow Terribly Famous wherever you listen to your podcasts or listen early and ad-free on Wondery Plus on Apple Podcasts or the Wondery app. I'm Peter Frank-O'Pern. And I'm Afua Hirsch. And we're here to tell you about our new season of Legacy, covering the iconic, troubled musical genius

that was Nina Simone. Full disclosure, this is a big one for me. Nina Simone, one of my favourite artists of all time, somebody who's had a huge impact on me, who I think objectively stands apart for the level of her talent, the audacity of her message. If I was a first year at university, the first time I sat down and really listened to her and engaged with her message. If I was a first year at university the first time I sat down and really

listened to her and engaged with her message it totally floored me and the truth and pain and messiness of her struggle that's all captured in unforgettable music that has stood the test of time. I think that's fair Peter. I mean the way in which her music comes across is so powerful no matter what song it is. So join us on Legacy for Nina Simone. On a December night in 1992, in a little apartment in a tiny Texas town called Mansfield, a 16-year-old girl named Marie Robards sat down at the dinner table. After taking her seat, Marie looked across the table and almost

started laughing at her father, Stephen. Stephen, who was 38 years old and delivered mail for a living, was 6 foot 4 inches tall with long legs and long arms, and so him trying to sit at their little kitchen table made him look like a giant trying to sit at a kid's table. Stephen saw Marie smiling at him, and he smiled back, and then the two of them sniffed the air and exchanged excited looks. Stephen barely ever cooked, so he and Marie rarely sat down at the dinner table to eat together, but tonight was going to be different. Recently, Stephen had started dating a new woman who lived in the same apartment complex as he and Marie. Her name was Sandra Hudgens,

and she loved to cook, and tonight that was what she was doing. And her Mexican feast she was preparing was filling the apartment with delicious smells. As Sandra stood over the stove seasoning tacos, rice, and refried beans, Marie began telling her father about her day at school. She said all of her classes were interesting and going well, but chemistry was her favorite class. In fact, she said she loved science in general so much that she had started thinking about going into a pre-med program when she went to college in a couple of years so she could become a doctor.

Stephen knew Marie could become a doctor if she wanted to, or really anything else she set her mind to. His daughter was intelligent, beautiful, charismatic, and a highly disciplined student. So much so that on the weekends, Marie often stayed in and just did schoolwork while most of her friends and peers were out and having fun and partying. And while this certainly made Stephen very proud of his daughter that she was so studious, secretly Stephen sometimes wished that Marie would step away from her schoolwork even for a day and just go out and be a teenager and have some fun. And lately, given what Marie was going through with her mother and Stephen's ex-wife, this secret wish of his was all Stephen thought about when he looked at his daughter. Up until just a few months earlier, Marie had been living with her mother, Beth,

and her stepfather, Frank, in a nearby town. Marie and her mom had always been incredibly close. Marie often said her mom was her best friend. But Marie's stepfather was a police officer who took discipline and rules very seriously, and so he was quite strict with Marie, which often caused the two of them to argue and created a lot of tension in their household. And their living situation got infinitely worse when Marie walked in on Frank in bed with another woman. Marie already did not like Frank, but now she hated him.

However, when she went to her mom and told her what she had discovered about Frank, her mom, who was crushed by the news no doubt, still said she would not be leaving Frank. This caused a huge fight between Marie and her mom, which ended with Marie moving out of the house and into her father's apartment. Stephen was overjoyed to have his daughter living with him, but at the same time, he knew this was not really a happy arrangement. Ultimately, he knew his daughter just really felt hurt by her mother and longed for things to go back to the way they were

when she and her mom were just best friends. In the kitchen, Sandra announced that dinner was ready and she turned away from the stove and began walking over to the dinner table, her hands full of serving dishes. And right as Marie got up to help Sandra put the food on the table, the landline telephone rang in the living room. They all looked at each other to see who was going to go pick it up and Marie said she would and that she would tell whoever was calling that they were in the middle of dinner and they should just call back. But a few moments later, when Stephen and Sandra heard Marie answer the phone in the other room, they heard Marie start yelling at whoever was calling. And after

a few moments, even though they couldn't quite tell what Marie and this other person were actually yelling about, it became clear that the other person that she was talking to had to be her mother. Eventually, Marie slammed the phone down and stormed back into the kitchen, her face bright red and her hands shaking. Stephen asked her if she was okay and you know what's wrong, but Marie just took a deep breath and suddenly a calm look came over her face and she just said, I don't want to talk about it. And after a quick glance at other stephen and sandra simply nodded and then before long the trio was back to chatting about marie's school work and her college aspirations but as much as marie wished that big yelling fight she got into with her mother could just fade out of everyone's mind it couldn't because over the next couple of months

marie and her mother would get into more and more of these types of yelling fights on the phone. And Stephen and Sandra, who often overheard these fights, would always ask Marie afterward what was wrong and was everything okay. But Marie would just continue to ask for privacy and demand they not talk about it. And for the most part, Stephen and Sandra did just that. They rarely pried, and instead just kept an eye on Marie, hoping that someday soon, the fighting with her mother would just stop. And by the middle of February of 1993, so two months after that first yelling fight Marie got into with her mom, it seemed like that was exactly what had happened, because the

angry phone calls stopped, and Marie seemed happier and somewhat back to normal. But beneath the surface, something else entirely was going on. On the night of February 18th, so right around the time that the yelling phone fights stopped between Marie and her mom, Marie was home alone at the apartment, sitting on the couch reading from one of her science textbooks. Her father, Stephen, home alone at the apartment, sitting on the couch reading from one of her science textbooks. Her father, Stephen, was out at church, and Stephen's girlfriend, Sandra, was at her own apartment nearby. As Marie flipped through the pages, she heard something bang against the front door. She wasn't sure if someone had knocked, or if maybe someone had accidentally hit

the outside of their door, and so Marie just sat there for a second, staring the door wondering if the knocking sound would start again, and after a few seconds she heard it again. Marie glanced at her watch and saw that her father had only left about 45 minutes earlier, and normally he would stay at church for hours at a time, so this likely was not him, and Sandra was not scheduled to come by that night, so it likely was not her either. Marie waited a moment, and when she heard yet another bang, she called out to see who was there, but no one answered. After a few more moments of silence, Marie stood up and began walking over to the door, but before she could get there, the front door suddenly flew open, and her father stumbled inside, and he looked absolutely terrible.

His face was pale and even though it was cold outside, there was sweat dripping down his forehead and his dress shirt was also drenched in sweat. Marie frantically began asking her dad what was wrong, what was going on. But all Stephen could get out was that he needed to lay down. So Marie rushed over and helped her enormous father stumble across the room until he kind of collapsed on the couch. And then once he was lying down, Marie, who was really starting to panic, told her father she was going to get Sandra and she'd be right back. And so a moment later, Marie had run out the front door into the cold night air and she charged across the parking lot over to the row of apartments where Sandra lived. And then once she found Sandra's door, she began pounding on it.

of apartments where Sandra lived, and then once she found Sandra's door, she began pounding on it. When Sandra flung the door open, wondering what was going on, Marie quickly explained that her father was very sick and they needed to do something, and so without asking any more questions, Sandra just ran with Marie back to the apartment. When they got there, they found Stephen still lying on the couch, but he was borderline unresponsive and looking much more pale than when Marie had left him. Sandra had no idea what was going on, but she knew whatever this was, it was bad. And so she rushed into the living room, she picked up the phone and she dialed 911.

The paramedics would arrive just a few minutes later, but it was already too late. Stephen had died. Shortly after his death, the coroner would conduct an autopsy and conclude that Stephen had died from a heart attack. After her father's death, Marie, who was totally crushed, moved back in with her mother, Beth, and her stepfather, Frank. Even though Marie and her mother had stopped fighting, their relationship was by no means fixed, and Marie still hated Frank. But,

Beth promised Marie that things would be different this time around, and true to her word, Beth made a real effort to spend as much time as she could with Marie, just like the old days. And for a time, despite the tragic loss of her father, Marie was basically happy. But, in the summer of 1993, a few months after Stephen died, Marie discovered a note that another woman had written to Frank and based on that note, it was obvious to Marie that Frank was still cheating on her mother. But again, when Marie brought this note to her mother and pleaded with her to leave Frank and for them to just go live by themselves somewhere else, Marie's mother refused and said she would not be leaving Frank no matter what. And when she said

that, Marie felt like her mother had turned her back on her and was choosing Frank over her own daughter. As such, Marie decided that she could not bear to live with either of them anymore. So in June, just four months after Marie had moved back in with her mom, Marie moved out again, this time to live with her grandfather, who lived in Mansfield, the same town where Stephen's apartment had been. Right away, Marie felt totally relieved to be away from all the drama surrounding her mother and Frank. And not long after moving in with her grandfather, Marie's senior year of high school began, and quickly, Marie was fully immersed in her schoolwork and spending almost no time worrying about all the issues in her family. Marie also began going out and seeing friends on the weekends,

just like her father had always secretly hoped she would. But as happy and normal as Marie seemed, beneath the surface, this was not true. Because Marie had a secret. A secret that she was now starting to struggle to contain. scandal. On our latest series, The Race to Ruin, we tell the story of a British man who took part in the first ever round the world sailing race. Good on him, I hear you say. But there is a problem, as there always is in this show. The man in question hadn't actually sailed before. Oh, and his boat wasn't seaworthy. Oh, and also tiny little detail, almost didn't mention it. He bet his family home on making it to the finish line. What ensued was one of the most complex cheating plots in British sporting history. To find out the full story, follow British Scandal wherever you listen to podcasts,

or listen early and ad-free on Wondery Plus on Apple Podcasts or the Wondery app. If you're listening to this podcast, then chances are good you are a fan of The Strange, Dark, and Mysterious. And if that's the case, then I've got some good news. We just launched a brand new Strange, Dark, and Mysterious podcast called Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries. And as the name suggests, it's a show about medical mysteries, a genre that many fans have been asking us to dive into for years. And we finally decided to take the plunge, and the show is awesome. In this free weekly show, we explore bizarre unheard of diseases, strange medical mishaps, unexplainable deaths, and everything in between. Each story is totally true and totally terrifying. Go follow Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries wherever you get your podcasts, and if you're a Prime member, you can listen early and ad-free on Amazon Music.

One afternoon in January of 1994, almost a year after Stephen's death and six months after Marie had moved in with her grandfather, Marie and one of her friends went back to Marie's grandfather's house to study after school. The two girls walked into Marie's bedroom, took off their winter coats, tossed their backpacks on the floor, and then after talking for a few minutes about school and what they wanted to do that weekend, they both decided it was time to actually start studying. And so Marie and her friend both sat down on the floor, they unzipped their backpacks and took out their copies of Hamlet that they were reading for their English class.

Hamlet is a very famous play by William Shakespeare that tells the story of a Danish prince whose father, the king, has died. Marie and her friend discussed the plot and the characters of Hamlet, and then Marie's friend said she wanted to read out loud one of her favorite parts of the play. So she flipped through her book and found the section she was looking for, and then Marie's friend held her book

up in front of her face, cleared her throat, and started reading that section out loud. Marie's friend read a part of a very intense scene where one of the characters reveals a secret he's kept throughout the play. Oh wretched state, oh bosom black as death, the character cries out to make it clear how upset he is about this secret. Marie listened to her friend read this part, and all of a sudden, she began feeling this pit in her stomach forming. Marie's hands started to tremble,

she felt a lump growing in her throat, and then she just started sobbing. Her friend who was reading was stunned and she stopped reading mid-sentence and asked Marie what was wrong. Marie struggled to catch her breath, then she wiped the tears from her eyes and she looked up and through a cracking voice, she told her friend that like the character in the play, she too had a secret that she had never told anyone, but now she had to get it off her chest. Marie's friend was stunned at this revelation,

but quickly told Marie that she could trust her and that whatever this secret was, she was sure Marie would be okay, that they could figure out what to do together. But when Marie actually began telling the friend what this secret was, the friend's face went pale and her mouth opened in horror. Marie's secret, which had to do with her deceased father, was way bigger than the friend had anticipated. And if this was true, and the friend told anyone about it, it would make headlines around the country. Based on this wild secret story that Marie would tell her friend, and on later interviews conducted with Marie and Stephen's friends and family, here is a reconstruction of what happened the night Stephen Robards

died in his apartment on February 18th, 1993. February 18th, 1993. On February 18th, about an hour before Stephen left for church, a delivery person arrived at Stephen and Marie's apartment with the takeout Mexican food Stephen had ordered for dinner. After paying the delivery person, Stephen put the containers of food on the kitchen counter so Marie could begin eating, while Stephen stepped into the other room to get dressed for church. When he came back out again, he wolfed down a plate of food, gave Marie a kiss and said goodbye, and then headed out the door for the night. Once outside, Stephen got into his car and made the short drive to the church he attended in his neighborhood. He was in a great mood because he always looked forward to weeknight services. There was usually a smaller crowd than on Sundays,

so it was easier for him to talk to friends and share in the community experience the church had to offer. When Stephen finally arrived at the church, he stepped out of his car and began walking towards the entrance. Even though it was a cold winter night for North Texas with temperatures lower than 40 degrees Fahrenheit,

Stephen felt warm and sweat was starting to bead on his forehead. But he just wiped the sweat away and didn't think too much about it. Stephen walked inside the church, took off his coat, and began chatting with other members of the congregation who were standing near the front door greeting new arrivals. A few moments later, Stephen had left the front entryway and made his way to a seat in one of the church's long wooden pews. Shortly after that, as the minister took his place in front of the congregation and got ready to begin the service, Stephen's vision began to blur. He felt sweat dripping down his forehead again and now he was having a hard time focusing,

like he was overtired or something. But Stephen just continued to wipe the sweat away and told himself everything was fine. But just a few moments later, he began to feel a sharp pain in his stomach. Stephen winced and grabbed at his midsection and bent over in the pew. The people sitting next to him looked worried and asked if Stephen needed any help. He told them he was okay through gritted teeth, but as he did, he started to feel nauseous, and so quickly he stood up, apologized to the people sitting next to him, and he hustled out of the row and out of the church as fast as he could. Once outside, Stephen felt the cold air hit his skin, but he was still burning up and sweating profusely. The pain in his stomach was getting worse too, but he managed to not throw

up and got into his car, turned it on, and began driving out of the lot back towards home. By the time Stephen pulled into a parking spot in front of his apartment, the pain in his stomach had gotten exponentially worse, and now, on top of everything else, he was struggling to breathe. He managed to get his car door open, and he groaned in pain as he stumbled to the front door of his apartment. His hands were shaking as he raised his keys up to the lock and tried to unlock the door, but he couldn't get the keys to fit in and he sort of fell forward and slammed against the outside of the door. This was the first loud thumping sound that his daughter would hear inside

as she studied her science textbook. Stephen took a breath and then managed to get the keys into the lock and open the door, stumbling inside practically onto Marie. Marie helped him lay down on the couch and then she ran off to get Sandra. Meanwhile, Stephen's throat began tightening up like he was being choked. And while Stephen lay alone on the couch waiting for Marie and Sandra to return, he began to convulse and foam at the mouth. And when Sandra and Marie did return to the apartment, Stephen was no longer responsive, and a few minutes later when paramedics arrived, it was obvious to everyone in the room that Stephen was just getting worse. And so, Sandra, sensing this, grabbed Marie and pressed her face into her chest so Marie would not have to see her father die.

Stephen then made one final gasping sound, and then he would die. As Sandra began to cry, Marie pulled herself away from her and just stood there motionless staring over at her now deceased father. Even though Marie's outward expression showed shock and horror and sadness, inside, Marie felt differently. She was pleased. The night had gone exactly to plan. After Stephen had put that takeout food on the kitchen counter and then stepped into the other room, Marie had rushed over to the kitchen, pulled out a folded up paper towel from her pocket that contained an odorless, tasteless white powder inside of it, and then Marie quickly sprinkled that powder into the refried beans, something she knew her father would be eating. She stirred it up so he wouldn't notice,

and then she grabbed a few untainted tacos for herself, rushed back to the couch, and waited in the other room. When her dad came out a few minutes later, she watched with joy as her dad did exactly what she hoped. He began eating huge quantities of the refried beans. Afterward, he grabbed his jacket, gave Marie a kiss, and headed out the door for church, not realizing he was already a dead man. Marie had poisoned her father, but it would turn out the reason she did it really had nothing to do with Stephen. Instead, it had to do with her mother and her very strict stepfather, Frank. Frank believed it was very important that Marie, whose parents were obviously divorced,

pick which biological parent, Beth or Stephen, she wanted to live with. And once that decision was made, he told her it was final. Frank did not want Marie to feel like she could bounce back and forth from one household to the other. She basically needed to commit to one family or the other and that was it. And Frank told Marie, who was living with Frank and Beth and so her de facto decision had been to live with them that if Marie ever moved out to go live with Stephen then Marie would never be welcome back to live with Beth and Frank and after Marie caught Frank cheating on her mother and her mother refused to leave Frank Marie moved out of the house and in with stephen but shortly after moving in with

stephen marie had a change of heart and missed her mother terribly and wanted to move back in with her and with frank but because of frank's rule frank said no marie had been furious and tried to persuade her mother to change frank's mind and let her come back home and live with them, but her mother continued to stand by Frank and just said, no, you need to stay with your father now. And so this led to all of those yelling fights Marie got into with her mother on the phone that Stephen and Sandra kept overhearing. Marie was absolutely furious and heartbroken and eventually felt so desperate to find a way to go live with her mom again, that she decided the only way was to kill her father, because then her mother and Frank would

have to take her back. And so, on February 18th, 1993, Marie poisoned her father's refried beans with a chemical called barium acetate, which is toxic to humans. Marie had stolen the chemical from her chemistry classroom. The reason the coroner had not noticed that Stephen had been poisoned is because in order to detect barium acetate you basically need to run a special test at a special facility and the coroner had not thought there was any evidence of foul play, so he had not asked for that test to be run. Marie had gotten away with murder. But nearly a year later, while studying Hamlet, Marie's friend happened to read the part of the play out loud where Hamlet's uncle admits to killing Hamlet's father.

And in that moment in the play, Hamlet's uncle realizes he'll never be forgiven because no matter what he does, he will always be a murderer. And when Marie heard those words, oh wretched state, oh bosom black as death, she felt a crushing sense of guilt wash over her and she promptly confessed to her friend what she had done to her father. Marie's friend kept Marie's secret for several months, and during that time, Marie did get to move back in with her mother, until of course she moved out again

after catching Frank cheating again and she moved in with her grandfather, and then shortly after that, Marie's friend did go to police, at which point Marie was arrested. Marie was ultimately found guilty of murder and sentenced to 28 years in prison. However, in 2003, she was granted parole and is believed to still be living in Texas today under a different last name. Thank you for listening to the Mr. Ballin podcast.

If you enjoyed today's story, be sure to check out our YouTube channel, just called Mr. Ballin, where we have hundreds more stories just like this one, many of which are not available on this podcast. They're only on the YouTube channel. So that's going to do it. I really appreciate your support.

Until next time, see ya. Hey, Prime members. You can binge eight new episodes of the Mr. Ballin podcast one month early and all episodes ad-free on Amazon Music. Download the Amazon Music app today. And before you go, please tell us about yourself by completing a short survey at wondery.com slash survey. In May of 1980, near Anaheim, California, Dorothy Jane Scott noticed her friend had an inflamed red wound on his arm and he seemed really unwell. So she wound up taking him to the hospital right away so he could get treatment. While Dorothy's friend waited for his prescription, Dorothy went to grab her car to pick him up at the exit. But she would never be seen alive again, leaving us to wonder,

decades later, what really happened to Dorothy Jane Scott? From Wondery, Generation Y is a podcast that covers notable true crime cases like this one and so many more. Every week, hosts Aaron and Justin sit down to discuss a new case covering every angle and theory, walking through the forensic evidence, and interviewing those close to the case to try and discover what really happened. And with over 450 episodes, there's a case for every true crime listener. Follow the Generation Y podcast on Amazon Music or wherever you get your podcasts.