My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark - 187 - Live at the Toyota Music Factory in Irving (Texas)

Episode Date: September 12, 2019

Karen and Georgia cover the Texas Cheerleader Mom Murder Plot and the case of Vicky Lyons. With special guest Skip Hollandsworth. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

We at Wondery live, breathe and downright obsess over true crime and now we're launching the ultimate true crime fan experience, Exhibit C. Join now by following Wondery, Exhibit C on Facebook and listen to true crime on Wondery and Amazon Music, Exhibit C. It's truly criminal. What's up Dallas? I filmed you. Yeah. Now we have to pass out some consent form so everybody just a quick release. Hope you got pens. Look it, we're on a thing.

Ew, gross. Don't look, don't look at it. They can tell that my nails are what I'm calling Dalmatian. That's the new thing. I picked them all off. That's what happened really. You just, as you chip off black nail polish, you slowly become one of Cruella Deville's most coveted animals, the Dalmatian. You know. You know how it is. Hi friend. I mean, how's everyone doing? Thanks. I feel like this setup more than any we've ever done before really feels like we're about to sell people a time share. Doesn't it? Yeah. We got our little earpieces. It's real mega churchy in here right now. It's real open to Leviticus. 516 please. Quick question. Have

you heard the good word? Oh. Tell me. Speaking of. It's, guess what? Guess what the good word is promo code murder. That's right. Right? That reminds me. When we were on the plane two days ago, I was sitting, we like got last minute seats, so we were all in window seats, so I was in next event and I was next to some dude who wouldn't stop highlighting and writing in a book, which means that I was being constantly elbowed and I was really getting angry at it, about to turn and yell at him. And when I turn, it was the Bible. And I was like, shit, I can't scream at him. And then you looked into his face and it was Jesus Christ, our savior and Lord. I did taking an American flight real quick, real quick and extra leg room. He can bump it up for

that. That's right. That's it. And I screamed in his face. No, I did it. I just said, excuse me, and I asked to do next events and he tried with me. So do you want to fucking window seat? And he was like, yeah. And then, and then I see the two of them getting along super well. The Bible guy and this new guy and I was like, oh, I'm a fucking terrible person. Oh, it's me. You know, the guy that you asked to sit in your seat, it turns out that his parents always neglected his left arm, just would not touch it, wouldn't touch it, hated it, told him it was ugly and bad. Boom. Here's this guy rubbing up against it from the word go. So I basically, like I'm the best person in the world. Yeah, you are. Absolutely is the moral of this story is

that was actually a meet cute at the beginning of a movie you're not starring in. It's their movie. It's not your movie. Oh, come on. Hey, I have to right now in front of everybody, thank Georgia, because I as I always will, there always be a little bit of outfit drama for me before we do these shows, mostly because subconsciously, I do not want to have to put on the Spanx military grade body armor that I'm wearing right now. I hate it. I'm a little bum real quick side note about your Spanx military grade, because like we had a thing for a little while where I was helping her get into it. And it was like kind of this fun bonding thing for me. Because I love like, to me, that's like, if you show your friend your undergarments, like that's friendship. Right.

So like we did a thing and then you realize especially when you're kind of you weirdly are shaping in a way that you, well, here's the deal. And I was livid for, I don't know, I guess the last five months we've been on tour, because I was like, I would pull it up and then it would stop right at like this chunk of back fat where I'm like, first of all, I didn't know that was there. Secondly, clearly they make these for women who have rolls of fat on their back. So why in God's name would you have to give yourself carpal tunnel to get the thing up onto your body? Yeah. I was so angry, you're sweating, sweating like a nut. And then I have to pull in Georgia to be like, I need you to pull up the back of my girdle. And I'm like, so excited about it pushing our way

into the bathroom. Well, last night I discovered that I just had everything on the tightest possible thing. Like I had it all on small and then I just unhooked it for and I was like, I don't need you anymore. I'm sad. I didn't realize I thought it bugged you. No, I love it. Okay, we should talk about stuff more. Let's talk about things. So I usually, I usually, I usually will leave one thing behind so that maybe there's a chance that I just get to wear sweats on stage. That's always my subconscious is working at all times to be like, well, I guess you better just wear those sweats you wore here. So I unpack my stuff tonight. And I'm like, Oh, fuck, I forgot my tights. And George was like, you can have mine. And I was like, fuck, okay, that'd be great. Actually,

that's gonna look really cute. Oh, I should have said no. No, you shouldn't have. They look great. Come on, we're in Dallas doing a show. And I fall backwards and break my back. Is this a new pop of color Karen? Because like, I think this is great. I think by this summertime, I'm going to be wearing red and yellow polka dots. And I'm going to be fucking, my golf days will be behind me. Starting with these purple tights. But do you remember on our first tour ever, I had to borrow tights from you then and I still have them in my drawer hot pink tights. Oh my God. 2016. That's right. We go back three fucking years. Thank you. Thank you so much. We've laughed. We've grown. We love I've taken two full pairs of Georgia's tights. And

that's how you know something. You know something. How about your outfit? Oh, this is this. Yeah, bow to your partner. Did I just show you my underwear? Did you really? And it was on the big screen. Oh, no, I was wearing tights the last two nights. I did that and no one saw my ass. Can we roll that tape back on the big screen please? No, never again. Shit. I blame the murderer who gave me this dress. Sarah Duke from fucking Canada. I'm coming for you. You're going to blame her. Yeah, it's her fault. How do you figure? Listen, because look, A B and C. She should have sewn in kick pants. That's right. That's fucking right. Sarah,

where are the bicycle shorts? I demanded that you sew into my dress. I can't stop looking up there now. Okay, I'm going to look away. You should take a selfie of yourself in front of that screen. Don't you think? I do. Should I send it to my dad? That's weird. My dad texted and said, have fun in insert city tonight because he just doesn't know where we are. I like to afford my dad the itinerary that Vince sends us. Vince Averill, who's our tour manager and Georgia 's husband. Thank you. You do that? Yeah. Oh, I thought neither of us opened the itinerary. You know, who opens the itinerary? Jim Kilgariff. And he's very interested. So he will basically read the email very thoroughly. He knows exactly when I land and take off now.

So like, I'll be walking like down the out of the corridor to get off the plane and immediately get a text. How was the flight? Where it's like, eww. But then he also loves to look up the theater and then just tell me, he'll be like, Karen, tonight there's 4,500 seats in that theater. Tell me about what I'm about to go do. I love that between Vince and Jim, like, and they have similar personalities. They just got everything covered. We don't have to think about a thing. Except for our underpants and underwear and not showing them to the whole world. Look, sex cells, and that's what we're here to do tonight. Because ladies and gentlemen, we have some exciting timeshares in Mazatlan that we think are perfect for your family and a relative, a weird relative

that has money. Jesus loves them. Have you heard about Jesus? He loves them. I wonder if there's anyone that sells timeshares during like a mass or at some kind of a church service. They've got to. If you've got to combine those two, just because people are busy these days. A lot of people have two and three jobs. They don't have time to do like a Saturday, timeshare, Sunday mass. Yeah. I call it mass. It's not, it's not a mass. A temple, combine them, all of us, all non-denomination. Just a hang. Let's call it a religious hang. Speaking of, this is my, this is my favorite part of the podcast. Nice transition. Really nice transition. Thank you. This is Karen Kilgaran. This is Georgia Hardstark.

Thank you. Thank you. You remember from the underwear earlier. Steven's here under here. No. No. No. We left him at home. Steven's at home, a head engineering, the exactly right podcast network. That's right. That's right. They gave us a podcast network. They just were like, do you want one? We're like, yeah. Yeah, we'll have Steven run it. You know what I just realized? What's this? I put a pin on my dress tonight because the last two nights I've been flashing my bra on accident because I'm not used to cleavage happening. And then I showed everyone my fucking underwear. I know. Just start streaking at the beginning of every show. I think it's what you want. I guess. It's natural.

Is it? It's not. It isn't. Should we sit down? Should we? Well, are we good enough to? I don't know. Are we mid-century modern enough to? I mean, where are they from? Anderson Cooper's house. Oh my god. These are... Oh, they don't spin. They don't spin. You have to manually turn them anytime you want to. I better... Okay, let's cheat out then. Let's do it. There we go. Oh yeah. These are cushy. Good stuff. Are you spinning in your chair? A little bit. Oh, wait a second. This fits my butt perfectly. Oh. Thank you. Good job, Dallas. Here's your extra towel. And then there's... Is this one mine? That's yours. Last night we were at a venue that had box suites for people who were ticket holders.

Yeah, so we had to give them the extra-long speech of what this is, but they stayed. I feel bad for seasoned ticket holders at shows that we go do, because as you probably have heard us tell the story if you listen to the podcast, and then if you don't, I'll get to you in a minute, but there have been times, and I think the last time it wasn't in Austin, where there were two women who showed up at our show, yeah, and they were seasoned ticket holders for that theater, and they were led to believe or put together that what they were about to see was the sequel to Phantom of the Opera. Yeah. And they... It's not. Oh, yeah, that's what you're here for. First of all, ends when the Phantom of the Opera ends. There's no other part. But the reason we know that is

because the murdering is sitting next to them, and the audience caught wind of it more like, this is the best thing of all time. And then told us in the meet and greet... I want my money back. Yeah, I would be devastated, actually. But then there was another time where... And I think those ladies ended up staying and liking it, which is a miracle. But then there was another time where there were a couple of seasoned ticket holders who thought they would love the show because they thought it was a murder mystery dinner theater. It's not. It's not, you guys. We serve dinner. I hope you guys like pot roast. I made one small pot roast in the back. Everyone gets a tiny piece. But tell them what this really is. Oh, okay. But actually, what this is for the people who have

been dragged along here by their mates, friends, spouses, or neighbors, which doesn't stop happening. This is a... If you don't know, this is a true crime comedy podcast. There's some people who immediately flinch at that title. They don't like it, and they're offended by it, and they think it's wrong that you would combine the worst thing that could happen in life, which is murder or violent crime and comedy. And so this is the part where we explain that George and I have always been interested in true crime since we were very young. But we also have coped with the heavy, terrible shit in life with humor. And so because of that, our conversations about these things are usually infused with humor. And of course, we have respect. It's like you have to listen to the podcast and

know who we are to get it. The thing is, what we're saying is, if you're offended, we cordially now invite you to get the fuck out. Seriously. Except for the ushers. Not the ushers who can't leave. They can't leave. And, you know, and they're right to be mad, actually. It isn't fair. We forgot to tell the story of getting picked up this afternoon. So we get picked up at the hotel by someone who works at the venue and brings us over where Vince has been setting things up and dealing with shit. And so I call the guy when I'm out front of the hotel and I'm like, Hey, I'm here. I don't see your van. And he is quiet for a minute. And then he goes, Are you performing tonight? And I'm like, Yeah, hi, it's Georgia. I'm performing

tonight. And he goes, Oh, be right there. And I see a van fucking speed in a minute, a couple minutes later, speed in and to you guys fucking tumbled out of the fucking van. These two drunks roll out of the van. He picked up the wrong two girls. You know what? Here's the thing though. They all look the same. Seriously. I see it. Dark hair, everything. And they're like, we're coming tonight. And we're like, don't know what's going on. I was baffled. I had just walked out of the hotel and I was like, wait, are we getting into a shuttle bus? I don't what is this? And these girls are like, Hey, yeah, we were there. But now we're here is just like, holy fuck, what's happening? Are we doing

are we having a show with more than two people tonight? And then he goes, I just said to them, are you guys going to the theater? And they said, Yeah, so I let them in. And then he was at the stoplight when I called and he's like, Are you doing the show tonight? And turned to them and go, Are you guys not doing the show? They're like, Do we have to do the show? Okay, we can. I just anybody could seriously. It's really think you've caught on to that by now. I mean, probably better. I just wish that he had delivered to random women events would have been like, wow, this is not a pre party. What is not my beautiful way? This is not my beautiful theater in Irving, Texas. It's exciting. We both have clickers. Oh my God, our own clickers.

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It's me. So I've decided to use the loophole in the fact that we are not actually in Dallas proper but we're right outside in Irving, Texas. And using that as an excuse, I'm going to do one of my very favorite true crime stories ever, the Texas cheerleader mom murder plot. Wow. This one, I mean, this one, guys. Shit. It's got everything. I don't think I know the details. Really? Maybe you should tell them to me. I think I'm going to do for eight fucking pages. Okay. But I talk fast and the print is very large. Mine's short and depressing. So do your thing. Okay. Perfect. We like to end on a down note. That's right. That's how we do. Okay. So because we're here in Texas and this is how we do it,

the main research, the article that I read that got most of the research and most of this color and amazing background is from Texas Monthly. Of course. It's so rude that you guys would keep this magazine to yourselves for so long. We've only known about it for like a year and it sucks. It was written by a writer named Mimi Swartz who's amazing and talented. There's also an article by Gwendolyn Knapp who actually was the author of the article I used last night as well. She writes for Houstonia.com. Was she the one when the girl in the front goes, she's here? And I go, she's here? And she goes, no. Yeah. That sucks. That's why I say, do not talk to them. Okay. Okay. People fucking with you in the front row. Not cool. Just kidding. Anywhere.

Go ahead. Go ahead. Do what you're soon to say. So let's just start with the subject of this amazing story, Ms. Wanda Holloway. Yes. Holy shit. Those are some fashion forward nails if I've ever seen any and eyebrows and the ring. Now here's the thing about Wanda. If you were like two days late for your license or registration renewal, this bitch would shut you down at the DMV so fast. I cannot even tell you. Wow. This is the woman who asks for the manager and then fires the manager and becomes the manager. That's Wanda Holloway. Is that the secret? Wow. That's the secret. It's the law of attraction and firing people where you don't work. And of course, the classic red flag that we all know, the eternal red flag, which is incredibly over plucked eyebrows.

You know, you're dealing with a real, a real personality if that's what you're looking at. And I say that non-judgmentally as a person who entirely decimated my own eyebrows during the 90s. They were like Claraboe with just one hair going along. It almost looked like a dot-to-dot over my eyes. Like, these are these used to be. Fill it in if you want to. Oh, that's so depressing, the one hair. Like it's worse than when you just shave it off and draw them on. Yeah, like still trying. Because, well, to my point, I was on speed. So red flag, right? You know, stay away from me. I'll steal your cigarettes right out of your purse. So we're just painting the picture for you. Okay, so she was born Wanda Webb. She was born in 1954. And she was raised

in a city called Channelview, Texas, which is the third character in this, or I guess fifth, but in this story, it's just east of the Houston metro area. And it is an unabashedly rough working class, mostly white community. So Mitzi Swartz starts this article off with this description of Channelview. Quote, when the cold, steady winter rain starts to fall, as it did unrelentingly last January, Channelview seems drenched in a dingy futility. The only color seems to be the perilous orange of the refinery gas flares. At the Dell Dale Highway Exit, a white elephant rearing about the flea market. Are we drove by that? Oh, yeah. About the flea market looks hopelessly grimy. And off the road, the rain soaks the yards of the tract and trailer homes to a

dirty brown. In such weather, people lose their resolve. In the Baptist temples, they turn to hymns of salvation, but do not keep time with the melody. In the pawn shops, I know, did not get you like, oh, fuck. That's right. And that's why I say white people do not clap. If you're at a concert and someone starts going like this, you keep your hands right where they are. No one needs your bullshit help. Back to Mimi Swartz. In pawn shops, they hawk their baby furniture, stub out their cigarettes, and think about looking for work out of town. Winter in Channelview can bring menace and breed hopelessness to qualities with which Wanda Holloway, who had spent most of her life here, was more than well acquainted. Fuck, Mitzi. I mean, Mimi. Sorry, Mimi. And you know

what? I just want to say, though, but don't let that stop you from this amazing opportunity of a timeshare in Channelview. Doesn't that make you want to? Because if you just hawk a little more baby furniture, you, too, can have a beachside retreat. Oh, wow. Plea market side retreat in Channelview. And then later on in the article, she quotes a criminal attorney named Mike Ramsey, who said, God created Channelview so people of Pasadena would have some place to look down on. Man. Local jokes get local work. Am I right? We don't know what that means. I don't know what it means. It sounds mean. Where we're from, Pasadena is a very rich area. So we don't, doesn't really translate. And also, she later mentions that the welcome sign of the city of

Channelview. Oh, my God. It's like they're welcome like Channelview population, whatever it is. And then it says, don't mess with Channelview. Okay, first of all, you stole that from your state. So shut the fuck up. And secondly, I'm fucking a mess channel is shut up. Okay. So drunk Karen lives in Channelview. Drunk Karen would thrive in channel. It's true. The mayor of Channelview drunk Karen would be swinging her purse in Channelview and making friends all over the flea market. I can't wait. I may retire there. Okay, so Wanda grows up in Channelview on the south side of town. Okay, bad. Okay. Okay. In this town, her father Clyde is a tester at a concrete plant and her mother works in the high school

cafeteria. A tester like taste test with the concrete. It's too salty. That's a shitty job. His mouth is always a little bit open. Both parents are strict conservatives. Wanda is an ambitious overachieving child who excels in school, particularly later on in high school in her business classes. But what she really wants more than anything else in the world, as you may have guessed, is to be a cheerleader. Okay. I mean, me too. But all of this so far, right? None of it. Oh, well, you know, what's this made me think of is when my niece Nora was in preschool, we went to like an open house at the preschool and they had pictures of all the little kids on the wall. They're a bunch of four year

olds. And then it said like the name and like their favorite animal and what they wanted to be when they grew up. And we were walking down and reading all the different, you know, hopes, high hopes and dreams of the kids. And we get to my niece Nora's and it says Nora, you know, cat. And then I want to be a cheerleader. And my sister's like, Oh, my fucking God, where did this come from? She had no idea. It's not like Nora was like around the house doing it was just like out of the blue. And then the whole family gave my sister shit for so long. It's like great job with Nora's big dreams of being a professional cheerleader. And then not that there's anything wrong with that. And then

could you imagine if we made a bunch of professional cheerleaders mad? They would make a cheer about it. That'd be so sad. They would fucking, they would make a pyramid to the sky. That's right. Of rage, a rage pyramid. That's a best pyramid or rage pyramid. Yeah, I mean, I'll flip down off of it. Landstab us. Wanda's greatest dream in life was to become a cheerleader, but her ultra conservative parents forbid her to try out her father says that he thinks the uniforms are skimpy and harsh. Judgy, right? And this is also 1971, where they're a little bulky actually, and very generous. Yes. Although I hear in channel view, they had, it was gold lame tube tops and Daisy Dukes, but

we don't know. That was just a gossip. Okay, so with that, Wanda's cheerleading dream dies on the vine. It's clearly the inciting incident in Wanda's life story. And for good reason. Here, we're back to Mimi Swartz in her article that's, if you can read it, it's the most beautifully written poetic and yet informative, amazing. It's like that kind of thing where you're getting the actual story of the people as opposed to what's on the front of like people magazine, which is all you got with this story. So she says, quote, those who dismiss cheerleading as trivial and vapid miss its essential and enduring reality, that it is still one of the best ways a young woman can advance herself socially, not just in school, but beyond. If it remains important

in a place like Plano, where a child can have many options, it is it is doubly. So in a place like channel view, where feminine beauty is short lived and harshness is the norm, she is just fucking tearing everyone up in this article. She's well, she's she's describing what she sees, but she's doing it in a way that's like, did she just insult me? I can't tell because that was so beautiful. Yeah. Did you just put your cigarette out and cigarette out in my drink? That's kind of cool. So essentially, her not becoming a cheerleader becomes this tiny, but malignant tumor in her brain. I'm trying to act like Mimi Swartz and I'm not okay. So Wanda graduates from high school

in 1971. Sure, her idea was that she was going to pursue an education in business, but in 1972, at the age of 18, she quits that and she marries a guy named Tony Harper, who she had known for most of her life. Together, they have two kids, Shane, who was born in 1973 and Shanna, who was born in 1977. Then Wanda Wanda gets a job as a secretary. She plays piano at their church, and she's a well regarded member of the channel view community and lifelong. And the locals describe her as a lovely person and then the words of her daughter's junior high school principal, quote, very, very refined, speaks good English and is beautifully attired. Sign the principal. The junior high, that's weird. Can you be like,

mom, I think the principal's into you. Oh, did you hear her English? Yeah, she's from here. What do you? It's not that big of a deal. In 1980, Wanda and Tony get a divorce. Wanda gets the house and the primary custody of the kids. And she briefly remarries an older, wealthier man from Beaumont. Hey girl. That's all right. That ends quickly. Her third marriage is to another older, wealthy man named C.D. Holloway, who owns his own oil field service company. So they stay living in Wanda's house, which is what the kids are used to, but C.D. is rich. And so he has money to buy Wanda everything she could ever want. Sounds fun, right? Money's kind of great. It's like, don't get it twisted. So the thing is though, as I have said and described, or the Mimi has,

that's not what channel view is about. So most people who live there work at the petrochemical plants. They all essentially make the same amount of money because they all work in the same places. Taste testing the oil, right? And they're like, mm-hmm. And if they have any more money than that, they do not show it. Just everyone just kind of like, it keeps to the status quo. But Wanda goes ahead and shows her and because her money because she loves it. And so slowly, but surely, the locals start to think that Wanda is becoming pretentious. Oh, just a major sin. So in 1983, when Shana is five years old, Wanda buys her her first cheerleading uniform and signs her up for intensive gymnastic classes. Oh, so here's Shana. No, she's a little baby. Yeah. So that's a

baby. Her mom's got a plan. Getty images. Yeah. So Wanda is in a very intense cheerleading stage, mom. She makes her daughter practice when she's sick and when she's injured. Five. Fun, because it's fun. That's fun. And that's what no, she loves it. She loves doing it. Oh my God, she loves to suffer. That's what she's always like. But Shana, of course, loves her mom. It's the thing that they do together, you know, and she so she's wants to do that with her and she sticks it out to make her mom happy. Then Wanda gets Shana into private cheerleading lessons, private cheerleading lessons away from others in the studio. They're all like, we know because we're from Texas, but we're like, we're from California. What the fuck? My parents smoke pot and hung out. I only ever took public

cheerleading lessons right on the sidewalk. She also signs her up to do some modeling at the San Jacinto Mall. And she regularly forces her to wear matching mother daughter outfits. That's the scariest factoid in this story. Probably one step over the line. Yeah, really great. Break that kid's back. Wait a minute. Wait a second. Matching sweaters? No. That includes matching mother daughter cheerleading costumes. Okay, look, everybody has different interests. Everybody likes different things. And everybody has different holes in their heart that they are trying to constantly fill with stuff like beer and cheerleading costumes. So stop judging. Thank you. Thanks. That's the one. That's the one. I just, what I do is I close my eyes and I just let it

come through me. It's beautiful. Thank you so much. I would buy time share there. Would you? Yeah. In that channel? In that part of your soul. I'm just saying that song. I'm gonna start fucking selling time shares in there. Show business. Okay, in 1989, Shanna tries out for her seventh grade cheerleading squad at Alice Johnson Jr. High and doesn't make the cut. What? Yeah. Oh, there were some bitches in that fucking team who were like, no, right? Right. Because she was great. Probably. Here's what's crazy as I'm reading this story. The way they pick their cheerleaders is you audition and you have to make a cut. And then there's a couple too many cheerleaders. And then the school votes, the students vote on who the cheerleaders are going to be. Can we have a moment

of just talking about how fucking terrible school is? Yeah. So glad. Yeah. Can you imagine? I don't have to. It's like it was yesterday for me. Yeah. The idea that they would leave that just to the student body meanest people who do you like today? Vote on it. So so sorry. Tell me more. There it is. The problem with this situation. So of course, and obviously, Shanna is in this, you know what I mean? She's the one taking this fucking lesson. She's the one doing stuff and powering through it. So heartbreaking enough that she doesn't make the cut. That sucks. Yeah. And it's happened to all of us in some fucking different way. And it's horrifying. Meanwhile, they have a neighbor down the street and her name is Amber Heath.

And she does make the cut. And this makes Wanda fucking crazy. Because first of all, Amber wasn't going to that junior high when she tried out. And yeah, disqualified, right? Immediately. That's what Wanda said. And so once, oh, sorry, I missed this important and heartbreaking detail. Once you make the cut and before the voting, you campaign. You campaign. Here's how you should vote for me. And this is really important. Here's how you should vote for me. I can hurt you like a motherfucker. Anyway. This breaks my heart. So where you go? So Wanda tells everyone not to vote for Amber. The adult person in this situation, I believe she was 37 at the time, begins to tell children at a junior high, not to vote for another

child to be a motherfucking, hooray for the team on the field. The other seventh grade boys, let the women talk. The other boys, blah, blah, blah, blah, coming out over there. Truly. Yeah, they don't like that. Like the seventh grade boys playing football, the seventh grade girls yet cheering for them. It's intense. It's gone fully lord of the flies and everybody seems to be in on it. Okay. Oh, this is Shana when she's a little bit older. So this is not junior high. This is her as a teenager. Okay. That's her as secretary. Yeah. And this is Amber Heath when she's older as well. Okay. Got it. Who plays them in the made for TV movie? The last one was Chelsea Clinton. That's all I can tell you. Oh, I didn't know she was acting. She's acting and she's cheerleading

these days. Did you know? And she got a perm. Wanda goes around saying, Amber is an outsider. You shouldn't vote for her. Jesus Christ. How do you have time in your day? Okay. Now, Amber's mom, Verna, Verna Heath, who is from cheerleading stock herself, when Amber was going to try out, she helped Amber campaign by handing out flyers that said, vote for Amber, and then attaching a little peppermint candy to it. And that's adorable, isn't it? Yeah. So it was 1989. So that blew everyone's mind and they all voted for Amber and she made it onto the cheerleading spot. Oh my God, this thing you can get for free in every fucking shit restaurant in town. It's like, it's almost like a technological miracle. We're like,

holy shit. I didn't even think of this. Oh my God. We can have candy. Yeah. This is before things were actually marketed toward children in any way. It's like, it was all cigarettes and booze back then. Candy for me. Sure. I'll make your daughter cheerleader. So like Wanda Holloway, Verna Heath, Amber's mom is a also a fiercely ambitious and competitive person. The only difference is Verna was a cheerleader in high school and she was good at it. And she was from, as I said, stock because Verna's mother twirled baton. So these are fucking serious sports encourager people. Is that some DNA shit? That's past. It's hereditary. Okay. She's having a passion for those after school activities that won't help you get a job later.

So Verna had also signed Amber up at the same time in the same intense gymnastics classes that Shana trained at. So clearly when Amber wins out over Shana, Wanda actually interprets that as she's losing to Verna Heath. Here's a picture of Verna Heath. Pensive. Yeah. She's thinking about all the fucked up shit that's about to happen in this story. Yeah. Okay. Ready? Yeah. So the next year in 1990, Shana tries out for the junior high cheer squad again. And this time Wanda calls her ex-husband Tony for help. She says, you have to help me pay. You have to split the cost. We're going to get rulers and pencils engraved with the phrase, vote for Shana for cheerleader. And Wanda goes and passes them out to the students.

You know how children love school supplies? Yes. That's like their favorite thing. Yeah. Almost as much as peppermint candy. So the junior high tells Wanda she's not allowed to hand those out that it's against school policy. She hands them out anyway. You know she was going, walking around that school, shoving engraved rulers into the principal's face like, Verna handed out peppermint candy. Why is this any different? Of course. So she's warned not to do it. She does it anyway. She hands out the pencils. So crazy. She hands out the pencils and rulers. And then because she does that, she disqualifies Shana from being a cheerleader. Don't punish the kid because your mom's kind of a dick. Well, it's also, she's, this is how much she's lost

her way. Yeah. Because she's not doing the thing that's best for her child or the thing that's actually helping her child or moving her forward. Peppermints. She's just trying to, she's trying to fix it. Yeah. Trying to make herself feel better. Trying to win instead of. She's trying to win. Let her daughter cheer. Well, she's ever wanted to do is cheer. I don't know. Okay. So goodbye. That page is done. So at this point, this is the saddest part, Shana tells her parents, she doesn't even want to be a cheerleader. Oh, have that convo go, do you think? Well, you know that Wanda was like, this is not over. And she then forces Shana to keep on training. Oh, that's the way to do it to your child is

force them to do something they don't want to do anymore. Yeah, especially if they come to you and just really express the truth after years. So, but the thing is Wanda has a plan you see, because she's like, okay, fuck junior high cheerleading, we're going to do that high school shit. And we're going to get you onto the freshman high school team. So she knows that JV, that the, like JV or freshman, I'm not sure which one cheerleading squad tryouts are in March of 1991. So she's like, okay, we got three months, we're going to do this. I had the tiger fucking cut too. Yeah, cut too. And it's not to Shana training. It's to Wanda taking a job in the high school band director's office. No, thinking that she's going to get in there and make friends and cozy

up and then basically win win it over from the inside. Brilliant. Like kind of brilliant. Well, diabolical, except it's the kids that vote. So it's still the band directors like, man, I have no power here. I'm, I'm merely the band director. It doesn't work. Okay. But never mind. And I think it's probably because no one warmed up to her because the issue would give you have to give to receive. So tryouts are like a few months away and Wanda is now desperate. So she goes to her ex brother-in-law, Terry Harper, this Tony's brother, Terry, she goes and knocks on his trailer door and literally that's not a joke. And and she's said, can I speak to you privately? And Southern Karen is my new favorite. Yeah.

Southern mom Karen, I watched, I watched want Wanda Holloway on Phil Donahue. Oh my God. You got to watch it. It's really uncomfortable though, because Donahue keeps kind of messing up. He keeps messing up the names of things, which how unprofessional is that? Oh my God. No, he seems nervous. Oh, he Donahue. If you're a millennial, there was a talk show host in the 70s and 80s. His name was Phil. Phil Donahue. He was the greatest, so good. He handled every issue. It was like these one hour, one topic talk shows that I would watch after school. Absolutely. Unbelievable. And rave culture and yep. Boy, George was on there. Yeah. Like explain this to us. You're wearing makeup, but you're a man. Everyone's like,

hey, this is fucking the world open to you when you watched Phil Donahue after school. And Wanda is so intimidating that Phil Donahue is like, so you're from Texas? It's really uncomfortable. But when she find, because she's sitting there listening to him, but she's doing this kind of like, she's chewing invisible gum. It has the energy of chewing gum, but she's not chewing gum and she's like, and then when she finally talked, she's like, well, we've been misportrayed in the media. Just like, holy shit, is she going to kill everybody on the set of Donahue? So she gets her ex brother-in-law and she drives into a local convenience store and they sit in the parking lot and she says, I want you to help me kill Verna Heath and her 14-year-old

daughter Amber. Holy shit. Yes. And Terry is like, no. No, I'm not going to do that, Wanda. What a bummer if someone thinks that that's the kind of person, like you're the person to go to for that. Not like, wait, what do you think of me? I'm really nice, actually. And I like gardening and I journal a lot. I highlight passages of the Bible when I'm on a plane. Just because I have a very long mustache does not mean that I am violent. What a bummer. Yeah. So he refuses, obviously. Stephen's violent. Don't get it twisted. That's why he's not here. That's not true. I want to go ahead and... Stephen, mark that. That's a lie about you. You're going to want to pull it out. There's a lot of... Probably. Whatever else you want to pull out. We never listen to it. Stephen

could be editing these shows any way he wants at the end. We're like, oh, we did it. You listen to it. We were there the first time. We know what we did to those poor people. Okay, so, so of course, Terry refuses. He's a decent person. On Christmas Eve, Wanda's like, what better time than to ask him again? So this time, she's like, cannot talk to you on the patio or whatever the fuck she said to him. Two trailers have patios? Yeah. Well, he built one because he cares about gardening. We already talked about this. We went over this. Like patio is gardening. He cares about cement. Okay, so this time, she asked, she's like, no, no, you said no before, but listen. This time she says, can you find me a hitman? Oh. And Terry hangs up. Oh, they were

on the phone this time. Sorry. They're not on the patio. They're on an emotional patio over the phone. Where you can get a timeshare. I'm going to let that one die. I won't mention that timeshare again. Watch. You know what? Save it for the very end. That's right. Okay. Be a great callback. Great. Terry basically hangs up on her, doesn't really, because doesn't commit to anything, doesn't give her answers, just kind of like, I'm sure, got the shivers real bad and then hung up. She's like, oh, she asked me again. She's crazy. And so he immediately calls his brother, who's Wanda's ex husband, Tony, and he tells Tony all about the conversation. He's like, a, good thing you divorced her. B. What should I do? Wouldn't that be funny?

Like, should I go out with her? But it's like, I don't know. Should I find her a hitman? Like, she's really nice. I love how she barely has eyebrows. I bet though, Tony on the other end of the line, like, Terry tells him the thing and he's like, I fucking told you. I told you she was like this. So basically Tony says, hang this phone up and call the police right now. And that's exactly what Terry does. So he goes to the police. He tells them every single thing and they do the, make the plan that they're going to wire him. And he basically is going to pretend over the next three weeks that he's going to get Wanda, a hitman, to kill a mother and a daughter. And he basically comes up with this. He's like, it'll

cost you $2,500 for a Verna and then $5,000 for Amber. It's a sliding scale. You're worth more. We all know this. You're worth more when you're young. Wanda decides $7,500 is too expensive to kill two human beings. She does not haggle. Please tell me she doesn't haggle. She haggles the fuck out of it. What she says is, what she haggles is, I'll just take Verna. Oh, and then if Verna is murdered, Amber will be so upset she won't be able to try out to be a cheerleader. It's a good plan. Is it? Well, logically, what is, what would be worse than a sad cheerleader? Yeah, but no, because here's why. Yay.

You guys, come on. Come on. That was amazing. I love every moment. You like a crying cheerleader? Okay, we'll bring that one back. It's better than a raged cheerleader, even if you can believe it. Well, the raged cheerleaders were really easy to picture. It was like a bit Mad Max. Yeah. Crying cheerleaders like, I need to know this story. What's happening? Okay, so meanwhile, the police are listening to all of it. They're listening to her haggle over the value of a life. They know Wanda's guilty. It's all kind of right there for them. And so on August 28th, 1991, with the fake murder plot all settled and the deal done, Wanda meets up with Terry and gives him her diamond earrings as a down payment.

And she says to him, she's recorded, I couldn't pull the trigger myself. In the accent, please. Oh, it's really, thank you, but it's really hard to do an accent in a room full of people who live in the place where you're trying to do the accent that you're not from. And you've only listened to half an hour of Donahue. Okay, I'm just saying that. Thank you for cheering. It's nice of you to cheer though. We love cheer. So here's her taking out a ring. I couldn't pull the trigger myself, but I sure can do it this way. Oh, yeah, she doesn't give a fuck. She doesn't care. What a bit. So the next day, the police show up at Wanda's front door knock, knock, knock, and they arrest her. And here's her mug shot. Oh, I got defiant. Yeah, strong. I got double

crossed. I'm double crossed me. That's good. That's the, it's the kind of way that I got, I got double crossed. I'm just doing Holly Hunter, I think. Oh yeah. They got them. They got them double crossed me. Is that right? They can arrest my body, but they can't arrest my cheerleader soul. She's released on bail one day later. That's how it works. As you'd expect, she pleads not guilty to the crime of solicitation of capital murder. And her trial begins on August 23rd, 1991. Here's her. Look at, she's never been more alive going to court. Look at that cascade of hair rolling down the back of her mullet neck. That is some crunchy hair. Like, I dare you to try to put a finger through that, impenetrable. When she scratches her head, she's like, I don't know.

Let me think about it. Oh my God. She was at Dillard's all day trying to find that blazer. They love Dillard's. I mean, just the amount of crunchy hair in this photo, there's that one too. Oh shit. We've just got, we've got disembodied crunchy hair on the right hand side. That's someone's mom. Someone in the audience. That's their mom. Or that's, that could be someone's dog. Doesn't that look like a tail? Yeah, it's a tail. Emotional support. It looks like a wheat and terrier. It looks like someone brought a wheat and terrier emotional support dog into the jail, into the courtroom. That should be a thing. Amazing. Okay. So the prosecution plays the recordings from Wanda and Terry's wired conversations. And Wanda's defense team argues that Terry and

Tony have conspired against her. I mean, they wouldn't even, the prosecutors were just pressed play and that's their argument. They won't have to say a word. Right. Maybe they get a discount on them. But they're basically, it's like the whole thing's a frame job. Like she's been, she's been lured into it out of revenge for their, for Tony and Wanda's contentious divorce 10 years prior. Here's Terry in court. Oh, he's like, I just want a garden. That's the first thing he said to the judge. They're like, sir, please keep to the case. We don't care about what you do in your private. But I'm a good person. He sounds like Holly Hunter too. It breaks my heart. I love him so much. Okay.

So like every other campaign that Wanda tries to mount, this one also shits the bed. On September 4th, 1991, Wanda Holloway has found guilty and sentenced to 15 years in prison plus a $10,000 fine. Hold. Because it's soon revealed, however, that one of the jurors is on probation for a drug related felony and should have never been allowed on a jury. Hi friend. Are you fucking bored or something? Like drug related. Oh, he's on drugs. Yeah. Got it. He fucking took so much acid and went to jury selection. Only someone on drugs would be like, yeah, I totally wanted a jury jury. Could you pick me? I'd love it. My pupils will be smaller the day of the case, I swear. Okay. So they declare a mistrial. The sentencing is dropped. A second trial is planned for 1996.

This time Wanda pleads no contest to the charges. On September 9th, 1996, she's found guilty and sentenced to 10 years in prison and a $10,000 fine. She also settles a civil suit with the Heath family and she has to pardon me. She has to pay them $150,000. Good. Yeah. I'll buy a lot of cheerleading outfits. Yeah, that's right. I think Amber and her mom, Verna in court. Oh, man. Wait a second. I recognize that hair. Yeah. Would they be that close walking down the hall? No, I can't imagine they'd walk them together. Also, I'm sorry, but does anyone here remember these fucking shit clothes in the 90s where everything was like, we're from, we're from Germany and the future. Put on this tunic. Everything is like royal blue and black. Pretender in a band. It goes out to

your beds. Yes. You're in a talking heads video, essentially. Look at that. Look at the puffiness of that pad of her shoulder. Yeah, that's right. Wow. Honey. She has two pom-poms stuffed in each shoulder. Okay. So on March 1st, 1997, after serving just six months of her sentence, Wanda Holloway is released from jail. She's ordered to serve the rest of her nine and a half year sentence on probation plus 1000 hours of community service. And as I said last night, the other case that I was talking about sounds about white to me. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Walk out if you want to. I don't care. So in 1993, our best friend, Holly Hunter stars in the HBO movie, the positively true adventures of the alleged Texas cheerleader murdering mom. Oh,

my God. Have you seen this? No. It's insanity. You have to watch it. Oh, Bridges. Oh, Bridges is in it. Holly Hunter. All the greats. Oh my God. Yeah. Look at that cheerleading outfit. It's not real. Horish. If they had just let that bitch cheerlead when she was a kid, everything would have been fine. It's true. Wow. It's an outrageous true story of jealousy and obsession. There's also, in 1994, author Anne Meyer wrote a book about this case called Mother Love Deadly Love. Okay. Okay. Now, I went through the hometown emails to see if anyone had written in about this case. And of course, someone did. So the top half, yeah, the top half of the email is basically explaining exactly how I just did like copy paste. Oh, this just went. And then the second half of the email

says, not much was happening in Pasadena. And this was big, big news at the time. So when my dad saw this crazy lady's face plastered on every newspaper, he realized that he had coached Wanda's daughter in gymnastics less than five years earlier at the local YMCA. He very vividly remembered Wanda constantly yelling at her daughter during practice to do this and that to the point where my then young and hotheaded father told her to quote, shut up or get out of my gym. He had no idea he was yelling at a sociopath. Otherwise, I imagine he would have kept his mouth shut for once. Then again, maybe if he had been a better coach, Wanda's daughter would have made the cheerleading spot. And this whole issue would have been avoided. Anyways, stay sexy and don't yell at sociopaths,

Jordan. Jordan. Yeah. And that is the insane yet highly competitive story of the Texas cheerleader mom murder plot. Jordan's like, where's the bus because I'm going to toss my dad right under that motherfucker. Wow. That was fun. Get ready to not have fun. We like all kinds. Great job. Great job. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Okay. This is the hit and run case of Vicki Lions. Now I want to go. Okay, let's just get into it. 1980. Crystal Lions and her husband live in the small town of Big Spring, Texas. Big Spring. It's a small town. It's a big, and there's a big spring. Yeah. They built a small town around a Big Spring, which sounds picturesque. Yeah. Nope. No time shares. There's no time to reserve. You want to go back to the

timeshare. Well, don't do it. I know it's my favorite. Well, it's good. So they live there with their four year old daughter, Vicki. She's a quiet and sweet child. I have a photo of her. She survives. This gets horrible, but she lives. That's a good spoiler. That's the best kind of spoiler you could give us. Really, the story is about two bad ass women who like fucking take a bad situation and are like, nope, and fucking take care of business. Hell, yes. It's a good, it ends up, yes. We love those stories. Okay. But it gets shitty first. So Crystal, the mother, works in the circulation department at the Big Spring Herald newspaper, like the town's newspaper. It covers every story in town. It's probably the only newspaper. I'm making that

up. I would save money. Yeah. One day, Crystal's babysitter doesn't show up to take care of Vicki. She calls her supervisor. She's a fucking working mom. She's like, I can't, I don't know what to do. And the supervisor is a lovely person and says, come in or you're fucking fired. Oh. So Crystal's like, great. I'm bringing my fucking four-year-old in then. Sounds amazing. So she brings Vicki in and she's brought her in before. Of course, everyone at the office loves her. She's a darling kid. And Crystal tries to keep an eye on Vicki as she works as best she can. So Crystal is moving papers to the loading dock for an afternoon delivery when she hears her amazing wonderful supervisor that we just talked about. Tell Vicki to go outside and play in the parking

lot. Go play in the parking lot. No. Moments later, Crystal's in the middle of telling him that she doesn't feel comfortable having her daughter at work and that she's just going to head home. And when her supervisor, they look out the window and they see Vicki lying on the ground outside. And Crystal can tell from a distance that her, like, immediately her daughter's injured. When she reaches Vicki, Vicki's unconscious and she's not breathing. She survives again. I'd like to go ahead. No one is around and there aren't any clues as to what had happened. So Vicki's rush to the hospital in Odessa, which is like an hour away. On the way, the ambulance breaks down. No. Like just to fucking, just to mess with you. They almost crash into the back of it.

They get her to the hospital. She's in Vicki's rush to intensive care. And when they finally see their child, Crystal and her husband notice that there's marks on Vicki's face. And they're like, what, that looks like tire marks on her face. And the hospital staff is like, that's what it is. Oh my God. So fucking Crystal, amazing. Crystal's like, I'm going to take photos of this and has the 1980. I don't know what kind of, where do you have your camera at home in a closet? Right. And it's huge. It's like the whole closet. Yes. She takes it out of the closet. I don't know. And she takes photos like has the wherewithal to take photos of the marks on Vicki's face. So Vicki falls into a coma and her parents, the only thing they can do is wait. Meanwhile,

police question everyone who works at the newspaper. No one had seen the accident happen. But they're like, we did see this man leaving the parking lot in a hurry just before Vicki was found. So police issue an APB for JB Hardman. He's a minister who makes his living selling fish from the back of his truck as well. Sorry, I have about four questions now. Remember, they're near a big spring. So it's probably good fish. No, you're not going to have that one. Where do you want to buy fish? It's not the back of a truck. From a pastor? Does that what you said? A minister? Yeah. A fish. Uh-huh. I mean, it kind of makes sense. Didn't Jesus do that? He sure did. He did. You know. Yep. I'm Jewish. I don't know that part. So that guy,

that minister just has the one fish or he's like, who wants it? He's got a big party tonight. This thing feeds a shit ton of people. Whoops. I'm a minister. I'm not supposed to say that. So police find this guy in the town of Snyder. They're like, you ran over a kid and he's like, what Snyder? He doesn't know what they're, he says, what are you talking about? He doesn't curse. He's a good person. He doesn't know what they're talking about. He's like, I did not run over a kid. I would have known. But they take him into the jail and they, they, he's in the jail, Sky JB. And this is a really great forensic files episode, by the way, that I forgot to write down the name of, but it's like one of the ones that you're like, who thought of that title? It's like every,

don't tread lightly. Oh God. That's not. Because of tire trends. Everyone, do you get it? I think they do. That's what that's, it's just, it's like subtle. Because I was going to do the official report with fish, all in cash. That's great. I only have like two seconds to think of it. That's, that was amazing. Thank you. I'm impressed. So, okay. So keep this guy, this amazing dude is interviewed in forensic files. He didn't do it, by the way. He's not the guy. Oh, I just keep thinking of other fish ones really. Go ahead. Look into this case just for the halibut. Sorry. You guys, we turned her. We turned her. You turned me into, to someone's dad at Christmas. Jesus. The only kind of comedy that we want. Pun comedy only from now on. That's right.

They arrest him and he's like, he talks in the case. He's like, I was sitting in the cell and I'm like, what is happening? And then he hears the police in the other, it's probably a small jail cell. I don't know. In the other room saying that they combed over every inch of his fish truck. And they only found one speck of blood. And he was like, oh, shit. Like that's, they're gonna fuck and put me away forever. But he didn't do it. So almost three weeks after Vicki had gone into a coma, she regains consciousness. She had suffered damage to her skull in one eye and she can't walk or even speak when she wakes up. Doctors tell her mom, Crystal, to just put her in a daughter in a wheelchair and get on with life. And Crystal's like, fuck that shit. No.

Hey, two things. Fuck you to fuck that shit. Right. Crystal's determined to help her daughter live as normal life as possible. And this time goes by Vicki's condition starts to improve. So one day, Crystal takes Vicki to the newspaper office again to see everyone who's all concerned about her, all her friends in the office. And when one of the employees leans in the car to say, hello, Vicki has a fucking reaction and starts like screaming. And it's the first time she's spoken or said anything since her coma. When she sees this dude, she's like, freaking out. And Crystal's like, this isn't something's not right. But she can't, her daughter can't explain why she's upset. So she's not able to explain, but Crystal decides to conduct her own investigation.

Yeah, she does. She doesn't think that the guy they have in custody did it. She just doesn't think it's him. I think she knew him from the paper. He like had come by or something. She's like, listen, I know the fish priest and he is not. He's got that great truck. And he's just not that way. So she's, I think she watched detective shows and she thinks about what a detective would do. And she starts making a list of all the vehicles that she remembers seeing in the newspaper parking lot that day. Then, okay, so at the time the newspaper parking lot is unpaved and bumpy. So it's possible a driver could have driven over Vicki and not known they had hit her. I know. But by, let's see, they didn't have an eyewitness and Crystal's like,

I'm not giving up. She decided she needs to compare the tire marks from the photos she took of Vicki in the hospital that day to the tires that she remembers in the parking lot that day. So she fucking, I know it's crazy. She takes a black shoe polish and rubs it on each tire and makes an impression with a piece of paper on it. And then her coworkers are like, her coworkers are looking out the window and then the one guy is just sweating a ton. Like, wow, what's Vicki doing? I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Oh, I got to go. I think we have a, yeah. So this is Crystal. Amazing. So, okay. The tire polish, paper. She keeps a careful record of the tire impression she takes. And she, from two vans and a pickup truck, and she like notes which tire they

can't, like which the front rear, nope, that's another thing. The front right. Front passenger. This is one huge chart. Wait a second. That's a snow plow. Hold on. That's a unicycle. Front rear. I know nothing about cars, obviously. Okay. She shows the detective her work. She's like, what's up? I did your job for you. And I think you arrested the wrong men. And of course, you know how they loved being told they're wrong about many things. They were like, get out of here, basically, to her. She says that they harassed a sweet old man who never did anything wrong to anybody. Except fish. A grand jury questions him on his involvement and he denies any. And the one spot of blood on his truck turns out to be fish blood. From that one fish that shaved in

the truck that time, obviously. I think they tasted it. Tastes like fish blood. Anyone want to get sushi? They don't have enough to indict him. So he's released. And Crystal's like, I still think that they don't have the right person. The detective's telling her it's a civil matter, not a criminal one. So goodbye. You know. So for the next three years, Vicki is nursed back to health by her parents. No one in the small town of Big Springs is willing to help her investigate the accident any further. Then she reads about a man known as the Sherlock Holmes of tire marks. That's a thing. Aka Mr. Hot. His name is Peter McDonald and he literally wrote the book on tire impression evidence. That's his fucking thing. He's the former chief designer for the Firestone Tire

Company. And he also assisted numerous police agencies and taught the stuff at the FBI Academy. Wow. And it's the great Crystal's been looking for. She fucking calls him up and she's like, can you help me? And he is like, hell yeah. Love it. Let's... Did you say tires? I'm there. She calls him. He's in Ohio. She explains the case to him and he's totally into it. He's familiar with the tire impressions in human flesh because he's worked on cases like that before the police with the police. And he is immediately like fucking amazed by the work she's already done. He said that she came more prepared than a lot of police departments come when they ask him for help, which is amazing. Yeah, she had to be. Yeah. So she labeled each tire impression with the date,

all that stuff. He immediately eliminates two of the cars. It's not the tire impressions. And the last three imprints though, he is interested in. He identifies them as a rare tire, which if you don't know about tires, they're all rare, right? It's no longer manufactured. It's the gold Sonic 78s for you tire heads out there. Yeah. There's got to be one, right? Oh, man. The 78 was insane. It was like ridges. There's ridges, but it also cracks. That's right. Yeah. Amazing tire. So he has to find out the exact match, the exact manufacturer, the brand, the size. And Crystal's photos don't have size reference because they're just on her head. So it's not like he can measure them because she was a four year old and four year olds grow.

So he is able to figure out when the human skull grows between four and seven. It doesn't release. So she's seven years old now. So he's able to take the measurement. It's a lot of math and science. These are the tire treads, actual treads. I don't know. This is the not one. That's the one. You know, it's really extensive and complicated. Was that just a still from forensic files? You don't ever do that. Oh, I do that all the time. Yeah, I know. But usually if you're watching the whole episode, then you know what it means. I didn't, I listened to it. Do you know what that you can just, there's a podcast. It's just forensic files now. Oh, really? Yeah. It's just forensic. I was on the plane over today. I was just like, this is forensic files in my

ears. That's great. Yeah. So Jay did that. Nice. Thanks, Jay. Okay. So he, not Stephen, he, he doesn't have to do that anymore. Thank God for him. Okay. So he finds all these little things, and there's like these skin marks that like don't, that do things when tires tread a certain way and cut things. He's able to eliminate the two of the Sonic 78 imprints since they had very little wear, but the last imprint shows the same degree of wear and matches the size of that what was on Vicki's face. And so in the forensic files, they call him Bob Jones, the dude who did it, because I think it's civil and not criminal, so they can't name him. But it's the dude who fucking poked his head in. Yeah. And she started screaming. It was totally him. So in 1985, five

years after Vicki's hit and run, Crystal Lyons filed suit against the Big Spring Herald, the newspaper, claiming that this dude Bob Jones hadn't taken the proper precautions while backing his truck out of the parking lot. The accident would mean a lifetime of neurological difficulties for Vicki and Crystal wanted justice. So Vicki needed dozens of surgical procedures because the accident damaged so much and she does get better and she's able to attend school. Crystal Lyons says she didn't sue the Big Spring Herald for just for financial motives. She wants him to take responsibility for the accident that left her daughter permanently disabled. Vicki says she tries not to think about the accident, but she does remember it. She remembers her mom's supervisor saying,

go play in the parking lot. Not great to tell a kid. No. And she went out there. She had some toy dishes. She was behind the truck and playing in the sand and he backed up and didn't know she was there. But of course not. But the reason Vicki starts screaming when she sees his face when she goes that day is because she saw him look in the rear view mirror, see her and drive off. Wow. So he fucking just, otherwise she wouldn't have known it was him. You know what I mean? Even before the lawsuit, Jones, this dude had suspected that he was the one who ran over Vicki. You fucking think? He commented to Crystal that he didn't think he did it, but if he did, he was sorry that it happened. Our favorite. So the Herald wants to settle the case and offers

to pay $750,000 for Vicki's care. Crystal accepts it, but demands 15 minutes in the judges chambers with just her and Vicki with the representative of the Herald alone. Wow. She wants to fucking be alone with him. And Crystal, she's there with him and Vicki tells him that he destroyed her life and they tell him to fuck off. I'm assuming I wasn't there. And that's the end of the lawsuit. And the Herald doesn't report the news of their own settlement in their fucking newspaper, which is amazing. Today the newspaper has new owners and completely new staff, so don't go to their offices and pick it or whatever. Crystal's able to arrange for the best medical care for Vicki. Vicki learns to speak and walk again and she tries to put the accident

in the past and she finishes high school and moves to Charlotte, North Carolina, where she attends the Art Institute studying mass media. Wow. Okay. Mass media. I'm sorry to say she died. She does die from unrelated issues in 2011 at 34 years old, but here's the thing. She had become a professional wrestler with the title. What? The lioness. Yes. Are you kidding me? How fucking badass is she? That's amazing. She works for the high sports wrestling call at school in Charlotte, which Vince totally knows about, of course. She becomes the lioness. There's videos of her wrestling online that you can watch on YouTube and she's just this fucking badass. Her friends say that she lived for wrestling all week. It was at every practice. I think she

taught as well. She also enjoyed belly dancing, was an animal lover. She owned dogs and cats, which is like, that's, how do you even do that? And Crystal Lyons went on to become a forensic scientist. Whoa. Are you serious? Holy shit. That is the insane, awesome story of Crystal and Vicki Lyons. Wow. Amazing, right? That's incredible. That's impressive. Sinacity. Yeah. Shit. Yeah. That's awesome. We don't have time for a hometown except we have a little surprise for you. So, you know, as we said at the beginning of the show, wait, first of all, that we, we've been coming here to you guys in Dallas and Houston and touring. You guys have been a stop on the tour since we very first started touring because, because of all our listenership, the highest

concentration of MFM listeners is in Texas. Yeah. It's incredible. So we've come here so many times and we have done so much studying of your insane murders. There's just always so many to choose from. And as we said, we constantly use the Texas Monthly as a resource. Yeah. And one of the writers of Texas Monthly that we have used many a time that we are huge fans of, and I'm sure you are huge fans of, too. We'd like to bring them out right now. It's Mr. Skip Hollinsworth. He's right here. Come here. Come over here. You guys, he's not mad at us. Look, he's not mad. We stole all of his articles and reread them. Or are you? This is your chance. This is your chance to tell us. No, it's the greatest in the world.

Where are you from originally? I'm from Wichita Falls. And my daughter loves to describe your show as hot feminist talk among women who have a penchant for murder. Yeah. That sounds right. And you're always going to come back because we have this ability down here to step over the line from normality to inexplicable rage. Now we have a little bit of an anecdote for you. Just when we were in, do you remember what city we were in? I don't know what story you're telling. Oh, I'm sorry. I thought we were sharing a mind. My mistake. No, no, it was the other, it was like two weeks ago. After the show, we have this now almost forced ritual where we go home, we order food, we go into our separate hotel rooms,

we sit down and then we both put on forensic files at the same time. And so we watch forensic files. And on the, this was probably two weeks ago, we both text each other at the same time because you came up as a talking head in one of the cases. That's right. And we both immediately were sending pictures of you to each other. It was like, look who it is. Look who it is. Screen grab of your, your face. That's crazy. I just can't explain how honored I am. Do you want to tell us your home, your hometown or your favorite story? Yeah, anything. Anything. Anything. You mean my favorite murder story? Yeah. Well, there's so many. I mean, I love the man in Dallas who I became friends with, Charlie.

But I have a killer. He was, he was a good friend. He was close, a close friend. There's Diane, I mean, there's great women murders in Texas. There's Diane Zamora, who was the Naval, the Navy, who went to the Navy Academy and persuaded her boyfriend who went to the Air Force Academy to kill his ex-girlfriend. So she wouldn't bother him. She was really sweet. There's Marie Robards from Fort Worth who stole barium out of her chemistry lab in high school to kill her father. So she could go back to live with her mother. She was real sweet. Well, we couldn't be more excited to meet you in real life, honestly. And if we, if there weren't true crime journalists, especially the ones to the level that Texas

Monthly seems to hire people at, our show would be so Wikipedia shitty all the time. So we owe you literally so much money. No, who could have guessed? Well, I will take some money. Okay. All right. Skip Hollinsworth, everybody. Thank you. My God. Wow. Hero. He's a hero. It's amazing. We are so grateful that we get to do this, that this is our job now. It's so incredible. And it is only an entirely because of your support and your dedication and the fact that you guys listen to us and we cannot ever thank you enough. We'll never be able to. Especially, especially because half our listeners are in Texas. Are here. Yeah. You guys, thank you. You're the muscle. You guys are the muscle. Yeah. The muscle that makes this weird true crime body run. So thank you so much.

Thank you. Um, you know, of course, stay saved and do God's mission. That's important, please. But more than that, stay sexy. And don't get hurt. Thank you. Thank you, Dallas.