My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark - MFM Minisode 178

Episode Date: June 8, 2020

This week’s hometowns include a trapped underground story and another local pervert.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, the mini-soad, where we read you your stuff that you've written us. Congratulations. You wrote it in. Thanks for doing our work for us. You did the work. Now we get the rewards. We literally couldn't do it without you. Literally thank you so much. Do you want me to go first? Sure. Okay. Also we're recording this the week before it's airing anything's possible in our culture and our world right now. Yeah.

But we hope you're safe and strong and fighting the good fight. That's right. And in the meantime, let me tell you about when Claire's great grandfather stayed sexy and was subsequently murdered because of it. Great. I went ahead and labeled this as geographically accurate as possible in case you do DC hometowns. While I was home in the suburbs of DC for Thanksgiving, I was finally able to get the story of how my mom's grandfather was murdered. For years, she never spoke about it and would always change the subject when I asked. After a few glasses of wine and light prying, I finally got the story that I simply had to share with you all. My grandfather was the youngest of nine children and his father, my great-grandfather, John, was a butcher. My family jokes that my

great-grandmother married him to make sure she always had enough food for her kids. My grandma too. Married a butcher. Hell yes. A great-grandfather, John, worked in Virginia as a butcher during the Great Depression, a time where, as you can imagine, no one could afford to buy meat. It is important to note that this was pre-civil rights era and Virginia was deeply segregated. This meant that people of color could only purchase meat from butchers through the side or back doors and could not go through the front door. Fuck that shit. Am I right in parentheses? My great-grandfather, John, thought the rules were stupid and wanted anyone who could afford meat to feel welcome in his store. Apparently one day, John was seen by some local clansmen,

quote-unquote, letting people of color come through the front door to buy meat from him. That night, the local chapter of the KKK murdered my great-grandfather outside his store while he was locking up. In a weird way, I'm extremely proud that he was murdered for being ahead of his time by not being a racist piece of shit. So while he was indeed murdered, I would also argue that he stayed sexy by not being a discriminating asshole. Oh, and don't worry about my grandfather and his eight siblings. My great-grandmother married another butcher after John's murder. Love you guys. Can't wait to see y'all in DC, Claire. Wow. I mean, yeah, you sacrificed your life for the greater good and not being a piece of

shit. What more could you wish for? It makes you think that maybe we should all donate 50 bucks to Black Lives Matter if we can. Why not? Or any of the associated jail fund or bail funds out there. There's lots of things you can find on social media to be an active participant in helping this movement and the people that are on the front line. ACLU is a great place to do it. Okay. A lot of great ones. So I thought we'd get real dark and deep and sad and do someone wrote in the hometown murder of Matthew Shepard. Wow. Which somehow we've never done. It's an important story. So let's get to it. I'm from the good state of Wyoming. And for those who don't know, because I get the question a lot, Wyoming is located in the Midwest United States

above Colorado. Thank you. The total population for the state is 50,000, which is fucking crazy. It's tiny and is overall a laid-back state. My story is about the murder of Matthew Shepard. Matthew Shepard was born in Casper, Wyoming in 1976. He was strongly present in the theater community, attending the American School in Switzerland, Katawaba College, Casper College, and became a first year political science major at the University of Wyoming in Laramie, with a minor in languages. In 1995, Shepard was beaten and raped during a high school trip to Morocco. According to his mom, this caused him to suffer from extreme depression and anxiety, ultimately believed to be the reason that he returned to go to school back home. Not long

after his return home on the night of October 6, 1998, fuck it, I was 18. I remember this fucking clearly. Matthew was approached by Aaron McKinney and Russell Henderson at the Fireside Lodge in Laramie. All three of them were in their early 20s. McKinney and Henderson offered to give Matthew a ride home. They drove to a remote area in Laramie where they robbed, pistol whipped, and tortured Matthew and then tied him to a fence and left him to die. Matthew was found 18 hours later in a coma by a biker and died six days later at the age of 21. At McKinney's November 1998 pretrial hearing, McKinney had stated in an interview on October 9 that he and Henderson had identified Shepard as a robbery target and pretended to be gay to lure him out to their truck and

that McKinney had attacked Shepard after Shepard put his hand on McKinney's knee. Aaron McKinney and Russell Henderson were charged with first degree murder following Shepard's death. Both McKinney and Henderson were convicted of the murder and each received two consecutive life sentences. Matthew's murder brought national and international attention to hate crime legislation at the state and federal levels. In October 2009, the United States Congress passed the Matthew Shepard and James Burr Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act, commonly known as the Matthew Shepard Act. In October 28, 2009, President Barack Obama signed and established the Matthew Shepard Foundation. Shepard's death inspired films, novels, plays, and songs. Most commonly,

American Triangle by Elton John and the Laramie Project, which I performed when I was in high school as my theater teacher was best friends with Matthew. The play is all 100 interviews compiled together by Moises Kaufman. All of those who were around the area during the time, who knew Matthew, the protesters, both good and bad, officers on the scene, and even some transcripts from trial. His dad described him as an optimistic and accepting young man who had a special gift of relating to almost everyone. He was the type of person who was very approachable and always looked to new challenges. Matthew had a great passion for equality and always stood up for the acceptance of people's differences. I know this story is heavy, but with Pride Month and

current events of the world, I think it's important to share as things are changing but not changing enough. I attached a link to the Matthew Shepard Foundation, which is an LGBT non-profit organization headquartered in Casper, Wyoming by Dennis and Judy Shepard in the memory of Matthew. The Foundation runs education, outreach, and advocacy programs should anyone want to donate. Stay sexy and be the voice for the voiceless, Ashton. Yeah. Amazing job, Ashton. I remember so well. It's such a horrible story. But also, I think they make a great point in an email, which is Pride Month, and that's the reason that there is Pride Month. It's parties, it's parades. I mean, not this year, not quarantine. What will they do in

quarantine? But I mean, there's the fun aspect, which is basically living your life and celebrating your life. But then there also is what people have had to come through in this country because they were gay and it's important to talk about it and it's important to talk about those struggles. The subject of this email is Baby Jessica's predecessor. Now, this happens a lot when we do a story or talk about one specific thing. It happens more with recommendations where you'll recommend one show and then there'll be all these people that come to me on Twitter going, have you ever watched this? And it's like, yes. I was talking about the other thing that person did, but that doesn't mean that I don't know about every other thing they've done. You would maybe

want to assume I would know it. It's really hilarious to me. So these got brought up a lot, but I actually read about all of these because this story of somebody trapped in a place and capturing the imagination of America has happened. Well, there were two big ones before Baby Jessica. Okay. And so this is one of when I saw this, I was like, oh, great, because now someone's done the work for me. Okay. And it will look like I'm a weird trapped in a well obsessive. Which we all know you are. Which we, I am. Yes. Now imagine if there was a pervert trapped in a well. In a fucking sinkhole, inside of a well. And pervert. He's a pervert, but he's perverted perverted for treasure. Just like me. Baby Jessica's predecessor. Hey, Queens, I just finished your May

seventh episode symbolic violins. And I was struck by the similarities between Baby Jessica's story and something that happened back in 1925. Have you read about Floyd Collins? Yes, I have. Fair warning. It's not a happy ending. Yeah. I don't think I know this one. It's pretty amazing. In the early 20th century, Kentucky went through a period known as the cave wars, where explorers were constantly competing to commercialize the biggest and best cave system underground, which is hilarious. Do you remember the mystery spot up in Northern California? Yeah. I know the stickers. I don't know the spot. Yeah. The bumper stickers you see all the time. Yeah. They're so cool. They're the original ones from the fifties because my, there's a classic picture of my dad's

family. They lived in the sentence set district in San Francisco, nine Irish kids. And apparently their kitchen table or their dining room table where they all ate had bedrooms bordering the room. I'm sure it was just a tiny house. So like, so behind, there's one picture of my dad showed me. He goes, Hey, that was my bedroom. And it's them sitting at the dinner table, but behind them is a bedroom door with a mystery spot bumper sticker on the door. Oh my God. So long ago. Yeah. I know. It's like literally from like 1958. Okay. Anyway, that was just a personal brag that I knew about the mystery spot, but I just love this idea. This is like, this was early entertainment for like early Americans like cave caves. No, we have a better cave. Like the cave wars. Okay. Okay. Okay.

I'm into it. Okay. Floyd had already had some moderate success with his crystal cave, but it was remote and he was super ambitious. He wanted to open a cave closer to the public and make a pretty penny. So he made an agreement to open up a new option called sand cave on his neighbor's property and share the profits. While he was working parentheses crawling through a all caps literal hole in the ground in order to widen the passengers passageways and parentheses closed parentheses of falling rock pinned his left leg and trapped him 150 feet underground stuck in a freaking crawl space with his lamp extinguished and no food or water. He was found the next day by his family and friends who sent him crackers to eat and an electric lamp for light and warmth.

He managed to survive underground for more than a week while the folks above organized rescue options. A local journalist Skeets Miller Skeets Miller reported daily on the rescue efforts. He was a smallish dude. So he was able to crawl down into the hole for an interview with Floyd in parentheses all caps. An underground interview. Come on journalism. I hope they gave him fucking opium too because I mean what a farmer for real. That's such a that's such a nice idea here. Floyd put this in your cheek and just let it dissolve. He was even he was even able to dig a lot of the earth away from Floyd's body in an attempt to aid rescuers. His reports were distributed and printed in papers all across the country

which led to a national interest in Floyd's situation. Radio broadcasts and news bulletins drew unimaginable crowds to the scene and the grounds above the cave were covered with vendors, reporters and thousands of tourists. It was the third biggest media event of its time. It was a goddamn circus complete with popcorn. Unfortunately the cave passage suffered a collapse in two places during rescue attempts because all the fucking popcorn makers and tourists are above him. I think this was back before people understood that you could absolutely set a perimeter and people will stand wherever you say you don't have to let him come right up to the mouth of the hole right which is the same thing as the mouth and the hole. Leaders tried to dig a lateral tunnel

above Floyd but by the time his body was reached he had already died of exposure. They left his body there and filled the shaft with debris while the whole mess of media and tourists quickly dispersed. Two months later Floyd's brother Homer ended up digging a new tunnel on the opposite side of the cave passage to retrieve his body and give him a proper burial. If that wasn't enough in 1927 Floyd's father sold the homestead and the cave and the new owner all caps displayed Floyd's body in a glass topped coffin inside Crystal Cave. Two years later yeah his fucking body was stolen. When it was recovered the injured left leg was missing. Jesus just let the dude rest in peace. The reason I know so much about a man dying in a Kentucky cave

it's a musical. It's called Floyd Collins and it was the first show I did with Syracuse University's musical theater program. I won't force feed you any of the videos of me in the show. I wish you would. Love that. We're in a quarantine. Please. I won't force feed you any videos of me in the show but I will share with you this Spotify link to one of the most beautifully heartbreaking songs I've ever heard. It's called How Glory Goes. This is Floyd stuck in the cave contemplating what heaven will be like when he gets there. Oh my god. Wow. Anyway I live in Manhattan which means I've barely left my apartment since mid-March. I've taken to climbing all the stairs in my building for exercise and the only thing that gets me through the torture is your

podcast. Thank you for all the incredible philanthropic work you do and for always making me laugh out loud love Victoria. Philanthropic. Philanthropic. That's so nice. That is nice. Thank you. Like we're in the Philharmonic. George I didn't know you played the oboe. Great. That's a great one. Like if you're like Karen do you know this one? Just send the hometown instead. I'm like you describe it. I love the like follow-ups you know like oh well actually my mother-in-law was there at the thing you're telling and here's her experience and here's the story you didn't know about that. Those are great. It's like a telephone game through the podcast where it's like you know that you mentioned Floyd being stuck in a cave while the result so it's

the best. Right. Those are great. 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 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 Mike Corey, the host of Wondery's podcast against the odds. In our next season, three masked men hijack a school bus full of children in the sleepy farm town of Chowchilla, California. They bury the children and their bus driver deep underground, planning to hold them for ransom. Local police and the FBI marshal a search effort, but the

trail quickly runs dry. As the air supply for the trapped children dwindles, a pair of unlikely heroes emerges. Follow against the odds wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen ad free on the Amazon Music or Wondery app. Okay, I'm not going to read the subject line. Okay. Hey there ladies and happy almost birthday to my birthday twin Georgia. It's me. Oh, okay, here goes. So we're a little early with almost birthday. Well, this is for next week though. So that's fine. Oh wait, today's my birthday considering if this is going up next Monday. So today's our birthday. Me and Kendall. Really? Are you sure? No, your birthday, Junete. Yeah, isn't next week, Junete? Next Monday is yeah, next Monday's Junete. It's canceled this year. I'm donating my birthday to anyone who needs

it. Damn it. I didn't even think to do the forward time math of being the one that says happy birthday to you at the top of the show next year in Paris. Oh, we're going to have a birthday bash on the Eiffel Tower. Okay, happy birthday. We love you, Georgia. Thank you. Happy birthday, Kendall too. Oh yeah. Okay, here goes. In the early 2000s, a couple in my town will call them Rich and Diane. We're going through a bitter divorce and there were disputes over the rock quarry that they own together, which rock quarries in any fucking disappearance story. Bad news. Yeah, not good. Not good. As well as custody of their two daughters who are splitting time between each parent's house. One evening, Rich brought his daughters to Diane's house to

stay for the week. But when they get there, they realized she was gone, like done, disappeared, gone. No sign of her and no indication that she took anything with her, which it was, of course, very suspicious. Fast forward two years and she's still missing and rumors are swirling around our small town because it's always the husband, right? Right. But Rich has an alibi and had been cleared by the cops. Due to Diane's disappearance, Rich got all rights to the rock quarry and was still running it like before. One day, he and his business partner were digging near a damaged well and they hit a large chunk of concrete, which shouldn't have been there, which they thought was really curious. They kept digging and uncovered a dead dog. Okay, that's even weirder,

they thought. And then they pulled up a chunk of concrete with a human hand sticking out of it. Yep, they accidentally dug up Diane's discarded body. It took the police a while to unravel the mystery. But it turns out that Diane was seeing a much younger man that worked at their quarry at the time of her disappearance. And they went on a date to go sight in some rifles. And this says small town shit. Turns out the guy ended up accidentally shooting her in the head in his truck as they were getting out. And he freaked out and didn't think anyone would believe him. So he dismembered and hid her body on the very quarry that she owned. Unfortunately, he wasn't a prime spot picker and ended up getting caught in his recklessness. But it turned out to

be Diane's pet dog that was buried above her to throw off anyone digging. He must have gotten this idea by watching really bad true crime TV shows like my sister and I used to because this is how I found out my sister was a murderer when we were kids. When she casually told me, quote, if you want to hide a body, just bury it standing up and put a dead dog above it to throw off whoever is digging. What the fuck, Cassie, you're nine. Cassie, you can come into my room. That's right, Cassie. You're cool. Although I think this story just proves that theory and shows that anything can happen to solve a cold case when you least expect it. SSDGM, Kendall. Wow. Yeah. And also that the husband had to find his own missing friend. Yeah. And was of course

a suspect. Right. I mean, I'm sure some people still think he had something to do with it because it's so suspicious, but. Right. All right. So I'm going to turn. I'm going to now take another left turn for us. Let's do it. And the subject line of this email is a classic MFM Perf. Hi, everybody. I love those guys. Hi, everybody. For your consideration, I am submitting this entry for inclusion in the lengthy canon of MFM Perf. He didn't jerk off the cheese that I know of, but I think he's still worthy. Okay. Oh my God. I love it. This guy, we should have done a Perf trigger warning before for anybody that was doing it. We don't know yet. Yeah. Yeah. That's true. This could be really not that big of a deal. This guy terrorized my hometown of Newark, Delaware.

So it might not be pronounced Newark because you know how they do the state to state name change. They love to do that. They love to do what I'm going to do the New Jersey pronunciation. Newark, Delaware when I was a student at the university there. In August of 2010, he started breaking into the houses of female students and making his way to their bedrooms where he would proceed to get under the covers and start spooning them. Oh God. When the girls woke up to the random ass stranger cuddling them, he would flee into the night. Naturally, the town was quickly ablaze with rumor and suspicion about a man who became known as the Newark Napper. Fortunately, one day, a police officer saw the Napper walking down the street and recognized his face from a composite

sketch made from victim accounts. Oh my God. Working all the time. He was arrested and charged with burglary, unlawful sexual contact, and offensive touching. As far as I know, he was convicted because the attacks stopped as quickly as they began. When the Napper's identity was revealed, I was shocked to discover that I'd once hung out with him. Small towns. I didn't see that coming. I love small towns. He played in the university jazz ensemble. Of course. Full. Get your trombone. Child. What do you think is happening? Take your oboe and shove it and get the hell out of my bed. That's right. He played in the university jazz ensemble with a good friend of mine. One night, my roommates and I had a party and that friend brought a few of his jazz bandmates. I

have a vivid memory of being in my living room and the person I would later learn was the Newark Napper bursting into song, singing several acapella verses of some Brazilian bossa nova tune. I remember thinking, huh, this guy seems a little off and how this is one of the most beautifully written hometowns we've gotten ever. Good shit. Such a good job. Okay. Anyway, thanks for reading and for creating something as reliably entertaining as this podcast. You guys are hilarious. Also, shout out to my wife, Kate, who's been listening to MFM for years and told me several times that I needed to start. She was right. Per usual. Oh, good job. Stay sexy. And if someone starts singing Brazilian acapella at your college party, call the fucking FBI, Mike. Nice one, Mike.

It's not an overreaction. Just do it. It's the real deal. Anytime acapella comes up in a non acapella festival situation. Absolutely. It is your right. Listen, if you're like, if you're going to go to asphalt on the green or whatever and go to the acapella fucking concert, fine, sing it, but not at a fucking college party. If it's a voluntary thing you bought tickets for because you just love pitch perfect so much as a film and that's on you. No, if someone brings acapella into your natural environs, then you get you get to absolutely how about unprompted acapella is a crime. Sorry. Okay. Here's my last one. It's so sorry. Sorry that we're right. I'm sorry about your party. Okay. This one's a meet cute. Okay. This one, I'm not going to

read you this title, but the beginning starts spooky quarantine, which I guess is the new It would go spooky quarantine. Yeah. Yeah. I just heard you lovely ladies discussing all the reasons never to go on a balcony at a party, but I have but I have one. Oh, I was living in Baltimore in my early twenties in a cute little row home when my roommates and I decided to host a fourth of July barbecue. We each invited people and through a crazy series of serendipitous events, a man from Alabama who was living in my home city of Philly ended up at the party with a friend, neither of them really knowing anyone. When we all went up to the roof deck to watch the fireworks, we sat on the deck railing and struck up a conversation about how much we love Philadelphia.

Yeah. With that, he fell backwards off the railing, falling flat off. He's fine. Falling flat on the roof next door, about a 10 foot drop. Oh, shit. I immediately burst into tears, convinced I would be charged in the death of a complete stranger at my house. But he popped up, dusted himself off and asked me out to the bar. Oh, the rest is history. We've been married for two years and had our first child a few months ago. So moral of the story, if you're going to go to the deck at a party, it better be to meet your spouse. Oh, SSDGM and stay the fuck home, Anna. Isn't that sweet? I hope that they got married on both of those roofs. He stood on the lower one. Listen, remember when we went through the hardest thing in your life

and not that big of a deal to me? Let's make it. How about I fell for you. I've fallen in love with you and I can't get up out of love with you. So please marry me. I can't get out of love with you because I'm an old 78-year-old woman in my own kitchen. Send help. Emotionally, emotionally for you. Yes. Send help. Get a strong neighbor to come by and pick up my body. That's how hard I've fallen for you. That was great. It's funny after we talked about those porch things because we were going, oh, was it this one? No, it was that one. There's been so many. There's been so many over the years. And I'm sure in every single city, it's been a horrible collapse. I feel like every party city that you can think of, there's been a

balcony collapse. And I bet you at a two-story party city, there's been one as well. That's right. And every party city from all over the, across this fine land. I feel like this quarantine, I've missed party city most. Out of everything I've missed. If you could go back and do one thing, I would go to party city and lick all the balloons, pre-core, free corona. I wish I could go to the poorly named soup plantation and just stick my hands in those garbanzo bean tubs, squish them around. I love doing that. I wish that I could get, take a couple pieces of pizza with my bare hand and then change my mind and put them back with the other bare hand. That's right. Just in case. I want to touch all the toothpicks before I figure

out which toothpick I want to use on my teeth. That was the first in this quarantine, the first time I went grocery shopping. I would stand there and look at everything because I always do want to kind of like touch things or at least check expiration dates. And I would just stand there staring and then grab something really fast. You can't touch it. You can't touch things like you used to and then just put them back. And one time I actually found a bunch of apples and picked four of them out and then realized that the better apples were over right behind me. So I went over to the produce guy and I was like, Hey, I just picked these and I don't want to put them back. And the guy goes, it's fine. Put them back. He was so over it. He was just like lady, lady,

just put them back. If you care, if you're like that conscientious, then you're probably, you probably wash your hands regularly. He knew that I had washed my hands at my home. I did the old Purell in the car. I'm not trying to spread misinformation, but yeah. But still, stay home, stay safe, stay strong, cool and strong. Oh, stay cool for sure. Yeah. And stay in school conceptually, but we know that most of you are out of school. In the fall if you can, but otherwise, do it from online at home. Yeah, there's also great courses on Amazon Prime. But mostly stay sexy. Don't get murdered. Elvis, do you want a cookie?