Murder: True Crime Stories - SOLVED: The Murder of Sister Margaret Ann Pahl 1

Episode Date: March 10, 2026

Sister Margaret Ann Pahl had devoted her life to faith, service, and the Catholic Church. A hospital chaplain in Toledo, Ohio, she spent her days comforting the sick and ministering to those in need. In Part 1, Murder: True Crime Stories traces Sister Margaret’s life from her early calling to the Sisters of Mercy to her years at Mercy Hospital. Known for her discipline and deep commitment to her vocation, she was respected by many and quietly at odds with others inside the institution she served. On Holy Saturday in 1980, Sister Margaret was found brutally stabbed and strangled inside the hospital chapel, her body positioned in a way that stunned even seasoned investigators. As rumors spread and early suspects emerged, her killing sent shockwaves through the Catholic community and left investigators facing a crime that felt both deeply personal and profoundly unsettling. If you’re new here, don’t forget to follow Murder True Crime Stories to never miss a case! For Ad-free listening and early access to episodes, subscribe to Crime House+ on Apple Podcasts. Murder True Crime Stories is a Crime House Original Podcast, powered by PAVE Studios 🎧 Need More to Binge?  Listen to other Crime House Originals Clues, Crimes Of…, Serial Killers & Murderous Minds, Crime House 24/7, and more wherever you get your podcasts! Follow me on Social Instagram: @Crimehouse TikTok: @Crimehouse Facebook: @crimehousestudios YouTube: @murdertruecrimestories To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it's Carter. If you're enjoying murder, true crime stories, there's a new crime house show for you to check out. It's called The Final Hours hosted by Sarah Turney and Courtney Nicole. Sarah is an advocate for missing and murdered victims whose own sister disappeared in 2001. And Courtney is a true crime storyteller who has seen firsthand how crime can change a family forever. Together, they bring lived experience to every case, examining the moment. moments just before a person disappears, the routines, the timelines, the small details that often get overlooked, because every disappearance has a moment where everything still feels normal until it doesn't. Listen to and follow the final hours on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon music, or wherever you get your podcasts. New episodes drop every Monday. This is Crime House. Mark Twain

once said, never discuss politics or religion in polite company. It's a lesson we've all been taught at one point or another. In school, we're told the two subjects should be kept separate. At home, we're advised not to argue with strangers about either topic, but in practice, the line isn't so clear, especially if a crime takes place that involves both issues. In 1980, officials in Toledo, Ohio were faced with this very dilemma. That year, a 71-year-old nun named Margaret Ann Paul was killed in a hospital chapel. Her death rocked the Toledo community. Margaret was beaten, violated, and posed in what looked like some kind of satanic ritual.

The police could make heads or tales of the scene, but eventually they landed on a strong suspect. If the police were on the right track, it meant this person wasn't just a killer. They were a wolf in sheep's clothing, and they deceived one of the most powerful organizations in the world. People's lives are like a story. There's a beginning, a middle, and an end. But you don't always know which part you're on. Sometimes the final chapter arrives far too soon, and we don't always get to know the real ending. I'm Carter Roy, and this is Murder True Crime Stories, the Crime House original powered by Pave Studios.

New episodes come out every Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday, with Friday's episodes covering the cases that deserve a deeper look. Thank you for being part of the Crime House community. Please rate, review, and follow the show. And for early, add-free access to every episode, subscribe to Crimehouse Plus on Apple Podcasts. This is the first of two episodes on the 1980 murder of 71-year-old sister Margaret and Paul. Please note this episode contains descriptions of sexual violence.

Please listen with care. Today, I'll tell you how Margaret found her passion through the Catholic Church and her work at Mercy Hospital in Toledo, Ohio. For decades, she served the public as a nurse an administrator and a spiritual advisor. Then one day before Easter, someone targeted her in the worst way possible and turned a sacred space into a crime scene.

Next time, I'll follow the controversial investigation and explain why the case eventually went cold. It would take another two decades for the truth to come out. And when it did, it put the Catholic Church under a microscope that shook it to its core. All that and more coming up. Margaret and Paul always knew she had a higher calling. She was born over a century ago in 1908 on a wheat farm.

Looking back now, she practically grew up in a different world. Every weekday morning, she traveled to a one-room schoolhouse in the nearby village of Edgerton, Ohio. but before class started, she had to milk the cows and chop logs for her family's wood-burning stove. In the fall, she and her eight siblings spent their afternoons shucking grain after the harvest. It was hard work, but Margaret rarely complained. Her parents remembered her as a quiet, intelligent, and humble girl. The thing she looked forward to most was going to church every Sunday. Some of her relatives were priests and nuns, and Margaret was inspired by their devotion.

As far back as elementary school, she knew she wanted to join a convent and serve God. She put her dream into motion on September 24, 1927, when she was 19 years old. That day, Margaret arrived at the Sisters of Mercy Convent in Fremont, Ohio. It was a Catholic order whose mission was to help poor folks all over the world. And for the next five years, Margaret spent all her time at the sanctuary, praying, training, and preparing herself for a tough but rewarding life of service. In 1932, 24-year-old Margaret took her final vows. She promised to be obedient, chaste, and most importantly, to serve the...

the poor, sick, and uneducated. One way the Sisters of Mercy lived up to that pledge was to help run schools and hospitals. Not long after taking her vows, Margaret began training as a student nurse. It only took a few years for her to vault up the ladder at every hospital she was assigned to. In many ways, Margaret was a model nun, the epitome of an old-school uncompromising Catholic. In public, she was stern and blunt, but always reliable. She spent nearly every waking hour doing her work and serving God. The closest thing she had to a hobby was listening to opera music.

The booming instruments and voices moved her almost as much as the gospel. And she took it just as seriously, too. Once Margaret played a piece of opera on the stereo and asked a new or none, Sister Shirley Lucas if she liked it. When Sister Shirley said, she loved Elvis's rendition of how great thou art, Margaret's lip curled.

She told Shirley that good Catholics should never listen to rock and roll. Elvis was far too provocative. By 1959, Sister Margaret was 51 and had spent over half her life caring for the sick. During that time,

she bounced around different hospitals in her home state, working as a head nurse, a hospital supervisor, and a senior administrator. Margaret was undeniably good at her job and kept at it for as long as she could. It wasn't until 1971 at age 63 that she was finally ready for a little less responsibility. Even then, she didn't stop working entirely. Instead, she took up a post at Mercy Hospital in Toledo, Ohio. There, she took care of the hospital's chapel, cleaning it and getting it ready for the daily 6am Mass.

She and the rest of the nuns stayed on the top floor of the main building, living, working, and worshipping in one place. Every morning, Margaret woke up at dawn to prepare the candles, holy water, and communion wafers for the day. Even after she started to slow down and lose her hearing, in her late 60s, she made sure to keep the place spotless. The schedule was demanding, but it took the kind of quiet devotion sister Margaret lived for.

This was how she helped people. This was how she answered the calling she'd heard as a little girl all those years ago. Besides her, there were several other nuns who worked at the hospital, and while Margaret was always pleasant and happy to make brief small talk, She never became close with any of them. Margaret was a solitary person, and that was how she liked it. But because her job involved preparing for services every morning, she did get to know the chapel priests better than anyone else.

There were two who worked at mercy, Father Jerome Chafio Antecki and Father Gerald Robinson. Of the two, Father Shifionintechi was the easiest to talk to. a large, cheerful man with a booming voice, he had a way of taking people's minds off their troubles. Meanwhile, 42-year-old Father Robinson couldn't have been more different. He was small, distant, and practically as quiet as Sister Margaret. And though she and Father Robinson were pretty similar, they didn't get along very well. Everyone in the hospital knew he found her blunt honesty and perfectionism irritating.

Still, they didn't have any kind of ongoing feud. In public, Sister Margaret more or less got along with both priests, and no one, not even Father Robinson, could fault her work ethic. Even at 71 years old, she was a valued member of the staff. That said, Sister Margaret and Joel, a break now and then. And on April 5th, 1980, her alarm rang a little later than usual. It was the day before Easter, one of the rare occasions the Hospital Chapel didn't hold

a morning mass, just an afternoon one. Margaret took full advantage of the freedom to sleep a whole extra half hour, waking at 5.30 a.m. Still, she didn't spend too long in bed. By 6 a.m., she was dressed in her uniform, a white blouse under a dark blue habit with a black veil over her head. Then she made her way from her fifth floor apartment down to the cafeteria for her usual breakfast, a grapefruit, some raisin bran, and a steaming cup of coffee. By 6.45, she was in the chapel on the second floor, getting started on her preparations.

She threw the drapes behind the altar open and started to arrange the candles for afternoon Mass. At around 8.15 a.m., another nun, Sister Madeline Marie, noticed the door to the sacristy was locked. And she thought that was strange. And the sacristy was right next to the chapel. It held the priest's robes, sacred books, and the supplies for Holy Communion that Sister Margaret should have needed to finish her chores. Usually, she would have left the door open while she was setting everything up. Madeline was confused, but since she needed to go inside, she decided to open the door herself. She slid a key from the ring in her pocket and turned it in the old metal lock. When she stepped inside, Madeline immediately noticed someone lying on the floor.

Because the lights were so dim, she thought it was a CP on. bar dummy. The hospital had been holding training classes recently. But when she got closer, she realized the truth. Madeline screamed as loud as she could and raced out to the chapel. As she burst through the door, she nearly collided with another elderly sister who ushered her to a seat and asked her what had happened. Madeline couldn't speak for a moment. All she could do was point at the sacristy door with a horrified look, struggling to find the right words. When she finally calmed down enough to speak, she wiped the tears from her eyes and said that Margaret had been sexually assaulted. The other sister jumped to her feet and ran to the sacristy.

Madeline was right. Sister Margaret lay on the floor flat on her back. Her dress had been yanked up to her chest while her girdle and underwear were around one of her ankles. And that wasn't all. Her face had been beaten so badly she was hardly recognizable. A halo of dark blood bloomed behind her head. But the worst part was her stomach. She had nine clear stab wounds in her. abdomen. Together, those nine small dots form the sign of an upside down cross. As the nun

struggled to process what she was seeing, Sister Madeline continued to scream in the other room. The noise drew several other employees to the chapel who immediately called for medical attention. It didn't take long for ER doctors to race down to the sacristy, but as soon as they arrived, they could tell they were too late. Although the blood around Margaret's head hadn't dried yet, she was already dead. Hospital staff quickly called the police who dispatched Toledo Sergeant Arthur Marks and a trio of other detectives to the scene. Initially, all they knew was that a nun was dead. They figured one of the old women had a heart attack or a stroke. But when they walked into the sacristy, they realized this was no natural death. Even veteran officers

were horrified by the brutal scene. Anyone who saw an elderly woman in Margaret's state would have been upset. But many of the first responders were also Catholic. Seeing a nun treated that way made them sick. Then and there the detectives vowed to to do whatever it took to track down the killer. But in the days to come, their faith and their duty would be put to the ultimate test. On April 5th, 1980, 71-year-old sister Margaret Ann Paul

was murdered in the Sacresty of Mercy Hospital in Toledo, Ohio. The scene looked like something out of a horror movie. not only had Margaret apparently been sexually assaulted, but the killer had also carved an inverted cross into her stomach. Local police placed a Catholic officer, Sergeant Arthur Marks, in charge of the case. The first thing Marx did was order his detectives to interview every hospital employee they could find. He hoped one of them had seen or heard something. In the meantime, Marx looked for clues near Margaret's,

body. At first glance, nothing really looked out of place. A few items like the phone were on the floor, but Marks figured Sister Margaret had moved them out of the way while she was cleaning. There were no obvious signs of struggle either. Next, he checked the exits, the altar, and the cleaning supplies for fingerprints or stray hairs. Of course, finding evidence was top of mind, but Marx was also fixated on the motive. The ritual aspect of the murder, especially the upside down cross, disturbed him. It was all so over the top. In Marx's opinion, this suggested the killer really hated Sister Margaret. They didn't just plan to kill her. They wanted to humiliate her, too. With that in mind, the first thing detectives asked while interviewing Margaret's co-workers was

whether she had any enemies. But the people they spoke to couldn't think of anyone who had it out for her. And while she wasn't the most social person, she wasn't hated by any means. That forced detectives to consider a different angle. They asked the other nuns if anything had been stolen from the sacristy, and the police thought maybe this was a bizarre robbery gone wrong. The sisters didn't think anything invaluable was missing, even Margaret's purse was still where she'd left it, completely untouched by the killer. And the only thing they couldn't find was a pair of scissors that they used to snip the candle wicks before mass. Detectives latched onto that, theorizing the scissors could have been the murder weapon. But even then, it didn't seem like theft was the killer's

motive. With that possibility eliminated, the cops moved on to a third angle. They wondered if the killer had been going through some sort of psychotic break. After all, the crime did happen in a hospital. It was possible that a mentally ill patient or someone on drugs may have escaped from their room then ridden the elevator down to the chapel on the second floor. From there, they could have killed Margaret in the midst of a manic episode. The problem was, none of the witnesses reported anything out of the ordinary in the hours before the murder. They certainly hadn't noticed anyone who seemed dangerous.

An ambulance driver named Jerry Tressler seemed to be the last person who saw Margaret alive. He came across her in the hallway outside of the chapel just before 7 a.m. and said good morning. One of the security guards, along with an EKG technician, passed by soon after, and noticed the doors were open as usual. Only a physician named Jack Barron reported anything suspicious. He was one of the people who rushed to the sacristy after the nuns found Margaret's body and called for help. He told one of the detectives, Officer Dan Foster, that he saw something awed when he approached the sacristy. One of the priests, Father Robinson, was walking away from the chapel. When Dr. Barron passed him, Robinson gave a stare that went right through him.

Something about Robinson's expression unnerved the doctor enough to report it. But Detective Foster didn't seem very interested. He didn't even make a note of it on his pad, but Dr. Barron was persistent. He demanded that Foster write down what he said. Instead, the detective changed the subject and moved on to other questions. From Foster's perspective, Dr. Barron's comments might have seemed insignificant. Ultimately, his suspicions boiled down to gut feeling. But without his statement, the police did.

didn't turn up a single solid suspect during their initial round of interviews. And while that didn't eliminate the possibility that Margaret was killed by someone she knew, it did leave Marx and his detectives back at square one. All they could do at that point was look into every single person who'd been at the hospital that day. Administrators provided them with a full list of employees. This included the priests and nuns who lived there, along with a group of 32 nursing students who stayed in dorms on the fifth floor. Many employees had gone home for the Easter holiday, but that still left plenty of people to look into.

And the hospital couldn't share a ton of information about the patients, but by speaking to witnesses, detectives got a few potential leads there too. It looked like Marks and the others had their work cut out for them. A few hours after the investigation began, Marx called the station to speak to his superior, the deputy chief of police, Ray Vedder. Vetter was a staunch Catholic who was very open about his faith. So it made sense that he took a strong interest in the case,

so strong that he ordered Marx to route all documents related to the murder through him. Usually detectives made three identical copies of their reports. courts, which were then shared with the deputy chief, the officer who wrote them, and the department they worked for. But this time, Vedder wanted all three copies for himself. When Marks asked why, he refused to answer. It was an odd request, but one Marx couldn't refuse, Vetter was his boss. So from then on, everything went through him. That said, after the first day of investigation, there wasn't much to pass along. Though detectives had interviewed dozens of people, they weren't any closer to nabbing Sister Margaret's killer.

They did manage to pull a few prints and scattered hairs from the sacristy, but they would have to wait for forensic experts to analyze them before drawing any conclusions. So for the time being, authorities hoped Sister Margaret's autopsy would point them in the right direction. Deputy coroner Renata Fizakas was the one who examined Sister Margaret's body. She found that Margaret had died by asphyxiation and believed the nun was probably strangled before the killer stabbed her. The chest wounds were clearly made by a sharp instrument at least three inches long. Dr. Fizakis could also tell the weapon had a four-sided blade, possibly something shaped like a diamond or a kite. In her opinion, the missing scissors could have been responsible for the chest wounds.

Margaret also had puncture marks on her face, though, and those must have been made by something sharper. Dr. Fizakis didn't find any evidence that Sister Margaret was sexually assaulted in the usual sense. However, there were signs of damage to her genitals. This indicated that the killer had violated her with a sharp object, possibly one of the two weapons. Those findings, combined with the deliberate way her body was posed, suggested some kind of ritual. killing. It was incredibly disturbing. And while the police did their best to keep the sordid details under wraps, there was only so much they could do. A few days after the crime, Margaret's case had already become a local media sensation. A nun had been murdered in what

looked like a satanic ritual on the day before Easter. The story was bound to grab headlines. That wasn't ideal for detectives working the case, but they tried to use the publicity to their advantage. Soon after Margaret's death, local officials partnered with the hospital to offer a $24,000 reward for any information leading to an arrest. That's almost $95,000 in today's money. With that much cash up for grabs, the department expected to be flooded with tips. but they didn't get as many as they hoped. And the ones they did receive weren't very helpful. And one man wrote a letter accusing his former lover of the crime,

calling him a devil worshiper. He turned out to be nothing more than a bitter ex. Another person called to implicate their boss. And once again, it was a way to get back at them for a personal dispute. Then there was a local psychic who told officers she was having vivid dreams about the murderer. She provided them with a detailed description of the potential killer, but when a detective interviewed her,

you realize she was full of hot air. There was really only one lead the police took seriously. An inmate at an Ohio prison claimed his former cellmate had confessed to the crime not long after Margaret died. According to the inmate, the alleged murderer and his friend, walked into Mercy Hospital that morning dressed in drag. Sister Margaret's allegedly confronted them in the chapel for causing a scene.

During the argument, one of them stabbed her to death with a knife. The story was difficult to believe, but then again, so was the murder. Without any other strong suspects, police decided to take a chance. They gave the inmate a lie detector test. To their surprise, he passed. The police were ecstatic, and they finally had a solid suspect, and they weren't about to let the opportunity go to waste. Hey, it's Carter.

If you are enjoying murder true crime stories, there's a new crime house show for you to check out. It's called The Final Hours, and it's hosted by Sarah Turney and Courtney Nicole. Sarah is an advocate for missing and murder. victims whose sister disappeared in 2001. And Courtney is a true crime storyteller and investigator who witnessed firsthand how crime can change a family forever.

Together, they bring lived experience to every case, looking not only at what happened, but what led up to it. Each episode examines the moments just before a person disappears. The routines, the timelines, and the small details that often get overlooked. Because every disappearance has a moment where everything still feels normal. A text that doesn't raise concern. A routine that goes unchanged. A door that closes just like it always has.

Until it doesn't. The final hours puts those moments under a microscope. Because when it comes to justice, there's no such thing as over-analizing. Listen to and follow the final hours on Apple Podcasts. Spotify, Amazon music, or wherever you listen. New episodes every Monday. 71-year-old sister Margaret Ann Paul had been dead for over a week when police in Toledo, Ohio, pursued their first strong suspect.

After an inmate at an Ohio prison claimed to know who killed Margaret, detectives gave the tipster a lie detector test. He passed, according to the inmate. His former cellmate stabbed sister. Mr. Margaret with a knife, then buried the murder weapon behind his house in downtown Toledo. Police Sergeant Arthur Marks rushed to get a search warrant. He and his team spent a long afternoon digging holes in the dirt to try to corroborate the story. But by the end of the day, they hadn't found anything. Still, the inmate had passed his polygraph, so Marks held out hope.

Maybe the lead would pan out in the future. It was possible the killer had moved the murder weapon before the search, or the officers had simply missed it. But for now, they had hit a dead end. And the deputy chief of police, Ray Vedder was getting increasingly frustrated. On the day of the murder, he told Marks he was hoping to make an arrest within 24 hours. Now that it had been over a week, he demanded some kind of decisive action. The pressure forced detectives to go back to the drawing board. They'd already eliminated robbery as a potential motive,

and after a week of interviewing hospital employees, it seemed unlikely that a patient had randomly attacked Margaret. That only left one option, the crime. was personal. Given the brutal nature of the crime and the way Sister Margaret's body was posed, the theory made sense. The only people she knew well were her fellow nuns and the two priests who held mass at the hospital chapel, Father Shefionatechi and Father Robinson. The thought that a nun or a priest had killed her horrified the police. Catholic officers like veterans, or especially reluctant to explore the possibility.

That was the main reason Marx and his team had spent the past week eliminating every other option first. But by April 18, 1980, 13 days after Margaret's death, they had no other choice. Police finally called their last remaining suspect down to the station. Every nun they interviewed was able to prove they were outside the sacristy during. the murder father she Fiona tecki the larger more popular priest had an alibi too that meant 42-year-old father Gerald Robinson who many people saw as cold and aloof was now in the hot seat detectives interrogated him for eight grueling hours although they didn't accuse him outright they made him go over his side of the story repeatedly they died

dissected everything he said, searching for any discrepancy they could use to prove he wasn't telling the truth. Father Robinson insisted he'd been in his quarters at the hospital when Sister Margaret died. He said he was just getting out of the shower when the nuns called to tell him what had happened. At least one witness, Dr. Barron, had already contradicted that account. He told a detective that he saw Father Robinson near the chapel right after. after the murder, though it's not clear if Sergeant Marks was aware of that. Either way, Robinson stuck to a story. But by 10 p.m., the stress was clearly getting to him.

Finally, he broke down and told Sergeant Marks that he knew who the killer was. He claimed someone had come to him to confess their sins three days earlier and had admitted to stabbing Sister Margaret. The sudden admission threw Sergeant Marks off. For Catholics, the right of confession was sacred. Priests were forbidden from ever revealing what they were told, even to a police officer. The punishment for breaking that rule was excommunication. Not only would they be barred from performing their duties,

but they would also be prohibited from worshipping in public. Marks knew Father Robinson had a lot to lose by confiding in him, but as a police officer, all he cared about was solving the crime. So he demanded to know who had confessed. All of a sudden, Father Robinson clammed up and refused to answer. And just a couple minutes later, he retracted his statement entirely. When Marx pressed him further, he insisted, he had made it all up. He said no one had confessed to the murder. He just wanted to get the

police off his back. After eight hours in a tiny room, he was frazzled and afraid. It was a moment of weakness. Marks leaned in close to the priest, but it was impossible to tell whether he was lying. Besides, it was getting late. Marks decided to call the questioning off there. He told Father Robinson to be back the following day for another interrogation. In the meantime, the priest agreed to let the police search his apartment that night, without a warrant. As Robinson was escorted towards the exit, he found his counterpart, Father Shifionatechi chatting with another officer.

Seeing him about to leave, Shafionatechi stepped in front of Robinson to block the path. He shouted down at the priest's. priest demanding the father tell the police what he knew. Robinson didn't say a word. After staring at his friend with a blank expression, he calmly stepped to the side and continued out the door. When the officer escorting him asked what the confrontation was about, Father Robinson said he had no idea. A few minutes later, he and two detectives, made it back to Mercy Hospital. The officers followed Father Robertson to his living quarters on the second floor and stepped inside. There wasn't much room to maneuver. The apartment consisted of a tiny

bathroom, a den in one bedroom. There was nothing on the walls except a single crucifix and a golden altar decoration called a corpus. That kind of asceticism was typical of Catholic priests, but it still struck the detectives as a grim place to live. In the medicine cabinet, they found a prescription bottle of valium that had recently been refilled. The closet was empty except for a few plaid shirts, a pair of jeans, and some clerical uniforms. After just a few minutes, the search was practically over already. There was just one last place to look. The priest's tiny wooden desk.

Inside the center drawer, the detectives discovered a silver letter opener shaped like a dagger. On the hilt, there was a picture of the U.S. Capitol and a label from the Washington, D.C. Wax Museum. More important than that was the blade. At about nine inches, it was more than long enough to have caused Margaret's wounds and it had a distinctive four-sided tip, exactly the same as the weapon that killed her. The detectives bagged the letter opener as evidence and took it straight to the crime lab. They were confident they had the murder weapon in custody. The only thing they couldn't figure out was the motive.

The next day at noon, Father Robinson returned to the station to answer some more questions and take a lie detector test. This time, he seemed more hesitant. For example, when asked why someone might have killed Sister Margaret, the priest kept quiet until finally he told the police she had a dominant personality. When asked what he meant by that, Robinson refused to elaborate. It was a strange moment that stuck with the detectives, but the final results of the polygraph were inconclusive. The examiner said several of the priest's answers seemed deceptive. In the same time, Father Robinson was clearly frazzled from the previous night's interrogation, which might have affected his results. The officers scheduled a second polygraph for the following week.

In the meantime, they decided to grill Robinson again. Mark sensed that he was close to cracking, and now that they had a potential murder weapon in evidence, he wanted to seize the opportunity to get some answers. Around 5 p.m. that evening, they began their second round of questioning. But about half an hour in, Deputy Chief Vetter called the detectives out to the hallway. That was a major breach of an unwritten rule at the department. No matter the situation, officers were not.

never supposed to interrupt an ongoing interrogation. When Marx demanded to know what was going on, Vetter told him that Father Robinson's lawyer had shown up at the station, along with a church higher up, Monsignor Jerome Schmidt. Monsignor Schmidt was a well-connected priest who was known as a consummate dealmaker and fundraiser in the Tilly area. He had friends in high places and typically stepped in when a church official was having trouble. In short, he was the kind of man with the clout to halt an ongoing police

interrogation. And on April 19th, that's exactly what he did, seemingly to protect Father Gerald Robinson. When the priest walked out of the police station that, he did, seemingly to protect Father Gerald Robinson. When the priest walked out of the police station that evening, detectives weren't sure he'd ever be back. Now that the Monsignor was involved, their job was about to get a whole lot harder. Because if there was one thing the Toledo police knew back in 1980, it was don't mess with the Catholic Church.

Thanks so much for listening. I'm Carter Roy. This is Murder True Crime Stories. Come back next time for part two on the murder of Margaret and Paul and all the people it affected. Murder True Crime Stories is a Crime House original powered by Pave Studios. Here at Crime House, we want to thank each and every one of you for your support. If you like what you heard today, reach out on social media at Crime House on TikTok and Instagram. Don't forget to rate, review, and follow Murder True Crime Stories wherever you get your

podcasts. Your feedback truly makes a difference. And to enhance your murder true crime stories listening experience, subscribe to Crime House Plus on Apple Podcasts. You'll get every episode early and ad-free. We'll be back on Thursday. Murder True Crime Stories is hosted by me, Carter Roy, and is a crime house original powered by Pave Studios. This episode was brought to life by the Murder True Crime Stories team. Max Cutler, Ron Shapiro, Alex Benadon, Natalie Pertzowski, Lori Marinelli, Sarah Camp, Terrell Wells, Honeya Aside, and Russell Nash. Thank you for listening. Hi, it's Carter. If you love murder, true crime stories, check out the new Crime House original

about disappearances, the final hours, hosted by Sarah Turney and Courtney Nicole. Listen and follow the final hours on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or wherever you get your podcasts. New episodes drop every Monday.