My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark - 138 - Live at the Red Rock Ballroom in Las Vegas

Episode Date: September 13, 2018

Karen and Georgia cover the murder of Gerard Soules and the death of Ted Binion.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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Shit. Oh my God, when was the last time this conference room had this many screaming people in it? Yeah, I'll tell you what, last night, I'm much louder than Georgia. Much louder. Am I? Yes. Oh, okay. What?

Yes. I thought I was way louder than you. I just thought you meant in life, are you louder than me? No, that's a yes. Okay. Nah. I was gonna say, it was super loud in here. Last night, they were selling time shares and it was fucking nuts.

It was like, they were the good ones. We bought them. Yeah. A couple of them. We bought a couple. Time shares. Oh my God. You guys, how's it going?

This is so exciting. This is our first show of 2018. Yeah. And nothing will live up to it. The screaming was incredible. And it's in a fully carpeted conference room. So it's more of an accomplishment, what you guys are doing. Sound come out of basically a large, one of those like big cat apartment buildings.

Yeah. But for people. Those people in the hallway are so confused as to what's going on in here. They're like, is this a Mormon thing? What's happening? You guys, this is the best buffet. It's $1.99. It's all waffles.

I think someone told the Red Rock Casino that Beyonce was coming because we accidentally got, it's not even a hotel room. It's the nice, I've never in my life. I think we own this casino now. The rooms that we're in. What the fuck? We're walking down the hallway. We check in.

First, yeah. And then Karen is the first one to go to her room. And then she picks her head out and goes, what the fuck? I thought it was mirrors. When I look, I swear to God, I looked and I'm like cute mirrors. And then I was like, oh my God, it's a whole room. It's like marble, mirrors. It'd be like an Egyptian Pharaoh's dream come true.

And it was not so. Can we talk about the important thing, the bathrooms? Sure. Let me tell you about the bathrooms. Yes. It's one suite, two bedrooms. Four bathrooms. Four bathrooms.

Two bathtubs. Per. Per. Heated toilet seats and every bathroom. Hot. Hot toilet seats. Hot toilet seats. Hot ones.

Yes, I am easily impressed. Well, and I mean, I'm telling you, America needs to catch up on bidets. Yeah. Yeah. Sorry, hold on, the girls in the front row are all saying hi. You're like fucking five minutes late and screaming hi to each other, not to us. It's like, what the fuck is happening? Anyhow, bidets, you guys are insane.

What the fuck? And then, it's like a robot washing your ass. Okay. And then, so I call, I space time with my seven-year-old nephew to be like, he'll be interested in this because he thinks I'm boring. Maybe he'll think I'm cool. And so I showed him around the place and all the incredible things and oh, and the toilet, when you walk up to it, it opens on its own.

Yeah. Like this is like a fucking robot. This is so cool. I actually pulled it open and it shut its, I'm not kidding. It scared the shit out of me. I was like, the toilet won't let me have it. It's like when you try to pump your own gas in certain places and you get fine for it. But I want to take care of myself like I always have.

Oregon says no. No. Can't do it. My nephew said, that's nice. Look at my house. And then he showed me the Minecraft game he was playing. He could not have given less of a shit. That little asshole.

Yeah. Well, I showed my sister, I sent her a bunch of pictures because that's her favorite thing. She likes it when we're in one normal hotel room with a nice bed and maybe a chair, a plant or something. That's exciting enough for her. And I just took this like five minute video where I was like, in your face, you'll never see art like this again. A pool table, you stupid shit.

It got really violent, but fun. But then they, the doorbell rings and it's the butler. I'm not joking. Wait, what? Are you guys mad? You don't get a butler? I get a butler. I got a butler.

His name is John and he'll bring me anything I want. Yeah. And he's here tonight. Get up here, you motherfucker. No. No, he's working for all the other high rollers and embedded gamblers that are in this building right now. I don't think he works for the hotel.

I think you just answered the door to his, I didn't get a butler. That's so sexy. If you're going to try to creep into my room, please pretend to be a butler. It will work. Is he in your room right now? Is he waiting? Yeah. He just sits there.

Can we get security? He basically showed me how to turn on the TV. What? Yeah. Dude. Yeah. Someone's getting fired and it's Vince for not fucking getting the butler to come. And then here's Vince on the phone.

I'm telling you, if they both don't get butlers, they will cancel the show. A podcast. A live podcast. I know you've never heard of it. Listen. There's two ladies. People like it. Wow.

Podcast divas. That's who we are. Oh, God. I forgot. There's giant pictures of us. What? On the side there. Look.

No, that's a bummer, huh? No. Can I tell you, the special guest tonight is the biggest zit I've ever had in my fucking life. But you're hometown murder. I'm going to hold the mic right here the entire day. That's how you do it. If there was a close up, it would look like Eileen Warnows in that crazy photo.

Like that's my fucking zit. What's your problem? What do you have going on? Are you the house photographer or use someone's mom? She's just cute. She's just a sweet person. That could have been a camera knife. Of course, the late people did nothing to help us.

Tell them about your foot. I sprained my ankle, everybody. Regular people like stuff like that. That made me sick to my stomach. Thank you. I just, you know what? I'm not wearing a brace. Normally I have like a little bit of a, you know, just from CVS a brace and I kind of

just walk like I'm considering things, you know, just kind of like, mm-hmm. Yeah, I see. I see. I saw one you got here. It's actually perfect for me because like this week in therapy, we talked about me calming down with my impatience and need to go everywhere all the time immediately and freak the fuck out over everything, including in the airport, especially in the airport. So like, I have to slow down.

Otherwise I'm an asshole. I'm like fucking speed walking away. And I'm back there. Go ahead. That's fine. Oh, get my butler to pick me up. No big deal. No big deal.

Oh, she got me on that one. Steven's not here. Oh, yeah. Sorry. You don't even really like him that much. Don't fucking make it up. Now that sound I like. Can't explain it.

He can't come on the road all the time. Yeah. He has my cats to watch. Yes. He has like 17 jobs that he, I mean, do you know how many emails you people send to him? It's crazy. It's crazy.

Do you know what I was wondering? Do you think he, like when he goes to my house, when we're gone, puts his mustache on every single like thing, like touches the remote control of his mustache, touches all the doorknobs of his mustache, just be like, my mustache was here. Just a peek inside George's mind. It sounds like what you need to do is set up a mustache nanny cam and catch that motherfucker in the act. I think you're right.

I mean, that's fine. His DNA is all over my house then. That's right. Mustache DNA? What if it's a fake mustache? I know it's a fake mustache. He's, he's doing it for attention. Even that mustache.

Now I have to stand like a horse because I have a sprained ankle. Did anyone else notice this? Oh, it looks kind of. I'm a little Clyde's daily anyway, so I'm fine with it. Don't look at these screens. Okay. Just look over here. I lived through the nineties.

Look at me. I lived. I lived. I don't like it. I lived. Well, this is my favorite murder the podcast. Oh, yeah. That's Karen Calguera.

Hi. And that's your friend, Georgia Hartstark, right there. Thanks. And I have pockets. Oh my God, walk them around. Yes, yes, yes, yes. This really sweet girl who makes dresses in L.A. named April just keeps fucking giving me her dresses.

Yes, she's smart. Uh-huh. That's how you do business in L.A. You just put the thing in the person's hand and then you're like, put this on sometime. Oh, thank you. Yes, mine's from Target. Woo!

Okay. $29.99. And if any dress in the world should have pockets, it's this one because it's practically a jumper. It's very childlike. And it has the 70s, you know, rank zip pull. Oh, that goes all the way to your belly button, doesn't it? I can do what I want right now.

We could go a total after hours club style in here. I feel like... Right, Vegas? You're up for that all the time. All the time. Then it starts raining from the ceiling. What the fuck? Oh, Vegas doesn't have rules, right? No. That's the whole thing.

Yeah. No rules. When was the last time you were here? You were here when you saw Magic Mike. Oh, yeah, girl. I won't talk about the other casino that shows that, but, oh, man, if you get a chance to watch it, it's the most romantic strip show you'll ever see.

So much talent. What if we had told Stephen he could come, but he had to learn Magic Mike, like, choreograph thing? And then he just went like this for half an hour. With his hat. With his hat. No, we love him. We love him.

My cats tolerate him. I swear there's a bit that he put like a, what are the kids call them, insta story? Insta story, for sure. Him yelling Elvis, Elvis, Elvis and my cat. Well, I swear to God, my cat, Elvis is just like, walking by him. Like, disdain in a cat's walk.

Have you ever seen that? It's magical. Fuck you, dad. Oh, I would like to quickly apologize for my hair. What's happening can't be explained except for that. I think you guys had a weather system come in while I was trying to straighten it real nice. And then other things started happening and it was just like,

it just kept kind of like getting going out. It was like a Tesla coil situation. Insta story. The ecstasy just hit and he was like, I'm going to say this in a normal voice. It won't be that loud at all. It won't be jarring at all. It'll be smooth and cool.

It's what she wants to hear while she's talking. Thank you. For your compliment. This is a true crime comedy and hair tutorial podcast. It doesn't look great. It looks like the first time I used a curling iron when I was 13 and my sister wouldn't show me how to use it. So I kept turning it the wrong direction.

It would do like the kink and then fall. And I kept, but see, I brought a travel straightener. So the actual ironing, the face of the straightening iron is the size of a coffee stirrer. So I'm just bending my hair to the left and right is what I did. I just went in. No, it's going to get good. I went in.

Anyway, when I opened the door, Georgia went, hi. And that's when you know you have that hair is when your friends greet you in a way that they never have before. Hi, I'm so glad to see your hair. I have no comment. No, I love it. It isn't what I want. That's good.

It's very like, you look like Sigourney Weaver and Ghostbusters. But like in the Zool part. Which is the good part. Yeah, not when she was some dumb working lady. Boring. No. There is no Karen, only Zool. Only Zool.

I'm the gatekeeper. You're the key master. You're the key master. Before we sit down and tell you about murder, we have a photo to show you guys. Exciting that happened today, you may have seen it on your TVs. But we had Steven put together. Can you put that first picture?

I haven't. Look. Are you in charge? Yes. You truly are the gatekeeper. Did you see what happened today? You guys. It's all about us and always.

Insane. You know the best. I mean, Steven, Steven pulled pictures where people were holding up signs of shit that we've said, which is very self-serving. But there were tons of amazing ones. Yeah. My favorite is just this lady that was holding a sign that said, Tick Tock, motherfucker.

Come on. I'll take a moment to say, and I think this is important to be clarified, that there is a world of difference between masculinity and toxic masculinity. And I don't want, you know, when people see that sign, I had a friend of mine who let me know that he was very upset about toxic masculinity. And he was kind of going on about it, how accused he felt and all that. And I was like, you do realize I used that to describe John Wayne Gacy's dad, right? It was a very specific reference.

You're not talking about fucking comedians who are graphic artists during the day, whatever he was. You're talking about John Wayne Gacy's dad. Yes, exactly. This isn't just like someone who's rude to you in the cafe. He made a serial killer with his fucking hands and beer. But we're really stoked. We couldn't be marching today because we had to fly here, which is awesome.

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And I'm Brooke. And we're the hosts of Wondery's podcast, Even the Rich, where we bring you absolutely true and absolutely shocking stories about the most famous families and biggest celebrities the world has ever seen. Our newest series is all about the incomparable diva, Whitney Houston. Whitney's voice defined a generation and even after her death, her talent remains unmatched. But her incredible success hit a deeply private pain.

In our series, Whitney Houston, Destiny of a Diva, we'll tell you how she hid her true self to make everyone around her happy and how the pressure to be all things to all people led her down a dark path. Follow Even the Rich wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen ad free on the Amazon Music or Wondery app. Should we sit down and talk about murder? Do you want to? I'd love to.

Look at these, Vegas. Nice. Horrible things have happened on this chain. Oh, no. Oh, no. You can't see the stains I can see. Oh, no. Stop us.

Well, after tonight, they're going to burn them after we get through it. Is this you? Yes. Yeah, that's mine. These are yours. Mm-hmm. Oh, do you want to put a piece of tape down the center of the table? This is mine.

Fucking thing away from me. Well, then that's mine. Someone, a really sweet girl saw us on the plane when we were boarding and she goes, oh, you guys traveled together. What do we fucking hate at each other? We don't travel together. Right as we come around the corner, I'm like, well, you can just shut your fucking mouth. Oh, hi.

Hi, sisterhood. She made me walk three-paced, like three people ahead of her. Wouldn't speak to me. So when we arrived at the hotel, there was somebody that was going to come to this show that was also outside. She was the girl on the plane. Same girl? Same girl.

Doubled up. Just got weird. Sorry. No. Well, you were talking on the phone because I just wanted to explain to her. Yeah. I would have said hi, but I was on the horn like a Hollywood big shot, except for I was talking to my neighbor.

You can't yell at me. Why didn't you learn from this man? I mean, her, right? I know. My dog, George, when I leave my house, when I take my suitcase with me, she knows I'm leaving for several days. And that's when she decides to climb the fence, like she's in a tough mutter competition. I'm not kidding.

My side fence is eight feet tall. She's a fucking, what, elaborate? She's a lab hound. She's like a combo. She's not like a little dog. Climbing at the fence, she's like fucking arm over arm. She had a big backpack on. Yeah.

Through that over the fence, through her skateboard over the fence. Fucking jump the fence. Carabiners. Yeah. Out of here. But the reason I knew, because I rebuilt, this is kind of interesting, I rebuilt the other fence on the other side of my house because I thought she was getting out of that fence, had the whole thing rebuilt.

Turns out she's going out the other fence that's eight feet tall, and I was like, there's no way it's this fence. And my neighbor, Rick, thank God, is a contractor, and he and I were like, do I need to fix this fence or that fence? He goes, it's got to be the other fence. Well then he's standing in his driveway, and he sees George come up over the fence, flip herself into the hedge, roll down and lock away, he witnessed it himself, he witnessed it.

So then. I couldn't do that. He couldn't either. I didn't lock down in my house, I just leave, I can't get in. No. And that's like an extra, what, three inches or three feet for us? Yes. Right?

Yeah. We're much taller than her. But so when Rick saw her do that, he came over and he goes, I've got a thing, I'll fix it for you, you don't have to rebuild a second fence. So he came over and leaned this piece of taller fence, but it was from a work site or whatever. He leaned it up, and then he put some cement on it. Well, today, while I was on the phone, it was my other neighbor, she got out again, she fucking double climbed, like she's trying to get into the fucking FBI.

She double climbed and got out. Amazing. And she's supposed to be a service dog, I think. Either that or my dog sitter is beating her with a chain while I'm gone. I feel so bad. No, it's funny. She would never do that. She likes dogs more than people.

I feel bad for Frank, your other dog, who's left behind because she's like tiny, she's just like, well, fuck. Frank couldn't get over anything because his legs are this tall. You know, he was, like, scrabbling after trying to be like, I'll come next, George is like, come on after me. And Frank's like, I got it. No. Can you open the side gate for me?

Oh. Wait, sorry. I just had a recovered memory. It's one of my favorite things I've ever witnessed. I was at a party in San Francisco in the 90s, represent, and there was this big, weird house party. We didn't know the people whose house it was, so we were just, like, in the backyard. Crazy?

No. Okay. I just saw a look passed through your eyes. I was looking to think, I was just wondering how close up that fucking camera was. I was trying to look past your head to be like, how horrible. I'm like Charlie Brown's teacher right now, you're just not hearing a word I'm saying. So we're standing, no, no, we're standing in the backyard of this huge Victorian house, this huge house party with Kigs everywhere, right?

And we're standing right next to the fence, and this is like a 12-foot fence, wooden fence. At one point, we're all just standing around like, this is a weird party. We don't know anyone should we leave, and then someone runs out onto the back porch and goes, the cops are here. And a bunch of people run, and these two girls that we're standing right next to us throw their drinks and jump and fucking throw themselves up over this fence. They jump, they grab it, they pull themselves, and they scribble, scrabble with their legs and their feet, and they push themselves over.

You hear one land, it's like sidewalk on the other side. You hear the other one land, and then this dude, of course, classically walks up, baked out of his mind, and he walks up, and there's a fucking latch, he just opens. Oh, classic. That guy is still talking about that story. That was his, like, best moment of his life, which is fair. If you're that guy, and you can hear me right now, please call me. I would love to laugh about that again.

I told people that story so many times, that people are always like, oh, that's nice, and I'm like, you don't understand how hilarious it is. You're dressed up for a party, me like this, like, yeah, so anyway, and you're like trying to be cute at a party, and then you just fucking throw yourself over a fence. Like, did they have warrants out for their arrest or something? It would have been great if then he opened the fence, and on the other side, they're going to arrest the girls. They're going to arrest them by the cops, too, like, hauled away.

And there's just pounds of cocaine at their feet. Yeah. Why would you bring that much cocaine? Yeah. Just a little bit. Well, then it would be even more impressive that they hauled the cocaine over the fence, along with their entire bodies. That's right.

Anyways, listen, we could keep doing this for fucking all day. I would love to. I want to. Just speculate about these two girls. Are you first? I am first. Okay. Yeah.

Okay. Thank you so much. Wait. Hold on. Don't take that photo yet. I'm blowing my nose. Oh. No, not yet.

Okay. Same lady? Yeah. Same? Yeah. Because we're, it's the same spot. We're like, nothing's changed. Giving the thumbs up doesn't matter.

But did you see fucking our awesome security guard over here? Yeah. They like come at me. Don't be afraid to tackle her next time. She wants you to. She fucking mows it over like, I got this no matter what happens. That was awesome. What if my butler came and attacked you?

I would definitely come back here. There is no butler. You guys, how do we tell her there's no butler? Well, there hasn't been a butler around here for 25 years. I don't know what that accent is anymore. Thank you. What's the best about that? It's 25 years ago.

It would have been like 1990. Why are they talking like that? In the great butler murder rampage of 1990. I don't know. What was it? Three? Okay. Go.

So here's the thing that I think both of us have started doing, especially when we're on the road because we have to write, it's like book report race. We have to write like six murders. The great book report is our new TV show that we're pitching and nobody likes it. Nobody wants to watch it. Everyone's super stressed out about it. It's just us in our hotel rooms in our fucking robes typing and things going on. Are you done with your story yet?

I need your story. Yeah. And meanwhile in the background for some reason in the beginning of 60 minutes is playing. That's how I was knew that my book, like I had to finish that book report. Sunday night, 7.30, you better finish your fucking homework. Okay. So in the middle of the murder I had, I was like, wait a second, I want to do Siegfried and Roy.

Oh. They weren't murder? That's why I was like, oh, are you changing the rules of this podcast? I seriously thought I was such a fucking genius for like four minutes. I was like, I'm going to fucking, I can't imagine when I say I'm doing Siegfried and what they're going to say. It was, it was, hold on, it was Roy. No, I just wrote down a couple of factoids.

Okay. Roy was bitten on the neck by Montecor, the white tiger. Monty. And as he was being pulled away and taken to the university medical center, right, local references, get some every time. I think they all work there. The whole hospital is empty right now? Let's go rob the hospital.

Rob the hospital. Just pills and then those weird water pitchers with the matching cup. I take like four of those. I don't know why. Okay. As Roy was getting loaded into the emergency room, the tiger bit his neck. No. Again?

No, I'm saying. Oh. Got it. I was like, why didn't they get the tiger away from him? Bit his neck. Roy said, down, down tiger. Okay. Oh, he did?

What is wrong with me? Oh, I fall for everything because I stand for everything. Isn't that how it goes? I think that's the saying. Yeah. Okay. I just wanted to get this great quote out that I found on Wikipedia. Because Roy said to everybody as he was being wheeled away,

Montecor is a great cat. Make sure no harm comes to Montecor. You bit him in the fucking neck. I think Roy was like, yeah, we've been waiting for this. It's not the fucking cat's fault. Okay. Everybody lived and they retired seven years later. It was not that big of a deal.

Including the tiger lived? The tiger lived too. Okay. No harm came to Montecor. It's pretty amazing. Those are going to be my last words. I hope I remember. It's going to be so funny.

You better be there so I can be like, what was that thing I was going to say? Something about Montaguez. No. And that's how I die. No. And then I'll be like, that's what she really wanted. It's just it. I know what she wants.

I knew how she really wanted to go. I knew her better than she knew herself. Soundly true. So actually I'm going to do for real the murder of Gerard Solz the poodle king. What? There's a poodle king? There is a poodle king. And he worked right here in this great city of Las Vegas at the gorgeous and historic

circus, circus casino. Yeah. Been there. Have you been there? I have been on mushrooms there. That sounds like a fucking nightmare. Don't do it. It was a bad idea.

It was a bad 90s idea. We were all wearing chokers. We're like, this will be funny. Oh, I was positive for so long that I was going to remain for the rest of my days in front of that carousel. Oh yeah. It felt like we were there for nine hours. I was like, God, I want to leave the carousel area.

But everyone else seemed to like it. But I was like, I'm having a nervous breakdown. Oh my God. And then just went from there every single place you turned. It was just like, oh no, someone's flying. Oh no, they're smoking. I went there when I was nine on mushrooms. Oh.

And I had the same freak out. I was there when I was a kid. Why did my dad take us there? That's not fun for children. I don't understand. Was it Halloween? No. He wasn't trying to scare you?

No. Oh, okay. I just remember there were so many of us and we had no money. So there was like eight of us sleeping in a room with two beds. And I slept on the floor. I don't know. Red shag carpeting. Oh.

Circus circus. Ew. What'd you pick up from there? Closing time. Time for me to go home. Okay. The entire source of the story I'm about to tell you is from one Vanity Fair article written by a woman named Megan Rose.

And actually she wrote this article so good that it ended up changing the verdict. What? Let's get into it. Shall we? It's very, very fun. I was going to read you the title of this article, but it is a complete spoiler title. It basically tells you all the good stuff. Don't do it.

So, okay, so on June 4, 1992, when Gerard Jerry Soles doesn't show up at Circus Circus Casino for work, which is very unlike him, his boss goes to the RV park where he lives to investigate. Don't judge. Yeah. They're really nice inside. I know. Actually really...

I'm not kidding. You would never know that you were in a double wide. It's kind of my dream home. They're pretty cool. And then very manageable. Not like this gorgeous palatial apartment I have upstairs tonight. That was too many messages in one. Okay.

So when he knocks on the door, he can hear Jerry's poodles barking like crazy and he knows something's wrong because they're normally very well-behaved dogs. They don't bark. So he calls the park's security guard and they call the cops. And inside the trailer, they find Jerry Soles' belongings scattered everywhere. The window shade's been pulled off the window, TV, VCR cabinets empty. There's a blood-soaked mattress and a trail of blood leaning back toward the bathroom. And they're in the bathroom, there's blood splattered everywhere.

It's just insane. And Jerry Soles is laying naked with his throat slashed. He's been stabbed so many times that the coroner stopped counting at 35, but they believe it's over 100. And somebody put an orange towel on his face. He was 55 years old. So we'll tell you a little bit about Jerry Soles. So he was born 1935 in Canada, but he moved to Michigan in his childhood and he grew up

outside Detroit. And when he was a teenager, he grew up in a very devout Catholic family, but he still came out to his mom when he was a teenager and his family totally supported him. Yeah. I thought in 1955, holy fucking shit. So but it was his lifelong dream since he was like 12 years old. He wanted to be in the circus. So when he wanted to to be on the trapeze.

So when he was 16, he left home to join the circus and this is so basically this is I found as Steven found his obituary. It was insanely long. This is the bridge version. It was written by a woman named Haline Weaver. And she says, Gerard Soles, who has been murdered at Las Vegas, Nevada, was one of America's leading circus performers, first as a trapeze artist. And she spelled it artist.

And later with his celebrated dog troupe, Poodles D. Perry, wait, were they all on the trapeze together? No, no, no. Fuck. I got so excited. You know, they let you do that shit like up until the like nineties, right? No, I think they do. But that's the high wire.

The trapeze would be, you'd lock a dog's legs onto a hand. No. Now grab this one. That's worse. It would be amazing. He like throws the dog to the... He'd be fucking incredible. Only cats could do that.

I am a poodle. I am a poodle. I just can't stop picturing. I know. It's a pretty good visual. Oh, I think we do have some pictures. Oh, am I in charge? Check this shit out.

Yes. Wow. So he got famous because he could do this trick where he would, he would go off the... Like he would launch off the trapeze, I don't know the terminology, and then he would do a forward somersault and catch himself by his, by his like ankles on the trapeze. And then be fine. That's amazing. Wearing like a cape.

He looks incredible. Look at him. Living his best life. He was fucking doing it. So his heel catching work as an aerialist was sensational. And together with his cool arrogance and electrifying personality, more than justifies, justified his billing as the star of stars on the high trapeze. So I guess he was like the fucking, I don't know why, I was going to say the Tom Cruise

of the trapeze. I go, I get it, I get it. My favorite star. So in his life, he had a number of falls, usually only in rehearsal, but in Belgium in early 1964, after a near fatal accident in front of a paying audience, he retired from the trapeze. He was next seen in the Clyde Beatty Colex Brothers Circus in America. You know your favorite circus.

The famous one. Clyde Beatty Colex. It was set up by the nuclear power plant. For that circus, he did a plate spinning act. His career span four decades. He worked in everything from small shows to the Barnum and Bailey Circus, the greatest show on earth. By 1956, he was a center ring attraction with Clyde Beatty's big tenting circus.

And four years later, he joined Ringling Brothers and Barnum and Bailey, in which he featured, he was a feature attraction, until 1963, when he was sent to Moscow to appear in an American circus. He was an admirer of a British dog trainer named Victor Julian, and that's how he got his idea when he was doing the plate spinning, he was like, this sucks, so he remembered this dog trainer that he loved, this British dog trainer, so then he decided he was going to have a dog act. And so that's when he came up with poodles de peri, and he made all the costumes for himself

and for the dogs. Wait. Oh no, tell me, is it happening? It is happening, look at this little guy right here, look at his outfit, look at their outfit. I love it. I believe you've never heard of Jerry's souls, I mean, the poodles de peri. I love that Steven wrote, with poodles, like that shit.

Thanks Steven. Look at them, I mean, with poodles and feathers. So basically he gets a job at Circus Circus in 1992, and the height of Circus Circus is great, something. Hold it. No, that would be too early for me on my drug trip. I'd be amazing. I'm like, wait a second, I saw this.

But basically on the second floor at Circus Circus, there's a stage, and all day long until midnight, they have Circus acts performing for free, so they just have act after act. And Jerry was like the hit of the show, and people would, you know, on their way to, in this article, she says, as they move along past to the 299 buffet. That's what she is. It's kind of, you know, it's a little elitist. So his show featured 14 Pete poodles hopping on their hind legs across the stage, one would wear a poncho and a sombrero, another had her dress attached to her front paws, so when

she stood up, she did the Mulan Rouge Can Can. Oh, he was sexualizing a poodle. I hope it was a girl. There was ones wearing three foot tall hats, giant hoop skirts, and then Jerry himself wore sequined tails matching bow tie, and all hand stitched himself, as we said. So the problem was in his personal life, Jerry was having a really hard time. He was 55, his partner of decades had died a couple of years before, and he, all the other performers, most of them lived in the Casino's own RV park, that's kind of a common

thing I guess here, but they wouldn't let him stay in their RV park, the Circus Circus RV park with the poodles, so he got banished to the silver nugget camper land, which we all know. Less desirable. Yeah. This is coming off. Oh. What's happening?

Don't know. So is this my part of the take-hold now, and that's your part? It's all you get. Grab it. Watch me. I'm going to yank the toilet back. Do it. Okay.

There we go. Everyone's good. Magic. Okay. So the thing that Jerry started doing was he was, to make himself feel better, he would help other people, so if he saw people panhandling, and usually it was men, because he was lonely for male company, so he would give them money, ask them if they wanted to go to dinner, basically kind of try to help out, and that's how he met a man named Fred Steeze.

So basically, Fred, he saw Fred was holding a will work for food sign. He was driving by in his truck. He said, I'll take you to dinner if you want to go to dinner with me. Fred's like, sounds great. At dinner, you know, Jerry said, I'm a gay man, you know, like I'm interested in hanging out. Fred's like, sounds good to me. I like to hang out too.

And then Fred was like, well, here's an interesting thing if you really do need work. I just fired my assistant, apparently he had an assistant that couldn't do the job. It wasn't in the article, so I don't know. I thought there was a lot of dog poop picking up in the said job. Poodle poop. Poodle poop. Diva poop. So Jerry offered him the job, and he was like, that'd be amazing, it would help me so much.

So they start working together, and then they actually start to have a relationship. So he trains him to be his assistant and learns the whole dog act. But then when they're ready to work at Circus Circus, like the HR department came and was like, you need a work permit to be able to work here and be Jerry's assistant. Well, Fred tells Jerry, I'm actually living under an assumed name because I'm on the run. I am in parole violation in Florida for what they called a hapless bank robbery, which I'd love to know. There's no details about it in the article.

That's embarrassing. You know, you're just kind of a shitty bank robber. Like he walked in with a bag with dollar signs on it, and then tripped and chipped his tooth, started crying. So basically he says to Jerry, I'm not going to be able to get a work permit, and this isn't going to work out. Thanks for everything. See you later.

And then in the article it says, then he panhandled enough money for liquor and a speedball and hopped on a train. How did they have that detail? It's just a fucking dream vacation. So Fred Steeves had a really hard life himself. He was abandoned by his mother when he was 10. He was in 37 different foster homes. Yeah.

As a teen, he wandered into a hobo camp outside Phoenix, where an old timer introduced him to riding the rails. So then he started doing that. And so, oh, we have a picture. This is... Oh, that's everybody that's on the second floor, that would do the second floor show at Circus Circus. Look at child labor.

See those kids? Tap dance. Janine. Do it. Again. Again. And then those girls on the top, that's all they did is put one hand up. But they were really good.

Look at those flat... Oh, sorry. No, I don't even... I could just stare at that forever. I'm on mushrooms. I just want to stare at that. What? You should have told me.

Oh, no. So that's the hapless bank robber, Fred Steeves. Okay. Okay. This is stressful to me. Okay. You want me to do it? Sure.

Do you want to? Yeah. Okay, I'm going to yell photo when the photo. Okay. Okay. Okay. So then six days later, after Fred jumped the train, it was six days later that Jerry didn't show up for work at Circus Circus and his boss came and they found his body.

So... How many days? Six? Six days. Oh, that's not a lot. It's not a lot. And when the detectives are investigating the crime scene, they find a letter that's from... It's sent to Fred Steeves but it's at Jerry's address and it's from the last guy that Fred

had hitchhiked with and then eventually started a relationship with. And so that's how they started to pinpoint that he was there. They called this guy and that guy told the police that Fred had told them that the guy he lived with had been stabbed like a hundred times. And so the second the police heard that he knew that bit of information, they were like, he did it and we just have to go get him. So they call Fred Steeves, they tell him he has to come back to Vegas. So Fred's way of coming back to Vegas, he's super drunk, he jumps on a train going the

wrong direction, he ends up in Wisconsin. That's not Vegas. So when he gets there, he realizes what he did, so he steals a semi truck and he drives 30 hours straight through back to Vegas and when he hits town, he immediately gets pulled over and arrested. I mean, you know, he got from point A to point B. Well, point A to point D. Right.

Then... Visa, V, B and C. So he tells them he has nothing to do with Jerry Sol's murder, that he would have never hurt him, that he really liked him, he considered him a close friend and that he had been in New Plymouth, Idaho the whole time. But Fred basically, he would deny it just outright and then the cops were getting angry and yelling at him. The interrogation lasted five hours and he changed his story.

At first he said he had nothing to do with it. Then he claimed that Fred sexually attempted to tie him up and sexually assault him with a plunger. The police are like, they showed him the layout of the trailer and they're like, it's physically impossible what you're saying he did, there's no room for that. Then he changes story again, literally, it was aerodynamically impossible. So he changes the story again, he ends up changing it six times. But in the end, he just says he decided to rob Jerry last minute and then Jerry woke

up and so he killed him and that's the story he gives the cops and so Fred Steece is arrested for the murder of Jerry Sol's. So two years later, by the time the case gets to trial, Fred Steece's defense team, they've put together an extensive alibi, there's 14 witnesses, 10 items of documentary evidence proving that Steece was nowhere near Sol's trailer at the time of the murder. But at the time, an ambitious young prosecution lawyer named William Keppert was assigned to the case and he knows that Steece did it so he wants to pull that alibi apart. So he goes to Idaho and he finds witnesses who say that Steece used to use the alias

Robert and that they heard him talking about having a brother. So they find out that Fred Steece has a look-alike brother named Robert who lives in Texas, yes, it's real. What the fuck? So they put it together, they come up with this theory. So here's the theory. Steece, it wasn't Fred Steece in Idaho, it was Robert and it was all a plan to create this alibi and the witnesses who thought they met Fred in Wyoming and Idaho, the two places

he was seen, actually met his brother Robert and the real Fred ran to Idaho after the murder and then met his brother there. The only problem with this theory is that there was no evidence that proved that Robert Steece had been in Idaho and it directly conflicted with the actual established timeline. And most importantly, it contradicted Steece's signed confession that it was this last minute drunken decision to rob and then murder Jerry Soles. So since it could be proved that Fred Steece was in Wyoming on May 31st, that would mean that Steece would have had to set the alibi plan into motion three full days before that

spur of the moment attack. But this theory presented to the court plus the signed confession was enough to get him convicted of murder and sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. You might want to hold that. He spends 20 years in jail. That's a long time. And this whole time, his original defense attorney, Nancy Lemke, is fighting to get his case reviewed.

She's sending it everywhere she can, like somebody has to do something, this guy didn't do it. And when they finally do get the case reviewed, they find evidence in the files that Fred Steece's name had been run through the system by Texas authorities on May 25th, June 1st and June 4th, which that means it's usually when people are stopped by the police is when your name gets run, which would mean that Robert Steece was in Texas at the time of the prosecution, at the time the prosecution argued he was impersonating his brother in Idaho.

I'm sorry, they find evidence Robert Steece's name. Shit. It's confusing enough. But essentially, the look-alike brother is proven to be in Texas at the time that he's supposedly being seen in Idaho and Wyoming. So they find this piece of information and the fact that it was suppressed by the prosecution. So they didn't tell anybody. So then they go talk to Robert, Fred's brother, and he tells the court under oath he hadn't

seen Fred since he was nine years old, he had never been to Idaho or Wyoming, and he didn't even know what Fred's birthday was or if he was still alive. So he had no contact or connection with his brother whatsoever. That's weird. So in October of 2012, after 20 years in prison, a judge declares that Steece was innocent. They go back through all of the everything and there was nothing that put him in that trouble home at the time of the murder. But because he had already been found guilty and gone to jail, they wouldn't retry him.

I mean, they wouldn't just say that he was innocent, they wouldn't just let him go. They made him sign the Alfred plea, which is the thing that says that you are convicted, but you say you're innocent, and then you can get out of jail. In that way, nobody, you're not allowed to sue, and none of the people who withheld evidence or were tricky in any way get in trouble. So I think I'm drinking your water. Anyways. Well, I guess I quit.

Sorry. Okay, so basically then, but Fred Steece is in jail, he's like, I'll sign the fucking Alfred plea, get me out of here, I'm good with it. So he does it, he gets out of jail, but of course he can't get a job everywhere he goes, he's a convicted felon. So that's when our friend, Megan Rose, wrote this article for Van B Fair, and then in November of 2017, the Nevada Board of Pardons and Commissions granted Fred a full pardon delivering a clear rebuke to the Las Vegas prosecutors who refused to recognize his innocence.

And Nevada Supreme Court Justice, Lydia Stiglich said, let there be no residual stain on his record. But a sad footnote to this, Jerry Sol's sister, Cathy Nurse Nazary, who was so angry at Fred Steece during the entire court case, went to him and wept and asked for his forgiveness and said she was so sorry. She has a whole shrine in her house, because she still lives back in Detroit, of all of her brothers, amazing accomplishments in the circus and being this insane, amazing trans piece artist and dog trainer and incredible entertainer for years and years.

And she also still has his silver ring and in this article it says, it's stained with blood and she wonders if the killer's DNA is on it and if anyone cares. Oh man. And that's the unsolved supposedly murder of Jared Sol's. Yeah. Wow. It's kind of fun, kind of pressing. Fuck.

That's crazy. How have we never heard of that? Okay. Listen. Okay. Okay. Now I'm going to get comfortable. You get comfortable.

You take the tablecloth. I don't think so. Oh, that's Fred Steece we got out of jail. Okay. Take the ceremonial tablecloth. Okay. Go ahead. I'm going to tell you about a murder.

Okay. You know? Sounds good. Yeah. That's, we love true crime. Yeah. This is the murder of Ted Binion. Oh.

So you know, so Stephen will send us like, here's a list of ideas of murders you can do and like send us each separate ones. And I had already found this one that I wanted to do and I was like, can I do this one? He's like, I sent it to Karen. What do I do? And I'm like, tell her she can't fucking ask that. Did he email you? Soon we're only going to be talking through Stephen.

Well, tell her I said maybe I want it. No, I still hadn't even looked at his email when he texted me. He's like, I'm so, Binion's is out. Okay. I was like, I don't know what you're talking about. Please don't bother me at home, Stephen. Well, he climbs your gate and he's like, hey, I just want to let you know. He climbs the gate from the outside, George climbs from the inside, hi.

They snapchat each other's faces. Snapchats still. I don't think so. I don't think so either. I think it imploded. Oh. Okay. So, where was I?

So this story is so convoluted and insane and weird that I ‑‑ my brain doesn't wrap around it. And to me, I'm like, I don't really know exactly what happened. So you'll have to tell me what you said. Oh, I'll tell you. At the end. I'll tell you. Okay.

I'm counting on it. Okay. All right. So Benny Binion was a gambling icon and kind of a mob dude who lived in Dallas and he fled from the Texas government to Las Vegas to open the horseshoe casino in downtown Las Vegas in 1951. Yeah. I have lost a lot of money at that exact casino.

I would love to steal an ashtray from the horseshoe casino. I bet they have a horseshoe on them. Yeah. Do you like horseshoes? I just like old ashtrays. Is it because you're a Clydesdale? A lot of Clydesdales are really bad smokers, all of us, so many of us. It is my ‑‑ like when we stay downtown, that's where we go to gamble.

They have a fucking buffalo machine, if you guys see one here, they'll play it. Buffalo. It's my favorite. Georgia loves buffalo. I'm a real sucker for Willy Wonka. Yeah. I just want to watch a movie and give my money away, and Willy Wonka helps me do that. Yeah.

Okay. So here's what Benny Binion looks like, fucking, what's up with this? Yes! Buffalo! Yes! Benny Binion. What is that, a buffalo on his neck? He is a fucking old timer.

You know you wanted to drink with him, right? My heart is singing right now. He parties. Yeah. Totally parties. He's the guy, he does cigarette and drink in one hand. Oh, that's good. It's all this.

This. He can do it. It's all individually ‑‑ oh, yeah. Shoes on as the gar makes it all wet and gross. Two pits. Okay. Maybe just keeps a tiny ‑‑ like a smaller than normal piece of gum, right in the front. Counts money.

He counts money while looking around and smiling at people. He licks his finger while he's counting money but he doesn't get sick. Yeah. That's like magic to me. No money can make Benny Binion sick. No. Never has. Proven fact.

Okay. I love you. Okay. So he comes here to escape from those guys in Dallas. He ‑‑ it's like one of the most profitable casinos. He totally changes the way fucking casinos work. He's like a total badass baller. Everyone loves him.

He's the dude. Right. But ‑‑ he was eventually convicted of tax evasion. Long history. It's actually really interesting. He's a fucking fascinating dude. So he ‑‑ you love tax law. No, I mean he's interesting.

This tax evasion court case is amazing. Oh, I read every piece of paper about it. Transcripts. So his sons take over the business of the horseshoe. His son, Ted, who's only 21 at the time, and his son, Jack, take over. Jack becomes president of the horseshoe. I guess he's kind of like a boring dude in the back, you know, counting money without licking his finger.

Yes. He has the green visor. He's got the garter on his sleeve. He's from the 1850s. Right. Right. So they don't let him out on the floor. But Ted is like super cool.

He becomes a casino manager. He's the face of the horseshoe. Ted's the 21‑year‑old? Ted's the 21‑year‑old. Sorry, it's like this late 50s, early 60s? You know, I couldn't tell. I kept looking for dates, but none of them seemed right. We're eventually going to get to the late 90s.

So just ‑‑ strike that question. Just strike it. It's a valid fucking question that I had, too. I'm just saying if you think about your YouTube stars of today, imagine if one of them had their own casino. It would be bad. That would be an asshole child. Right.

Just picture it. No, this guy ‑‑ okay. So let me tell you about him. You like him? Yeah. He's a good guy. Okay. Would I like him?

Yes. So he's basically a younger version of his fucking pimp ass dad. Oh. Can I say pimp? You did. I know. That's really not you. I know.

I didn't know what to say. That's Vegas, baby. Let it out. Okay. A younger version, or at least he tried to be, he basically grew up in the casino. He learned the trade as a preteen from his father and some ‑‑ and like casino players, he learned it all. By the time he was 18, he had been in the casino business his whole life.

Someone said that Benny told me that Ted was the best in the business. So he's like a businessman. He dresses like his dad and boots in cowboy hat, takes a pistol in his jeans, and he drove a pickup truck with his dog Princess riding shotgun. He drove it right into the casino. He was always ready for fun. He was super likable. Also a junkie.

A junkie? Yeah. A gambling junkie? No. It's a drug addict. The word junkie is also problematic. Okay. He had moved from pot to opium to LSD and finally black tar heroin was his drug of choice.

That's how he ran this huge, crazy business. Well, yeah, I think he probably built up a tolerance. So it all got real normal to him that he was like ‑‑ It's crazy. I mean ‑‑ Black tar. Sorry. I've had two cups of coffee and I can barely fucking read.

For real, I had two cups of coffee and I'm sweating like a lunatic. Me too. Okay, good. I thought it was ‑‑ That's the lights. Okay. So the next 30 years, Ted's the face of the horseshoe becomes well known as the host of their famous poker tournaments.

He loved living the high life, partying, schmoozing with high‑profile guests and flirting with hot ladies. One such lady ‑‑ I can't remember what photo I put up next. I don't remember. Just roll those dice. Yeah. What if it's just a funny meme? One such woman was Sandy Murphy, aka the Irish Venus.

Oh, hello. So they had met in 1995 while she was working at Cheetahs. Yes. The exotic dancing place. So wait, is Cheetahs like a chain like Bennigan's? I guess so. Because there's one in LA too. Yeah.

I didn't realize. And it's topless, right? I believe topless. Yes. Okay. I think topless. At the very least. Okay.

Okay. It's all tank tops and tube tops. Old fashioned. That's where Ted likes to hang out and do his business and take his meetings and stuff. Sure. You know. It's easier to concentrate there. Right.

You do that too, right? Yep. So Sandy is beautiful. She's 28 years younger than Ted. She had come to Las Vegas from Bellflower in Los Angeles. You know, the hub of sin. Oh, the city, Bellflower? Yeah.

But Bellflower was another strip club that I was supposed to know about. Is that a good one? Are they all awesome? It's, Bellflower is all, it's goth and mod. Oh yeah. Stripping. It's hard to tell. So like, you can read stories about her that, you know, they make her to be the sexy, sex

queen. She's like looking for money and then some, and then like in her thing, she's like, I lost all my money and I needed money. So I'm hot and I went and worked at Cheetahs. It's like, you know, you can't tell. I mean, look, listen, listen, but I like when they list things like that, like they were after money. Aren't we all fucking after money on the daily?

Yeah. Yeah. Please. They make her, you know, it's like one of those things where like in the 48 hours on ID, they show like probably like a pole dancing person from like the knees down, you know, just to show you what the gritty CD underlay under belly. When really weird dudes that are like, yeah, yeah, like they've never seen legs, right? And it's like, oh, legs.

This was, she was bad, but it's like, she just needed some money. Let me, oh, okay. This might be the photo. I think it is, which will make you laugh. No, that's not it. Okay. That's Ted Vignette. That's the fucking black tar heroin addict.

Oh my God, I love him. Apparently he was like a really, everyone loved him. He was a, you know, gregarious, you gave a pathway through on gregarious, like, I don't know what that means. He just doesn't look like anyone I ever did heroin with. That's what's freaking me out. Does he look like someone who would wear a fucking feather boa and a hat like his dad? Well, that's who he was.

Okay. Sorry. Got to take him away from you. Okay. Sandy. Okay. So, so shortly after they met, right after Ted's wife and kid move out of his house or their house, Sandy moves in with Ted and she, like, starts racking up credit card bills.

I have a drink with 5500 is the number I saw. Expensive jewelry. Plastic surgery. European vacations. All paid for by Ted. He's got the money. Let him pay for her shit. If he wants.

Isn't that what casinos are all about? Yeah. Okay. Just, like, spend in and waste day and stuff, smoking, heroin. That's funny. They both loved to party all night, sleep all day, which who fucking doesn't. And, okay, here's the photo that I think you're going to enjoy. This is from their made for TV movie.

Oh. Are you ready? We've played her. Well, if she's the Irish Venus, you're already on the wrong track. Okay. Because it's so Diane Carroll or what? Oh. Mina Savari.

Matthew Mote. And Matthew Mote. Who is also totally addicted to black tar heroin. Let's spread that rumor. Yeah. I'm going to. I'll tweet it out tonight. So this is the kind of idea.

Let me tell you about this movie real quick. This movie is called Sex and Lies in Sin City. Let me read you a quick blurb from it. I'm sorry. That title is easily the laziest piece of writing I've ever heard. No, no, no. The movie seems like the laziest piece of writing. Someone wrote about it.

Shot in New Mexico for what looks like jackpots off penny slots, the fact based story as depicted isn't trashy enough to qualify as a guilty pleasure. That's the worst when they're not bad enough to be fun. Yeah. Yeah. Sorry, guys. That's them. Look.

Listen. Everybody's good. Okay. You've got to make those made for TV movies sometime. Okay. According to Texas Monthly, our favorite news magazine in the world, the story by Gary Cartwright, according to all this shit, she was famous for her big mouth, and she called Ted old and ugly and told people openly that she was sticking around just for the money.

But other friends of the couple attested to seeing Sandy with bruises on her face and a clump of hair missing once, and that she told a friend that Binyon had beaten her. Binyon's gardener said she took a lot of crap from him. Oh. And on the gardener nose. That guy's outside the house. Yeah. Not inside.

No. After one particularly big fight, Ted bought her a Mercedes worth $97,000. That's almost $100,000. What kind of? What the fuck? Does it have a CD player? Or something? I don't know.

What if it looks like our hotel room upstairs? That's just the car that you drive. In March 1998, finally, we have a date. Okay. Here we are. We're in 1998. Okay, great. Karen's living the high life.

Loving it. I'm graduating high school. 28. On speed. Freaking out. Can't sleep. Can't stop drinking. Panicking, but pretending like I'm having a great time, plaid mini skirt, black combat

boots. Red. I have a photo of it, right? No. What if I did? I know. I want to see it too. Don't be mad.

If you did, it would be me with the tiniest eyebrows, like Claribo eyebrows. Me too. Right? You pluck them all out when you're on speed. And then my eyelids never touched my irises. I was always like, hi, what's up? I was always really angry about nothing. 1998.

She took us there. The Nevada gaming commission finds out that Ted is associating with Chicago mobster, his name is Fat Herbie Blitstein. What? Say it again. I'm sure I got that. Fat Herbie. Herbie.

Herbie. Herbie with a K. Herbie. Herbie. Herbie with a K. Like the love bug. Yeah. Got it.

Blitstein. Fat Herbie Blitstein. Which I'm like, oh, geez. Yeah. Fat Herbie Blitstein. Yeah. I thought he was fun. I hope he was super skinny.

One of those ones? They find out that Ted's hanging out with him. So they vote, the Nevada gaming commission is like your older sister that tells on you and is like a super big bummer and you're like, what? That they voted unanimously to provoke, permanently revoked Ted's gaming license. He's the first, duh, duh, duh. He's the first person to lose his license from violating an Nevada regulation that bans gaming license holders from associating with known criminals.

Oh. I mean, who amongst us is not a criminal? She likes it. Yeah. Fucking finally. Had it. Sick of it. Commission these games for fuck's sake.

Sorry. Can we get some regulation? I know. Right? Yeah. I'll do it for you because you're telling your story. You don't have to do that. I will.

It'll be fun. Thank you. That's very nice. Okay, his ties are now... I get a little too. Oh, okay. On the back. It's making your hair do this like amazing thing.

Okay, ties are separate from the family business. They're like, pack up all your shit in the basement of the horseshoe. Get the fuck out of here. You can't be in here. He takes all his crazy fucking silver collection, estimated to be worth anywhere from seven to 14 million fucking dollars. He collects silver. Yeah.

Okay. My dad's like, do it. That's my dad's like apocalypse plan. Invest in silver. Yes. Yeah. It's a good idea. Copper wire is also a great thing to strip.

If you ever see it anywhere, just pull it down and put it in your car. I've heard that. For later, for after the bomb hits. You'll know. You'll find someone to sell it to. At this point, Sandy and Ted's relationship is starting to sour. Ted had lost his gaming license and after that, his drug addiction got fucking worse. Probably his board is fucking home, right?

We've all been there. We just didn't do just can't stop. So he, needing to find a new place to store his silver, since he had a GTFO out of there, he enlisted the help of a dude named Rick Tavish who owned a trucking company who Sandy had met recently and there's just so much information about this dude and it's so hard to find the exact fucking details of him. Sounds like he was a bad guy. He's described as regularly handsome, financially troubled contractor from Montana with a criminal

record that included convictions for abrogated assault and cocaine dealing, like the dating show. Your eyes turned into hearts. Contestant number one. He's perfectly terrible for me. I think there's a photo of him. Yes. That's them.

So that's Sandy and that's Rick. That's fucking Will Ferrell if I've ever seen him. Do not, do not try to tell me. He owned a trucking company. Okay. He's soon confiding to friends that he was, quote, here's this fucking romantic. He's clearly a romantic, laying the pipe to Binion's girlfriend. Oh.

Okay. I have another recovered memory. Great. There was a stand-up comedian that I knew when I first started stand-up in Sacramento. Please tell me who it is. I can't even remember his name. Okay, good. He's a nobody.

I don't think he ever, I don't think he flourished. You don't think he succeeded. I don't know. Okay. But he had a map and he had pens in the map and next to the pen it would say LP. No. And that's everywhere in the United States he had laid by me. No.

Yes. It is. Yes. Yes. This is my world. I've been in it since I was 20. It's so upsetting. I mean.

Never got better. Are we sure he didn't mean to take a shit? That's what I thought it meant. Yeah. The first time I saw the map I thought he had put a pen everywhere he had taken a shit across the United States and I was like that's weird and not something to brag about and then I think it was someone like Blank Patch or somebody who was like Karen Blank Pipe means making love with a woman and I was like, oh, I've got to get out of this business.

I've got to go lay some pipe. I'll be right back. That's like an obvious one. You're going to the bathroom. I'm seeing this girl, we've started to lay pipe. I just think, I think there's something there. I think it's real. The pipeline is so ‑‑ there's miles of it.

It's all copper. It's amazing. It's copper wire everywhere. So he's clearly ‑‑ sucks. And then also telling her that he's also telling his friends he's using her to advance his plan to steal the bulk of Ted's fortune including the silver, et cetera. So when Ted has to get a new place to hide his shit, he hires Rick to help construct a new vault.

It's a concrete bunker, 12 feet deep, built on the desert floor on a piece of property he owned in Parup. Parup. Parup. I don't know. I'm just saying what I think they're saying. Parup. Got it.

I only need to scream it at me four times. Parup. But I do know it's 60 miles west of Las Vegas. Can you imagine? What's the after parties there tonight? We're going to have a rave. We drive out there to Parup, lay some pipe. I had to say it.

I had no choice. It's the thing we were talking about two minutes ago. It's called a call back. I'm stuck. I'm stuck in this. Okay. So the bunker, which sounds awesome, contains tons of silver bullion, horseshoe casino chips, paper currency, and more than 100,000 rare coins including Carson City silver dollars,

many in mint condition. I don't know what that means. Really nice. Washed. Not mint, but Carson City. I know what mint means. Oh, oh. I mean, I understand that you wouldn't think I did based on my track record.

It was just the sentence construction. That's all. Came at the end. Estimated to be worth up to $14 million in this fucking vault. And so the only people who had the combination are Ted and this fucking bad guy, Rick. Bad Will Ferrell. Bad Will Ferrell. So Bad Will Ferrell becomes a regular visitor at the Binion household.

He said he fell in love with Sandy. This is after the treasure is sealed in this underground bunker. Ted revises his will. The bulk of his estate is $30 million worth it. Worth that. He's going to go to his daughter, deleted the names of a bunch of people, and bequeath Sandy $300,000. Oh, that's a slap in the face.

Because sure he has a $100,000 car. That's a lot of fucking money, though. No, it is a lot. It's not enough. Well, I think what she wants, she wants to be living that, you know, silver bullion life. Right. Right.

Oh, but also his home and all of its contents. That's weird. Do you think his daughter would want to fucking keep sake? Maybe it was all like a daffodil yellow or something she could handle. Remade the whole thing. It's like marble flooring and stuff. I don't know. What's nice?

Marble countertops? Yeah. Marble's nice. Okay, Sandy, I don't know. I'm really, I feel like my brain is, okay. And then, so by this time, though, and maybe this is why the relationship had started to go real shitty, Sandy and Ted slept in separate rooms and Sandy barely hit her affair with Rick.

So on September 17th, 1998, six months after losing his gaming license, Sandy calls the police saying, my husband is not breathing, and then the connection was lost. Paramedics found Ted Binyon in his den lying on a yoga mat, empty bottle of Xanax besides him, dead. The autopsy and toxicology reports show that he had died of a lethal dosage combination of Xanax and heroin. With traces of valium. Yay.

Wow. That's so many drugs. Someone just went, woo! Keep an eye on her. Just a little one. Yeah. Come on! The day before Binyon had himself purchased 12 pieces of tar heroin from a street drug

dealer and had earlier gotten a prescription from his next-door neighbor, a doctor for Xanax and had gotten it himself. So he had purchased all those drugs on his own. So they thought that maybe it was an accidental overdose or on purpose. But Las Vegas homicide detectives thought that the scene looked staged. His body didn't show typical signs of a drug overdose. Also his stomach contained heroin, and the police thought that an addict nor suicide would take heroin.

You don't eat heroin, right? You do not eat heroin. It's not like pot. You can't make heroin brownies. Someone in the audience is like, actually you can. I mean, I didn't know that. I mean, I wouldn't have tried it. I just feel like eating it isn't the ideal way to take heroin.

If you want to shoot it into your eye, that's good, but eating it won't work. So then, yeah, that's really suspicious, right? I think so. Okay. So what prosecutors ended up believing is that Rick restrained Ted with handcuffs or thumb cuffs while Sandy mixed, I know. Is that real? I was in the article.

I didn't make it up. I think we need to get a pair of thumb cuffs and see how, if they really work. I can't even picture it. It seems like a dumb party game that if it happened at a party I was at, I would get really mad. I don't think they would have picked you for the jury after this. They were like, how do you feel about thumb cuffs? Is that the fucking game that people keep playing?

Ma'am, we're going to need you to ‑‑ Ma'am, you're dismissed from society. So then they said that Sandy mixed up the heroin and stuff in a glass and forced him to drink it and then that he was smothered. So this is the fucking weirdest thing I've ever seen. The wine glass disappeared. They could never find that wine glass. The prosecutors have a videotape, film the following day of the crime scene, you know. And I guess it shows Sandy removing a wine glass from the kitchen counter and dropping

it into her handbag. On the police tape. And I was like, is this real? Because I only saw in one article. I couldn't find the video. And it's just like, well, then clearly ‑‑ And she did it like ‑‑ she did that with her mouth as she took the wine glass away. She has like a mask on.

A black and white stripe shirt. All tiptoes. Plink, plink, plink, plink, plink, plink, plink, plink, plink, plink, plink, plink. Yeah. Like, honey, wait until the cameras pointed elsewhere. But also, wouldn't videotape cop be like, pardon me, you're not allowed to do that? I'm pretty sure. Yeah.

Lots of questions on that. Okay. It might not be even real, but I had to include it because ‑‑ I love it. Great visual. Just kind of like ‑‑ Also, like, smash immediately in your purse. You would have to get, like, a very specific purse. Yeah. But ‑‑ okay.

So I guess a large amount of cash and jewelry we were missing from the house, a $300,000 collection of rare coins and currency that Ted had kept in his den were gone, and two days after Ted Binyon was found dead, sheriff's deputies found Rick Tabish, so I can ‑‑ Will Ferrell, and two other men unearthing the silver from the vault, like also with eye masks and fucking tiptoes. Two days. Two days. Just hold on the vault for fucking six months.

He ‑‑ and they were like, no, he told us to do it, but he was arrested and then he was bailed out by Sandy with a Mercedes Benz 500 SL convertible and five pieces of jewelry as collateral. Oh. That are probably worth more than something. Yeah. A lot. The Binyon estate hired a private investigator because nobody believed that he had done it

on purpose or even on accident, and so he turned up a trail of cellular phone conversations and secret meetings between Rick and Sandy as well as evidence that they had told people about the plot to kill Ted, so they were like, Bolivity Blabbing all over town. Oh, guys. Yeah. But it wasn't until about ten months later in June of 1999, when I turned 19, after it was a special day. Describe one outfit.

I did it. I wore, like, low‑rise, like, old man pants that, like, went down to the hip real low with, like, one of those belts that has the buckle that you, like, you know, like a buckly belt. Yeah, yeah. Crop top. Okay. Real tiny.

Just, like, super skinny. Like, a cat collar with rhinestones, barrettes, very, like, homeless? No, like, emo, girl. Wait, I've seen that picture ‑‑ is that that picture where you're ‑‑ it's, like, from below and it's, like, really long? That's her. You looked pretty cool. Thank you.

Ninety‑nine, I had stopped drinking and I was just mad all the time. But then ‑‑ ten months. The corner changes, Ted's cause of death, from suicide to homicide, Sandy and Rick are arrested and charged with murder and conspiracy to commit murder and or robbery. The prosecution was purely circumstantial, relying heavily on the testimony of pathologist Michael M. Baden. He testified the two small red lesions on Ted's chest indicated ‑‑ are you ready for this?

But he had died as a result of birking. Do you know what birking is? Oh, no. I did not need to know what this was. It's a technique in which one person obstructs the victim's nose and mouth while the other person sits on their chest to suffocate them. My sister did that to me every day after school. What's it called when they dangle spit over your face and you turn away and then it goes

into your fucking ear? Sorry, it's not about me. But isn't it ‑‑ Birking owes its name to William Burke, who along with the partner used the method. The partner was like, why couldn't it be called fucking Thomasing or whatever his last name was? Smithing. What did I get it?

Yeah. They used the method to kill women in the 19th century Scotland so the corpses could be sold for dissection. Oh, Birkin hair. Yeah. What? You're so smart. That doesn't have the same ring.

I agree with them. I've heard those people, of those people. Shit. Okay, so he's killed in a really kind of weird ‑‑ like they think it's going to be ‑‑ no one's going to catch on to it. That's what the rescuers are saying. Another key witness, attorney James Brown, testified that Binyon called him the day before his death to change the terms of his will.

He said that quote, he said, quote, take Sandy out of the will if she doesn't kill me tonight. If I'm dead, you'll know what happened. Wow. Right. So, clearly, the jury found Murphy and Tabish, Sandy and Rick, guilty of first degree murder and conspire ring to seal Silver Bullion. Jesus. Conspire ring?

Conspicer ring. You know. Making it spicy. They're spicy enough. You make a plan while you're listening to the Spice Girls. Exactly. Okay, so, at 28 years old, Sandy was sentenced to at least 22 to years in prison on 12 counts. The judge said she had committed, quote, the ultimate betrayal.

Which they should have called the man for TV movie that. That you're exactly right. The ultimate betrayal is an amazing title. Yeah. I'm sure it's taken. But you know what? So is sex and lies and ‑‑ in the video tape ‑‑ was it Matthew Modine in that? Yes.

Sex, lies and video tape? Yeah. James Spader. Thank you. Thank you. James Spader. Gene Chalets here, everybody. Oh, shit.

Rick was sentenced to 25 years to life. But in 2003, so more than three years after her conviction, the Nevada Supreme Court ruled that the trial was unfair because Judge Bonaventure, cool name, had made two errors. First, he had included an unrelated charge in the trial. Okay. So basically, Rick Tabish had tortured a businessman to get him to work in his business, which is fun. That's one way to do it.

And he allowed ‑‑ so basically they were tried together, but he was being tried for other stuff at the same time. So they shouldn't have been tried together is what they were arguing. And then also our friend James Brown's statement about the will, they couldn't say that because the jury should have been considered as an offering of insight and dominion state of mine and not evidence as Sandy wanting him dead. Something like that. It's not ‑‑ yeah.

Him saying it doesn't mean it's going to happen. Right. So ‑‑ and then as for the Birking testimony, several experts are called to testify that the marks on his chest were probably just dermatitis or even skin cancer or even a burn from a cigarette rather than buttons being pressed into the skin. So then on November 23rd, 2004, the jury acquitted Sandy and Rick of the murder. Rick stayed in prison on extortion charges until 2010 where he remained looking like our friend Will Farrell.

And he's here tonight. Ladies and gentlemen. My goodness. Okay. No. So they're out. So Ted Benion had millions in and around his Las Vegas home, all of which were ‑‑ Hid?

Hid. He hid fucking money. Trasier? Trasier. All of which went missing after his death. It's rumored to be buried on the property under odd mounds in the front and back yards. And that's it. That's the story of the murder of Ted Benion.

My God. There are so many things to love in that story. But the fact that he went out having buried money makes me love him more than I've ever loved anyone in my family. That's the best. He's like, enjoy yourself from the next 50 years trying to find my doubloons. Yeah. Have fun with it.

Fucking love it. Yeah. Benions. Have fun with your murder. Benions. All right. Do we have time for ‑‑ I think we do. Downtown?

I think you're ‑‑ it's still you. I think we should start 2018 fresh. Are you sure? Yeah. Too much pressure? Yeah, way too much pressure. Okay. Well, we're going to just tell you a couple.

And I know a lot of you know this already. It's yelling won't help. Here's a couple rules. You can't be so drunk that you can't tell your own story. Buzz is fine, but you have to be able to deliver. It's good when it's local, as people want to hear about stuff that's happened here. Nevada. We don't care.

God, your voice ‑‑ I hope you're in the theater because your voice was clear as a bell. It was amazing. Karen, is there any other rules? No. Fucking killer. Can we have the lights come up just a tiny bit, if that's possible? Karen's picking.

So I have nothing to do with this. Blue in the blue shirt. Yes. Yeah. Blue. Yeah, yeah, yeah. There's this. Thank you.

That's good with the lights. Oh, my God. Look how big this room is. Hi. What? Right over here. It's crazy. Who is it?

Where? That way. To this. Don't bring a bunch of fucking people. Jesus, do you see this? Come on. You guys. What did you see?

I didn't see the person. She's over there. Hi. I'm not sure. Oh, here we go. Oh. Hi. Oh, there we go.

Sorry. What's your name? Sarah. Sarah and Brenda. Brenda. Brenda. Yes. She's okay.

Oh, my God. Then go. Okay. What's your story? Oh, my God. Where are you from? We are from ‑‑ We're from the state of Jefferson, if anyone knows where that is.

Northern California. Oh, okay. In a small town called Weirica. Oh, yeah. Okay. And our hometown murder is none other than your favorite Jody Eris. Who? Jody?

Oh, shit. Yeah. Oh, shit is right. Because she ‑‑ we're from a kind of large family. We have four brothers, three of which have had sexual relations with one or more of the ‑‑ oh, two. Two. Two.

Not a four. Of the areas is? Oh, my God. So anyway, so I'll let you tell the story because you actually wrote the hometown. The email. The email. Okay. You know more than I do.

Fuck. I can't believe this is happening right now. This is so surreal. So stand up and just appeal. Everybody, your name. My name is Brenda. And yes, I did write an email about Jody, okay. Our brother, Buzz, dated Jody for his sophomore year of high school.

They were together less than a year, and if you watch the trial of Jody, she talked about how she wanted Travis to come back to Wairika, and they were going to go up to this area in Wairika called Greenhorn. Well, we lived right next to Greenhorn, and she actually did that shit with our brother. Wow. Yes. Like obsessive, like stalking and all that. Just teenage, they were dating, they were teenagers.

They would take a blanket, camera, go up, oh, we're going to go hiking up on the trails of Greenhorn. They would go up there and do that. Do what specifically? Sexual stuff, probably fingering. I don't think my brother ever tied her up to a tree like she wanted Travis to do, but that was her pattern. And after they broke up, she was still very much infatuated with our brother.

She would go out of her way to see him, talk to him, whatever. Our brother, Buzz, is now married to her cousin. They've been married for ten years, they have four beautiful children together. Yes. It's a small town. It's a small town. Go to younger brother. Okay.

Meanwhile. Oh, that's a later story. Okay. Tony, Tony is two years older than Buzz. He's kind of a dirtbag. Cool. And being a small town, there were several girls that both Buzz and Tony slept with throughout high school, and I think that was part of the reason Jody connected with Tony, because

she wanted to make Buzz jealous, that kind of thing, bad stuff. After high school, after teenage years, 2008, Jody moved away from Yreka. She was doing the whole, she had met, actually she met Travis here in Las Vegas in 2006. So it kind of comes full circle, but 2008, she's moving from Las Vegas, Mesa, Arizona. She's kind of going all over, but she always comes back to Yreka to see her family. And our brother Joel, he's a tattoo artist. He has a tattoo shop right next to a restaurant that Jody's parents have there in Yreka. And they become acquaintances, talk to each other, Jody's very drawn to Joel because of

the history with our family, and because he's artistic, but Joel never screwed Jody ever. I swear, he didn't. But she did start dating his roommate. And this was literally during the time where she was coming back and forth. And actually, the roommate was asked to testify or give a statement. All those pictures of Jody were, you know, she's here in Yreka, and the roommate was on those. Oh, God.

Yeah. Like, that's how close it was. But anyway. So, Jody. And my other brother. So, Jody. Will you get there? The roommate.

Okay. Jody's dating the roommate. She comes to Yreka. The roommate and Joel and Jody go, they're hanging out. They're going out. They go to the one bar in Yreka. They go to the one bar in Yreka. And for some reason, Jody is very much gravitated towards our brother.

And she was going to stay the night at their apartment that they shared. And Joel's like, okay, are you going to stay, blah, blah, blah. And she's like, no, I have to go back to Arizona. I have to go to a funeral. Whoa. Before? Yeah. Well, she says, I have to go back to a funeral because my really good friend, he was just

murdered. Oh, my God. And of course, Joel, he's like, whoa, wow. Oh, my gosh. I'm so sorry. That's horrible. And she's like, yeah, he was brutally murdered. She gives graphic details of he was stabbed.

They think it was somebody he knew, blah, blah, blah. I had to give DNA. Like the police questioned me. Like I just got back from being interrogated. And of course, my brother, he's like, are you a suspect? And she's like, no, no, this is just protocol. And they're just talking to everybody who, you know, close friends, blah, blah, blah. And my brother, he's like, oh, my gosh, I'm just so sorry.

And she's like, I don't want to talk about it anymore. And so she starts dancing and she's like, I want to sing karaoke. And he's like, okay. So she gets up, Jody fucking Arias, just about to go to her funeral for her good friend, Travis. And she gets up and she sings Patsy Cline, crazy. Crazy. Crazy.

That was amazing. Wow. Yeah. She fucking sings crazy. And two weeks later, she was arrested in Wairoika, California, my good friend. She lives in that house. My sister-in-law is her cousin. It's fucking small town Wairoika.

Thank you very much. You guys. Good job. Good job. That was horrible. That was horrible. That was horrible. That was horrible.

That was horrible. That was great. Great job. Great job. I know you hate that girl. That was amazing. I hate you. I hate you.

It's just fucking, that was some high level sister smack talking. You don't want to be the ex-girlfriend at that Thanksgiving. Oh shit. That was fun. This was fun. The first show of our 2018 tour. We're so fucking lucky. Oh my God.

And you guys, it's such a, we love doing this so much. But the idea that we put tickets on sale and then they sell out so fast people get angry at us is the most exciting thing that's ever happened in our lives. Thank you so much for, for getting the tickets, for waiting, for, you know, spending lots of money and everything. We are so, so grateful that this podcast gets to bring us here with you guys. We love it. The live shows, the live shows are the most fun.

So thanks for being a part of it tonight, you guys. And thank you for screaming for the longest any audience has ever screamed for us at the beginning of our, Las Vegas, Las Vegas, Nevada, stay sexy. And don't get rudder. Thanks you guys.