My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark - MFM Minisode 171

Episode Date: April 20, 2020

This week’s hometowns include a woman with a sword and self-defense with canned food.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. Hello. Welcome to my favorite murder. The mini-soad. Are you ready? Are you ready? Let's get started. Okay. Let's just do it. Okay. Cut to the, oh. Cut to the clap. Cut to the clap. You want to go first? Sure. This starts, hello, corn queens, adorable pets, and Stephen, in parentheses, you're adorable too. Back when I was in college, I was home one night and I turned on the news to see a story of a young college female who fought off an intruder with a

sword as, as he assaulted her. I normally don't watch the local news and I remember thinking, wow, you go girl. And thinking that she was a total badass who amidst fear decided to fight back. The next day I went in nice and early to begin my shift as a host at a popular chain restaurant. My friend who hosted alongside me came in a bit late and frazzled. I'm so tired, I complained to her as I began to recount my previous day. I'm tired too, she exhaled. Someone broke into my house last night. I ended up beating him up and chasing him off with my dad's sword. Oh my God. My mouth fell open. That was you. I saw your story on the news. So she began her harrowing story. In the middle of the night, she'd woken up to pressure on her chest and the smell of cigarette smoke.

Move and I'll stab you, a voice said. In the darkness, she could make out the shape of a man holding her down with one hand and holding a syringe in his other. He instructed her to remove her clothes as he removed his shirt and lowered his pants. He began to assault her and as she laid there a million thoughts began to run through her mind. Is this really happening? Do I die like this? But what reverberated through her head and stood out to her were two simple words. Fuck no. She looked up and saw her father's sword hanging on the wall above her bed. Her father, a trained martial artist had given her one of his swords a year prior and she had hung it up as decoration in her room. In one quick decision, she kicked her attacker, jumped up, grabbed the sword and began

to beat him with it. He reached out to grab the blade and she drew the sword down, slicing open his hand as he gripped it. He began to back out of her room as she continued to hit him. In the scuffle, she was stabbed by his needle on her hand. She was able to beat him out of her house and down the street. She naked and he with his pants down at his ankles and bleeding from his hand before running back into her house to call 911. Within a few hours, the police were able to find the man and made an arrest. Apparently he had been stalking her home for a few days, looking into her windows and waited for when he seemed to know her roommates would be out of town. He had snuck into her house earlier that day when no one was at home, went into their attic

and waited for her to come home and fall asleep. What a creep. Holy shit. I couldn't believe that here she was telling me this story about why she was tired and what an amazing, strong, courageous person she was. This five foot five college student and her dad's sword, telling this guy to fuck it. In fight or flight, she fought. She did end up being tested for all the things from being pricked in her hand, negative. To this day, she still gets minor PTSD from smelling cigarette smoke, but she's a badass and made a beautiful life for herself. He went to jail and I'll never forget her courage in the face of one of the scariest things a woman can face. Stay sexy, hang your swords and always check your attic CJ. Oh my God. I'm like, I have chills.

Unbelievable. What a badass. I love it so much. It's so good. Swords. Swords. Swords. Also, everything about like that attack is scary enough, but the idea that someone's holding a syringe. Yeah. You don't know what's in it. I mean, it can't be good. No, it cannot. It's not vitamin B. No. That's crazy. And you're not Liza Minnelli. That's crazy. Mimi. Okay. Go away. This is the 1918 Spanish flu story. Hello, friends. This crazy pandemic has reminded me of a story that is at once totally integral to my family history and at the same time is rarely brought up in conversation because it is rarely discussed. I'm sure that I will get a few of the details wrong. So please forgive me for that. We do. Forgiven. In 1918, the Spanish flu hit hard. At least 17 million people

died worldwide. It was of course crazy and awful. Naturally, our current crappy situation made me think about how a lot of things change, but some things don't. Anyway, in 1918, my grandfather was an infant and his parents brought him to Mobile, Alabama to visit friends and introduce them to the baby. While they were visiting, tragedy struck and the people they were visiting, names unknown and my great grandparents, names also unknown, all died very suddenly from this awful flu. Oh my God. Before they died, they gave the baby, my grandfather, to a neighbor to try to keep him safe. He did stay safe and he did not get sick. Here's where it gets wild. The neighbor who took my grandfather and didn't know his name, his parents' names or where they were from, or even

the neighbors, which is pretty damn weird for Alabama. We usually all know each other. Since it was 1918, there were no social services. There was no way to locate any family, etc. So my adopted great-grandma, Mrs. Sheffield, did what any amazing lady would do. She kept the kid. She named him Joseph Sheffield and raised him as her own along with her other kids. My grandfather had no idea about any of this until he was 16 and needed his birth certificate, at which point my great-grandmother had to fess up and tell him the whole story. It's crazy to think about the twists and turns of fate if his parents hadn't come to visit their friends, if they hadn't had the foresight to give him to the neighbor. My life would be totally different or more likely I wouldn't exist at all. My grandfather

stayed in Mobile, Alabama, married and raised three sons and a daughter. I am the daughter of his youngest son. To this day, we have no idea where my grandfather was from or what his birth name was. My last name is Sheffield, as it should be, but whatever my grandfather's birth name first and last was, it's lost to history. Thanks for everything you do. This podcast has changed my life in more ways than you will ever know. If you choose to read this, please use my name in honor of my great-grandmother, a badass lady who is almost definitely the reason I'm here today, XOXO, Sarah Sheffield. Oh, nice.

Isn't that touching? Yeah. God, go on fucking 23andMe and find those relatives. But what a crazy situation where it's like we all have this terrible flu. Can you take the baby next door neighbor? Not next to Ken or family or anything. It's just like whoever's closest. That's how bad it was. Probably. Yeah, it was probably this like split second. I can tell I'm getting sick, like thinking it's going to be temporary. Just take the baby while we're sick.

Yeah. And then it wasn't temporary. No. It was not? No. Okay. All right. This one has no subject line. It just starts, obviously love you guys. Thank you for helping me accept and begin to tackle my anxiety. That's all. There's no,

there's no hello. Just straight into like, look, we know this is a giveaway and also this. Love it. Okay. So my dad has the worst and most hilarious luck. Ranging from that time, he went to get a bat out of my bedroom and ended up accidentally letting another bat into the room. Oh my God. A bat. I thought you meant like a baseball bat. Oh, and then at parentheses, it says, I grew up in the countryside in England. God, that's fucking like, get the bat out. Now here comes the second bat. So your dad is a vampire. Got it.

So your dad is a delicious mango that bats love to eat. I don't, I wish I didn't. Oh. What, what did bats eat? Okay. So basically she said, from that time about the bats to when the bomb squad was called, because he was quote, parked suspiciously in a car park. But the most amazing thing that ever happened to him was when he was arrested for carjacking, spoilers, he didn't do it. Thank you.

Spoilers, plural. He didn't do it. Let's get into it. So my dad used to run a weed control business, which I had to read three times. And I was like, weed control. That's weird. Which is a cop. He's in the DA? No, the EA? No. Oh, he's McGruff, the crime dog? Okay. Is that guy British? Is he a bat? Okay. He ran a weed control business and he was sat in his van with the dog on his lunch break

when a police car pulled up and officer gets out and tells my dad that there's been an attempted carjacking in the next village over. And would my dad mind coming over for a lineup? When my dad gets to the lineup, he looks to his left and right and suddenly has an uh-oh moment. He was the only person in the drive-by lineup. The car owner drove by and said, yes, my dad was the guy that tried to steal their car. The next six hours of my dad's life became a bit insane. He was bundled into the back of a police car. Our sweet dog was put into the police kennels and my dad was processed and put into holding.

Finally, they got around to interviewing him. The interaction went something like this. Sir, you match the description of a carjacking and have been identified as the suspect. The description is of an unshaven man approximately five foot nine in his mid to late thirties, to which my dad replied, well, uh, I'm six foot two in my mid forties, but I'll give you one out of three. Yeah, sassy dad, right? After a bit more back and forth, the police officer begins to get annoyed and sternly says, sir, I need you to understand how much trouble you are in. The suspect stopped the car with both hands and we have a full set of 10 fingerprints. At this point, my dad begins to laugh uncontrollably. What, like this? My dad says as he holds up his hands,

my dad only has nine fingers. Oh my God. He lost one years back in a worker-related accident. The interview ended pretty swiftly after that and my dad was released with no charges. Oh my God. My dad is absolutely one of my best friends has always used his loss of a digit to his advantage, mostly for good humor, often quickly removing his hand from closing freezer doors in the supermarket to look at the person next to him and shout, what, what have you done? Dad jokes. Dad jokes. What have you done? As he brandishes his four-fingered hand, but this is the only time his lack of a finger has proven his innocence. Thank you for bringing light into my long commute. Stay sexy and remember sometimes nine fingers is all you need. No name.

That was great. That was excellent. Yeah. Love it dad. So good. Dad joke story. And also just thank God that it turned out that way because how many stories do we know of, there's no laughs, there's no missing finger simplicity, there's no dog and then that person spends 40 years in jail. There's no dog. Dogs. And saddest of all. And the saddest part, there's no dog. Okay. This is called like those dogs. Oh, hello, friends. Georgie, look up with your cone. George. Oh, George is poor. She's so mad. Yeah, she's fine. Okay. This is called lock your gondob windows. Hi. A while ago, maybe a year who the fuck knows with the self isolation. For real. I know you guys read a story where someone broke into a house through a second story

window. And it reminded me of a story I've been sitting on for years. One night after a few glasses of wine, my mom casually told me about this incident from when she was a teenager in the 70s, when she was living in with her mom in Oklahoma. My mom's room was on the second floor and had a window at the same level as her neighbors. So you could look across and see into each other's rooms. You get the idea. I do. One day she was doing homework at her desk, which is against the opposite wall from the window when the phone rang. It was her sweet old lady neighbor on the other end who told my mom, Katie dear, try to stay calm. But there's a man on a ladder watching you through your window. Try to stay calm, Katie dear. Katie dear, I know this might be the first time

you've dealt with this. Not mine anyway. Now don't stand up screaming. My mom somehow managed to keep from losing her shit and calmly got up without looking behind her and walked down the hall to my grandma's room to inform her of the situation. My grandma quickly called the police, but that creepy motherfucker booked it before the cops got there. When they had to go check out the ladder he left behind in his haste, they also found all caps, a fucking butcher knife next to it. That's fucking ominous. That's not funny anymore. No, that's how this show always goes. Yep. Light laughs. Oh, can you believe this? And then boom. That's right. I never see it coming. No. Sadly, they never caught this guy, but he didn't come back after that day. As if this

weren't already creepy enough after the whole debacle was over, my grandmother informed my mom that she had found other items beneath her window over the past few weeks, such as polaroid pictures of her and flowers, but was told by the police that nothing could be done without a threat being made. I am sorry. A ladder up to a teenage girl's window is a threat. Yes or no? Yeah, the knife's a threat. Yeah. Being a peeping tom, being step one in usually sexual assault situations. That would be a threat. But this is what year was this? This is probably in the 70s in Oklahoma. Oh, right. Okay. Yeah. So that was back when peeping toms were hilarious. Right. They're like, that's normal. Everyone does it. Oh, boys will be boys. Let them have their butcher

knives. Yeah, exactly. Of course, I had a million other questions like what other treasures the dude left behind, but my mom has refused to talk about the whole thing since. At least now I understand why she's always so paranoid about locking the doors and windows and closing all the blinds at night. You think you're safe on the second, at least I do on the second floor, but ladders exist. We got to get rid of ladders, guys. Get, let, span, all ladders. Sign our petition. Thank you for being awesome humans and for supporting the mental health field by normalizing seeing therapists. I am an associate marriage and family therapist specializing in trauma with the goal to one day have my own practice working with first responders,

because as we all know, this population sees some messed up shit and needs slash deserves so much support. Stay sexy and lock all your windows. Yeah. Wow. I mean, who needs fresh air? I lock your windows, but then also don't be afraid to put that shade down. Yeah. That's really the because I mean, like, yes, the windows should kind of remain locked. Right. I guess we shouldn't pull it apart. Advice. We give it. Looking for a better cooking routine with meal planning, shopping and prepping handled. Hello Fresh has you covered. Hello Fresh makes home cooking easy and affordable so you can stay on track and on budget in the new year. Hello Fresh meals are convenient, seasonal and delicious. Stay cozy all winter long with classic comfort foods available

weekly. Why stop with just dinner? Now you can enjoy Hello Fresh's expanded menu of quick lunch solutions weekend brunch simple side dishes and amazing desserts. Karen January is going to be my month for Hello Fresh. I am so sick of takeout. I miss cooking so much I haven't lifted a knife or a pan since like early fall. So I can't wait to get back in the kitchen and Hello Fresh makes it so easy and also makes it so that my food tastes good, which is hard to do on my own. It gives you everything, everything you need. So get up to 20 free meals with purchase plus free shipping on your first box at hellofresh.ca slash murder 20 with code murder 20. That's up to 20 free meals plus free shipping on your first box when you go to hellofresh.ca slash murder 20 and use code murder

20. Goodbye. What makes a person a murderer? Are they born to kill or are they made to kill? I'm Candice DeLong and on my new podcast Killer Psyche Daily, I share a quick 10-minute rundown every weekday on the motivations and behaviors of the criminal masterminds, psychopaths, and cold-blooded killers you hear about in the news. I have decades of experience as a psychiatric nurse, FBI agent, and criminal profiler. On Killer Psyche Daily, I'll give you insight into cases like Ryan Grantham and the newly arrested Stockton serial killer. I'll also bring on expert guests to dive deeper into the details, share what it's like to work with a behavioral assessment unit at Quantico, answer some killer trivia, and even host virtual Q&As where I'll answer your burning

questions. Hey Prime members, listen to the Amazon Music exclusive podcast Killer Psyche Daily in the Amazon Music app. Download the app today. The subject line of this email is a self-defense use for the canned food we've been hoarding. Dear exactly right employee or intern who screams hometowns. Oh, that's Lily. Lily. That's dear Lily. I took Karen and George's advice and used my quarantine-induced free time. Quarantine-induced. Yeah. My quarantine-induced free time to ask my parents for their hometowns. And boy, did my mom and dad deliver. That's so smart. Yeah. Ask your parents for theirs if you don't have one of your own. Okay. Love it. While they had some real gems, this story was the most light-hearted and perfect for a pandemic. My mom's cousin,

Cheryl. I have a cousin, Cheryl. My mom's cousin, Cheryl, worked at a rural Idaho convenience store in the 70s. She was manning the cash register alone one night when a guy came in and started skulking around the store. Skulking. Skulking. Skulking is so threatening. Yeah. It's like, it's like shifty eyes and your shoulders are up a little bit. Yeah. You're kind of greasy. There's a grease element. He eventually approached her and asked her for a can of peaches that was behind the counter. And then in parentheses, I guess they kept the canned fruit by the cigarettes in those days. That is super hilariously weird. She turned to get the peaches. And when she turned back around, this perv had his penis displayed on the counter. Something about laying a penis on

surface is so gross. Well, that gets you in both ways because you don't want to see the penis and you don't like the germs that will eventually be on that penis. Totally. Convenient store counter. It's also almost like at a jewelry store, like showing the... I hate it. I hate it. Then you have to pull out your jeweler's loop and look really closely at the penis. I don't want to. And then you're like, that's not a diamond. Wait a second. I was promised a diamond. With near superhuman reaction speed, she slammed the can down on his junk. There was some disagreement between my parents about the size of the can, but us Mormons love our bulk food storage. So I like to imagine a giant seven pound can. Us Mormons love our bulk food storage.

God, we learned so much. Such a good little tidbit. Tidbits and factoids. Okay. He passed out giving Cheryl time to call for help. Yeah. He passed out. That's how bad that was for him. Hell yeah. Don't put it up there if you can't handle a big can on it. The first responders arrived. She was giving her statement to the cops while the paramedics loaded creepy bastard onto a gurney. When she got to the part about the peaches, the EMT started laughing so hard that they dropped the gurney and broke creepy bastard's arm. Oh no. Oh my God. That's hilarious. I know you all love a story where the perp gets his just desserts. So I hope this story brightened your day during what's otherwise a dark, weird time. It did. It really did. Stay sexy and hoard canned fruit instead of

toilet paper, Rochelle. I just love the idea of this Mormon girl who's like probably hasn't seen a penis before and just knew to react like that immediately instead of being horrified. Yeah. Smash. I love it. Smash it. Well, and also it's like, you know, if he was a Sculker, the vibes were bad. Right. You know, she knew something was about to happen. And so like it was just like, whether it was he had placed a knife on the counter or a note that said, give me all your money or his own penis, she was going to smash it with a can that was going to be her reaction. Thank God. Oh, thank God. It was number three. Rochelle, that was amazing. Thank you so much. Rochelle. Love it. Love a penis smash story. Any Mormon stories. Come on. Yeah. We learn. We laugh.

We love and we learn. That's right. This is not a murder story, but a meet cute since you asked for them. It says. That's right. We did. Shortly before the pandemic took over all the things, I had a dream about someone I hadn't talked to in probably five or more years. He and I had a brief fling back in the day, but neither of us were in a place emotionally to let it be anything more than that. After the stream, I felt an extreme nagging sensation that I needed to reach out to him and see what was up and how he'd been. It took me almost a week to mull it over and decide to send a message, but I did. He answered immediately and we began catching up. Two weeks later, we're Facebook official. And honestly, I'm still in shock and awe. He was my brother's high school

best friend. Hey, girl. And I had a friend of the family and I can't help but feel like my mom, who passed away three years ago, heard my heartache over numerous unhealthy relationships and nudged me in this direction. Quarantine sucks, but we're making it. And honestly, I think I might be losing my mind if we hadn't met at the time we did. Stay sexy and follow your dreams, question mark. April. Oh, I love that. Cute. Me, cute. Quarantine. I have gotten texts from people that I don't normally talk to that I think we would normally feel weird texting each other because it'd be like, I'm not trying to, I'm not trying to get a hold of you. I think that might be an LA thing of like, I'm not asking you for anything. I'm just saying hi. I don't have time

for lunch or coffee. I just want to check and see how you are. But that's weird on a normal day. It's weird on a normal day. And now it's like the greatest. It's like, Oh my God, thank you. Hi. How are you? You know, it's like the loveliest kind of thinking of you making sure you're doing okay wherever you are. It's really lovely. You don't have to do the horrible. Let's wish I get a drink soon. Nope. Right. No, because no one's getting a drink except for by themselves in their kitchen. That's right. Send us your stories and your quarantine meet-cutes. Your quarantine breakups. How about a horrible quarantine break up? Facebook official break up. That's the idea that she said we're now Facebook official is such a true modern stamp of this isn't just in my mind.

Totally. I love that. It's we're Facebook official. We've gone public. It's so cute. Very sweet. Yeah. Keep sending these awesome stories and stay safe and stay home and stay strong and stay sexy and don't get murdered. Goodbye. Elvis, do you want a cookie?