Rotten Mango - I Sat Down With A Killer

Episode Date: August 18, 2025

What happened that day in that little house in the woods is not a debate. The evidence is all there. The blood, the wounds, the dead man lying on the floor of the living room. That night while the h...omeowner was watching TV - Clark Fredericks walked in, slashed at him with a hunting knife, stabbing him all over his chest, before finally slitting his throat. It’s a bloody killing. There’s blood splattered and smeared all over the room. Detectives have so many questions for the killer - Like why did he kill him? Why did he go and spit on his bed before leaving? Did he think that he was going to get away with this? What was the reason? And does he regret it? Today, we’re getting answers to those questions. This is our interview with Clark Fredericks. Full Shownotes: rottenmangopodcast.com

Transcript
Discussion (0)
Starting point is 00:00:00 There is a certain process of elimination when you are at the scene of a death. Some cases are obviously going to be trickier than others. Some cases the whole time the investigators are debating. First of all, how? Like, how did this even happen? We don't know. And if this is what truly happened, if our theory is correct, are we sure that's what really happened?
Starting point is 00:00:26 That's what the investigators are doing. But for Detective Ryan, this case starts off really easy. Dead man in the living room in his own house. He's dead in his living room, in his house, in like a secluded, wooded area. He walks in, was it natural? That's the first question. Well, no, because there's droplets of blood right at the entrance of the house. It doesn't seem like it was natural.
Starting point is 00:00:50 Detective Ryan steps into the house a little bit deeper now. Was it a robbery gone wrong? The door shows no signs. of forced entry. He steps inside further. And there are just streaks of blood everywhere. One of the other officers walks straight up to him and just says, well, somebody tried to cut this dude's head off. Murder. That's what this is. We got the how. The cause of death is murder with a hunting knife. By the clues left behind in the living room, I mean, nothing of value has taken. All of the blood is concentrated near the couch in this living room area.
Starting point is 00:01:28 Whoever did this hunted the dead man. It's like they hunted them and killed him in his own living room. And it wasn't quick either. Like there are slash wounds all over this man's body. His throat is nearly slit. You can see the bone on both sides. There's blood all over the walls. There's blood soaking into the carpets.
Starting point is 00:01:47 This guy was hunted. He was killed rather painfully, rather violently, in his own living room. The first interesting detail that sticks out to Officer Ryan is that there's this bloody footprint that just feels so out of place. Obviously, there's going to be lots of bloody footprints all over this living room, but it's concentrated in this specific living room area, except this one clear bloody footprint, right in front of the door to the primary bedroom. It's almost like the killer, whoever this person is, walked over there, put one foot just outside the door, never step inside. What are they doing? Detective Ryan steps inside the master bedroom and he starts looking
Starting point is 00:02:28 around and that's when he sees it. He's like, did the killer slit that man's throat? Walk over to this bedroom to spit on the bed? Detective Ryan knows instantly that whoever did this knows the dead man, targeted the dead man, hunted the dead man and left a giant trail of evidence. It's not long after that, that Detective Ryan is going to find the killer, and he's got a lot of questions to ask this killer. And so do we. Can you take us to when we're in the car after you kill Dennis? I was bleeding severely. I had a severe wound. Speaking to my buddy in the passenger seat, I was not even thinking about getting away with it. I was thinking about stopping the blood flow. Did you have a hole in your hand? I did. I put a knife right through it, severed the ligaments
Starting point is 00:03:25 and tendons. How long was the knife? It was a hunting knife, so they're about six inches long, six, eight inches. And that was also the murder weapon? Yes. Did you take the murder weapon with you, or did you leave it? Took it. And there was blood everywhere. Was it coming from your hand, or was it someone else's blood? A mixture. Did you feel the need to get rid of the blood? I had a glove on, and when I got back to my house, I could ring out the glove. It was just pouring out of me, and it was everywhere in my garage. Can you walk me through the hole in your hand? See, it wasn't straight through the hand. It was down this way. It was down this way. and out this way. So it went the whole length. And you could see pretty deep into the,
Starting point is 00:04:25 because it was wide open at the time. And you're just driving with one hand. I had the glove on at the time. So I couldn't see it until I got back and standing in my garage pulled the glove off. And then I was like, oh boy, we got a problem. Did it hurt the hole in the hand? Yeah, but I was, I was full of adrenaline and cocaine and alcohol. I wasn't fixated on the pain. Pain didn't bother me at the time. The next morning, police are surrounding your house and you pour a glass of Sharday. How many police officers are outside trying to arrest you? 12 to 20 Are you scared?
Starting point is 00:05:17 I'm thinking life is over. Your attorney describes it as horrific crime scene photos after you left Dennis's house. Have you seen those photos? I have. Did you feel anything when you saw it? Honestly, No. Dennis's obituary reads,
Starting point is 00:05:44 To those who knew him well, he will be remembered as a great man who always went above and be on the call of duty. And one whose love and loyalty for his friends was unparalleled. Do you agree with that? No, I do not agree with that. You provided to us your records, like your psychology records from when you were in jail
Starting point is 00:06:07 and then later prison. psychologist asked you, do you feel relief after the homicide? And you say, I can't say that. Things were out of control. No relief. Yeah. What happened in that night was horrific in his house was horrific. And it wasn't anything to sit back and rejoice over. It was a bloody, gory, horrific event. do you remember how many times you stabbed him or do you only know from what's been told only from what i've been told initially when you were first arrested i think there was questions of maybe there is an insanity plea maybe there are all these other things and one report reads the most outstanding clinical feature was the absence of any significant overt psychopathology. So does that mean that some psychiatrists were confused
Starting point is 00:07:12 because you didn't strike them as a psychopath or someone that just kills out of nowhere? Right. They didn't find anything psychologically wrong with me to do what I did. You killed Dennis Pegg. I did. You stabbed him. I did.
Starting point is 00:07:34 reports say you slit his throat Yes You spit on his bed Yes And you drove off with a hole in your hand Correct And then you were arrested And psychiatrists say that they found
Starting point is 00:07:51 Nothing wrong with you Correct And so technically you killed someone And you don't regret it No And everyone in town while you're in jail waiting for a trial, a plea deal, waiting for whatever fate has in store, everyone in town has free Clark stickers on their cars. People are writing articles. People
Starting point is 00:08:19 are selling bumper stickers that say free Clark. They were everywhere instantly, like in less than a week's time. Why did you kill Dennis Pegg? The short answer is he was a monster. What's the long answer? The long answer is he had a 45-year reigning of terror in our little town of Stillwater, New Jersey, raping boys. Were you one of the boys? I was. I was reading in your memoir, Scarred.
Starting point is 00:09:01 You were born with a hole in your heart. I was just a defect in my heart. And the doctors monitored me for the first six years of my life. And they told my parents we were down to a six-month window to operate to repair it. And so you had the surgery and you have a scar that you call a zipper. You know, with all the stitching, it looks just like a zipper. I know in the beginning when you were a kid, you were bothered by the scar. Is that something you're still bothered by?
Starting point is 00:09:33 No, I've come to make peace with my scar. So, okay, what was your first impression of Dennis? I know in your memoir you talk about how he came over and he offered you a dollar to touch your scar. Because it was the thing that your parents were doing to try and get you to be proud of your scar was to show people for quarters. Right. You're going back to 1971 to have open heart surgery as a six-year-old child. Open heart surgery today is still a risky endeavor.
Starting point is 00:10:06 So they were extremely proud of me for surviving this. I was in Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City for a month straight. And they were so proud. They just wanted to show me off to their friends. And they thought a neat way to, you know, when you're a kid, you just want to fit in with all the other kids. I had something now that made me stick out from everybody. So they just thought it would be a way to get me.
Starting point is 00:10:32 comfortable with it by showing it to their friends and collecting a quarter. Dennis Pegg was a family friend. He was. He was my brother's boy. I had a brother who was six years older than me. Jay. Jay. And he was my brother's boy scout leader.
Starting point is 00:10:51 And we had a lot of land where we lived in New Jersey. And he would hunt on our land with my father and brother. I was an old enough yet. And my parents owned a restaurant back then. My father put on big Sunday night meals, and he would come every Sunday and have dinner with us and tell stories about – he worked at the county jail as a sheriff's officer, and he would tell stories about there. Do you think that he targeted your family to get close to you guys, or do you think he genuinely was just friendly with your parents? Targeted. Predators have to win over one day. have to win over their community, so nobody would ever suspect them. Two, they have to win over
Starting point is 00:11:37 the family. And then last, they have to win over the victim. Can you tell me about the moment that he saw your scar? It was just a couple months after I had the surgery. Everybody in my family was in our backyard. And I came inside to get a drink and watch cartoons for a minute. And Dennis came to the front door, which was right next to our den. And I heard his voice, and I bound it up. I loved Dennis. You know, I just thought he was great. He always had his gun on and a badge.
Starting point is 00:12:14 And I let him in, and he asked where everybody was. And I told him everybody was out back. And he said, let's sit in the den for a minute. And then he said, you know, hey, I got a quarter. Can I see your scar? Didn't think anything of it. lifted my shirt, showed him. And he said, I've never seen a scar so raised up like yours. I have keloid conditions. So my scar is pronounced. And he goes, how about I give you a dollar if you let me
Starting point is 00:12:43 touch it? I couldn't possibly think of in my little six-year-old mind of any ulterior motives he would have. And I said, sure, Dan. And he took his big, meaty fingers and he ran him up and down my scar. And then he went below my scar line to, like, my belt line. And he was just probing and saying, is your stomach sore from the surgery? And I'm like, no, not at all, then. And he's like, okay. He's like, this has to be our little secret. He goes, if you tell your parents that I gave you a dollar for touching your scar, we can't be buddies.
Starting point is 00:13:17 I'm like, I can keep a secret. So when he's like probing and touching, did it just feel like, because you had just gotten out of surgery, Did it just feel like another adult that's maybe making sure you're okay? Is that the feeling? Yeah, and like I said, there wasn't one thought in my mind that he could have any other reason to touch other than he cared about me and my well-being. Throughout the book, you describe him as having needy fingers. And I know a lot of cases that we cover, a lot of victims, remember specific sensations or very specific sense even? Is that something that you would like
Starting point is 00:14:01 remember distinctly as meaty fingers? Yeah. He was a big hulking guy and I was a little tiny kid back then. When I say hulking, he was probably 265 pounds and just one of those big, beefy guys, him touching my scar stands out so pronounced in my mind. And the visualization of his big, meaty fingers is, like, ingrained in my memory. I wish I could scrape it off and remove it, but I can't. It's, like, ingrained in there. I'm assuming that's a worse memory than the actual open heart surgery. Yeah, he, like, ruined my open heart surgery, ruined my scar.
Starting point is 00:14:50 I hated my scar because what would happen later on. And he's the reason for me hating the way I looked. Did he have any sort of fascination with your scar? Or was it truly 100% just an excuse to start grooming you? Yeah, I don't think he had any. Things with a predator, they're never the way they seem. A predator is a chess master, always multiple steps ahead of you. So, like, everything may seem one way, but to them,
Starting point is 00:15:25 it's a complete other way. And I don't think he cared two hoots about my scar. It was just a avenue to get what he ultimately wanted. You guys would go fishing. There would be a lake. You and a bunch of boys would go fishing. Dennis Pegg would constantly be there. And there was an issue with the sunfish, like these little fish in the lake that don't taste good.
Starting point is 00:15:50 They're not edible fish. I mean, they're tiny. So to filet a sunfish, you don't have to filet a lot of them to get any meat off of their... So it's mainly sunfish? Right down by the dam, there'd be a lot of sunfish, and they're a really, like, gullible fish where you don't even need to put a worm on a hook. You could just put your hook in the water, and they see the bright shimmering, and they just latch on to it, and, you know, you catch them, and you just release them,
Starting point is 00:16:19 or so we thought. He does not catch and release them. What did he do? No. And again, for me to say he didn't like Sunfish is wrong because he's a chess remember, he's a predator and he's one step ahead of us, two steps, three steps ahead of us. He would tell us little boys that Sunfish were a worthless fish and that they needed to be killed. and he would catch them and stomp on him with his boot. Or he would catch them, throw them in the grass alongside the river,
Starting point is 00:17:02 and then pick up a big rock and smash it down on them. And he'd be like, that's what you do to things that are worthless. So anything's like a means to an end for him. So he just wants to scare everyone? It's a control thing. It's a domination thing. it's also to let you know if he considers you worthless, this is what will happen to you. You know, we're down there as a group of young boys, and it's not just me. He's targeting all of us
Starting point is 00:17:35 and letting us all know how he feels about worthless things. This is a little sidetracked, but I was doing research into Sunfish because I didn't even know what they looked like, And in a lot of indigenous cultures, they're actually known for protecting the young. Really? Like, they're some of the fiercest protectors of their young. Wow. Like, they will stay by their young for 10 to 14 days and starve themselves just to protect them. And so it seems almost ironic that he specifically did not like sunfish as well.
Starting point is 00:18:08 Wow, I didn't know that. I never heard that. Yeah, it's amazing. So in one of the court documents, it mentions that he, did he drink a goldfish or he He bit a goldfish in half, spit the halves into his beer. Did he drink the beer with the goldfish? Yeah, yeah. And he said he used to do that with his army buddies.
Starting point is 00:18:29 And he would just make you guys watch. Made me watch. This was at his house. You're saying that he will buy the goldfish in half? Yeah, he bit a goldfish in half and then swallowed it down with his beer. And you can make up whatever psychological reference you want. Again, it's to scare me. It's to show violence to me.
Starting point is 00:18:54 Like his demeanor during all of it is just... Dennis was a light switch. He could be one way, outgoing, friendly, gregarious, fun-loving. Instantly, eyes dilate, turn black, and he becomes a completely different person. What happens with the Polaroids? Yeah. Down at the lake again, I lived out of lake community, and there was a dam area, and the dam would separate the lake and then into the river. And that's where all us kids would hang out and play.
Starting point is 00:19:29 He did everything out of the watchful eye of my parents. When everything happened, you know, my mother said, I never even saw him with you. I'm like, everything happened down at the lake. And he was giving beer to us young boys, not just me, down there. So I'm like nine years. years old. You know, get a picture of a little nine-year-old. He invites me into his pickup truck down at the lake, and let's have a beer. So he gives me a beer. And I thought it was great. You know, like, here's a lieutenant. He's a lieutenant in the sheriff's department. And I'm getting to have a beer with him. I'm thinking, this is fantastic. And he says, one of my friends just bought a old farmhouse and there was a desk, old desk left behind. So I started going through the
Starting point is 00:20:19 drawers and it was filled with, uh, uh, porno pictures. You want to see some? And, you know, I'm like thinking like Playboy magazine type stuff. He, you know, reaches, he had cargo shorts. You know, cargo shorts had the big pockets on him. So he opens up his, his cargo shorts pockets and takes out a handful of Polaroid pictures and he just he's looking at him and he just starts giggling like a little schoolboy would giggle and he's like
Starting point is 00:20:51 oh these are a riot he's like here and it was a close-up of a young penis and he's like here's another one and here's another one and it was just penis after penis and he's slapping my knee in his truck laughing aren't he so funny aren't
Starting point is 00:21:10 these a riot? And I'm like, where's all the women, then? And he's like, oh, those must have been in the other drawer. Next time I go over to that house, I'll open up the other drawer for you. But look at these. Aren't these a riot? Aren't these so funny? And he's, and I'm just like, you know. So you think he took these polaroids? I mean, there was no friend. There was no farmhouse. No. He took these. Yes. Yeah. He always had. had large stories. And looking back now, I don't know if any, if one of them was true. I have no idea. He would invite you to his house and then he would try to feed you beers and...
Starting point is 00:21:54 What would happen a lot is the damn area where I lived, the river went right through stillwater to a bridge area, the Gristmill Bridge. There was an old Gristmill right at the bridge. and he would say down at the dam area the fish aren't biting that good let's go over you know towards the gristmill or there's twin bridges in another section of the river or he'd say let's go to the twin bridges and he would always mysteriously slip in the mud his foot would go into the mud or he'd slip and go into the river and get his boot wet and we'd have to go to his house so he could change his shoot sneaker or change his boots and that's how he would get me over there and then why we're there well let's have a beer while we're here so it would be just to get me comfortable going to his house and having a beer at his house were the houses like far apart or did people see that there's constantly boys going in and out of his house no he lived he lived up a long driveway and house sat alone up there so you can't see anything like if you were to scream people
Starting point is 00:23:08 can't hear it's pretty there was houses down below but his was a driveway that went up did a 90 degree turn to the house and it was the only house up there his house um i don't want to call it a cabin it was a two-bedroom uh one bathroom house and it sat up on a hill that overlooked the elementary school playground was he like looking there all the time was he outside i went to that elementary school Storder Elementary School. I was in Little League baseball, and he was at every game that I can recall. Down on the fence, there was a fence that would go around the ball field. He would be down there. He would come around the fence to the bench where we'd sit at and grab your shoulders. Oh, great job out there. Great job. Just always down at the playground with the young kids.
Starting point is 00:24:08 No one thought it was weird? Because he doesn't have kids of his own, right? Not married, no kids, but he's the lieutenant in the sheriff's department. He's the Boy Scout leader. The Boy Scouts did their meetings in the gym of the elementary school. So he's wrapped around everything in the town. He's on the Stillwater Historical Society board. The little old ladies loved him.
Starting point is 00:24:37 I mean, this goes on for years now. You know, the touching of the scar happened when I was six years old. It goes on to, like I said, inviting me into his truck down at the dam to have a beer with him. And this has to be our secret. And in my mind, I'm like, I don't want to. ruin this, so I'm not telling, I'm not going to tell my parents. I had a beer with the lieutenant from the sheriff's department. This is fantastic. You know, and he made you like his equal. You know, he put you on equal. He made you like feel special and it's us against
Starting point is 00:25:22 the world. Everything, he told me, I mean, I mean, one of the stories I recite is he was always taking trips out west. And on one of his trips, he said he met the Marlborough man. Now, if, If you grew up in the 70s, 80s, the Marlman was a fictional character, but on the back of every magazine with a Marlboro cigarette dangling in his mouth, and he was the coolest dude imaginable. Dennis took the coolest, machoist guy in America and told me he met him on a trip, and he was gay. He said, it didn't bother me in the least. He was such a great guy. We hung out for three days and had dinners and just, you know, just spent a lot of time together.
Starting point is 00:26:10 So, and again, he would say, this has to be our secret. Don't tell anybody the Marlboro Man's gay. He confided that in me, you know. I don't want his secret getting out. Did he ever meet the Marlboro Man, who played the Marlboro Man? Yeah. I have no idea. Probably not.
Starting point is 00:26:27 Was the Marlboro Man gay? Who knows? It's just, like I said, nothing is ever as it seems with a predator. And so what's he doing? He's taking the machoist guy in America, fictional character, but machoist, and making him gay and trying to gauge my response and trying to normalize it. Like, hey, that machoist guy in the world is gay, you know. and that's um again i i that's what i would surmise he was doing you know i can't get into his mind he tries to start wrestling with you that was kind of like the gateway and to yeah you know so he
Starting point is 00:27:17 he's taken years now you know of of porn pictures marlborough man beers slipping into the river go to the house beers you know so he's he's in invested years of grooming um and at some point you have to initiate more touch that's why i i see people tussle a young boy's hair and it just sends a chill down my spine because to the normal person it's like oh cute little billy you know but to a predator they need to initiate touch and that that little tussle of the hair is going to go to a pat on the knee is going to go to a pat on the thigh, is then going to go to a wrestling match. So he told me that he wrestled my older brother, Jay, and he wrestled my next-door neighbor, Jeff.
Starting point is 00:28:13 Jeff and Jay were inseparable. They were same age, same grade, in the scouts together. And he says to me, I wrestled Jeff and Jay. Let's see how tough you are. And I'm like, okay. And at first he would let me dominate, let's say, you know, get the upper hand on him. And then like I said, that light switch would go off. And his eyes would turn dark and black.
Starting point is 00:28:47 And he would pin me to the ground. And he would get his hulking 265 pound body on top of me and start gyrating and moving and grooving. And looking back on it at the time, not really realizing what he was doing, but he was erect. And this was getting him off. And you're 11. So you're tiny. I was 10 when that started happening, when the wrestling started. I mean, he's like three, four, five times your size.
Starting point is 00:29:24 Yeah, I mean, because of, I was a sick little kid when I was showing. Like, you know, I was in the hospital constantly with the flu and bronchitis and anything because of the hole in my heart. They would put me into the hospital immediately. I'd be in an oxygen tent. And, you know, so I was constantly in the hospital. And I had to be careful for a long while after surgery with playing. There was some limitations put on me by the doctors. you know so i was just a small little kid back then sick kid and uh and this guy just took
Starting point is 00:30:07 took advantage of that and and he could tell like i was insecure you know because my scar made me stand out and they look for something like to separate the week from the pack you know like any predator does and my scar was you know in my insecurities uh about it is how he separated me from the pack. And wrestling was the next avenue of physical touch. He's devoted four years now of stories and secrets, alcohol, pornography, and now it's time to get back to touch.
Starting point is 00:30:47 There's a part where in your book, your memoir, you talk about how he pinned you down and he says something along the lines of like, come on you can get out come on squirm do you feel like he is getting off on you struggling or yeah yeah it's exactly what he was doing you know he he would he would get me down you know like I would be in the dominating position on top of him and and then all of a sudden the light switch goes and he would get rough with me and like sort of throw me down my 10 year old body throw me down and get on top and be commanding me to try harder to get out, squirm more, move more,
Starting point is 00:31:36 you know, because he's wanting me to move against him and what he has going on. He comes over for Christmas. What does he get you as a Christmas present? I had a Boy Scout hunting knife, is what they were called. And he brought me a wet stone sharpening kit to sharpen the hunting knife. And over, over him drinking, you know, a glass or two of eggnog at our house, he taught me over the next hour, you know, keep the blade at, you know, an 18 degree angle, how to drive it, you know, across the stone, you know, with the oil you got to use. and then he would have me do it and taught me how to get a perfect blade on my hunting knife.
Starting point is 00:32:30 And that was something I kept perfectly sharp my whole life. The hunting knife? Yeah. What happens when you're 12 and what happens to Dennis's dog as well? I know that there was like a hunting ploy excuse use of like you're going to pretend to be shot in the woods because my buddy shoots everyone without thinking. So at 12, he concocted this whole big hunting ruse of having a friend who just shot
Starting point is 00:33:06 and aimed and shot without knowing if it was safe to shoot. And he said, you know, we've got to correct my friend from this bad habit. And I'm going to, I'm going to use you. you as a decoy out in the woods, you're going to be laying there with fake blood on you. And I'm going to take him out hunting, and he's going to do his, you know, typical shoot. And then we're going to come upon you lying there with fake blood. And you need to practice gurgling sounds like your gurgling blood, you know, your death rattle, he called it. You have to practice your death rattle. So he got me down at the lake one day, got me back to his house.
Starting point is 00:33:47 We're going to practice your death rattle at the house. And instead of offering me beer, he offered me Blackberry brandy, you know, a glass of Blackberry brandy with a beer. And he told me to chug it. And then he gave me another thing of brandy. And his house was, it was a summer day, but his house was like way hotter inside than outside. And in my adult. mind now looking back i'm like did he have his heat on did he like purposely turn his heat on in
Starting point is 00:34:23 his house to make it sweltering knowing what he had concocted like i say with a predator you never know what they're thinking so his house is boiling we're sweating he wants me to lay down on his bed to practice my breathing and it goes to it's so hot in here let's just take our our shirt and pants off our shorts off and then it goes to he's behind me has me in a bear hug and me and i'm screaming i'm crying and he had a dog um which is uh called the coon hound and coon hounds have this long drawn out howl they do and as i'm being i hear his dog howling away because of my cries and screams and it didn't stop this guy until he was done doing what he wanted to do with me and afterwards he sat me down at his kitchen table and got another beer like like almost like we were two lovers who
Starting point is 00:35:45 just had a romantic trist together. And he brought his dog over to me and said, I want to show you what will happen to you if you ever open your mouth about what just occurred. And he started to beat his dog and beat his dog. And I'm crying and screaming and begging him to please stop, to please stop. And he wouldn't until the dog lay in a heap at my feet. now I was just contacted just two days before this interview by a gentleman who when he was 17 years old needed a place to stay and he stayed at Dennis Pegg's house for six months and he said it was the most bizarre six months of his life. He said the guy was a complete freak. He said one thing that happened though is he got now when he was 17 he's 10 years older than me. I would have been seven back then
Starting point is 00:36:57 when he me would be five years later. So this dog would be five years old. And this guy said Dennis got this coon hound puppy when I lived with him and it peed on the rug and he beat the puppy so bad we had to take it to the vet to save its life so even as a puppy he beat it for simply doing what puppies do and peed on a rug and then this is the same dog five years later that he beat and probably killed in front of me you never saw the dog again no And a lady, a female guard who worked with him at the jail, told me how Dennis came in one day, all distraught that his beloved coon hound dog Duke died. And we all gave him hugs and tears. And we all loved dogs.
Starting point is 00:38:01 We were all dog people. and she goes, I am horrified to think that's because of what he did in front of you, that he killed Duke. It says in your book that you felt guilty over what happened to the dog. He only, I felt he only did that to Duke because of my cries and screams. And if I hadn't cried and screamed her in her, that uh what he did to duke wouldn't have happened do you still feel that way or
Starting point is 00:38:44 yeah i mean he might have had that plan well he couldn't determine if duke was going to cry or not like i said with a predator you never know um but yeah i still feel i still feel guilty for duke Do you feel like Duke had more humanity than Dennis in that moment? I feel Duke and I were the only two in that room who had humanity. And that's saying a lot since Duke's a dog.
Starting point is 00:39:23 Dennis, I feel, lost his humanity a long time ago. as soon as you as soon as you dedicate your life to hunting children and them you really can't say you have humanity that's pure evil to me if you're going to define what the devil is
Starting point is 00:39:46 the devil is really the guy with a smile on his face who's charismatic outgoing friendly charming who everybody loves who's involved in all these organizations, who's on the historical board, but who's only doing those things to fool people of his true nature. What changed after that day?
Starting point is 00:40:11 My life was forever altered after that day. My whole trajectory in life changed that day. Nothing would be the same. I would tell myself that talking about what just happened would be reliving it, and we were never going to do that, we could just bury this down deep inside and go about our life. I convinced myself that that's what I could do.
Starting point is 00:40:39 I led the most exhausting life because I would crank on a smile to the world, and inside I was completely broken and destroyed. And I went through that way my whole life until I couldn't keep it up any longer. How many years passed since you're 12, and then the day that you see Dennis Peg at Quick Check? I was 45 when I saw him at the Quick Check. So you're talking 33 years.
Starting point is 00:41:13 33 years, he's probably still hunting kids. Yes. And then there is a day that comes where you effectively hunt the hunter. you step into quick check what happens there it's like a gas station it's a convenience store yeah this one was just a convenience store they have gas stations now they're a lot larger but this was just a convenience store and a little like four store mall i'm getting a coffee i'm at the coffee island making a coffee the front door opens i think it had a bell on it so it made me look up and i look up and i look up and i look
Starting point is 00:41:54 into Dennis Pegg's eyes. He sees me, and he yells out to me, hey, how are you, buddy? And I instantly start going into a panic attack. I can tell just to by the way, he said, hey, buddy, you know, that he's going to come over to me. I had seen Dennis around our town over those 33 years you know I recall once in a bar after college me and my buddies were in a bar and as soon as we ordered a beer I get a pat on my shoulder and it's Dennis Pegg and I chugged my beer and I tell my buddies we're going there's no no shame no remorse no shame no guilt yeah the predators uh yeah they don't ever show that so so i had seen him around town but it had been probably 10 years since i saw him and what was different this time in that quick check which
Starting point is 00:43:03 completely unraveled me was that he had a young boy by his side probably close to the age he me at and that young boy called him the same nickname Dennis used to make me call him and I heard that nickname and I saw that young boy and I just it just ripped open everything for those 33 years that I told myself I could bury down and go about my life when he would touch me I would I would freeze I would stiff and like a board and I felt my muscles it's like a paralysis and I felt that coming on me and I felt it hard to breathe
Starting point is 00:43:49 and the thoughts in my mind just like your mind starts swirling where you can't even think and I'm like I got to get out of here before I completely freeze and this guy like grabs me and I just left my coffee and whatever stuff I had
Starting point is 00:44:09 on the island there and I ran out past him. We sort of shoulder bumped a little, and he's like, where are you going? Where are you going, buddy? Come here. And I ran out, and I hopped in my truck, and I sped out of the parking lot,
Starting point is 00:44:23 and I went down the road, and my life unraveled. Just completely unraveled. Do you think you saw yourself in the little boy? Is that, or you just felt protective of the little boy? I couldn't. get out of my mind over the next months that boy and wondering what part of the grooming process is he? Is he being shown Polaroid pictures? Is he having beers in his truck? Is he
Starting point is 00:44:57 at the wrestling stage? Is he teaching his buddy how to shoot right in the woods by lying there with blood on, fake blood on him and doing the death rattle in his bed? You know, it haunted me. I couldn't even work any longer. Like, I was in business with my brother. We had tire automotive center, and I walked out one day, and I just couldn't go to work anymore. I was having to drink before work just to go into work. You know, instead of filling my coffee mug with coffee, I was so out of sorts. I'm filling it with alcohol, and I'm doing other drugs, cocaine.
Starting point is 00:45:42 So I walked out of the business with my brother, and now I've got free time on my hand, which is never good when you have trauma. And I've got Dennis Pegg in the forefront of my mind. I've got that little boy in the forefront of my mind, and I had zero coping skills throughout my whole life. You know, like mindfulness, like all these foreign terms, I never incorporated it, you know. I just dove head first into drugs and alcohol, like literally around the clock. Just one drug on its own wasn't enough. So I'm just taking any drug I can get to try to numb myself,
Starting point is 00:46:27 to try to block the thoughts from. You start unraveling after quick check. But then there's a guy that you see smirking. Who is this guy? You see him smirking on TV. What happens? Yeah, I was in bad shape. I wasn't sleeping much because of all the pain I'm doing.
Starting point is 00:46:48 And I put on my TV, and it's Jerry Sandusky, the start of his molestation trial. Jerry Sandusky was one of the coaches at Penn State University. And he was running a football camp for young boys. And over the course of years, decade plus, molesting boys at his football. camp. He was finally facing trial for that. And his trial was starting on June 12th of 2012, and I saw him on the news, get out of his lawyer's car and smirking and buttoning his coat jacket. I don't know what I was to say. And I just started yelling cursing. And I just started yelling curses at my TV and spitting on my bedroom floor, because I saw Dennis Pegg as him.
Starting point is 00:47:48 I felt Dennis Pegg was never going to face justice. It's like a similar smirk that they have? Yeah, you know, they can never let their guard down. They'll never apologize to you. Like, victims always reach out to me and say, I want to go confront my abuser. I'm just like, don't. You're going to get re-abused because they'll never give you the answer you want to hear. It's not worth your time.
Starting point is 00:48:17 And so they keep that air about them. Dennis Peggin, that deli, like, calls out to me like, we're best friends. I'm a victim of his. Like, what do you do? And Sandusky's getting out, smirking as he's trial starting. And that just infuriated me. I spent the rest of the day out with a couple friends drinking and me sneaking drugs, you know. I got to go out and make a phone call, you know, in my truck, I'll be right back.
Starting point is 00:48:53 So, and I'd go out and do Coke and Papa Zanex. And I had someone, I stopped at an Italian restaurant on the way home that night. I was meeting a buddy at my house who I had lent money to. and he was going to power wash the cedar siding of my house and stain it as repayment. So I was meeting him at home, but I stopped at this Italian restaurant, and there was a guy in there who burned me on a business deal, a motorcycle deal. I took out a $33,000 loan to have him build me this custom motorcycle, and he took the money, my money and a couple other people's money, and closed up shop in the middle of the night,
Starting point is 00:49:36 Then left town and all of a sudden here he was in this Italian restaurant. So I went up to him and had words with him. And he was with his family. So I said out of respect for your family, you know, I'm not going to take this any further. But, you know, you got to pay me, you know. And he just told me to get lost, you know. So I get home and I tell my buddy about seeing that guy. and you know we unloaded the equipment first and we're having a glass of wine at the kitchen table
Starting point is 00:50:12 and my my buddy goes to me that guy's got to be number one on your hit list and it's been 33 years since I was you know and I've never told anyone and for whatever reason I couldn't stop the words coming out of my mouth I just said actually he's number two on my hit list The piece of garbage who made as a young boy is number one. And there it's out for the first time. The air was like heavy. Like time stopped. The clock stopped on the wall.
Starting point is 00:50:50 And we're just like you and I are sitting across from each other on a table and we're just staring at each other. And he's like, are you for real? Are you messing with me? So this is the first time in 30 years that you tell anyone? Yeah, yeah. To be exact, 33 years. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:51:10 You tell Bob, it just happens. You don't even decide. It's not like. Yeah, it was, it just came out before I could even like stop my mouth from speaking. You know, I was just so tired and exhausted and beaten down from drugs and seeing that other guy inflamed me at the Italian restaurant and just, it just came flying out. Who is the first to talk you or Bob? Bob's, as I recall, is the first to say, like, are you for real? You know, and I'm like, yeah, I'm for real.
Starting point is 00:51:45 And then he's like, who is he? I'm like, he was my Boy Scout leader. And like, where did it happen? When did it happen? You know, so I'm just saying, you know, and he's like, where does he live? And I'm like, you know, he lives like two miles from here. And I think at that point, I said to him, you know what, it's time to go confront this guy, you know, ever since seeing him with that boy and that quick check have just been haunted.
Starting point is 00:52:20 And I'm like, it's time to go confront him. Now, Dennis Pegg, he had retired from the sheriff's department, but he was still the firearms instructor. Everybody in law enforcement has to get recertified with their handgun every year. And he was the firearms instructor for two counties, Sussex and Morris. So every cop, every sheriff's officer, had to go to him to get recertified. So the guy was a complete gun nut. And I told Bob that. And I said, we ought to take something with us.
Starting point is 00:52:55 I gave Bob a steak knife. And I went under my bed to where I kept that Boy Scout hunting knife. he taught me how to sharpen and I grabbed that. Now, Stephanie, basically this was a suicide mission. You know, a steak knife, a hunting knife against a guy who had 33 guns in his house, shotguns, rifles, and over a dozen handguns. If you were doing what he was doing for 45 years, you would think he would have a gun at the ready under every table, on every armrest, on every couch cushion, you would think, like, my time,
Starting point is 00:53:38 you know, I'm rolling the dice here 45 years in. I better be ready. So it should have been a suicide mission when I went there. What did Bob say to you made that suggestion? I just handed him the knife, and I said, I'm going to go get my hunting knife. And that was pretty much it. It wasn't, you know, it wasn't like that long, drawn-out thing where we're crossing our T's and dotting our eyes, and this is how this is going to happen, and that's how that's going to happen. It was just like, I'm like, let me just go confront this piece of garbage, you know, and we'll take these with us. And it's a six-inch hunting knife, right? Yeah. Was that the biggest knife you had, or was it more so poetic justice because he was teaching you to sharpen that specific knife?
Starting point is 00:54:27 Or you had, like, no thoughts. You're like, let me just grab a knife. I would think it's a subconscious, uh, poetic justice, you know, like, take this with you, you know. So you have no plan, just a knife. You guys drive to Dennis's house. At what point are you like, maybe this is not a good plan? No, just, uh, like I said, he had a long driveway.
Starting point is 00:54:57 Yeah, it had a 90 degree turn in it. Bob pulled up there, and at the 90 degree turn, stopped, went up the driveway. His front door was open, and there he is sitting. Like, he had a storm door. It's a summer night, so storm doors shut. I mentioned earlier, you know, like the definition of a devil. Well, to me, it looked like the devil sitting in his lair. That's all I saw. But seeing him, this is the first time I'm back at that house in 33 years since what happened with me and the dog. I never went back to that house and I instantly started going to that panic attack again. Just breathing got real hard and I feel like rig-a-mortis in my muscles. And before I completely froze, I walked up to his door, that storm door and ripped it open, broke the hinge, and I'm standing in his doorway. It's 9.30, quarter to 10 at night, and there's somebody you ripped in your doorway, who just ripped open your door, and he casually looks over his shoulder at me and goes, hey, how are you? And it just seemed like the most incredulous thing to say in that moment.
Starting point is 00:56:25 But again, they can never let their guard down. Like a normal person would like get on their hands and knees and start praying like, oh my God, I wronged you. I'm so sorry. I know where you're here. Please forgive me. I'm sick. I need help.
Starting point is 00:56:45 Come in. Let's talk. No. No. Do you think if he did that, anything would be different? If someone's down on their hands and knees praying to you, praying at you, begging for forgiveness, I would think so. So he just says, hey. How are you?
Starting point is 00:57:13 What happens next? we all have two faces the face we show the world and the face behind closed doors i've been showing the world that one face and no one for 33 years has seen the face behind closed doors Dennis is now going to see my other face the face filled with rage the face filled with hate the face filled with anger and i said hey how am i let me show you how the hell i am and i raced across his room he stood up in a violent struggle started i started slashing at him with the knife he started punching me a violent bloody brawl ensued at one point he connected with a you know he's still this monster hulking guy and he connects with a
Starting point is 00:58:23 square shot to my jaw and as I'm falling down I grab his shirt to keep from falling down and I bring the knife down and that's when I'm holding his shirt and that's where it goes straight through and straight out and into his skin just a little we continue going at it and i mean we're talking minutes here it's not it's not like a long drawn-out thing you know maybe three four minutes two minutes three minutes i it was quick and uh he slips in the blood and he falls down and it's a mix of our blood you know like i'm gushing blood now and he's up against the wall I leaned down in front of him
Starting point is 00:59:13 I got eye to eye with him and I said it's not so fun little boys now is it Dennis and I slid his throat and Bob was standing in the doorway wide eyed and I said go get the van and bring it up
Starting point is 00:59:31 because I had one more thing I wanted to do I walked over to the bedroom he ripped me in and I spit on the bed. The answer to everyone's question is, did this solve everything? No, it didn't solve everything. You don't heal from trauma by adding more trauma. You don't heal from sexual abuse by murdering someone.
Starting point is 00:59:59 It's not how you heal. I stopped the predator from ever harming another young boy. 45 years was long enough of raping young boys. It should never have came to that. It would be uncovered that multiple boys over the years had come forward and filed lawsuits against him, and he got out from every one of them. But I did what I did, and I knew walking out of his house that night that my life was over. You can't have the wound I have and just show up at a hospital and be like, I was cutting a steak and drove a six-inch hunting knife through my hand and severed all ligaments and tendons. I need help. Did you think about doing that, though?
Starting point is 01:00:50 I just knew it wasn't an option. Like, you know, like, I just know, I just know things were never going to be the same again. So at no point during this altercation. And I know minutes are briefed. but at no point he doesn't apologize. No, there was just, the only words he said was, hey, how are you? And throughout the whole attack, he made like a high-pitched squeal. He never uttered a word, like, stop, let's talk, don't do this, nothing.
Starting point is 01:01:27 There was no words, just a high-pitched squeal. Like a wounded animal almost. Not one other word other than that initial thing when I was standing in his doorway. Did you feel like you're in control of your movements at that time? Or did you feel like you're watching from the outside in? Or you're just like on autopilot? What is that? Yeah, I definitely wasn't in control of my movements or any.
Starting point is 01:01:54 It was like something that had taken over my body. and uh man would i would i be honest if i said i had an out-of-body experience during that no i wouldn't be honest but it was like that it was like it was like looking at at this real going on and and just like that's how i when i look back at it like i just i can't believe what happened i can't believe that i got to that point of brokenness to go do that and potentially flush my whole life away just from never healing from trauma. It's keeping the secret and not addressing it and not trying to grow from it or heal from it or learn from it or do anything other than let it just poison my system for decades. And that's what it did. And that's the part that I look back on now.
Starting point is 01:02:56 And I just like, man, I probably would have died of a drug overdose and everybody would have been like, oh, my God, Clark, Clark had a great education and he was so popular. And what did he go die of a drug overdose from? I mean, that's where my life was headed. Are you saying? that even when you killed Dennis, you didn't even feel a moment of relief? No, there was no relief because of the wound I had, because of how gory and horrific killing someone was. Again, I don't view Dennis as having humanity, but you're still, it hurts your soul to kill
Starting point is 01:03:51 somebody. It's not therapeutic in any way. It's not healing. Like, it damages your psyche. It damages your soul. It hurts. And I had to be completely broken to go do that. Do you have nightmares about it or you never think about it?
Starting point is 01:04:15 No, no, I don't give him. Again, if I killed an innocent person, that would haunt me. If I killed a human, that would haunt me. I don't view Dennis as an innocent person or a human. Why did you walk to the bedroom? That was to go spit on the bed he ripped me in. At what point were you like, I'm going to spit on his bed?
Starting point is 01:04:43 Was it just like... I don't know what came over me. Like, you know, again, it's not like Bob and I sat at the kitchen table, like across from each other like you and I are. And I said, yeah, after I do this, this, this and this. Then in my bloody footprints, I'm going to walk to the bed, he spit me on and spit on the bed. So, like, I don't know what possessed me to go do that. It's something to just bring things full circle and to a closure. I needed to do that.
Starting point is 01:05:10 Did it bring closure? I thought it brought complete closure to my life and his. There was two deaths that day. The life I had been living up to that point, I could never. go back to living the way I was. And I literally thought, I forfeit the rest of my life. I'll either kill myself or spend the rest of my life in prison. I forfeited any healthy, happy life to just put an end to his reign of terror. That's what I thought. It's interesting because like when I'm reading your memoir and going through that moment, because I mean, the way that it's written, I feel
Starting point is 01:05:52 like, I'm there. I'm obviously not experiencing, like, the depth of emotions, but it feels very, I'm there with you. It almost feels therapeutic when you spin on his bed. And it's, like, kind of interesting, because I know you don't advocate for people to do and follow in those steps, but it just, I guess it was relief for the reader. There's some sort of poetic justice in doing that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think if everybody and it's a lot of everybody's. If they could spit on the bed they were ripped in, they would
Starting point is 01:06:28 want to do it. Yeah. You have a hole in your hand. You drive home and you say you need to tell your mom. What is the thinking behind that? You're telling your mom because you don't know what's going to happen next? Yeah, my mom had just come up from Florida. Welcome home, mom. Oh, man. And
Starting point is 01:06:47 I called my best friend at the time, and the girl I was dating and asked them to come over because I just my life's over stuff you know like I am I am I going to kill myself after this or am I going to spend life in prison it's it's one of those two things so let me say goodbye to my buddy let me say goodbye to my girlfriend and let me get my mother up and say goodbye to her because this isn't going to turn out good And your mom is, she's 80, how old was she at the time? Yeah, like 81 maybe.
Starting point is 01:07:34 And so your plan is I'm going to wake my mom up, tell her goodbye. But your mom's plan is I'm going to clean up the blood and we're going to run. We're going to get away with murder together. Mom's like, we're getting away with murder. She was, oh, man, I guess it's good to laugh about it now, right? So she wakes up and you tell her what happened. You still don't tell her. The thing is, I couldn't even tell her then that I was by Dennis.
Starting point is 01:08:08 I still couldn't, I couldn't bring it out. And she was like dumbfounded. Why would you go do this? Why? and I said to avenge a lot of other kids in this town. And she goes, still, why are you? Why are you the Avenger? Why? I don't get it. Why?
Starting point is 01:08:28 And I couldn't tell her like, for what, you know, for me too, Mom. I just, I still couldn't say it. Even though I told it to my buddy earlier. She, uh, helped me upstairs. I, I wrapped my hand in duct tape, which fixes everything. So I wrapped it with paper towel and duct tape and went to, took a couple Xanax and went to bed. And my mother went downstairs and started scrubbing the floors all night long to get the blood up. And so she's like, we're going on the run, but you wake up and the cops are surrounding.
Starting point is 01:09:10 Yeah, yeah. Yeah, she told my sister that she was going to take me and we were going to go on to run. I know. It says in the book, you guys are thinking the end of the world, which is Florida. Right. Because we're going to go to Florida. No, I like the plan. I think your mom is really adorable. I mean, there is, I was just so fascinated by your mother because, you know, she's cleaning up the blood.
Starting point is 01:09:38 She's ready to go, Bonnie and Clyde with you. And then the cops come the next morning. They've got on the loudspeakers. they're saying Clark come out, and she's like, no, the neighbors are going to hear. Your mom is so fascinating. She said to one of the troopers, as I was still in my bedroom, what are the neighbors going to think? He's like, ma'am, I really don't give a damn what the neighbors think. Oh, my gosh.
Starting point is 01:10:07 Okay, so you see the cops outside. So they took her out. Like, they took her out of the house. And they're, like, you look at the window and they're just, like, trying to be sneaking. trying to Yeah, they're, like I said, they're behind they're hiding behind trees. You know, they don't know what's inside. What I have? If I'm loaded up with
Starting point is 01:10:25 AR-15 or what my mental state is, you know, they've got a dead body. So they're, they're, every one of them has their gun drawn. Everyone's taking, you know, some sort of protection. There's this big rock to the left of the yard and there's trees and there's the shed out back and uh they're they're just all behind everything and then they're behind their their cars lining the street and uh and i just couldn't
Starting point is 01:11:01 believe it i was lying in bed like how are we going to get out of this like how are we going to get out of this and like there's got to be there's got to be a way out of this and before and possibly think of any way out of this, the cops are there. And your stomach just drops. And you're just like, it's over, bro. It's, it's over. And all I could think, you know, they ordered me out of the house over a bullhorn. And as I walked to that front door, I just called out to God, let one of these guys kill me when I step out. Like, like, it's over. It's over, God. Like, I don't want to do life in prison. Just take me now.
Starting point is 01:11:50 And, uh, let him shoot me when I walk out. And I stepped out that front door with my state police shirt on that I put on. And, uh, and I put my arms out to the side. And I just sort of tilted my head back. And I just waited for the crack of a gun. And it never came. And instead, I was ordered off my porch down to her front lawn. spread eagle, handcuffed, and taken away.
Starting point is 01:12:21 Were you disappointed when you didn't hear a shot go off? Yeah, yeah. Because in that ride to the police barracks was like the longest ride of my life. And I'm just like, man, one of these guys couldn't kill me, put me out of my misery. Like, I'll have to find a way in prison to do it. I'll have to take care of this myself. You killed a cop. You're arrested by a bunch of cops.
Starting point is 01:12:55 You're about to go to the jail that that cop worked at. Things are not looking good. Oh, boy. Understatement of the year. Yeah. But there are some cops, some detectives who seem to, they give you some sage advice in that weird moment. What happens there?
Starting point is 01:13:18 Like, what was the energy? Like, or all the arresting officers, do you feel like hatred dripping off of them because you killed a cop? Or do you not even notice what their energy is? What is that dynamic? Well, I'm thinking, like, I'm public enemy number one amongst law enforcement.
Starting point is 01:13:34 I just killed one of their own. And yet, at the state police barracks, this lieutenant, Howie Ryan, comes in and goes, I have to apologize. to you. And I'm like, I'm like, what are you apologizing to me for? And he's like, I've heard rumors about Dennis Pegg for a long time. And he goes, I want to apologize to you for never stopping him. He goes, I can't arrest somebody on rumors. I need victims. I need cold hard facts. And I had neither of those. And I apologize to you. And at first step, I felt, and then he left
Starting point is 01:14:12 the room and I felt wow that's that's pretty cool and then I'm like to start fuming I'm like even the state police knew everybody knew about Dennis Peck and young boys everybody's got a story the state police just admitted they knew and yet I'm the one who just had to flush his life away and look at life in prison to stop them like and they knew and then so I went from feeling good for a second, getting really pissed off for another second, and then I'm like, what's it matter anyway? I'm done. I'm done. When that cop, Howie Ryan, came back in the room, he could see that I had like mailed it in. He said, I just, I could tell you were, you were done. And he goes, something moved in me that even though you thought you were done, I didn't think you were done.
Starting point is 01:15:12 And he said, look, I've got your DNA all over that crime scene. He was in charge of the CSI team that worked Peg's house. He's like, your blood's everywhere. He goes, this isn't a whodunit. He goes, but that doesn't necessarily mean your life's over. My detectives and detectives from the prosecutor's office are in another room waiting to interrogate you. He goes, if you go in that room and open up your mouth, you could potentially destroy the of your life. He goes, I'm telling you right now, go in there, exercise your Fifth Amendment
Starting point is 01:15:50 right, request a lawyer, and stay, keep your mouth shut, stay quiet. And I said to him, but I don't have a lawyer. And he goes, I'm going to take care of that for you. He goes, I'm going to get you a lawyer. And he left the room, and on his cell phone, he called one of the big lawyers in our county and said, I need you to send over, fax over to the state police barracks, a retainer for somebody, like, immediately. And the lawyer said, who is he? And what did he do? And he goes, Clark Frederick's murder. And he goes, okay then. And had a thing over in a couple minutes. So he tells you not to talk. Do you listen to him?
Starting point is 01:16:39 I do. right when you get arrested, it seems like the whole town is divided. A lot of people feel like you did this for very nefarious reasons. Other people start hearing what Dennis has been doing around town. Do you feel like at any point where they're just dividing opinions was, did it feel like everybody had their own thought about what the reason, the motive was? Yeah, there was some vocal people on his side who were pro-den. who just, like, referred to me as a drunk drug addict who just killed a great man, you know,
Starting point is 01:17:18 like, like, yeah, I just woke up one day and said, Dennis Pegg, I'm going to go kill you for no reason. Before it, like, really started coming out about what happened, you know, because, yeah, there were the little old ladies on the historical society that worked with him were like, he was such a sweet man. And, you know, the mayor in store at the time was like, oh, he was a giant of a human being, you know. And then people like Howie Ryan are like, no, I knew all about rumors about this guy. Your audience is going to have to get the book because there's a line from Howie Ryan in the book to the prosecutor. It's one of the greatest lines you will ever hear. I don't want to give it away. it's such a
Starting point is 01:18:08 it's the most powerful line you will ever read said by him we will put the page number so you guys can go get it and I will tell you what page piece I know exactly what I'm talking about I know exactly what I was a powerful line right? No that was unbelievable
Starting point is 01:18:25 line yeah at that point once you've been arrested you're facing first degree murder charge initially so you're facing life in prison life in prison and you haven't attorney and they're saying have a little hope but not too much hope yeah you know I and it's funny that the the lawyer Howie Ryan at the barracks called George Daggett who sent the retainer
Starting point is 01:18:51 over I never even interviewed him at the jail as one of my lawyers and I don't know why but I interviewed a bunch of other lawyers and you know one lawyer just wanted to get me bailed out We'll get you bailed out of here in three days. Like, and I'm like, all right. And then this other lawyer came in all flashy with his, you know, gold jewelry, Rolex watch. And he's listing all these cases he's worked. And I knew the cases. And he lost them all.
Starting point is 01:19:23 And in my head, I'm like, but you lost all those. You know, like, and then this guy, Dan Perez came in. He was, he just looked like a really good guy, you know, like really down. to Earth, and he came in, and he said, I think we can have a valid defense for this. I was like, really? He goes, yeah, yeah, yeah. He goes, you know, it's not going to be easy, but I don't think your life is over. I was like, really?
Starting point is 01:19:50 I'm like, you're hired. What was that? During that time, Dennis had a security deposit box that the police go through. Yeah. And they find a bunch of letters. Right. That he wrote 10 years before he died. Correct.
Starting point is 01:20:10 And when he was in his young to mid-50s, healthy. They all have some variation of pray for me. I hope I didn't disappoint you. Forgive me for any failings. Do you think some of these letters are to victims? Yeah. Yeah. And like, they're creepy.
Starting point is 01:20:33 There's something really creepy. about him. Like, and the prosecutor told me after the fact that he thinks there was 14 of them in there, that 13 were probably victims. Would you ever think, like, right now to, like, write letters to people in case you die? No. He was 50-something years old.
Starting point is 01:20:58 Like, like, what would make you do that? And he does keep writing, interestingly, like, If I go to heaven, pray for me. But if you're already dead, I don't know. What exactly he's asking for in prayer? Yeah. Is it to get to heaven? It's weird.
Starting point is 01:21:17 Yeah. It was, uh, I read those and it just like left me feeling yucky. Yeah. Because, and then if you assume that they're to victims, like, I tried my best. I thought we were family. Forgive me for shortcomings. What are your shortcomings? How many victims do you think that he had? My buddy's wife is the sheriff's secretary, and she sat in on every meeting with the sheriff in the early days, and they estimate well over 100. one of the other victims is very close to you family relation who was that my brother
Starting point is 01:22:09 my arrest opened up my brother's pandora's box you know like seeing seeing that boy in that deli opened my box up my arrest opened my brother's box up and my brother wasn't ready to face it he wasn't ready to handle it didn't want to deal with it you know like like I told myself at 12, we're just going to bury this and go about our life. Well, that's what my brother had done his whole life. And everyone urged him to get help, to see a therapist. And my brother did what I did was to numb himself. And I found him dead on our kitchen floor a couple years ago.
Starting point is 01:22:58 from drinking himself to death. This is going to be a two-part interview. This is part one. In part two, we're going to ask Clark about how and why the FBI came to him to warn him that someone put a hit out on his life. He has, I mean, there's his entire journey, or I guess more so fight in prison, trying to get through it while he's surrounded by criminals
Starting point is 01:23:22 who are accused of doing the very thing that Dennis Pegg did, which is harmed children. there are letters that Dennis Pegg left his presumed victims in his safety deposit box and how someone very close to Clark is killed by Dennis Pegg after Clark gets out of prison. Like, how does that even happen? We're going to go through all of that in part two. Also, how the hell does Clark get out of prison when he's facing a first-degree murder charge and life in prison?
Starting point is 01:23:48 That will all be asked in part two. But in the meantime, if you feel like you can't wait for those answers, which same, you can get Clark's memoir. It's probably the most intense memoir that I've ever read, and I've read copious amounts of memoirs before. There are just so many aspects of his story that aren't included in our episodes that you can find in depth in his book. I think I finished the whole book the first time around in like four hours. It was one of my quickest reads. There's something about it where I don't know how Clark does this, but every time you catch yourself feeling like, okay, there's a black hole that we've now went into there's no way out of it you get out and then there's
Starting point is 01:24:28 just like another black hole and it is like the most intense emotional journey that i have ever been on you can also find clark on his social media accounts and his own podcast which i will link below but with that being said that is part one of the two-part series of the story of clark fedricks and i will see you in part two You know,

There aren't comments yet for this episode. Click on any sentence in the transcript to leave a comment.