RedHanded - Episode 110 - Murder Mansion: Glensheen & Marjorie Congdon

Episode Date: September 5, 2019

In 1977 an intruder entered the beautiful Glensheen mansion on the shores of Lake Superior. In the night of terror that followed, in a macabre game of Cluedo come to life, the wealthy heiress and her nurse were savagely murdered. There were suspects aplenty but the police knew from the start that the answers lay close to home... Sources: 'Glensheen's Daughter: The Marjorie Congdon Story' by Sharon Darby Hendry 'Will to Murder: The True Story Behind the Crimes & Trials Surrounding the Glensheen Killings' by Gail Feichtinger    See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can listen to Red Handed early and ad-free. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. They say Hollywood is where dreams are made. A seductive city where many flock to get rich, be adored, and capture America's heart. But when the spotlight turns off, fame, fortune, and lives can disappear in an instant. Follow Hollywood and Crime, The Cotton Club Murder on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. Hello, it's me again, your favorite announcing lady.

Before we get going on the show, again, a couple of things to tell you. There are just two weeks before we go on the road, so time really is running out to get your tickets. Don't delay a second longer, get them right now. Also, on Monday we dropped a Patreon bonus episode which is available to everyone who is a $10 and up patron. It is on the persecution of people with albinism in tanzania it's a really interesting topic it's a really important thing to be talking about so head over to the patreon to check that out and now i will shut up and we

can listen to the show i'm hannah i'm saruti please go and buy your tickets and we will see I'm Hannah. I'm Saruti. Please go and buy your tickets and we will see you on the road. So with that, I think the best way to describe the family that we're dealing with today is all I could keep thinking when I was reading about it was Kate Winslet's family in Titanic. Yeah, they are posho pastos. Posho pastos. Oh, it doesn't look any bigger than the Mauritania. It's exactly that. Of the Boston Dawsons.

And if you don't get the pasto reference, you're not watching enough Peep Show as part of your required red-handed homework. So it's the Condon family that we're dealing with. And can I just say, though, if i was as rich as them i would have changed my surname from congdon congdon that is a horrible sir i'm sorry if that's your surname but that is a shit surname i don't mind it it's quite like you've got to make good shapes with your mouth to say i'd change it congdon congdon the condons however you pronounce their name were as old money as old money gets.

At least in the United States. I tried to say States and Snark at the same time and I ruined myself. So today we have a female serial killer who never, ever, not once was convicted of first degree murder. And like most women killers that we come across, this one murdered for money. And some say for revenge. But we've got to start with her granddad. His name was Chester Congdon. He made his money first as a lawyer and then he bought up land that had iron or copper in it and then he just mined the shit out of it. And he did the majority of that in Minnesota. He did some in Arizona but mainly he spent a lot of his life in Minnesota, specifically around Duluth.

By 1909, Chester had made enough money to build his dream home. It was on the north shore of Lake Superior in Minnesota. The house was put together by a local architect, and it was truly stunning. Can you imagine having a made-to-order house? No, I can't imagine buying a house, let alone a made-to-order one. I watched a movie the other day. I can't remember what what it was it's got like Richard Gere in it and he like goes and stays in this bed and breakfast on the beach and it just looks like the most fake house in the world and I was like why were they trying to make me believe that this is an actual house it's like

a mansion on the beach that's what I think of when I think of this house yeah absolutely house it's like a mansion on the beach that's what I think of when I think of this house yeah absolutely but it's like it's Lake Superior so it's all like misty and like it rains all the time I do love it though I love a lake it's kind of like sort of withering heightsy but with more water it's like my dream I love like holidaying in really bleak places you really do I do I really enjoy it and I love it to be really cold and rainy and misty. We should go to Lake Superior. It sounds like just your kind of caper. Oh my god, chuck it on the list. When we eventually do our North American tour, it's happening. Okay, great. We'll do a live show on Lake Superior on a boat, on a canoe. I'm in. I'm a marketing genius. Right, okay.

The whole house, because you can do this if you build your own house, you can have a theme. And Chester chose the theme of birds and pineapples. Okay. What is a bird and pineapple theme? And where do you acquire one? Because that sounds amazing. It does, doesn't it? I think pineapples, especially then, were such an exotic thing that it was just like a show of wealth for sure and like it would have been in like the 70s it would have been like an avocado and like weirdly now because trends come back it would be an avocado again because everyone's a dick did you see that tweet where like it was um oh what was it was the times or the week or something published this article

that was like oh why millennials aren't buying diamonds? And someone tweeted, I work in Lidl. And because of the intergenerational poverty that baby boomers left us in. Thank you very much. I thought you were going to say about that MP who said that the reason that we can't buy houses is because we spend all of our money on avocados. Yeah, avocado on toast, no less. Though saying that, I bought a big bag of wonky avocados from the supermarket last week, and I have slowly watched them and waited and touched them and prodded them and now they've all just fucking ripened at once so now I have to eat avocado every day. Can we start a band called the wonky avocados? Morrison's will sue you. But we've got a drum kit in rehearsal tomorrow It's the perfect time

It's been dropped on us from above Oh no, the procrastination It's coming I literally was born to be a backing singer So I'll just do it myself Just step and click on my own Have you watched that Netflix documentary 20 Feet From Stardom?

Yes, I have I want to be there That's all I had to say about that anyway Where am I? Oh, and the other thing about this house So it's got birds, it's got pineapples, and it also had gas all the way through it, which in 1909 was a pretty big deal.

And when it was all finished, the bill came to $750,000, which in today's money is well over $20 million of our post-recession bullshit money. And by well over, we mean almost $700,000 over. This mansion had 39 rooms and every piece of furniture was hand-picked from all over the world. The fireplaces were imported from Algeria. The rugs came from Ireland and what is now Iran.

It's like if you made your house on The Sims, but like in real life. Exactly. He's got like original Persian rugs. Like that's what the situation is. And a bird and pineapple theme. I love it. It does sound like my dream house. So as if this house, with everything that we've told you, couldn't sound more made up, it had an actual, factual billiard room. I didn't even know that was a thing!

There was a billiard room. Oh my God. When I was in was in la not when we went but when i went a couple of years ago i went into this bar and they had a shuffleboard which i'd never seen before this guy was in there and he heard my accent and i was like playing it with my friends and he was like oh well you've got to watch her because you know english people grow up with those in their living rooms and i was like excuse me i've never seen this before in my life do you think I just live in like an antique mansion full of like antiquities and board games of yore like what do you where do you think I live I do kind of love that he thinks that but I also just want to let him know what the average like square foot edge of like a British house is compared to a massive fucking American house we don't have room for shuffleboards in our living. But what I was going to say about the billiard room actually was that at my

old job, we obviously had meeting rooms and we had a vote one day about what we were going to call all the meeting rooms and we named them all of the rooms from Cluedo. That's amazing. I love that so much. I have so much time for that. I've got a meeting in the kitchen, but it's not actually the kitchen. It's the room that's called the kitchen or the billiard room. As opposed to the actual kitchen. Excuse me, I'm just going to retire to the ballroom genuinely the ballroom was the biggest one the billiard room is going to be just the first of our many cludo references that we have for you in today's episode chester built his house for his wife and kids to be happy in he had a shed load of kids but But unfortunately for Chester, this house would

not stay happy forever, because it became a full-on murder mansion. But before it became a den of homicide, Chester decided to call his house Glensheen. The glen bit comes from the trees that surrounded the house, and sheen came from the fact that the family's roots came from sheen in Surrey. Sheen actually now counts as Greater London, would you believe it? It's down by Twickenham. Well, London's spreading like a cancer. But so does fucking, like, Stansted.

That's in Cambridge. Or past Cambridge, or some shit. And Southend. And Luton. Whatever. Sad thing is that even though he put so much effort into making his house so beautiful for his wife and for his bajillion children,

Chester didn't get to enjoy his masterpiece home for very long. In 1916, he died at 63 years old of a pulmonary embolism. Being a wealthy man and a smart businessman as well, Chester made sure that all of his affairs were in order before he left his earthly body. He decreed that Glensheen was to be lived in by his unmarried children. Chester knew that his sons would marry off quickly, so Chester's daughters had a much stronger claim to the house. All of his kids did marry, except one, and her name was Elizabeth with an S, and she lived in Glensheen all of her life.

I guess in that economy as well, kids weren't moving out of the house, unless they got married. Well, that was the thing. You had to go and live with your husband if you were a lady. Oh, of course. I feel like Elizabeth's the only smart one. She's like, fuck that shit. Yeah, I've got so much time for her.

Keeping this house. I've got the dream house. I'm not going to move into someone else's. I love the idea of like her other sisters or something. You know, I don't know if I'll get married. He really likes you. I just like, I feel this connection. I feel this spark when you guys are together and did you know he's a capricorn can't get them out the door fucking fast enough

but elizabeth wasn't really a spinster either she had once been engaged to a man called fred wolvin who apparently was a fabulous dancer and he was completely besotted with her but elizabeth wasn't so sure. And when he proposed to her, Elizabeth never wore the incredibly impressive diamond ring he bought her. She pinned it inside her bra instead, which for back then, very risque behaviour, Elizabeth, I would say. It's also such an uncomfortable place to keep a massive diamond ring. Yeah, I know.

I bet she like pulled it off with him as just being like, oh, well, you know, it's closer to my heart here rather than I'm too embarrassed to wear it. Why would you be embarrassed to wear a massive diamond ring? I don't know. I think once you wear it, that's like a public announcement that you're engaged. I think once it's on the finger, you can't go back.

No, but once you keep it in the bra, All bets are off. I don't know. There's something there. So Elizabeth thought about this proposal for a while, presumably quite uncomfortable with this massive clonking ring in her bra, but she decided that she wasn't going to go through with it

and poor Fred was so heartbroken, he flung the ring into Lake Superior. Could you be more dramatic, Fred? No wonder she didn't want to fucking marry him. He sounds completely irresponsible. Why are you throwing a ring, a massive diamond ring, into a lake? No one's going to give you any credit for that. That's all I'm saying. I think it's quite romantic kind of who are you i don't know i'm very tired and also just anything in a sort of withering heights setting just get i read withering heights like twice a year it's the only book i read i hate every other book i call the squirrel

in my garden heathcliff stop it yeah he's black squirrel. We have black squirrels in my town. One of the only towns in the world that has black squirrels. That's nice. Seems very brooding to me. He's always on his own. I'm glad you've got a friend. It's someone working from home by any chance.

Just naming the animals in the garden. I've been working from home for three weeks and I've named the fucking vermin in my garden. I think, you know, as dramatic as Fred was, she didn't want to marry him. And I think it's probably a bit more to do with knowing that she was onto a good thing with Glensheen and she wasn't going to give it up for no man, which is why I love her. And I just, you wouldn't move into someone else's house when you've got the best house in the whole world and you just live there with your mum and your staff. 100%. I'd be fucking ecstatic. But when the 30s rolled around,

both the decade and the age group, Elizabeth had escaped marriage, but not her biological clock. She was broody with a vengeance and having no husband was a bit of an ish in the 30s, especially in the high society where Elizabeth was quite firmly placed. But she didn't care. She wanted a baby and she had all the money in the world. So, of course, in 1932, she got one. But the thing about this baby that she got, the baby was kind of dark, kind of a bit warm in its colour tones, more of a Fenty than a Maybelline. She doesn't look specifically mixed race. She's just very obviously not Elizabeth's daughter.

And this is the thing, no one knew the exact ethnicity of the baby, but there were rumours that the baby had a black father, but these were never confirmed. The main thing is though, that the baby looked markedly different from Elizabeth, but Elizabeth never let this bother her. She named the baby Marjorie and loved her as her own. Three years later, Elizabeth adopted another baby girl, who she called Jennifer. There were rumours of where Jennifer had come from exactly, but she wasn't dark like Marjorie, and she did look a lot more like her adoptive mother. So some people thought that Elizabeth may have been her biological mother after all. But unlike everyone else, Marjorie, Elizabeth's first daughter, hated Jennifer.

Marjorie had a tough time as a child. She was introverted and always felt like second best. She had a hard time interacting with adults as well, especially men, except for with her uncle Ned, who she loved dearly. When little Marge was eight, though, Ned died. And he died suddenly. So she was so upset by his passing that she started to pull out her own hair and laugh maniacally at random

intervals. I also guess that Marge has a difficult time fitting in because like she looks so different. Yeah it's quite obvious that she is an illegitimate child I think and back then it was like the 30s back then like there was sort of umming and ahhing if adoptive children could even inherit you know it's so it's already a bit taboo. And then for her to look so different. And then Jennifer comes along and she's just perfect and good at everything and looks like her mum and everyone loves her. I get it. I get it.

Marge always felt separate. And as she got older, this started to manifest in destructive ways. She started stealing, primarily from her mother. She would take herself off to town and buy hundreds of dollars worth of clothes that she would either pay for with cash that she had stolen out of her mum's purse or just charge it straight to her mum's account by forging her signature. Cashmere jumpers were her particular favourite. Forgery, spending other people's money and then lying about it,

would accompany Marge throughout her whole life. And another consistent feature of Marge's life was horses. The first horse she ever had was called Grey, and she got bored of it. So her mum was like, OK, fine, you don't have to have it. I'll sell it to someone who's going to love it and look after it. But if Marge didn't want the horse, she didn't want anyone else to have it either. So she attempted to poison Grey with pills that she had stolen. A stable hand spotted her doing this and told on her.

The horse survived and was rehomed in the end. But little Marge never saw any consequences. So even as a little girl, there were quite a few signs and signals that little Marge wasn't totally all right. Marge got married when she was 19 to a man called Dick... Oh, grower. I know, I'm sorry. Marge got married when she was 19 to a man called Dick Leroy. I know, I'm sorry. It just sort of, I was going to say it sort of just hit me.

Did it? Did the dick hit you in the face? Dick just hit me in the face. So she married this man called Dick Leroy when she was 19 and she moved out of Glensheen and they moved to the suburbs of St. Louis. Their first two months of marriage were blissful until Dick started to get calls from people wanting money from him. and they moved to the suburbs of St. Louis. Their first two months of marriage were blissful, until Dick started to get calls from people wanting money from him. Marge told him that her mother must have done it by accident,

so Dick gave her a call. Elizabeth told him that she thought he knew about Marjorie's little problem. So Elizabeth sent Dick $3,500 to cover the costs of that little problem. And the Congdon money would continue to bail Marjorie out for a really long time. Elizabeth had set up approximately seven bazillion different trust funds. I think you'll find that says basquillion. Basquillion, sorry. I'm veering dangerously off script. She had set up seven basquillion different trust funds that pay out to Marjorie and Jennifer at different ages throughout their lives.

So at 18, at 21, at 25, etc. Marge never really had to wait long for the next one to pay out. And she never did an honest day's work in her life. Marge loved having money and she loved spending it as well. She never worked out how to have her cake and eat it too. I've recently only just understood that saying. What? Have your cake and eat it too? Yeah because if you've eaten it you don't have it anymore. Exactly. I literally learned that last year. I know. What else don't I know? It's scary man. I find this shit out all the time. I think you should start another podcast called

What Else Don't I Know? Where every week it's just you having an existential crisis about the other things you don't know. I was just like, why would you have a cake and not eat it? That's so stupid. Exactly. But if you eat it, you don't have it anymore. Well, now I know. There you go. Now you do know. So Marge clearly understood the saying, but couldn't apply it. And she got herself and Dick into debt all of the time and her mum Elizabeth always bailed them out. Antique furniture was a particular fave of Marge's

and she wanted to decorate the living room of her house with exquisite antiques. But Dick, already in thousands of dollars of debt, told her no, they couldn't afford it. I like Dick. Yeah, he's putting his foot down. Sorry. No, you can't have a solid oak amour. Imagine the rage. She's had to move out of Glensheen and go live in the suburbs, and he won't let her have whatever she wants. Yeah, I know.

It's an outrage. This is not the life Marge wanted. Honestly, how is she expected to live like this, below the poverty line? Without a horse to poison. Yeah, exactly. A few weeks after that discussion, one Sunday morning, all seven of Marge and Dick's children were piled into the car getting ready to go to church. But Marge kept them waiting in the drive.

After a while, she came out to the car and they all toddled off to church. When they got back after the service, the house had been turned upside down. Furniture was smashed and the sofas had been slashed. There was a notable concentration on the living room. Dick got an insurance payout and Marge got her new living room. If there is one thing that is pervasive in this story, Marge always gets what she wants. And one of the things that she wanted was an ocelot. This is the most ridiculous part of this fucking story. I hate this so much. I know. It's just pretty gross. And if you don't know what an ocelot is, it's like a wild cat. Yeah, it's like a massive jungle cat. I mean, they can weigh up to

like 20 kilos. They're massive. As much as I hate this bit of the story, I do like that she called her ocelot Lancelot. Yeah, I mean, I'll give her that. That's pretty funny. I'll give her that. So Lancelot the ocelot wasn't pretty well behaved because he went off and impregnated the neighbor Siamese cat and rather tragically the cat died giving birth because the babies were just too big and possibly because they had to talk so much because Marge kept getting her family into debt Dick and Elizabeth became very close and once Elizabeth even admitted to Dick if it weren't for you and the children, I would just let Marjorie go. Can you imagine your mum saying that to your husband? Yeah, I know.

I know. That is some deep cut betrayal. I think Elizabeth's a smart lady too. Like, I don't think she's saying it lightly. No, no. As you would after all these shenanigans, even though it is your daughter, Elizabeth was getting pretty sick of her daughter's shit.

In 1965, Elizabeth suffered a massive stroke and she never gained control on her right side again and from then on she was watched round the clock by a team of house staff and nurses in 1966 marge and dick's garage burned down there what what? Oh, fuck. Oh, fuck all of you. Their car hole burnt down. And very mysteriously. And they received yet another insurance payout. How very convenient. So when Marge was 35, she gained access again to yet another one of her trusts. And this one released $288,000 in cash. That is mind-boggling.

In the 70s too. Yeah, fucking hell, Marge. So Marge used that money to buy six horses. That's sensible, isn't it? When you live in the fucking suburbs. Loads of room for horses in your living room. It's like whenever Marge gets loads of money, she asks herself, what do you buy someone who already has everything? Yeah, an ocelot. Six horses.

Oh yeah, she's outrageous. By 1971, it wasn't just Elizabeth who was sick of Marge's shit. Dick was too. So he sued Marge for divorce on the grounds of cruel and inhumane treatment. Love that. Not even like irreconcilable differences.

Yeah, no. And he sues her for it as well. Because she's not having it. She doesn't want to get divorced. And he's like, fine, I'll fucking sue you for it. Good for Dick. I mean, even though he pushes through this divorce, he doesn't come out on top. Marge kept the kids, the horses, the antiques, the bank accounts and the insurance policies. Dick got the car and not a sausage more. Marge moved out to Colorado to live a more horsey lifestyle and the house she bought was in desperate need of a refurb according to her so it was probably absolutely fine and she decided that

this refurb would cost a hundred thousand dollars and Marge just didn't have that kind of liquidity. But quite conveniently there was another fire quite quickly after Marge received didn't have that kind of liquidity. But quite conveniently, there was another fire quite quickly after Marge received that $100,000 quote. And the house happened to be insured for $430,000. What a coincidence. Unlike the break-in and the garage fire, this blaze caused Marge some trouble. She was immediately under suspicion for arson. But what Marge didn't know was that her

insurance policy on her house had lapsed and at that time in colorado there was a little bit of a loophole a person could not be prosecuted for damaging property that they were not insured for so marge got away with it again and she was right back at it in 1976 it would seem when she moved into an apartment block and uh that caught fire as well. But because no one saw her actually setting the fire, she was never charged. That also seems completely wild that you can't be prosecuted for damaging property that you're not insured for. I know. It's bizarre, isn't it? It might be houses specifically.

Maybe, but it's like, have you never heard of vengeance? Yeah, right. Yeah. Weird. Or like a sexual attraction to fire? Yeah, I know. It seems very odd, but she gets away with it. So all of this slipping through the clutches of the long arm of the law was no fun without someone to share it with. So Marge was on the hunt for another partner.

With this in mind, she took herself off to a parents without partners meeting, where she met a man named Roger Caldwell. And the two were married within two months of their first meeting. Marge does not fuck about. She's not here for that. She is here for, I was going to say she's here for dick, but she's a dick to bolster. So the two moved out to the mountains after they got married and their house was foreclosed on by the bank. So they had to move into a motel and this seems like an odd move i guess because i feel like you know when like super duper rich people go bankrupt like johnny depps just lost all of his money he's still living in a fucking oh yeah yeah he's lost like 450 million he's suing his like financials

advice team he's like broke but he's still living in a massive house on the hollywood hills do you know i mean like so when rich people lose money it's like donald trump going bankrupt like six times or whatever it is he still fucking lives in a massive house do you know i mean so i think she can't quite let go of that yeah idea and moving into a motel someone changes your sheets you get fresh towels it's kind of still like having staff rather than just moving into like a like a tiny apartment somewhere where you have to like and there's no washing machine and you have to like do your own stuff definitely at least there is as you said someone cleaning up after you picking up after you but it still would be quite for her a high stress way of life that was made significantly worse by ro's drinking problem. Because yes, Roger was a violent drunk.

She can pick him. And there were many times where Marge and her youngest son Rick had to make a run for it in the middle of the night to escape him. And on top of that, as if that wasn't enough, Marge had almost run out entirely of money. Back in Glensheen, Elizabeth was living her life. Roger had asked her for money, but she'd said no. Marge had tried to talk to her mother herself and try to talk her around, but no can do. So she showed up one day and insisted on feeding her elderly and extremely

diabetic mother marmalade on toast. After Marge left, Elizabeth Congdon would not wake up again for almost 24 hours. The doctor had to be called and Elizabeth just about pulled through. But it didn't seem to be a reaction to the sugar in the marmalade. Velma Pietila had the job of watching Elizabeth on the night of the 26th of June 1977. And this was not really Velma's job, she was more of a day nurse. But she agreed to help out just this once, even though her husband asked her not to. And the next day, another member of staff whose name's Mildred arrived at 7am and walked straight up the sweeping solid oak stairs to give Elizabeth her insulin. As she climbed, she saw some legs dangling over a bench on the landing. She thought

Velma must have been having a rest. But as she got closer, it became very clear that Velma was not having a rest. 67-year-old Velma was dead. She was covered in blood and her face was barely recognisable. She had a clump of dark hair in her hand. There'd clearly been a struggle. Her skull had been severely fractured and she had 23 separate lacerations on her face. It would later be ascertained that Velma had been beaten to death with a candlestick. Just like an actual Cluedo. And before we go any further, just like calling football soccer, Cluedo is only called Clue in North America, and it was invented by a British person from Birmingham. So I apologise if you can't handle

the extra syllable, but that is what it is called. After she found Velma, Mildred continued into Elizabeth's room. She was lying on her back in bed with a pillow on her face, she had been smothered. Her face was bright purple and she had a scratch on her nose. The satin pillow that had been used to kill her was crumpled. Someone had really been holding it down hard. And this is the thing. These are pretty brutal. Like smothering somebody with a pillow and 23 lacerations to the face.

Brass candlesticks are fucking heavy. Like, that is real damage you can do with one of those. I mean, obviously she's dead, but like... And think of the rage or whatever has to possess you to be able to wield that that many times. Absolutely. So the police were at Glensheen within half an hour after the bodies were discovered.

And that's when they realised that Velma's car was missing. And that wasn't the only thing that was amiss. Over the next few days, the Glensheen staff noticed that jewellery had been taken from Elizabeth's room. And a Byzantine coin. And a wicker basket. And worst of all, a ring had been taken off her finger after she had died. Taking jewellery off the dead is probably the lowest thing. Not the lowest thing, but it's pretty low. It's really fucking pathological. So a small basement window had been broken and unlocked. The shattered glass was found 16 feet away from the window, which suggested

that something smaller than a person had been thrown through at first. Everyone suspected Marge, obviously. Elizabeth had been taken extremely ill the last time she'd seen her, and Dick too was sure that Marge had a hand in the double-cludo homicide. And he would know he was married to her for 20 years. But with all these accusations flying around, if Marge was nervous, she didn't show it at all at her mother's funeral. She was bouncy, like she was at a party. And Roger went to the funeral as well. He had a swollen hand and a split lip.

He claimed that he had fallen out with one of Marge's many horses. Marge also paid a visit to the detective who was leading on the investigation. His name was Ernie Grams. And if that name isn't good enough for you, in the Duluth tabloids at the time, they rather pleasingly call him the Duluth sleuth, which congratulations, whoever came up with that have a pay rise, except you're probably dead. So Marge told Ernie all about the real estate agents that she had spent time with over the weekend her mother and nurse had been killed. Marge had been all the way in Colorado and she had three people who could say that they were with her. So Marge had a pretty cast-iron alibi. Roger did not.

No one could account for Roger the weekend of the mansion murders. He and Marge had stayed in the Radisson Hotel in Duluth for Elizabeth's funeral. And in this hotel room, the police found a receipt from the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport, dated on the 27th of June. That's the day after Elizabeth and Velma are killed. So that puts Roger right near Glensheen, the morning after Elizabeth and Velma were killed. And a local cab driver told the police that he drove Roger to Glensheen the night of the murders. And Velma's car was found parked at St Paul International Airport

in the Short Stay car park. Someone had even bought it a parking ticket that was stamped at 6.35am. On the 5th of July, the Duluth sleuth made it to the Holland House Motel in Colorado where Marge and Roger lived. And in that motel room, they found the wicker basket and the jewellery that had gone missing from Glensheen. And the very worst bit was a Duluth Radisson envelope that exhibited Roger's handwriting that had been sent to the Holland House Motel,

had inside it the 300 Common Era Byzantine coin that had been taken from Elizabeth's room in Glensheen. And to top it all off, forensics revealed that there was a big fat thumbprint on the envelope that was consistent with Roger's own hands. And they also found the item that had been bought at St Paul Airport, the one they'd found the receipt for back in Duluth. It was a garment bag. So that is pretty, that's piling up evidence. It's almost too good, isn't it?

No. And of course, this was therefore more than enough for an arrest. But Roger wasn't at the motel when the authorities called. He was in hospital. He was in hospital because Marge had poisoned him. Old Roger, as we said, was a heavy drinker and Marge had had enough of it. So she got hold of some antabuse, which causes all sorts of problems if taken in conjunction with alcohol. It can cause heart palpitations, cardiovascular

collapse, heart failure, convulsions and even death. Roger had gone out on one hell of a bender that night and Marge wanted to teach him a lesson. So she slipped her Antabuse into his morning coffee, knowing full well that he'd have a raging hangover. And he collapsed. The hospital obviously thought that it was a heart attack, but Marge knew better. When Roger finally came round, he was immediately placed under arrest on suspicion of two counts of murder in the first degree. He was indicted with these charges on the 5th of August. The very same week, Marge called an old friend whose name was Manette, and she said that someone had broken into her room at the motel and attacked her with a razor blade.

And she said that this man had had a gun and a badge, so she's insinuating that he's a policeman, essentially. Manette rushed over to the motel at once to find Marge bleeding from the arms and face. The walls of the hall and of the bathroom were covered in bloody handprints, but the corridor connecting the hall and of the bathroom were covered in bloody handprints but the corridor connecting the two was not so there's no like trail of blood it's just some on the wall in two separate bits of this motel room how big is this motel room that's all i want to know

marge went to the police but as the wounds on her arms and face were quite obviously self-inflicted the case was not pursued. But that didn't stop Marge going to the press claiming that the man with the razor told her that he would be back if she did anything to help her husband. And I think what she's doing here, she's like, I don't want to pay to bail him out. So I'm going to make it look like I'm actually doing a good thing for my own safety rather than just being a tight bitch. She is so devious. And like slashing at your own face to get out of paying your husband's like bail yeah and then she's just honestly i've never

crumb across someone who is so shameless she's very single-minded yeah it's it's marge's world we just live in it and then uh she also had the absolute gall to claim that all of the negative press attention she was getting meant that she was unemployable. I actually think that might have a little bit more to do with her never having done a day's work in her actual entire life. What are your skills? Marge? Poisoning horses and parents and beloved husbands. so obviously a dead Elizabeth Congdon meant that her two daughters stood to inherit even more money than they had already been dished out in the previous long list of trusts the books that we used to research this case this week are called Glensheen's Daughter, The Marjorie Congdon Story

and Will to Murder and we will link both of them properly in the episode description so that you can have a read of them. Because the latter goes into extreme detail on how all the trusts worked, if that is your thing. There isn't time to talk about that in this week's episode. Also, it's really boring. It's not our thing. Harvard is the oldest and richest university in America. But when a social media-fueled fight over Harvard and its new president broke out last fall, that was no protection. Claudian Gay is now gone.

We've exposed the DEI regime, and there's much more to come. This is The Harvard Plan, a special series from the Boston Globe and WNYC's On the Media. To listen, subscribe to On the Media wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Jake Warren, and in our first season of Finding, I set out on a very personal quest to find the woman who saved my mom's life. You can listen to Finding Natasha right now, exclusively on Wondery Plus. In season two, I found myself caught up in a new journey

to help someone I've never even met. But a couple of years ago, I came across a social media post by a person named Loti. It read in part, Three years ago today that I attempted to jump off this bridge, but this wasn't my time to go. A gentleman named Andy saved my life. I still haven't found him. This is a story that I came across purely by chance, but it instantly moved me. And it's taken me to a place where I've had to consider some deeper issues around mental health. This is season two of Finding. And this time, if all goes to plan,

we'll be finding Andy. You can listen to Finding Andy and Finding Natasha exclusively and ad-free on Wondery Plus. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. They say Hollywood is where dreams are made, a seductive city where many flock to get rich, be adored, and capture America's heart. But when the spotlight turns off, fame, fortune, and lives can disappear in an instant. When TV producer Roy Radin was found dead in a canyon near L.A. in 1983,

there were many questions surrounding his death. The last person seen with him was Lainey Jacobs, a seductive cocaine dealer who desperately wanted to be part of the Hollywood elite. Together, they were trying to break into the movie industry. But things took a dark turn when a million dollars worth of cocaine and cash went missing. From Wondery comes a new season of the hit show Hollywood and Crime, The Cotton Club Murder. Follow Hollywood and Crime, The Cotton Club Murder on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can binge all episodes of The Cotton Club Murder early

and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus. This time it was different with the inheritance because Jennifer was awarded her inheritance straight away and Marge's went into a trust where she couldn't touch it. Marge had just lost out on $8.2 million. Rightfully, she was absolutely furious Is it rightfully? Her mum's just being like, you can have it when you've grown up a bit, Marge

Yeah, not rightfully in the world Rightfully that she's furious In planet Marge In Marge world, rightfully And at this point, Marge's own children turned against her as well And filed that no money should be given point Marge's own children turned against her as well and filed that no money should be given to Marge until the criminal investigation into Elizabeth's death had been completed I think that speaks volumes her own children think she did it she's got two children

who are called Stephen and Rick who stay quite loyal to her but the rest of them are like she's an absolute animal and I like that because they're not just yeah, we'll stand by mum and then she can inherit that money and then we'll get some of it. They're like, you fucking killed our grandma. Like, we know what you did. Poor old Roger's trial began on the 8th of May 1978 and it lasted 12 weeks. And in all those 12 weeks, Marge didn't show up once.

Presumably terrified of this fictional policeman who'll come and slash her face if she turns up. The whole thing was basically a walk in the park for the prosecution. Money is, of course, the easiest motive in the world. Roger was just trying to appease his unemployed, fortune-seeking wife. That's the story and it makes sense. And what's more, Marge had given Roger the right to half of her inheritance just three days before the murder. So come on, he's got like a golden like motive here. And not only has he got the golden motive, his fingerprints on the envelope that he's allegedly sent to himself with the stolen coin in it. He's got the stuff that was taken from the thing. They know he was at the airport.

The taxi driver said he was there. It's too perfect is what it is. It's Cluedo. Well, yeah. However, having said that, none of Roger's fingerprints were found at the scene of the crime. Three hairs that were consistent with his were, but we know about this.

I think hair analysis back then was basically like reading tea leaves. It was total bollocks. I think it was literally just like length and colour. Yeah, maybe. Or just like the cells look a bit the same under a microscope. The clump of dark hair found in Velma's hands was never identified. Roger's hair was a sort of sandy brown in the parts that it wasn't grey. Here's what the prosecution argued. Here is their story of the night. They said that Roger took the taxi to Glensheen, then broke through the basement window by posting his arm through the broken glass and unlocking it from the inside. Then he climbed through the window, snuck up the stairs where he ran into Velma. He bludgeoned her

to death with the brass candlestick and he did that so hard that he split the base of it. And then with the Velma threat neutralised, he carried on with his ultimate target, who is Elizabeth Congdon. And after he smothered the half-paralysed old lady to death, he took what he wanted from the mansion and left the same way he came in. Then he took Velma's car and drove straight to the airport. That story makes perfect sense. But when I read that for the first time, the first thought I had was why would someone be so careful to not leave a single print, and they're breaking through a window as well, to not leave a single print at the crime scene, but then leave a perfect trail of clues? Who sends a letter to themselves with stolen goods in it? It's a a coin put it in your pocket

what was it about that that needed posting exactly and it's also like the weird stuff that he steals like a coin and a ring it's like you're gonna get all that shit anyway because your wife's probably going to inherit half of it why are you stealing random bits you could say it's to make it look like a burglary but then why are you fucking posting it to yourself exactly also, I think he'd only actually been to Glensheen once before. They haven't been married that long. How did he know where Elizabeth's room was? Very good point. After 106 witnesses,

the jury took just 24 hours to find Roger guilty on both counts of murder in the first degree, and he was sentenced to two consecutive life sentences. And as the judge told him his fate, Roger said two words. You're wrong. Marge wasn't out for the woods either.

In July 1978, she was charged with conspiring with Roger to kill her mother. But she got herself, of course, an extremely good lawyer. His name is just perfect. His name was Ronald Meshbesher. There's some cracking names in this story. Meshbesher. Meshbesher. I mean, seriously, you're a lawyer.

You can just do your own deed poll. Change your name. Like, what's going on? Ronald, despite his questionable name, got her a plea deal. But she flat out refused. So she went to trial. And hers lasted unbelievably even longer than Roger's. At 16 weeks. The star witness at Marge's trial was Elizabeth Congdon's doctor,

who had been called to the scene after the marmalade incident. The doctor confirmed that Elizabeth Congdon's blood had shown an overdose of the tranquiliser meprobamate, which is basically an old- timey Xanax, and clear proof that Marge had tried to poison her elderly mother. This was cracking evidence. It shows Marge has form, but it is all about to go tits up for the prosecution. You couldn't buy better testimony than that. It's like, I am a doctor.

She poisoned her. I was there. I tested it. I know. Then the only other thing would be if that stable boy also came out and told them that he saw her trying to poison Grey. But then Mesh Besher brought in his own fingerprint guy called Herbert MacDonald. And he's the very same Herbert MacDonald who would later testify at OJ's trial.

If there is any other trial that reminds me of Marjorie Congdon's trial, it's OJ's. Because it's like, they did it, but you can't prove it. I was going to say something about people coming for you who think that OJ didn't do it. But I was like, are there still those people? I don't know. Nah, we've said it before. We've said it before. I'm so scared of the internet. So, Macdonald told the court that he was 100% certain that the thumbprint on the envelope that had been posted from the Radisson in Duluth to the Holland House Motel in Colorado, the thumbprint on that envelope, did not belong to Roger Caldwell. So, the only solid evidence that the prosecution had against Marge and her husband was in tatters. The jury didn't believe anything else the prosecution said,

and Marge was found not guilty on all counts. And it was also the longest trial in Minnesota history up until that point. Marge celebrated with a day by herself at the zoo with a bag of white castle hamburgers i have never eaten a white castle hamburger but i understand that it is basically the lowest of the low she's lost all her money oh well that's very true apparently what was the name of those i should have fucking looked this up man there was a series of like stoner films that came out when we were teenagers harold and kamar oh yeah so harold and kamar get the munchies is what we call it here in america it's called harold and kamar go to white castle oh is that like some sort of like what's their censor board the fca i don't know yeah something they changed it for our stupid british minds wow but no did they oh i thought that makes

sense because we didn't know white castle is though that makes sense because we don't know what White Castle is though. That makes sense. Yeah. I thought the Americans had controlled it because you couldn't say Munchies because it implies drug use. Oh, maybe. Which came first? I don't want to start another cracker barrel war, but I think I already did. Which came first, the Munchies or White Castle? That's the question that we need the answer to. And of course, this trial result was huge news for Roger too. He was released on bond to await a retrial.

His first trial had taken three months and cost a quarter of a million dollars and to avoid these costs, Roger took a plea deal. He admitted to the murders under oath and in return he would be found guilty of murder in the second degree and sentenced to time served, which would mean that after five years Roger would be found guilty of murder in the second degree and sentenced to time served which would mean that after five years Roger would be free. Roger gave a detailed confession which was basically the same as the narrative presented by the prosecution in his first trial

but he stopped and started a lot as if he was trying to think of what to admit to and what to leave out. Some said his confession was a little bit too detailed for an innocent man and he said that he didn't remember posting himself the coin or the wicker basket in the motel room or any of the trail of like massively incriminating clues that led the police straight to him. He closed his statement with quote I never thought it was a murder. When he was released Roger moved back to his hometown of Latrobe, Pennsylvania, where no one had ever heard of the Duluth murders. But his criminal record stopped him from finding work,

and he became extremely depressed and again started to drink very heavily. On the 17th of May 1988, Roger was found dead in his apartment by his girlfriend. He had slit his wrists with a steak knife. Roger also left three suicide notes. Two were illegible, and the other read, quote, What you need to know is that I didn't kill those girls, or to my knowledge, ever harm a soul in my life.

Roger was 53. The thing is with his suicide note, as poetic as it is, he does rather conveniently leave out the fact that a week before his death, he beat his girlfriend so badly that she had to go to hospital. So whether or not he didn't kill Velma and Elizabeth, he certainly had hurt other souls in his life. So I don't think we can really count him as the most reliable of narrators. Do you think she was there?

Oh, as in, do you think Marge did it? I don't think Marge did it, but I don't know whether she was in the house. Oh, like when he slit his wrists? No, no, when Elizabeth and Velma died. Oh, no, I think... But whose hair was it? Whose dark hair was it? It wasn't Roger's. Velma? No, it's in her hands.

Oh, I don't know. I don't know. Maybe. Maybe. I don't know, but I feel like she'd be too careful. She had to set up

the perfect alibi. She had to be seen by people and she was. So, how could she? I don't think Roger was in there on his own. I just don't know who the other person is.

Was it one of the kids who stayed loyal to him? Might be. Might have been. If you had any doubts about Marge's character, this bit of the story will seal the deal because she is one stone cold bitch. Even though Roger was out of prison, Marge had moved on. She started an affair with her old friend's husband.

That man was called Wally and Wally and his wife Helen were literally the only people who had stood by Marge during her trial. Helen had early onset Alzheimer's and she was living in a nursing home at just 64. Marge went to pay her a visit in March of 1980. The next day, Helen slipped into a coma and her daughter Nancy went in to check on her and noticed that on her mother's notes that she was not listed as her daughter. Marge was. And when Nancy asked the nurse about this, she was told that Marge had been in the night before and had been feeding Helen baby food from jars that she had brought in herself. Days later, Helen was dead. Her autopsy revealed that she had died from dehydration and pneumonia, but no toxicology report was ever carried out. Nancy had her suspicions and I'm sure you do too.

According to her doctors, Helen should have lived another 15 years. A week after Helen died, Wally turned up to his daughter's house and said, I came to tell you that I hated your mother for the whole 47 years I was married to her. And then he walked out. Marge was waiting for him in the car outside. Once her and Wally were official, in classic Marge fashion, she started to affect everyone around her. She told Wally that he didn't need to pick up his grandson from nursery. So nobody did, and that kid ended up in a

foster home, and then Nancy had to spend the whole next day in court trying to get her son back. And after the reading of Helen's will, Wally said that he didn't want anything from her. But the house that they had lived in together was ransacked soon after, and everything, including the will and all financial papers, vanished. These papers showed that Wally had not been paying bills with the money that his daughter Nancy had been giving him over the years. He had been giving it to Marge. And with all of the financial papers just vanished, there was no proof of anything. So none of Wally and Helen's children got a single penny of their inheritance. And this is the real kicker. Marge had stolen Helen's wedding rings before she died. She stole wedding and engagement rings off a lady with Alzheimer's. And then she nicked her husband. Wally and Marge

got married in 1981. And that we should mention here that Wally was 23 years older than Marge. He was 71 and she was 49 when they got married. And also Marge was still technically married to Roger. So when she married Wally, she got charged with bigamy. But because her and Roger had got married in North Dakota, extraditing her was too expensive. So she got charged with bigamy but because her and Roger had got married in North Dakota extraditing her was too expensive so she got away with that one too. In the clear once again Marge got straight back to her old ways and she sold one of her houses to a couple to finance the purchase of another. Two weeks before they moved in the couple noticed that most of the floors in the house had been really poorly varnished and that all of the windows were open.

And we're talking like they hadn't even cleaned the floors before they put the varnish on, so there's like dust and hair just like stuck onto the floors now of their new house. So they are like, enough with your fucking renovations. And they requested that Wally and Marge make no more amendments to the house and also that they got all of the keys that they had. Wally and Marge handed over four sets of keys and invited the couple out to dinner the night before they moved into the house.

Ten points for guessing that while they were out for dinner, the house caught fire. Surprised, everybody is so surprised. I can hear the gasps. Because the floor varnish mixed in with all that hair and that dust was super flammable and fire needs air to spread, hence the open windows. The fire department decided that two fires had been set on the first and second floor at the same time. In the week leading up to the fire, Marge had been making several calls to the insurance

company to find out about fire protocol. Don't you know that by now, Marge? You making several calls to the insurance company to find out about fire protocol don't you know that by now Marge you've done enough fires exactly exactly but I'm also like if they were out to dinner with this couple and two fires were set simultaneously who did that okay so what they did was they're obviously they're prepping the house for many days also Wally is like a magical electrician so he rewired the whole house and then they left stuffed newspaper in like nooks and crannies and then so they don't know exactly how they did it but they were managed with the electrics to sort of delay this start of fire and then they had all of that newspaper ready to go and it just blew up I mean I found this quite

interesting because the insurance company did pay out. But because both the new couple and Wally and Marge had to be compensated, they made less from the fire than they would have done from the sale of the house. She's a maniac. She just fucking loves fire. And on the 6th of October 1982, Wally and Marge were served with a warrant and all of their financial records were finally seized. Later that same day, Wally and Marge were spotted packing their lives into a pickup.

They were going to run. But before they made it away, Marge was arrested for second-degree arson and defrauding an insurance company. They also found a key in her kitchen cabinet that opened the door to the house that she had sold and that had caught on fire. She had sworn that this spare key did not exist. Marge's arson trial got going in late November 1983. It was a slam dunk. Marge had motive, means and form and she had also written 63 bad checks that year alone. She was found guilty and sentenced to two and a half years in prison and a $10,000 fine. Wally's daughter Nancy attended the trial and Marge leaned into her and said, I'll get you for this. But Marge liked prison. She had her own room. She did well there. She started a quilting club and she sent flowers to the warden every week. Of course she did. Yeah.

Because she's still getting, these trusts are still paying out to her, even though she's in prison. So she's just having a great old time. And she only ended up serving 20 months. And then her and Wally moved to Ajo in Arizona. Wally was now 82 and he really wasn't very well. Marge told the whole neighborhood that he had cancer. So they moved close to the Mexican border

so she could buy, quote-unquote, alternative medicine for him in Tijuana. In the two years the couple lived in Ajo, which is a very small town with a low crime rate, there were a total of 43 fires. And the police were sure that at least 15 of them were set by the same person. And then Marge got cocky.

She tried to burn her neighbour's house down with him inside it. She was caught in the act, literally red-handed. It's the first time we've ever done that on the show. I'm not ashamed. She was caught with a flaming rag in her hand, walking over to her neighbour's back garden and she'd been stuffing holes in his house with kerosene-soaked pieces of cloth for weeks. The police took photographs of her with the flames in her hands and she was arrested. Wally couldn't pay her bail bond so Marge went to jail to await trial and while she was away, guess what? Wally mysteriously got quite a lot better. He was still old, of course, but he was walking around town a lot more than he used to. So you do have to wonder what kind of alternative medicine it was that Marge was giving him.

She can't handle not being in control. Like she's, I don't know if she ever poisoned Dick, her first husband, but she definitely poisoned Roger with his, that like anti-alcohol medication. And now with Wally, who like, by all accounts, like I think he genuinely did love her. Yeah, but she can't love anyone, I don't think. They had an affair for years. They planned the whole Helen thing together. Like it had been going on for, I want to say a decade.

It had been going on for a really long time. And so by this time, Marge is 60 and had 36 grandchildren and four great-grandchildren. We won't bore you with the details of the trial. We've had quite enough of that this episode. So Marge got 15 years. She was allowed one day's grace to sort out Wally's affairs before she was taken away. So the day before Halloween, 1992, she returned to her home in Ajo. The next day at 1pm, a local sheriff passed the house and thought he smelt gas, so he stopped to check that Wally and Marge were okay.

Marge assured him that there was no problem and that she would see him in a few hours when she was to be carted off to prison. At 4pm, Marge called Nancy to tell her that her father Wally had passed away, peacefully in his sleep while holding her hand. Nancy didn't believe a fucking word of that and I'm sure that you don't either. Gas takes a few hours to dissipate from a body and of course Marge knew that. When the authorities arrived to take her away, Marge handed them a suicide pact that was in Wally's handwriting.

She had forged it hundreds of times before. Essentially, the note detailed what the couple's dying wishes were. They didn't want to live without each other, so they had ended it. They wanted to be buried together with the words, Wally and Marge united in death as they were in life. And I'm sure that you have noticed that Marge is still quite conspicuously alive and the police noticed that too so Marge admitted that she'd actually lost her nerve at the last second.

After she was taken away to prison it didn't take the police very long to find a length of hose in the garden that had been cut and was exactly the right length to reach Wally's chair. He had been killed by a Xanax overdose, and the autopsy report showed that there was absolutely no cancer in his body at all.

Marge had been drugging him for years. So what they think happened is they think that she drugged him with an overdose of Xanax, probably loads because she's been drugging him for years. He's probably got an insane tolerance. And then she gasses him from her gas stove using a garden hose. So after this, Marge was charged with second degree murder. But yet again, she slipped through the net. The coroner's office took too long to determine the cause of death. So the case had to be dropped. No cause of death meant no murder trial. But before you stick your pencils up your noses, this time the

law loopholes worked against Marge for once. Because the charge was dropped, it could be refiled at any time. If the judge had thrown the case out, Marge would have been free to go. But as soon as the autopsy came through, the case was refiled and she went to prison for Wally's murder. There is a continuing legal battle between Marge and Wally's children. Currently, half of his remains are in Minnesota and half of them are in Arizona. What a nasty, nasty person. Like, she's in prison. You can't be buried with him. Like, and also, you murdered him.

You can't have been that bothered. It's just about control, like you said. She doesn't care. It's just about one last middle finger up at his children. Yes, exactly. She just wants to get back at Nancy. That's it. She said she'd get her and this is how she's doing it.

Yeah. But if you think that sounds like the end of the show, you are wrong. Marge got out of prison in 2004 and she's still going strong. When she got out, she moved to Tucson and befriended a man in his 70s called Roger Samis, who had recently inherited a large sum from one of his deceased friends. And surprise, surprise, he unexpectedly died in March 2007. Marge told the funeral directors that Roger Sammies had no family. That isn't true. He had a sister. And then she forged his signature on the inheritance check and she wired herself the money.

She was caught and got sent straight back to prison. She tried to argue that Sammies owed her the money. He didn't. Obviously, massive massive lie yet again but because she was so old marge was sentenced to three years of intensive probation she is still as far as we know alive and kicking i mean i've got to say about marge she's got game yeah oh yeah out of prison next husband and she picks the rich ones. Like, she's got game. She just, I think she genuinely doesn't know how to quit. Yeah, I love it. She's like, I won't do the fires anymore, but I really can't let go of the fraud. Yeah, I mean, that is just like some affirmation, isn't it? Just don't know when to quit. Just never know when to quit. So this is the case that just keeps on giving. Before we finish up, we have a little bonus crime for you.

So Roger Caldwell, Marge's second husband, who went to prison for murdering her mum and maid, had a daughter called Chris. And on the 17th of August, 1999, that daughter killed her mother and then kept her in the house for two weeks, encased in 700 pounds of salt. Yeah, she made this little like cardboard coffin.

Oh my God, like a salt-baked mum. Yes, exactly like a salt-baked mum, yeah. So when the police found the body, it was of course mummified. And Chris had been living in the house with it. Yeah, pretty grim. But on a slightly cheerier note to round us off, Glensheen is now open to the public. It's a museum now.

But under no circumstances are the murders mentioned on any of the tours you can take around the 39 rooms, which seems honestly... So weird. They're missing a trick, I think. Do they not understand the true crime wave that is hitting the world yeah exactly ride the wave glensheen i read an interview with like the the curator and they're like oh we don't deny that they happened it's just not really our focus i'm like well it fucking

should be are you dumb do you not like money on every bit of marketing and merch you put out no sorry no money don't it. We should just teach a business class, which is find the true crime angle and then fucking pull that lever until it's dead. You've been talking about levers all day. I think you've made like three lever references. Oh, have I? Pull the lever. I spent a lot of time with just a dog and a squirrel named Heathcliff today. So on that note, I'm staring rather terrified at this massive list of fucking patrons. So let's do it. As usual, you guys know the drill. Tickets, links, link to the tickets for the live show is in the episode description. You should definitely

buy it. It's going to be like a proper show show you know we've got like visuals we've got all sorts of shit we've got loads of things you should come check it out and we'll be there which is great so apart from that follow us on red handed on all the social medias at red handed the pod you can also be a lovely lovely person and go and pledge us some money on patreon here are some lovely people who are we are going to say thank you to today. So thank you, Miranda, Trey Robinson, Kim Bernard, Candice Rivera, Nadia Parker, Mercedes Schneider, Bailey Proudly, Liz Schwartz, Emma Jones, Jack, Eve, Megan Klus, Abby Chitwood, Nicolette, Naomi, Evelyn Perry, Judy Cox, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, Sean, go. Keely Clark, Alyssa Ray, Lauren HR, Jessie Dark, Clarissa Lockley, sorry. Clarissa, not Clarissa.

Simon Hancock, Fallon Gladue, Sending Ravens, Catherine, Keira Long, Bailey Ray, Meg Loweth, Charlotte Shona, Kim Thomas, Erin Connor, Megan Wigglesworth. Does anyone ever say your name without doing a little wiggly head? Sorry. I know, you said it and I wiggled.

Ashley Irwin, Chelsea A. Chappell, Claire Beck, Billy Hensley, Arsnoff, Alice, Lissick Amberman, Annie Simpton, Lisa Green, Caitlin Murray, the one with the difficult Scandinavian name. Thank you so much for understanding. Monica Caprasau, Leilani the Savage Zamora. I love you. Raymond Paylor, Pedro Knowles, Jade Miller, Ashton Tobar, Emma Rose Turrett and Tina Kwan. Thank you so much for your money. And we'll see you next week. All right. See you next time.

Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. He was hip hop's biggest mogul, the man who redefined fame, fortune, and the music industry. The first male rapper to be honored on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, Sean Diddy Combs. Diddy built an empire and lived a life most people only dream about. Everybody know ain't no party like a Diddy party, so. Yeah, that's what's up.

But just as quickly as his empire rose, it came crashing down. Today I'm announcing the unsealing of a three-count indictment, charging Sean Combs with racketeering conspiracy, sex trafficking, interstate transportation for prostitution. I was f***ed up. I hit rock bottom. But I made no excuses. I'm disgusted. I'm so sorry. Until you're wearing an orange jumpsuit, it's not real. Now it's real. From his meteoric rise to his shocking fall from grace, from law and crime, this is The Rise and Fall of Diddy. Listen to The Rise and Fall of Diddy

exclusively with Wondery Plus. Hi, I'm Lindsey Graham, the host of Wondery Show American Scandal. We bring to life some of the biggest controversies in U.S. history. Presidential lies, environmental disasters, corporate fraud. In our latest series, NASA embarks on an ambitious program to reinvent space exploration with the launch of its first reusable vehicle, the Space Shuttle. And in 1985, they announced they're sending teacher Krista McAuliffe into space aboard the Space Shuttle Challenger, along with six other astronauts. But less than two minutes after liftoff, the Challenger explodes. And in the tragedy's aftermath, investigators uncover a series of preventable failures by NASA and its contractors that led to the disaster.

Follow American Scandal on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. Experience all episodes ad-free and be the first to binge the newest season only on Wondery+. You can join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. Start your free trial today.