My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark - 296 - Stakeouts & Balloons

Episode Date: October 14, 2021

This week, Georgia and Karen cover the unsolved cases of three Indigenous women, Kiana Klomp, Amber Tuccaro, and Ella Mae Begay, and the disappearance of Lawrence Joseph Bader.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. Hello and welcome to my favorite murder. That's Georgia Hardstar. That's Karen Kilgara. And the winds, they are a hell in tonight. That's right, ladies and gentlemen. They are blowing loudly. I was too scared to drive over to Karen's because we're in California. I'm not used to any kind of weather, as we said. Especially not a tornado. A fucking tornado came through. Hurricane slash hurricane slash monsoon. We're not, we can't, we're not meteorologists. We can't

tell you what exactly it is. What we know is it's insane. Maybe we should get more wind audio. Should I open the window? I have a question. Yes. Is this earthquake weather? You know, what's funny? I thought the exact same thing because here's why. There's a very strange marine layer in the valley. Yeah. It then began to look like a sandstorm. Yeah. Then everything turned kind of orange for a while. And I was like, oh, that's not good. No, no. That's something weird. What about the first, my favorite murder earthquake that happened while we were recording? You know what? We've gone through fire. We've gone through rain. We've gone through every James Taylor song you could ever deal with. We can handle this shit. We can. Well, I talked, I've

always liked where, you know, are we late for the big one? And I actually spoke to an earthquake scientist recently who was like, we're always overdue for the big one. Yes. Just like that. And the big one, the caldera in Yellowstone is supposed to blow. There's lots of, you know, and also remember that those people, the geologists and the people that study that stuff, they look at everything on like the longest timeline. So they're like, we're overdue, but they mean like in the next thousand years. Right. That's what I like to remind myself is they, everything is by a thousand of them. They don't, they don't deal with time the way we do. That's true. It's all a mystery. This universe. Mysterious. You never know. That's why you,

you have to send that text. You always have to be holding on to something. That's because you never know. And you always have to screw stuff to the wall. Yes. Yeah. I, yeah. Put your plants on little sticky things. And I mean, seriously, right now, just outside my window, my window, it sounds like a spooky Halloween record. Oh, it's spooky Halloween again. It's spooky Halloween. And it's happening outside our door. Yeah. That's true. Let's, this should be a weather podcast. I disagree with those who say this is bad content. They're always saying, don't do it, guys. The death of your podcast is talking about weather. And we say to them, go to hell. You don't know our meteorologists souls. That's right. Can I, speaking of mysterious,

creepy, weird things, have you been following this like case of this family who died mysteriously? Yep. All together. What the fuck in Yosemite? In the mountains. Right. So this like family of this like lovely couple and they're like one year old baby and their fucking family dog were found dead in the Devil's Gulch area of the Merced River in the Sierra National Forest. Like just altogether, right? And I'm telling you this, even though you said, you know, maybe other people don't know. Oh, okay. Cause your tone was also writing the line perfectly of asking or telling I couldn't tell. You know what it was? I was just waiting to see. It was reading. I was reading it. I should recognize that by now. Ouch. No, this is supposed to be a slam. I know. So they have not ruled out

toxic algal blooms. Algae blooms. But it's like, it's not algae, it's like algal, it says. But all these other like toxicology reports and like all these like, hold on, it could be extreme heat that they all just like collapsed together and died. So like, but I don't know if they like were in the water or drank the water, ruled out chemical hazards and any other kind of death. Like, it's so mysterious to me. Sorry. And they did rule out the, I thought they did rule out the like micro toxins and algae thing. I think that I read a thing about that. There's as of this article from the SF gate from September 30th, they didn't rule out from a week ago, they didn't rule out that this one kind of algae thing. Right. Yeah. So. And I think the other thing I was

reading was like, because they're in mining country, that there's the possibility that some mine had a gas, some kind of a gas thing. But, and I have to say that this is, it's scary, right? Because of course, the first things you think of are all extreme or, you know, was it intentional or whatever, but then it also, it's equally scary to think about the different ways nature can cause that. Oh yeah. So many ways. Yeah. It's fascinating. I don't feel like this family would have all drank the water in the river. Like, that's not your first thing is like, unless it was like, it was like 109 degrees, maybe, and they ran out of water, which means the parents, the dog and the baby had to drink the water. Right. Which seems weird.

Or if they had one of those things that they thought was like a water filtration system, but they didn't put the charcoal in or they didn't, it didn't work somehow. It didn't work against this one thing. Yeah. Right. Where they're thinking, this is what we usually do and somehow it doesn't happen. Whenever I hear about that of like the, this kid who was swimming in this lake, this fucking parasite went right up his nose and the brain eating parasite or when you use a netty pot and they're like, don't use tap water because it'll just go right in your brain. That shit scares the hell out of me. That stuff, black mold, all that shit scares the fucking life out of me. Well, take a deep breath because it's all around us. And also that's the kind of thing

where I think that's why people begin to believe in like fate and destiny and stuff like that, because it counteracts that overwhelming fear of life is a random series of events that you may or may not die from. Yeah. And that's just kind of like the bottom terror that everybody is either completely running away from and like blocking out or somehow trying to face or somehow incorporate so that they live their lives better and more aware. So hence therapy and medication for me. Yeah. I just pictured writers. I was finishing that sentence that I just half a tree would just come folding through this window. You really slowed down at the end of that. What would mine be? Oh, no. Jump in on this. There's no, you're like, no, thank you. You're telling everyone to

let go and let God a fucking bold tree comes right through your goddamn window. Life is a series of tragedies. It just is. It just is. Deal with it. Okay. We all have to face it. Okay. Sorry, I'm yelling. No, you're not. Speaking of fucking, what about squid games? Speaking of tragedy, finish the shit out of it. We could talk about it now. Isn't it amazing? Oh, my God. Yeah. Did you do dubbing or did you do subtitles? We did subtitles. We were like debating it. I know you did dubbing. I thought we thought let's just try subtitles first and see if we can handle it. I really like stuff with subtitles for some reason. It like relaxes me and I'm paying attention instead of like drifting off and thinking about trees coming through my window. I can actually

pay attention to something. Oh, that wasn't my original idea. You've been thinking about that all day. The second the wind kicked up. Yeah. I think of different variations of trees coming through windows at all times. Yeah. Well, agree. And then so my first impression because of the pink and the green and it looked like a video game or whatever. I was like, oh, I don't think that'll interest me because I don't play video games and I heard people are like on social media talking about how violent it is. I don't think this is for me. But then of course, as it always happens, a friend of mine whose opinion I really respect was like, you have to start it right now. Yeah. I will wait for you, whatever. And the writing is so good. The story is so great. The acting

is amazing. We're talking about the Korean TV show on Netflix, everyone called Squid Games. They know because it's the number one in like the world. It's huge. It's so violent, but I never got like out of control, freaked out by it. Vince didn't know anything about it when we started it. So that first game that they play, he was like, just thinking it was just some drama or whatever. And then it was like our video game type of thing. And then he went, I should I can I spoil? Everyone knows what the premise is. I don't know if everyone knows. I mean, it feels like everyone's yeah, watching it, right? If it's number one, right? The game, the games that they have to get through, you die if you lose. So the first time someone gets shot, he was like, oh, wait a second,

this is not what I thought it was. Yes. It's fun to watch him do that over like junior mints or whatever. He was just like, pros and junior mints. We already have Halloween candy in the house. It's as shocking as it is. And people want to talk about the violence. But if you if that's some reason why you would stop, then just like go through the violent parts or whatever. But watch the actual story because the story it's telling is really good and so worthwhile. Can we talk about how 101 is pretty hot? His name is which one is that the hot skirt, the snake guy, the hot scary snake guy. Yes, the guy, the guy with the tattoo on his face that's just like, take your place. Hot scary snake neck tattoo guy. Snake neck is like, and then I looked him up on

Instagram and it's like, oh, shit, like you're actually a really hot person. Where is he? Okay, his name is Hyosung Tae. And he's like a big actor in Korea in South Korea, of course. But like he's like fucking model sexy in real life. It's a little ridiculous. It's a great look. And I think that's a tattoo is a great look. A neck tattoo is a great look being super bossy in the middle of a basically a group of Russian roulette. Yeah, that's hot. Like you're like, oh, I'm an alpha this horrifying situation we're all in. Yeah, I'm gonna get scared of me even though you might die in the next game. I'm the one game. I'm going to kill you. That's right. That's awesome. Thank you, sir. You step up, you fill that gap. We're all distracted. We hate you. We can unite

against you. However, it's great. Pretty fucking hot. Also, what about the guy we were calling it a slap envelope because we can figure out what's called the initial game? Slap envelope. Yeah. But the guy that does slap envelope is an actor who is also in an amazing zombie movie called Last It's called Train to Busan. And if you haven't watched it, you have to because it's truly great. It's a truly great, scary, insane action movie. And that actor slap envelope is in that and he is the most beautiful man where you're just like, this is kind of insane. Yeah, it is. Yeah. They're doing it. They're doing it. I love global entertainment. That's what I've always been about. You know that. I do know that. Did you watch any of Made? I watched the first episode.

Okay, so the show made MAID on Netflix. How beautiful is it? The first episode was good. Margaret Qualey, who's the main actress in the show made that I fucking cried the entire time. It was incredible. Her mom is Andy McDowell and her mom plays her mom. You know what I'm saying? You know what I'm saying? It was so incredible. It was like, just beautiful story that was so tragic and sad and hopeful and all the things. How many episodes are there? I think 10. Oh, I got through it in like 24 hours. I liked it so much. It was really good, but the not to spoiler alert. So ignore this. I'm just going to refer to a thing, but it's a type of show where someone has mounting problems. Yes. Then I'm sitting on the couch. Now I have mounting

problems. I cannot separate my nervous system from like, now we have to do something about this. And so when she was doing things that I was like, that's not going to. Yeah. When she was stressing me so bad. So I really loved how they did that because it hooked you. Yeah. And we were just right in this like gut punch feeling with her. Yeah. It's about a young woman who leaves an abusive relationship with her three year old daughter and has to make it through the fucked up system to try to make a life for herself and her daughter. And it's the whole way through. It's like that where it's just like roadblock after roadblock of like her trying to make her way. It's a true story too. So the whole time you're like, and yeah, it definitely hits really hard,

especially if you ever have been in a position, you know, where you don't have money. Yeah, being broke and not knowing how you're going to get through the next month. Yeah. But it's so beautifully done. And of course, at the end, you know, she triumphs. So what? It's a memoir. You can't have a memoir that's like a bummer at the end. She's like, I'm writing this to you from jail. Well, I was going to say, so I watched the first episode, then got super stressed out. And then I was like, it's okay. I paid my bills last month. And then I was like, I need to watch a comedy, which I find myself doing all the time, which is the exact opposite of when quarantine began. And I could not, could not stay with a comedy. Oh, had to be like, okay, post apocalyptic

end of the world, like crazy shit, like be where I am now, please. Yes, please. So I switch off maid, which I really did like, and we'll, I get it. It's not, you have to be in a certain mindset and place in your life where you can watch it. It's hard. Yeah. Well, and also, because something, I had to do something, whatever it was, so I couldn't binge it. It was like, oh, I'm only going to get this one in. Yeah. But I would have if I could have just powered through. Yes. Yeah. So what I switched to just to change that feeling in my stomach, I found the show that's come up almost every time I've gone on Netflix. And then I just looked at it and go, oh, it's just, it's a comedy. I probably won't like it because it's called working moms. This is a Canadian show

I talked about this before. Catherine Reitman. Yes. And it is, I can't believe how funny it is, but it's really like it's in your face from the second it starts. I love it. Because I was like, oh, it's mom stuff. So I won't write. I won't relate or whatever. And it's so well written. The people in it are so compelling and real. Yeah. I love it so much. So funny. I watched the first season. I think now there's a second season out, right? Which is why it's like, oh, there's I think four seasons. Oh, shit. Okay. I fucking loved it when it first came out. I haven't seen it recently. I'll watch it. I'm so sorry. I didn't remember you saying it because it was like literally two years ago. I stumbled on it and was just like, wait a second. This is

fucking genius. And there's a scene one of the so they all meet in a like a mommy and me group. Yeah. So it's all these women that have like one year old children. And one of the women has really terrible postpartum. And she just spends the rest of the episode kind of like trying to kill herself here and there. Yeah. Is she the like super perfect blonde one that peas her pants at the movie theater one time? No, she has curly hair. Okay. I mean, I don't remember that part, but it's the lady with the big curly hair. There was one scene where she has her face in the pool that I was laughing out loud so hard in my home. And I was like, this never happens. Yeah. It's not a good feeling. Yes. So there's now there's a bunch of seasons

to watch. And it's it's really good. And like, it's really good. Okay. Quick. Exactly. Right. Catch up to see of all the latest and greatest news. This is some breaking news. So this week on bananas, the bananas boys had Mary Roach on. So that's that's a nice crossover for the murderinos. If you haven't tried bananas, you can go listen to one of your favorite authors talking on their latest episode. But they also hear some pressing information. They have a mini tour that they're about to go out onto. So if you want to see the banana boys doing a live podcast, follow them on Instagram at the bananas podcast. And you can get their tour dates, locations and info about an upcoming live streaming event. And then Wicked Words, Kate Winkler-Dawson interviews the author

Dean King about notorious family feud, the Hatfields and the McCoys. So check that out. And then also make sure pretty pleased to follow Exactly Right on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook for updates on all our awesome podcasts. We are excited that the very first episode of our new Exactly Right Family podcast waiting for impact hosted by Dave Holmes is up. It's live. Please go rate, review, subscribe and of course, listen to it wherever you listen to podcasts. And if you want to listen to it on Citro Premium and listen to all 10 at one time, you can do that if you belong to Citro Premium and you can use the code impact to get it free for a month. So you can try it out and you can get all your shows ad free and

bingeable and special content and all that stuff. Check that out. Check it out. Come on guys. Okay. Wait. Oh yeah. It's our brand new segment, Random Wikipedia article. So here's, I thought of this as I was printing up. So I hit my first article. I hit random on Wikipedia, which maybe some people don't know. We all use Wikipedia every day, ladies and gentlemen. Have you ever given them five dollars for the use and all the information it provides you? You should go give them some money, support them so that we always have that community information service that a bunch of eighth graders work on all the time. We appreciate it. So one of the buttons you can push on the website is random article and it literally will bring up a random article and teach you something brand new.

So to make it truly random, so you don't think that I print, I picked this or went through and hit random article until I found a good one. I printed up five random articles. So now you're going to pick Georgia a number between one and five. Don't blow it. You have to pick a number between one and five and I will choose the article of the proper number. Okay. I'm sweating right now because I'm so nervous. Number, I'm going to pick two. You're going to pick article number two. Yeah. Good choice. Here's showing it to you on the zoom. It's article number two. There's definitely a two on it. She's not bluffing. And it's a nice short one. There was one that was five pages long. If you would pick number one. Okay. Okay. This article, today's random Wikipedia article is

about a person named Alberto Jimenez Marino, born September 25, 1959. He is a Mexican politician affiliated with the institutional revolutionary party. As of 2014, he served as deputy of the LIX legislature. Perhaps that means like 63 or something. No, the legislature of the Mexican Congress representing Puebla. That's the entire article. Wow. That's him. Alberto Jimenez Marino. We learned something new. What's the most interesting, the one that you found the most interesting? Like you were like the most like, wow, this is a cool one. Was there any? There was one about the, I think it was the 42nd or the 45th district in Michigan. And it was all the people who were like district representatives or something. I don't know. That was the most interesting one.

Well, I mean, it wasn't, the pick wasn't great because here's the thing. Most information is pretty standard. It's just like here, sure. Yeah. Where is it? Where's the, is it on the left? Yeah. I don't know. I see it. It's down. Like there's a couple blue lines that are like this, that, blah, blah, blah. Oh, it's like the third or fourth one. Oh, random article. Random article. Got it. Hit one. Okay. Stanley Switlick, a parachute pioneer, born in 1890 in Galicia, now part of Poland. He immigrated to the United States at the age of 16. And he, so he was a parachute pioneer. So like he developed workable parachutes at the turn of the century? I guess so. Something about Six Flags, Great Adventure in Jackson, New Jersey, controversy,

how they sold the property to them. But it was haunted. It was going to be, it was haunted with parachuters. I saw this one on Scooby-Doo. Yeah. His legacy is that there's a elementary school named after him in Florida. Called Parachute Valley Elementary. And the kids parachute into class every day. I have to say in grammar school, this is such, I was in Montessori, first through third, combo class. And we had a, like a green parachute that like 50 kids, if you all put it up at the same time and you put it behind you and then you're inside the parachute. Yes. That was some exciting stuff in grammar school. That's a classic Montessori thing. 70s, like 80s, kind of will make our own fun, you know, everybody. I keep hitting it.

Natural peanut butter. Isn't that fascinating? No, I think what it turns out is that it's kind of boring. You're boring. Oh, why did I say that? Why did I say that? I don't know if you had to, because it was right there. I'm so sorry that I interrupted you for random Wikipedia article corner, but it had, it had potential to be magical. I like the idea of it. Oops. Uh-oh. Oops. I muted myself. Oh. It was like the wind took her. The wind took her away. It had the potential to be magical. What if next week you do, what if next week you pick some? Okay. Okay. Then we'll see. I might cheat, but yeah, okay. Looking for a better cooking routine? With meal planning, shopping, and prepping handled, HelloFresh has you covered. HelloFresh makes home cooking easy

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on your first box at hellofresh.ca slash murder20 with code murder20. That's up to 20 free meals plus free shipping on your first box when you go to hellofresh.ca slash murder20 and use code murder20. Goodbye. Hey, I'm Arisha. 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. So as you know, Karen, today, October 11th is Indigenous People's Day. So I thought it'd be great to cover eight couple cases of missing and murdered Indigenous women that don't, I haven't gotten a lot of media coverage. Great. So the sources I use today are a Guardian article written by Hallie Golden, which I used heavily, an Independent Two Spirit Media video, an article for the Lily by Cecilia Noel, a CBC article written by Marnie Luke and Connie Walker, a Fox 13 article written by Laura Stein-Britcher, and a Navajo Times article written by Arlissa Basanti,

and a secangucdc.org article. And also Murder Squad covered Amber Takaro's case back in May of 2020. So check that out if you're interested. Okay. So there's been a lot of talk lately about how missing and murdered Indigenous women don't get the same amount of media attention as those of white women. And this isn't based on opinion or conjecture. In 2018, a study found that 90% of cases of missing and murdered Indigenous women were never covered by national or international media. And a third of the stories that were covered included language that engages in racism, misogyny, and stereotyping. So according to the Urban Indian Health Institute, in 2016, the National Crime Information Center said that there were 5,712 reports of missing Indian and

Alaskan Native women and girls, but only 116 were logged in the Department of Justice's federal missing persons database. Out of almost 7,000. Almost 6,000. There were only 116 logged. Indigenous women are murdered at a rate 10 times higher than the national average, according to the U.S. Department of Justice. And homicide is one of the leading causes of death for young Indigenous women. And for white, young white women, it's like number five and higher. So number one for Indigenous women. One in three Native women report having been raped, and 86% of the offenses are committed by non-Native men. And so, and I think I read about how a lot of it has to do with the fact that, like, they're in these areas where there's a lot of, like,

mining towns, fishing towns, and places where there's a large population of, like, transient men that come in. And that, you know, adds to it. All right. So the first case I want to talk about is that of missing 17-year-old Kiana Jacqueline Klomp from the Yakutet Tlingit tribe. I'm going to do my best, and I looked up all the pronunciations, but it's inevitable that I'm going to screw something up. So, apologies. Will you say her full name again? Yes, it's K-I-A-N-A Jacqueline Klomp. So, Kiana's mother, Terri Dushane, told The Guardian that her daughter has been missing for a year and a half, and there hasn't been a single article about her disappearance. And she's not exaggerating. As of this recording, there are no articles about Kiana. There's only

missing person alerts that give Kiana's description and a brief summary of when she was last seen. So, through those alerts and an interview with Terri, I was able to find that on March 22nd, 2020, Kiana's father dropped her off at work, who she worked at a Papa Johns, and she and her dad had gotten into an argument. He leaves, and so Kiana decides to run away from home. At first, she stays with friends in Post Falls, Idaho, or in nearby Spokane, Washington. And then she starts staying with a man who her mom, Terri, describes as being a sexual predator. Kiana disappears after staying with this man, and she hasn't been seen or heard from since. When Terri finds out that her daughter has been reported missing, she leaves her home in Alaska and heads to Post Falls.

She speaks to the police who tell her they've done everything they can and that you can't find someone who doesn't want to be found. Not getting the help she needs from police, Terri reaches out to the media, but they don't respond. And she feels, quote, left out and unimportant. Because Kiana's case received no many attention, Terri spends months putting up flyers and posting on social media. And this is something that you see talked about and happen a lot in cases like Kiana's, where when law enforcement isn't interested in pursuing any case, if the family and friends and tribe essentially become like private detectives themselves. And it's totally and completely up to them to keep the story of their missing loved one alive. Otherwise,

it would just fade into obscurity. No one would ever talk about it. And they call the detectives every day and every week. And if they didn't do that, there was just, they would never be any follow up, any information given to them. So they have to become private detectives, essentially on their own. So more than a year and a half later, Kiana still hasn't been found. And Terri is still desperate to find her daughter. Kiana loves skateboarding and shopping. And Terri wants Kiana's story to be shared. While the media often fails Indigenous women and girls, the police do as well. In the United States, Indigenous women and girls are 10 times more likely to be murdered than the national average. In Canada, they're 12 times more likely. Yet

there are countless instances of police officers not responding to an Indigenous woman's disappearance or murder in the same way they would a white woman's. 20 year old Amber, Alyssa Takaro from the Mikasu Cree First Nation is one of those women. On the 18th of August, 2010, Amber and her 14 months old son, Jacob, and a female friend, leave for Fort McMurray, Alberta, and head to Nixu, a hamlet outside of Edmonton. And they're going to visit Edmonton over the next few days and see friends. But they're staying in Nixu because it's way cheaper. So after settling in the motel, Amber decides to head into Edmonton on her own. She leaves her son with her friend and says she's going to hitchhike into the city. And she's known to have gotten into a vehicle between 730 and 8

with an unknown male. But Amber never comes back. Her friend notifies Amber's mom, Vivian, who reports from missing to the Leduk RCMP. And the police asked Vivian if Amber has ever gone missing before. Vivian says no. And the police just say maybe she's out partying. And she'll call or whatever, like blow it off completely. Vivian's adamant that her daughter would never just run off and leave her son, but police completely downplay Amber's disappearance. They don't take it seriously unless then three weeks later, on September 4th, a media relations officer with the Leduk RCMP tells the local newspaper, quote, we don't have any reason to believe Amber is in any danger. We know she's in the Edmonton area. So the next week, police take Amber off the missing

person's list, even though no one has seen her. So they actually don't know what they just said. Police then destroy all of Amber's personal property that had been left behind at the motel. Even though no one had to fucking see in her. When Vivian asks why they took her off the list, even though no one's seen her, they don't have an answer. And Vivian spends the next month getting Amber back on the list. So almost two years later, Amber's case is being handled by RCMP's care unit, which investigates unsolved homicides and cases of vulnerable missing persons. Then on October 28th and 2012, that care unit releases a recording of Amber's last phone conversation, because it turns out while she was in the car with whoever picked her up hitchhiking,

her brother called her from prison, which means that the call was recorded. So the conversation lasted 17 minutes. The police were released 61 seconds of it to see if anyone recognizes the man's voice. It's an unknown male. And in the short recording, you can hear Amber defensively questioning where the man is taking her. She's like, she can tell he's not taking her to Edmonton, even though he said he was going to. And it's on speaker. She's like, you know, yo, what, like, she goes, yo, we're not going to the city. Are we like, where are you fucking taking me? I can tell this is not where we're going. He's like, no, no, we are. We're going to 50th Avenue, like, trying to convince her they are. And she repeats the information he's giving her to her

brother, but she can tell in her voice, there's fear in her voice, there's confusion, and there's kind of like this knowledge that something is not fucking right with this dude. The last part of the call is unintelligible, but you can hear the man say something, something gravel, and then you hear scuffling noises before the call abruptly ends. Fucking eerie. So after releasing the audio, police say that they believe the man actually drove southeast along the rural roads of Lettich County instead of north into Edmonton. And multiple women from the area contact police and say that they recognize the man's voice and they all give the name, the same name in the man. Police look into this dude, but rule him out as a suspect, which to all the women who heard the

voice and recognized it is totally surprising. So I don't know on what context they ruled him out. Then on September 1st, four days after the recording is released, Amber's remains are found on a rural property near Lettich County. And the 17 minute recorded conversation is almost the exact time someone would need to drive from the motel where Amber was staying to where her body was found. So it's just almost certain that whoever she was with and whoever voice is on that fucking recording murdered her. The Lettich RCMP admit that they mishandled Amber's disappearance. Amber's mother Vivian files a complaint against them. She says downplaying Amber's disappearance and taking her off the missing persons list hindered the homicide investigation.

In 2015, the Lettich police tell the CBC that their policies and procedures have changed as a result of the Amber Takaro investigation. However, the person who killed Amber has still not been found or arrested. Even if the police properly investigated missing and murdered indigenous women, they would still be hampered by lack of funding. According to the Navajo police chief, the recent case of missing 62 year old Navajo woman Ella Mae Begay is a prime example of how budget issues can affect a case. On June 15, 2021, so this past June, Ella's truck is seen in the middle of the night driving down the Arizona dirt road she lives off of. Later that day, Ella's family realizes Ella and her truck still aren't home. And it's completely unlike Ella,

who's a caregiver, a beloved elder and matriarch of the Denay Navajo tribe and a talented master rug weaver. It's unlike her to leave in the middle of the night. And especially during COVID, which she took very seriously, she rarely leaves the house during the day even. So in the middle of the night for the 62 year old woman to just take off is weird. She's reported missing. And by 435 pm, a missing persons alert is released by police. The next day Navajo police start looking for Ella. They start around her house, which the Navajo times describes as one of the most remote areas on the reservation. It's far from the main road with no markings for where to turn and people often get lost just trying to find her house. And so from there, the search expands leading to other

states even. On June 20, Ella's disappearance is listed as a homicide and her case is transferred to the FBI. But her family wasn't notified of this change. They had to find out about it on social media. Oh my God. And of course, her family is upset with the Navajo police department for not providing updates and not bringing in enough help and alleged they don't have the proper training to find Ella and her family starts conducting their own searches and following leads. As of this recording, Ella and her truck are still missing. However, a 21 year old man has been named a person of interest and he's been arrested on unrelated charges in the meantime. And it's not clear, you know, you can't find any information as to how he's connected to Ella. So Ella's family

is unhappy with the Navajo police, of course. But Chief Phillip Francisco says his department did all they could before the case was transferred to the FBI. He says many people are quick to say outside departments should help the Navajo police investigate, but all departments are understaffed and underfunded. He says there's also a major lack of support from the Navajo Nation Council. For example, when it came time for funding, he asked about buying a helicopter to help with missing persons cases. It was verified that the department needed a helicopter and that they met the funding guidelines. But when 714 million worth of funding was released, the Navajo police only received money for hazard pay, which Francisco had already been paying with other funds. He says

the council did give him money for personal protective equipment. But that was after he'd already figured out a different way to pay for them. So there's just a lot of juggling going on. Along with budget issues, there are ongoing struggles that continue the pattern of structural violence against Indigenous people. This includes lack of emergency services, amber alerts, counseling and family services. There's also a lack of overall community awareness and education. And to make matters worse, there's poor communication between federal, state, county, city authorities and tribal authorities. There is some positive news in order to help alleviate some of these struggles. In October 2020, what's known as Savannah's Act became public law. It's

also known as the hashtag MMIWax and it quote, aims to improve tribal access to federal crime information databases and create standardized protocols for responding to cases of missing and murdered Native American women. The act was nicknamed after 22 year old Fargo North Dakota resident Savannah Lyfontein Graywind, who was a member of the Spirit Lake Sioux Tribe, who was murdered in August 2017. The act will clarify responsibilities between agencies responding to cases of missing or murdered Indigenous people, increase coordination and communication between agencies and give tribal governments resources and information that's necessary to respond to cases of missing or murdered Indigenous people. And we'll increase the collection of data related

to missing or murdered Indigenous people. There's also a big issue about how Indigenous women are entered into the system because a lot of times they're mislabeled as Hispanic or white. So these numbers aren't able to correctly be processed. So of course, this is a huge problem. It's very slow moving, any kind of solution. But there is hope that Savannah's Law and the MMU can help speed them up. And there are many ways people can help missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls. You can attend vigils, sign petitions, reach out to lawmakers, join social media campaigns like the We Care, MMIWG. You can educate yourself through organizations like the National Indigenous Women's Resource Center that's from the US and the Native Women's Association of Canada. Both

offer extensive education materials as well as options to donate. And there's also a documentary called Sisters Rising about this issue, the documentaries by Willow O'Farrell and Brad Heck. And that is just a couple of the many, many cases of missing and murdered Indigenous women that are not getting enough press and media coverage. Great job. Thank you. I mean, we've known, we've since basically, since we've started this podcast, this is one of the things that our listeners have talked about and that is a major concern, especially when we tour up in Canada. It's a thing that people who follow true crime are very aware of. But it is, you know, I think more and more people are starting to talk about it more in the mainstream, even if it's just the

story of how these numbers are, the discrepancy is so high and it's so, it's so imbalanced and that that has to change. Yeah. Like the white women syndrome is real and true and needs to be, the only case is getting extensive coverage in the media, which they need it too, of course, but it sees blonde, pretty white women. And those are the ones who get these crazy media blitzes. And meanwhile, not a single word is said about all these cases that happen all the fucking time. So, yeah. So to do our little part to help, Karen and I are donating $10,000 to the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women USA organization, whose number one mission is to bring the missing home and help the families of the murdered cope and support them through the process of grief.

So you can check them out on MMIWUSA.org. And if you by chance have any money, which we know lots of people have strapped these days and it's really hard. But even if you give like five, $10, just something to kind of acknowledge that you realize what a huge problem this is, you know, that has to change, like people just have to start putting their energy toward figuring out how to change it. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. Great job. Thank you. What a great way to commemorate Indigenous People's Day. Thank you. It's really important. Yeah. Well, I feel like it's like the very literal least I can do. So, yeah, but I think sometimes if that's the mindset you have toward it, it's also easy to just go and doing nothing doesn't

matter. Right. So I think this is like one of those topics that's a tipping point where it's like, it really has to change. Yeah. And I think, you know, it's great to talk about it. And it's not the least you could do. It's like you put together a series of really good stories and a bunch of information that a lot of people would not have known and wouldn't be aware of. And I think it doesn't have to, everything doesn't have to feel like this, how it feels on social media where it's people shaking their finger and saying, you're wrong or you didn't know. It's like, no, it's about spreading awareness and spreading action. If there's any action that you could possibly take, yeah, and becoming educated on it and not denying it when someone, no one brings it

up to. Yeah, no, not getting defensive or like to me, we all observed in the Gabby Petito case what intense attention and like, and not just like local, it was just like immediately every major network. And we can see that now. There's no denying it. There's a certain kind of woman that will garner that attention every time we all know it and we've seen it. And I thought it was so incredibly generous when her father spoke after she, her remains were found. And he basically said that, that there are other people that should be getting this kind of attention. And they don't like what in that time, what an incredibly noble and beautiful thing to say and acknowledge, because it's not saying it doesn't take anything away, people clearly cared about

her going missing and we can care that we have the capacity to care for many more people. Yeah, let's spread this around instead of focusing on a one person. Yep. That's really amazing. Okay, I'm gonna take us in a different direction. Okay, let's do it. I didn't tie this to anything except for wonderment, weirdness, mystery, and, you know, spooky Halloween, like weird type of shit. I'm on board for all of those things. Okay, then I'm going to tell you the fascinating and mysterious case of Larry Bader. Okay. All right, I'm not going to read the names of these articles, but I'll just tell you and I'll read them at the end. Okay. So there was a life magazine article by a journalist named Chris Wells. There is a mental floss article by a journalist named

Jake Rawson. There's an article in the newspaper, The Dispatch by journalist David Smothers, and of course, Wikipedia's wonderful Lawrence Joseph Bader Wikipedia page. Okay, so I'll read those article names after, but let me tell you, this starts on the morning of May 15th, the 1957. So 30 year old Lawrence Joseph Bader, everyone calls him Larry, he's a kitchen cookware salesman in Akron, Ohio, and he's leaving to go on a business trip. He has to go meet with someone about some bad checks that he's received. So he's going to go see a man about a bad check. So he tells his wife, Mary Lou, that after he gets his business taken care of that he might stop off for a quick fishing trip on Lake Erie on his way home. Larry loves fishing, he also loves archery.

And so any chance he has, he will take to do either one. Sure. Right. And Mary Lou, who's at home taking care of their three children while she's five months pregnant, suggests that maybe Larry just come right home after the business trip. And he responds, maybe I will, and maybe I won't. Sounds like a catch. Right. That's the kind of man you want, the life partner you want with you through the tough times. Okay. So he takes his suitcase and his fishing gear, packs his car, and leaves for the drive from Akron to Cleveland around noon. So on his way up north, he cashes a check for $400 and strangely pays some bills. I guess back then you had to do it in person, right? So he's just like, I'm going to be near the gas company or whatever. The milk

store. So I'm going to drop off three quarters at the milk store for the milkman, you know, the milkman. The milkman. Our next door neighbors used to get their milk delivered in the 80s. Well, you know, when I moved into this house that was built in 1940, there was a milk door to the outside number. Yeah. Yeah. Very cool. Milk used to, guys, teens, milk used to be a big deal. Everyone drank it. The big milk, you know, they convinced us that smoke cigarettes and drink milk and you'll live to be 100. Just take a quick puff, down some milk, you'll be fine. Martini lunch, everyone's happy. And then I glass some milk when you get back to the office. Okay. So Larry's paying his bills and, you know, taking care of business. Sure. And one of those bills is an installment on his

life insurance policy. Okay. Will this come up again? I wonder. Probably not. No, don't, you've got to believe. Okay. So once he arrives in Cleveland, he handles his business, then he heads over to a place called your favorite place, Eddie's Boat House. Sure. Which is a boat rental facility that's on the banks of the Rocky River, right where it feeds into Lake Erie. Gorgeous. Gorgeous. This is the time of year. You love that spot. Yeah. So I looked up on Cleveland.com, what the weather was on May 15th, 1957. Damn, researcher. I mean, it's fun. I don't know. I just love to put things into the Google bar and see what comes up. Listen, here are my favorite murder. One thing we can promise you is that this is a weather podcast and we will always

will report that weather, whether it's today or in 57. That's right. In the future, in the past, we'll tell you the weather. We don't care. We want to talk about it. That's right. The wind has died down a bit. Just listener. Good to know. Okay. So on Cleveland.com, it said that May 15th, 1957, the high was 79 and the low was 43. How does that happen in one day? I think it's because that's how they do spring. It's still snowing in April and then they're just coming out of it and things are getting crack in the beginning of May. Okay. So probably by the water, it's a little colder than. Well, this is, it's Cleveland. So it's not the weather at Eddie's Boathouse. I'm sorry. Well, I want Eddie's Boathouse's weather. What did it say on that little thermometer with the

flowers that they have on the wall? I looked up Eddie's diary. Okay. So, okay. So basically, on this day, the mid-afternoon skies are cloudy. And so the guy that owns Eddie's Boathouse, his name is Lawrence Kotler. And he warns Larry, this is Lawrence warning Larry, Larry, that a storm is coming. Larry, a storm is brewing. Larry, it's May launch. You have to listen now. Listen up now. A storm's a brewing. So Lake Erie's is apparently a shallow lake that can be tough to navigate. And so a storm would make the waters incredibly dangerous. Then it's all chopped up and crazy out there. Larry doesn't care. So he plans on being back before it's dark and he tells Lawrence that he's confident he can handle the water until he gets

back. Lawrence cannot convince him otherwise. So he rents Larry a 14-foot motor fishing boat that also has two oars. And then before he leaves, Larry asks for a set of lights to be put on the boat. And Lawrence is confused because Larry said he was going to come back before dark, which is four hours away. But Larry insists upon getting the lights. So Lawrence is like, whatever, bro, you're a pain in my ass. Listen, get the fuck out of here. He sets him up. It's like I warned you as many times as I could. New diligence. Done. Fuck off. Done. He wiped it. Lawrence wiped his hands. He fixed his ass, got anyone back to the counter to help the next person. So a while later, it's close to sunset and the winds begin to kick up as Lawrence

foretold. As was foretold in the farmer's almanac. So then a member of the Coast Guard sees Larry out on the water and he calls out to him offering some help to get him to navigate back to shore. But Larry dismisses him and continues on. Larry, let me give you a hand. No, go fuck yourself. That's Larry to the Coast Guard. What a day. How about thank you for your service every once in a while, Larry. Larry. Okay, so the next morning, May 16, Larry's rental boat is found in Lakewood, Ohio's Perkins Beach on Lakewood, Ohio's Perkins Beach. This is five miles down the shore from Eddie's Boathouse. And there's minor damage to the boat. It has a scratched hull. It has a bent motor propeller. It's missing an ore. But other than that, there's no sign that the

boat capsized. The life jackets are still on board, as is Larry's fishing gear. But the gas can's empty and the suitcase is gone. And Larry is nowhere to be found. Larry. So as soon as this empty boat is discovered, of course, his wife, Mary Lou, is notified and they start to search for Larry. The Coast Guard, they circle Lake Erie and the surrounding shores for two months. Oh, straight. Yeah, two months hoping to find him either alive or dead. He never turns up. Authorities don't hold out much hope. They know that those choppy waters make it virtually impossible to survive for a few hours, let alone days or months without a life jacket being in the water. So the two months search turns up no leads. And in 1960, Mary Lou

Bader's petition to have Larry legally declare dead is made official. Okay. So now it's eight years later. February 2. Well, not from when this happened, not from when Mary Lou's thing became official, I just did the math. From when this happened. So eight years later, from when Larry disappears. It's February 2, 1965. And an old Bader family acquaintance is at a sporting goods convention in Chicago, Illinois. And he sees something he cannot believe. A man who looks just like his old friend, Larry, except for this man has a mustache and an eye patch. But aside from that, he's like, that's fucking Larry. That's the like, that's your fucking, what's it called? Disguise. Yeah. Do you remember that little puppet thing that you could, this is so

70s that you might be too young for it. But it was a little guy that you could put disguises on his head. So it's like he was bald. Oh, Mr. Potato Head. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. All potatoes are bald, Karen. No. This, this guy was a little evil looking guy. It was almost like he was a villain. You can make him all different kinds of villains. So there was like a monocle you get sticking in front of one of his eyes and a mustache. I love it. Goatee. You could snap hair like Beatles hair onto his head. You should be him for Halloween. That's a great idea. Okay. Did you find it? No. Hold on. Stephen, did you find it? Is it Hugo? Hugo? Yes. Yeah. Hugo, a man of a thousand pieces.

Show Georgia that picture. Oh, he's scary. Oh my God. That is the most terrifying doll I've ever seen in my life. Look at those disguises. Wow. It looks like he's from Star Trek. And, yes. And he's going to kill you and your entire family. Because he has a blue tunic, right? Yes. He's a blue tunic. Oh my God. Okay. That is the most terrifying fucking doll I've ever seen in my life. It's not hilarious. It's like, give this to your nephew. Yeah. Have nightmares for the rest of your life. Okay. So let's not lose sight of the fact that this friend of the family looks across the room and a guy who was declared dead. No. No. Five years before, he thinks he's standing across the sporting goods,

whatever you call it, conference convention. Yeah. Hugo. That is a nightmare. That is a nightmare. This, what a perfect example of what the 70s were like for children. Totally. Hugo is that in a nutshell. Yeah. We'll post the picture for everybody. So the acquaintance is looking across. He sees a ghost. He's Hugo. It's Hugo. Mostly the main reason that this guy is positive it's Larry Bader is because he's standing in an archery booth. Yeah. At the sports, the sporting goods convention. Very incognito, Larry. Very incognito, but everyone knew he loved fishing and he loved archery. Yeah. So it's just like, okay, you're standing right there, the place you love. So this old acquaintance runs and calls Larry's niece, 21 year old Suzanne Pica or Pica. He swears up and down that he's

seen Larry at this convention and he tells Suzanne to come to Chicago right away to see it for herself, which I live for. I live for you. Ring, ring. Yeah. Pick up the phone. I think I can, I think I'm seeing your dead uncle at this thing drive to Chicago right now. Yeah. Isn't that the most exciting drop? Everything like come and do a stake out with me at the sporting goods convention. I'll follow him now. Just get your ass here. Yeah. And it's the, and it's the mid 60s. So there's no cell phones. This is all pay phone shit that they're doing. How about for your next birthday? You have to wait by the home phone. I call you and set up and I'm like a fucking get your like, we'll do a stakeout. Maybe I could do like a treasure hunt for you. Like I'll plan out.

Yeah. But I don't want to do any of that kitty bullshit where it's fake. I need you to find a relative that I think is dead. This is the key. It's literally, it's me calling you and just being like, you know, your uncle that you lost years ago. Your grandma's 110 now. So my grandma died. Yeah. She loves archery. She's right here watching her do it in her house. I get there and you're like, I was lying. And she's like, honey, I have an iPad. It's not, it's not me. Okay. So she does it. She drops everything. Oh, I just wrote, I wrote, drop everything and drive to Chicago so we can spy on a one-eyed ghost archer. Okay. I got an archery kit during COVID. Did you really? I think so. You must have told me. Okay.

I mean, did you use it? Not yet. Talk about it. That's why I think I got it, but I'm not positive because there's a lot of weird shit in the garage that I like bought late night on Amazon. It was just like, I'm going to get into this now. And I, one of them is, I got a punching bag. I got, I think I got an archery kit. All sorts of things. All sorts of stuff from camp. I, I did archery at camp every year. They were big into archery at the camp. I went to Camp St. Andrews. Yeah. And it was super fun. And I was kind of good at it. I like liked it. I got it a little bit. It's fun. Okay. I'll set it up for next time. You're over here. Be careful. They're probably like nerf archery. I'm going to get, you have to figure out how many

ambient you were on when you ordered it. What level of ambient was it? Okay. So Suzanne stunned to get the call. And of course, as I wrote, probably stoked and feels alive for the first time in years. So she does it. She makes the trip. They track down this. Yes. The one, the mustachioed patch eye man. She is convinced it's her uncle Larry Vader. Sure of it. She walks right up to him and says, pardon me, but aren't you my uncle Larry who disappeared eight years ago? And the man laughs says his name is not Larry and that he isn't anyone's uncle. Now, and my comment on this is, I absolutely agree with his approach. If someone walks up to you and it's like, Oh, I'm sorry. Aren't you George Hartstaff? No, I'm not. Sorry. Even with me. You

must be mistaken. Okay. Nope. Never admit it real time. You don't know what those people want. They could be serving you with the summons. They could be like you owe me $50. Get away. You deny, deny, deny, put, pull down your iPod to get to a secure location, figure out what these people want. I feel like you and I would be really easy to serve with the summons because all you have to do is send over like a tattooed librarian girl with a cat and like, Are you Karen? Are you Georgia? Yeah. You think it's a murderer, you know? And they're like, you've been served. Or if you came over with like three balloons, I'd be like, Oh my goodness. That's our friend me. Balloons. It's not easy to trick Karen. My favorite. A dead uncle or balloons.

I know what living good is all about. Clearly. Stakeouts and balloons. Okay. So this man introduced introduces himself to Suzanne and he says that his name is Fritz Johnson and that he's a sports director at local TV station in Omaha, Nebraska. So Suzanne isn't buying it. So she runs, she calls her dad and her uncle, who are Larry's brothers. They fly out to Chicago to confront this man as well. Damn. In mid 60s, they have to like call up Pan Am on a rotary phone. You have to get dressed up like you can't just get so dressed up. Yeah. Oh, my mom used to get so mad. She would see me in a sweatsuit for the airport. She'd be like, You're not wearing that on the plane. Like yet on Southwest. Yes, I am. Yeah. Mom. Mom. They don't give a fuck. No one cares about

anything. This is how the fucking the fucking flight attendants are dressed. They have jean shorts on. Like what do you want? Put your girdle away, ma'am. It's over. Okay. Okay. So the brothers go and so basically the family confronts him. Sorry, I wrote so much extra bullshit. Are they like holding him hostage right now while the family gets on the plane and shit? I think it sounds to me like they're milling about the sports conference because he's at he is the demonstrator at the archery. Okay. All right. That's why he's at the sporting goods thing. So they're just kind of like, I think staring from afar, running to the old pay phone, which is actually a whole booth, but inside a building, right? Yeah. A bank of pay phones. Yeah. People

are flying, but they're also it's from Ohio. So I don't think it's the craziest distance, right? Yeah. Ohio to Chicago. What's that nine hours? Couldn't be more than nine. Okay. So, oh, okay. Fritz keeps his cool. No matter how many times Suzanne or Larry Bader's brothers confront him with the fact that they know for a fact it's him, Larry Bader. This man argues, no, I am Fritz Johnson. After a long back and forth, Larry's brothers ask Fritz to go with them to the police station to get him fingerprinted because Larry Bader was in the Navy. So they know that they'll be able to access Larry's old prints and compare them to Fritz's fingerprints from now. Okay. Fritz agrees. They all go down to the local precinct. And the next day, it takes a full day.

The next day, Fritz gets a call from the police station. The results are in and it turns out the fingerprints are a match. Fritz, Larry, Johnson, Bader, one guy. Dude, why would he go? Why would he go? Yeah, I'll meet you guys there. Screech is off. Why would he go? Yes. Put that on your whiteboard. It's there. Because that's a question to to consider and remember. Okay. So let's talk about Larry Bader just a little bit. He's born and raised in Akron, Ohio, run of the mill boy. He loved the outdoors. He wants to be a dentist like his father when he's growing up. But then he gets into school. He can't get good grades or doesn't get good grades. Wait, he's a real boy? Larry Bader? Yeah. Oh, I'm sorry. I thought you were talking

to my friends. Sorry. Take that out. Go on. He's a real boy. I thought you were telling me. Yes, I'm about to tell you the story of Pinocchio. Okay, leave that in because that was classic. No, this is we're talking about Larry Bader, the guy that went on the fishing trip. Got it. While he did some business on the way. I'm here now. I'm here now with you. So we're just giving a little background on that guy to kind of like fill in the blank. So he wants to be a dentist, can't get the grades. So instead he drops out of high school. He joins the Navy when he's 17 years old in 1944, serves 18 months. When he gets out, he gets his GED. He enrolls in Akron University in 46. And he gets a job at a hamburger stand on campus. So he can make

ends meet while he's going to college. But again, his grades are bad. So he ends up flunking out in one semester. Larry, I've been there, Larry. We've lived at Larry. Yeah. He keeps working at the hamburger stand though. And while working there, he meets a student named Mary Lou Knapp. They start dating and they get married on April 19, 1952. So Larry and Mary Lou have three kids, Mary Lawrence, Jr. and Stephen, and the family settles into a nice neighborhood in Akron called West Hills. On a hamburger flipper salary? That's how you could do it back then, kids. For real. I mean, we were all living off the fat of the land. Yeah. When your boomer grandparents tell you to fucking pull up your bootstraps, kick them with those boots. Don't kick your grandparents.

Please don't kick your grandparents. That's crazy. Also, do you have boomer grandparents? I guess they do. Yeah. Yeah. This was, this was quite a time. But, but that was actually his problem. They moved into this nice neighborhood, but he didn't have the money to actually live there. So now he needs it. He has to get a new job. So he starts working as a cookware salesman for the Reynolds Metal Corporation. Okay. I believe the people who brought you Reynolds Wrap, but I'm not sure. Well, that would make sense. So guess, one of Larry's friends describes him as red-blooded beer drinking all around nice guy who could talk your ear off and you'd love to sit and listen to him. Oh, your dad. Right? For real. But this friend makes a point to say that although Larry, of course, likes fun,

but he isn't wild. He's definitely a family man. Okay. So even with Larry's slight pay increase, he's falling behind on bills. Their mortgage is $17,000. Seems like a lot. There's a fourth back then. Yeah. Huge amount back then. Fourth kid on the way. And then of course, he's got this huge life insurance plan that so he can't like he makes $10,000 a year so he can't cover expenses. And that makes it all the more suspicious that he would use what little money that he has to raise that life insurance plan to $40,000 a year. There are $40,000 payout, right? With a double indemnity clause in case of accidental death. Oh, honey. Before and he does that shortly before he leaves for that business trip. Yeah. Right. Okay. So now

let's talk about Fritz Johnson. Fritz Johnson, on the other hand, is the life of the party. So this guy shows up on May 18th, 1957 at the Roundtable Bar in Omaha, Nebraska. And just so you know what we're talking about, that's 740 miles west of Rocky River, which is where Larry was last seen. Wow. Okay. But he shows up there three days after Larry's disappearance. And Fritz Johnson is wearing a sport coat and a jacket, which is similar to the outfit Larry had on the last date, the last time he was seen. I feel like every man back then, that's what they, that was, you slapped it. Very true. Those are pajamas. Was he wearing a fedora and a blazer and a tie? Oh, yes, that guy. And penny loafers? Definitely. I saw 1,000 of him

on the street. Okay. So, but he also was carrying a suitcase and a navy bag and a bartender's guide. And he had come to the Roundtable Bar looking for a job. He introduced himself to the owner Mike Chiodo as Fritz Johnson. He flashes his Navy ID to confirm it and explains that he was recently discharged from the Navy after a 14 year stint because of a back injury. And that's stint included tours in World War II and in the Korean War. So Fritz explains that he took time to travel after getting out of the Navy, but now he's staying down at the Farnham Hotel near the bus station and he needs a job. He has prior experience bartending at clubs while he was in the Navy and he believes he'll be a good fit at the Roundtable Bar. So he gets the job and he quickly makes friends with

the locals. When he's asked about his odd name, Fritz explains he was an orphan in Boston and he was one of 22 boys at an orphanage. They were all named John Johnson, which is Fritz's actual legal name, but they all were called different nicknames. So depending on who you ask, the nickname Fritz was either given to him at the orphanage because he reminded everyone of a character from the 20s comic strip Cats and Jammer kids. There's a character named Fritz. Others were told that he got that name from his fellow naval officers because of his short haircut that made him look like a German soldier. But either way, Fritz is so committed to being called Fritz that he lists himself as Fritz on all of his bills and he signs his checks, Fritz. Okay. Just Fritz. Stick with it.

Oh, sure. And they also has a strange habit of dating his checks by season instead of the actual date. So fall. Legal. No, it does. And also it's like, I remember when I very first came to LA and got a checking account, I got Simpson's checks. I just thought that was cool. And then after using them for a couple months and feeling like just a humongous dork every single time I was seen with my Simpsons checks, I realized and that's what Fritz needed to realize. Writing a check is the last place where you need to be expressing your personality. The person at the gas company doesn't give a shit that I like the Simpsons. It doesn't matter. Okay. So when Fritz isn't bartending, he moonlights at the local radio station KBON,

where he learns about recording equipment and he practices broadcasting. And within two years, he's hired as a disc jockey on KBON. And then he earns local celebrity status. So everyone knows who Fritz is because he's a DJ at the local radio station. He sounds completely opposite of that guy Larry, who was kind of a fuddy duddy. Yes. Who worked for rental drop. Right. Exactly. That guy's just like struggling to make ends meet. And Fritz is like, I'm out and about and like going and grabbing life by the tail. Yeah. So we'll listen to this. It gets better. His popularity grows even more after he sits in a box perched on top of a 50 foot flagpole for 15 days to raise awareness for the station's polio charity drive. Oh. The front of this box

reads Fritz on KBON on the pole for polio. Oh, I was going to call him stupid until I realized it was for a good cause. It's a it's for a great cause. And every then they invented the vaccine for polio. And I was like, great, a vaccine. That's great. That prevents disease. We're going to we're going to volunteer Stephen to do this same thing for COVID vaccine. So get up there. Okay. So his friends swing by the pole. They hoist up martinis and milk bottles for him. And when he finally comes down. Wait, there's some martinis and milk. Were you kidding? No, that's literally what happened. We were just talking about martinis and milk. I know. But this it sounds to me like they used milk bottles, but they poured martinis in. There

was no milk involved. Unless they didn't rinse them. Remember on Laverne, Shirley, when Laverne would make a Pepsi and milk? No. It's disgusting. It's so gross. That was so funny. Oh, God. Okay. So basically, his friends make sure that he's feeling no pain while he sits up in a box raising awareness for polio. And then when he finally comes down, he's whisked away in a convertible full of beautiful women for a celebratory parade. So Fritz is he's living large. Then he transitions from radio to TV. So he takes a job as the sports director for the local TV station, KETV. Fritz, much like Larry Bader, has a deep love for archery. He competes and wins several regional championships in and around Omaha. And he's hired by a Nebraska archery supply company to attend

the sporting convention in Chicago to demonstrate and promote their equipment. So that's how he ended up at that convention. You think he'd be lying a little low, right? Well, you'd think. But I bet there's more to the story. I'm going to go ahead and go out on a limb and get, oh, hello, Mr. There's this photo. That's him being a handsome like a TV guy. Oh, he's old timey handsome. Yeah. Pencil thin mustache. Pencil thin mustache. Okay. So Fritz settles into his popularity and his bachelor status lifestyle. He has an apartment that he furnishes with nothing but pillows and cushions. Oh, tacky. He's your suit Larry over here. He's like, uh, would you like to lay down anywhere in this front room? Take a seat anywhere you'd like.

He's nasty pillow. He uses the apartment for wild champagne parties. Okay. And he also buys himself an old hearse from an undertaker in Kansas for 150 bucks, which he outfits here. This is even prettier with pillows, a bar, an incense burner, and dubs it his hunting vehicle. Ew. Ew, you nasty. Fritz. Do you remember his pencil thin mustache? I hate it now. He, um, he also sports often sports a leather beret. Me too. Fucking Fritz. Fritz. God damn it. Calm down with your iPad, Fritz. Fritz is going for it. Yeah. That's, that's one thing you can say about Fritz. You know, there are people that like, they go to leave the house and then they go and they grab a jaunty leather beret and they're like,

this is it. Tonight's the night. This is who I am. This is what I do. Deal with it. I want people to see me. Yeah. I want them to know who I am. I've got my milk jug full of fucking martini and I'm ready to party. I'm going to jump in that hearse. I'm a hunt. Dog will hunt. Ew. Yuck. Everyone is so charmed. Uh-huh. Sounds real fucking charming. It was easier back then to charm people. Charm was very, first of all, charm was only about men. Yeah. And it was just, uh, it was also called Letcherie. Letcherie. Yeah. And remember, he's, he's so charming when he writes a check, it says fall of 1962. Oh, that Fritz. So quirky. Oh my God. He's so different and unique. I want to take off that leather beret and see what's underneath it. Fritz. Okay. So he's basically,

he's known as a ladies man. You know, I told you about the cushions. Sorry. I lost my place and now I'm, I'm just kind of free, free styling. I'm free styling till I find it again. But it's more than his flamboyance that charms his friends in Oklahoma. In Omaha. Where are we? Jesus Christ. But it's more than his flamboyance that charms his friends in Omaha. Okay. It's his persistent, fun loving spirit and his willingness to always listen to a friend in need. One of these people later told Life Magazine, the only times I ever saw him depressed were when his friends were in a jam. Oh, there's also a certain rebellious spirit to Fritz's independence. He once told his friends, quote, all my life, I've had people tell me what to do in the Navy, in the orphanage. Well,

now I'm going to do what I like to do. That's right. You heard me. I'm Fritz Johnson and I'm going to do what I want to do now. I'm going to audition for Auntie Mame. Okay. So Fritz, Fritz was declaring. He was declaring him his freedoms. So his beloved bachelor life comes to an end in 1961 when he's going to do a thing that you will not see coming. He marries a 21-year-old model named Nancy Zimmer. Man. What Nancy? Talk about unique. Talk about a different type of man. What a rare bird. So Nancy has a, this is actually very nice. She has a four-year-old daughter from a previous relationship. Fritz adopts that baby and later Fritz and Nancy have a child of their own, a baby boy. So they have, they settle down to a nice little family. Okay.

So in 1964, Fritz goes to the doctor and he gets some bad news. He has a malignant tumor that's developed behind one of his eyes. He has to have the tumor removed, which saves his life, but he loses the eye. Oh, it's not just a disguise. Okay. No, it's, it's not just a Hugo situation. He actually needs the eye patch. Okay. I'll let him have it. I'll let him have it. Yeah. He gets to, he's earned it. But even still, he's quoted as saying that he's having a ball and he's never been happier in his whole life. Right. So when those fingerprints come back and the news hits that Fritz and Larry are the same guy, everyone's world is rock, especially Fritz Larry's. So by his account, he's got more than 30 years of memories as John Fritz Johnson,

and he has absolutely no recollection whatsoever of being Larry Bader. He later says, quote, it was like a shock up until that moment. I had no doubt that I was not Larry Bader. But when I heard that it was like a door had slammed and somebody had hit me right in the face. So he's sticking with the story that he had no fucking clue. Yep. That he's lying. Well, I had no idea I was lying. Right. It's not a good, here's the thing that I always am on the lookout for. Like that phrase, I had no idea I was not Larry Bader is a double negative. Yeah. That, that actually doesn't make you seem very honest when you say what just say what you mean directly. Okay. Is my advice to Fritz? You can't hear me.

Okay. We can. It's worse news for the widow, Mary Lou Bader, who has thought this whole time. She's gone through the grieving process. She learned how to function as a single mother with four kids. Then she believed she was a widow. She had been begun dating other men and she was had just accepted a marriage proposal from her very serious boyfriend. But because Mary Lou is a devout Catholic, she can't divorce Larry. Fuck that. And so she has to like, she has to go back to her marriage that she thought was long over. I'm going to vote no on that. I'm going to go ahead and does my vote count right now? I think I mean, spiritually it does for sure. I'm going to say, Mary, go live your best life. Mary, your husband's a judge. It's just not, it's also just

not fair because she must have had her doubts that he, that it was intentional or that, you know, that quote of maybe I'll come back and maybe I won't. Maybe she actually thought he did take his own life. You know, maybe she thought that, but I can't imagine back then thinking like, he's, he's cadaveled. You know what I mean? I mean, what did she think? What a horrible reality to then live in and just be like, well, I bet she didn't have that much time to consider it because she had to fucking raise four children alone. It's intense. Okay. So she believes she has to break things off with her new fiance and honor her existing marriage. She ends up telling Life magazine, I just wish it wasn't true. We'd become adjusted.

We'd adapted to and accepted his death. It was just, well, wrong that this had to happen. You're right. You're right. So meanwhile, Nancy, the young model, she vows to stick by Fritz, regardless of the fact that their marriage is now null and void, and regardless of the fact that his name is not Fritz. So these sticky familial matters aren't Larry Fritz's only problem. There's a matter of the social security payments that Mary Lou's been receiving since Larry's death, which has been $254 a month, as well as the $39,500 she's received from his life insurance policy, almost all but $500 of it, which all of that has to get paid back now that he's alive. That's on him. Not on him. It should be. On top of that, you remember old Lawrence Kotler from

Eddie's boat, Ram. Well, he's the one that rented the motor boat back in 57, and he hears that Larry is actually alive and he sues him for the cost of damages to his boat. Amen. Get yours. It runs right up. That's going to be $302. See you soon. Okay. Okay, Lawrence. Okay. So Fritz has managed to make a decent living for himself in Omaha, but Larry was deeply in debt. And now the IRS starts sifting through the financial mess that Larry has landed himself in, and they make another interesting discovery that Larry Bader didn't pay taxes from 1951 to 1957. So on top of all that other shit of being underwater with his mortgage and everything, this is my story. He didn't pay taxes for six years. So he had accrued tax fees and liabilities and probably a lien. So he was in

serious debt that like that kind that's really hard to get back out of unless you have a windfall. Yeah. Horrifying. Yeah. Okay. So he basically was doing it to save money at the time. He was like not paying taxes thinking he could pay off all his other stuff and then catch back up. Don't work like that. No, no, no. So now it's all coming back to bite up in the ass. And he has to head back to Omaha and lawyer up. So the first thing Larry's lawyer does is send him to the hospital for psychological testing because it's possible that he was in a boat wreck and that if there was one that he wrecked the boat during his fishing trip and he could have severe amnesia. It's also possible that whatever tumor that had been growing behind his eye could have affected his memory long

before that tumor was big enough to be detected by doctors. Okay. Which does remind me of an episode of Law and Order SVU. Very disturbing, very similar plot and it's a real consideration. So if either of these possibilities are true, Larry can't be criminally charged for anything. But if it turns out he faked his own death to start a new life somewhere else with a clean financial slate, then he would be on the hook not only for fraud but for bigamy. So I think that's really fascinating because why would you fake your own death in this boat accident and then go immediately do stuff that's that much in the public eye? Totally. It could be anything because this was a way back then which is a thing we can't imagine anymore.

You could actually escape and start over. Totally. This was pre everything. We're talking about like 50s and 60s where people did it and they could do it and they did it a ton. So that's definitely on the table and it makes the most sense because of that financial shit and but then at the same time there's it just doesn't make sense because you would do that and you would just go and like hide and live a peaceful life. Quiet. Quiet little life. But the idea that he was just like the big bachelor in town on TV. Mr. Pizazz. Yeah. Mr. Pizazz on the radio. It's like I don't know. It doesn't make a ton of sense. Okay. So a team of doctors examine him for 10 days and they run through a whole gamut of physical and mental tests and at the end of it all

their findings are inconclusive. They think there's a real possibility that Larry has no recollection of his former life at all. Although at the same time they can't prove anything enough to prove that he isn't running a scam. Shit. So it's just inconclusive enough on both sides where they truly don't know what to think. So of course local news outlets pick up on this story because it's not just oh this fascinating human interest story. It's like the guy from local TV and the local radio show. People know who he is. He doesn't appear to them to be particularly upset about the ordeal. He's just confused and sort of amused. And he says that he quote never heard of this Bader man until the matter came up. And while he acknowledges that both he and Larry

Bader do look similar and they love archery, he continues to maintain that he is John Fritz Johnson. But people back in Akron who knew Larry since he was a child are suspicious. Yeah. One childhood friend reported that Larry and all his siblings were spoiled and that they would go to daddy whenever they wanted money. So they never so that Larry or siblings never really developed any real work ethic. His college acquaintances blame his poor scholastic performance on that hamburger stand job he had saying that he devoted all of his time to making a quick buck at the restaurant instead of playing the long game and focusing on school. And even his own father is quoted in Life magazine is saying, quote, I can't put my finger on it, but there's something about

this that stinks. Oh, dad is ratting him out. No wonder you wanted to be someone else. Yeah, for real. That's so my dad too. It's like, I don't know. I don't buy it. You're like, dad, my arm was cut off. See, dad, please don't talk to the press about my thing. Okay. So mounting debt that Larry's facing certainly doesn't help the situation. One of his old neighbors believes that Larry quote wanted to be a high liver and a swinger and quote, which is something you can't really achieve with a wife, kids and crushing debt. Plus Akron isn't exactly an open town as it's not as open in Akron as it is in Omaha. You know, you know how it is. Although remember how cool Omaha was when we toured there? I did like it. It's a truly cool town. That was very

cool. I bet it has been for a long time. So basically, all of Fritz's various stunts like the hearse and the champagne parties and of course the leather beret, they'd be frowned upon in Akron. He would never be able to do any of those things. So there is the possibility he just went and started over started the new life he really wanted. Okay. So Fritz always keeps his story consistent. There's no proof that he was running a scam. There's no charges that are ever filed against Fritz Johnson or Larry Bader. In fact, his doctors recommended he try not to access any of his former memories as Larry Bader, because the very act of trying to remember could cause him severe psychological damage. You just rest your pretty little head and keep up with this fucking bullshit.

Please rest your pencil thin mustache on this little block of wood and take it easy. Fritz, lay down on one of your many cushions. Oh, Fritz. When pressed by reporters about this matter, Larry says, my God, don't you understand? All of a sudden I find out that 30 years of my life never happened. You see, I really do have 30 years of memories as Fritz Johnson. What am I supposed to do with those 30 years? Throw them out the door? Yeah, that doesn't that quote kind of in and of itself makes me go, I don't know. I don't know. I'm on the fence though. Yeah. So even though there's no legal recourse for Larry, his life as Fritz is over as he knew it. Unsure of what to do with the bizarre double life or amnesia due to itumor situation. Station KETV drops him as their

sports director. He gets the only job he can as a bartender. But now he's only earning $100 a week. Half of that goes to Mary Lou to support the four kids that he has with her. Another 20 goes to Nancy to support the two kids he has with her. He's left with $30 a week for himself. He can't afford a regular apartment. He moves into the YMCA in Omaha. So this total unraveling of his life becomes too much for Nancy. So she takes the kids and leaves and she tells one reporter, I just don't know what to think. Oh, fuck. So Mary Lou does her best to dodge reporters and she tries to process this crazy development in her life. But in August of 1965, she agrees to take the kids to meet up with Larry in Chicago to try to hash things out. They have a cordial conversation.

No matter how much Mary Lou tries to jog his memory, Larry maintains that he has no memory whatsoever of their life together. Wow. So. Jesus Christ. Right. So Mary Lou actually is hopeful that Larry as Fritz will come around. And then I just wrote in all caps, girl, literally anyone else in the greater Akron area. There's plenty to choose from. But the next year, 1966, Mary Lou's hopes are dashed when the same cancer that took Larry's eye returns and Larry Bader or Fritz Johnson dies on September 16th, 1966. They hold two services for him. One is for Fritz at the First Methodist Church in Omaha, Nebraska. And then the next day, the body is buried at the Bader family plot at the Holy Cross Cemetery in Akron, Ohio. Oh, my God. But Fritz and Larry are conclusively gone. But the

mystery of whether Larry Bader had amnesia or just ran away from his old life and abandoned his family to become Fritz Johnson will never be definitively solved. And I'll just read you this article titles, the man with two wives, amnesia or hopes by Chris Wells for Life magazine. The man who forgot himself, how presumed dead Lawrence Bader invented a new life by Jake Rosson. That's mental floss. And the strange case of John Fritz Johnson, which is the David Smothers article from the Dispouch newspaper. And that that's the story of Joseph Bader. I had no Larry Joseph Bader. I I want to call bullshit 100%, but that tumor gives me a little squeak of doubt, but just the tiny yes. Otherwise, I think he's the biggest fucking bullshit or ever. Or it's like,

what if it is some strange combination of like all of those things like he wasn't happy, things were going badly, blah, blah, blah, you know, yeah, like, it's a little bit of the way he normally had thought before he had this tumor. Yeah, like I want it be interesting if we knew anything about the human brain. Because there's you know, it's like, there's different areas where you're like short term and long term memory are held. So if there's a possibility that that wherever your long term memory is was somehow being pressed by that yeah, or interfered with in some way. Wow. Tumor scientists email us at my favorite murder at Gmail and let us know tumor scientists, quick Q Q and a is it too, too much of a too much. Yeah, what if I then submit my x-rays to the

channel scientists? No, but I was gonna say, is it too much of a coincidence that the debt it's not like he walked away from just a plain old regular life. Well, maybe the stress exacerbated something. We want to hear stories of personality changing tumors essentially. I mean, the yeah, it's fascinating. And I just also think it's weird, because he was so famous. Yeah. Yeah. Like it's it's such a it's just like such a fascinating story that I would have thought I would have heard totally for now. Totally. Yeah, very interesting. Yeah, great job. Thank you. I was a twisty tourney. I want answers. I want a Hugo doll for myself. I wish I could erase that from my mind with the tumor. I wish I could have amnesia about ever seeing Hugo.

I dare you. I dare you to do that. Hugo will come to you at night and you will make you pay for this. That's the problem. So many people. So wait, aside from the brain doctors, are there brain doctors that can tell us the kind of damage Hugo did to young boys in 1975? The psyche of children and have a Mr. Potato Head while we're at it. Are we throwing him and Mrs. Potato Head right under the bus with it? I think so. I wonder. I mean, I feel like that that Mr. Potato Head was like the watered down version of Hugo where they're like, yeah, children are crying and they're they feel like, you know, they're seeing visions. Why don't we just get a potato? Yeah, you know, it's neutral is a fuck of potato. It's neutral. It's a nice start. We'll call it a potato head.

Mr. Potato Head, like just throw it out there as soon as possible. Let's get those kids great. Let's get those nightmares reversed. I bet you in 75, if you put Mr. Potato Head and Hugo side by side and you said, make a bet, which one's going to make it? Well, which one will people still know about in 2021? I bet there are some scientists could do a study that when Mr. Potato Head came out and and Hugo was taken off the market, the children needing psychotherapy went down. It's plummeted. And so they were like, okay, well, then we're just going to get this latchkey kid thing going and that'll get us back up to where we need to be. Stranger, danger. Let's get it started. Let's go with that. All right, cool. I think we did it. I think we did our job this week.

I do too. We thank you guys for listening to our stories and our blabbering and yeah, that was a real that was a that was a real highs and lows. But I but I think I think it was good. I think that was a good episode. I think that's what she can expect from my favorite murder. And if you don't know that by now, I don't know what to tell you. Oh, first, if you don't know that by now, welcome. Welcome. And yeah, thanks for telling your sister. Thank you for making you listen. Yeah, it's great. Rec, go ahead and slap your sister real hard on the back. Pretend that you meant it in a friendly way. And then when she gets mad at you later, yeah, like you don't know why she's mad. Shame her be like, why do you always overreact, Melissa? Melissa, you were a kid.

Melissa, this is not the last act of Macbeth. Boom. Boom. Shut her down every time. Every time we have big sisters, can you tell? And don't forget, I wouldn't we've mentioned this already, but it's so exciting to me. Our brand new podcast hosted by Dave Holmes called Waiting for Impact, a Dave Holmes passion project. We are so proud of it. Everybody worked so hard for the last, you know, six, eight months. It's been amazing. Dave has done a beautiful job and you can go listen right now and you should because it's a really, it's going to be a really good, really great listen. We have a podcast network. So please rate, review and subscribe. And thank you so much for following and listening and hanging out with us. We adore y'all and stay sexy and don't get

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