Scamfluencers - Mark Hofmann: The Mormon Murderer | 182

Episode Date: October 13, 2025

Mark Hofmann, a lifelong Mormon, skyrockets to local fame by uncovering “historical” documents that challenge core LDS Church narratives. He sells the documents to the church, claiming he’s protecting it from scandal—but the truth is much darker. The documents are forgeries, and Mark is a closet atheist and master con artist. And when his double life is about to be exposed, he takes drastic measures to protect his secrets.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Hey, scam influencers fans, Sachi here. If you live for the outrageous stories and unbelievable cons that we cover, you need Wendry Plus. It's like sitting in the room with us as we unravel every twist, ad-free a week ahead of everyone else, and packed with exclusive content you won't hear anywhere else. Start your free trial in the Wendry app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify now. A heads up to our listeners, this story includes a brief mention of suicide. Please listen with care. Sarah, have you been watching all the Mormons in our pop culture lately?

Like, I'm sure you're watching Real Housewives of Salt Lake City and the Secret Lives of Mormon Wives, right? Well, of course, Salt Lake City, I mean, Jen Shaw. And yes, I definitely am very fascinated by this rise of Mormonism in pop culture. I am watching all of it, and I think what I love the most is how they're always fighting while holding, like, a 90-ounce cup of soda. They drink so much. Much soda in the secret lives of Mormon wives, because they have that thing swig, that I'm like, are they just constantly, like, burping and gassy and like...

I think they're just vibrating. It's just, it must be crazy, right? Well, I asked because I'm about to tell you about another story that made headlines all over the world about the Mormon church. When one of its members made his crisis of faith, everyone else's problem. On January 6th, 1984, days before his 30th birthday, Steve Christensen is about to buy himself a big present. Steve lives in a suburb of Salt Lake City. He's got a broad frame and thick, dark brown hair that hangs over his forehead. He's a financial consultant, a father of three,

and a Mormon bishop who collects documents and rare books related to the church. And today, he's about to buy one of the rarest, most important church documents in the world. The document is known as the salamander letter. It was supposedly written by an early member of the church, and it totally upends the church's origin story. According to Mormon doctrine, the angel Maroni led the prophet Joseph Smith to a box of golden plates engraved with a new book of the Bible,

the book of Mormon. But this letter tells a different story. It claims it wasn't an angel at all. It was a white salamander. Mormonism, or the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, has long pushed to be recognized as a legitimate branch of Christianity. But practically since the church's founding, critics have accused Joseph Smith of practicing pagan folk magic. In Smith's time, salamanders were considered creatures with magical powers.

So, if he was guided by a salamander instead of an angel, it would be a huge revelation, one that would fuel critics and undercut the church's ties to mainstream Christianity. Sarah, can you read this quote from a Mormon history expert explaining the significance of the find? Yes. The expert says, it's as if someone came up with a document in which Moses said, I got the Ten Commandments from the Ghost of Elvis Presley. You know, when you put it that way, it's kind of like, God can do anything. Why not? You know? Yeah, the document almost strains belief. But Steve has good reason to think it's real. It was discovered by famed rare document collector Mark Hoffman. Mark has been a major figure in the

Mormon history world over the last few years, ever since he discovered a seminal religious text written by the founder of the LDS Church. He's seen as a kind of Indiana Jones, but for Mormon stuff. Mark offered to sell the Salamander letter to the church, but its contents are so explosive, the church doesn't want to be seen as having anything to do with it.

That's where Steve comes in. Steve has done well for himself. He's almost a millionaire, and he deals in rare books and documents often. His personal library is nearly 13,000 volumes, so church officials asked if he would buy the salamander letter and donate it to the church. This way, the church can own the document

without officially acquiring it or appearing to endorse what it says. Steve agrees right away, with one condition. Mark can't tell anyone about the letter's contents. Mark agrees, and Steve buys it for $40,000 or more than $125,000 today. But what Steve doesn't know is that Mark is less salamander and more snake. Because the letter is a fake. Mark forged it in his basement.

And now, Steve is caught up in Mark's elaborate forgery scheme. And as their business relationship deepens, he's about to get pulled into another con, a Ponzi scheme. When the truth about Mark starts to come out, it'll lead to betrayal, broken faith, and eventually deadly violence. Grab a coffee and discover Vegas-level excitement with BetMGM Casino. Now introducing our hottest exclusive, Friends, the one with the Multi-Drop. Your favorite classic television show is being reimagined into your new favorite casino game, featuring iconic images from the show. Spin our new exclusive because we are not on a break.

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If you have questions or concerns about your gambling or someone close to you, please contact Connects Ontario at 1-866-531-2,600, to speak to an advisor free of charge. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with Eye Gaming, Ontario. It's your man, Nick Cannon, I'm here to bring you my new podcast, Nick Cannon at night. Every week, I'm bringing out some of my celebrity friends and the best experts in the business to answer your most intimate relationship questions. So don't be shy. Join the conversation and head over to YouTube to watch Nick Cannon at night

or subscribe on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcast. From Wondry, I'm Sachi Cole. And I'm Sarah Haggy. And this is scamplencers. Come and give me your attention. I won't ever learn my lesson to my speaker to a love and I feel like a legend. Mark Hoffman was born into the Mormon Church and became a local celebrity in Utah for uncovering historical documents about the church's early days.

He sold some of these potentially scandalous documents back to the church, framing it as a way to protect the faith from damaging revelations. On the surface, he appeared to be a Latter-day Saint's success story, a devoted family man with close ties to church leadership. But underneath, Mark was something else entirely. A closet atheist with a knack for forgery. He faked dozens of documents that cast out on the very origins of Mormonism, breaking in millions of dollars that funded his decidedly non-Mormon double life

of debauchery and indulgence. But when his scheme starts to unravel, Mark will protect his lives in the most of his own. drastic and deadly way possible. This is Mark Hoffman, the Mormon murderer. By the time Mark is born in 1954, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is growing rapidly, and the church has been making a lot of changes

in an effort to go more mainstream. Mark's parents are super devout and stellar examples of the new Mormonism. But by the late 60s, teenage Mark has a crisis of faith. He learns that his mother was a product of a polygamous marriage that took place after the church banned the practice. His grandfather got permission to take a second wife

because his first wife couldn't have children. Some of Mark's relatives dispute how much of a secret this was inside the family. But young Mark sees it as a symbol of the church's hypocrisy. Mark confronts his father, who tells him he just needs to have faith in the church's teachings. But Mark has also been reading about Charles Darwin's theory of evolution. And by the time he's 14, he identifies as an atheist, though nobody in his family knows. I figured that would be kind of something you can't talk about in a very religious family, especially back then.

Of course, no one would know he's an atheist, right? Yeah. I also feel like being a teenager and having an atheist phase is just part of it. Yes, big time. Yeah. And another thing that Mark gets into in his teen years is magic. Other hobbies include chemistry, electronics, and stamp and coin collecting. When he's around 15, he learns a skill called electroplating,

which is basically using electric current to add fake markings to metal. With the right tools, things like alligator clips, a battery, and a container of acid, he can add markings that make ordinary coins look rare and valuable. Mark takes one of these forged coins to a dealer who says it's worth thousands of dollars if it's real. The dealer is skeptical. He doesn't believe a teenager could possibly have such an expensive item. But when the dealer asks the U.S. Treasury to authenticate it, they confirm the coin is genuine.

Mark is elated and validated. Sarah, can you read what he says about this years later? He writes, My rationalization was that if the Treasury Department pronounces it genuine, that it is genuine by definition. I mean, yeah, sure, if you're lying to someone and they believe it, Does that make the lie true? I don't really know.

Yeah, well, Mark has managed to create his own reality and he's gotten others to believe in it. Or at least that's the story he tells about it. We don't know what's actually true. But it's clear that Mark gets a thrill out of this sort of manipulation. Later, in a letter to his sentencing board, Mark writes, As far back as I can remember, I have liked to impress people through my deception.

In fact, some of my earliest memories are of doing magic and car tricks. Fooling people gave me a sense of power and superiority. Forging old coins is only the beginning. Soon, Mark won't just be tricking collectors. He'll be rewriting history itself. It's 1974, and Mark is walking the streets of Bristol, England, spreading the good news about the Book of Mormon. He's 19 years old and on an overseas mission, a traditional rite of passage for young Mormon men. Mark is still an atheist, but his family doesn't know that, and he doesn't want to disappoint them. So he's still going along with their expectations and those of his community. Mark's faith doesn't grow during his mission,

but his interest in the history of the church does. It was common practice for missionaries to hunt for anti-Mormon materials and remove them, sometimes replacing them with the Book of Mormon. But when Mark looks around libraries and rare bookstores in the UK, he's amazed by what he finds. Mormon missionaries arrived in northern England shortly after the church was founded and left artifacts behind with information about its early history. Mark finds documents that contradict Mormon teachings,

like a critical biography of Joseph Smith. He starts seeking out more documents that question the church's narratives and stashes them in a box under his bed. Mark returns from his mission in 1976. At this point, his family expects big things from him. They even dream that one day, he could join the small, elite circle of men

who basically run the church's affairs. Mark enrolls at Utah State University as a pre-med student. Shortly afterward, he meets a popular, stylish classmate named Judy. They quickly get serious, and, less than a year later, Mark proposes. Once Judy accepts, Mark starts sharing his real feelings about the church with her. Judy later tells investigators that Mark confessed he was an atheist and said he wanted all Mormons to know that they are being misled. that there's no God.

Mark is devastated when Judy says that she doesn't agree. She returns the ring, saying she knows the marriage wouldn't last. Mark continues to struggle with his lack of faith, and over Easter weekend in 1979, he gets into an argument with his mom. He criticizes the church for burying historical documents that could be embarrassing. His mom disagrees. If there are documents that could shake someone's faith, she doesn't think they should be made public.

In response, Mark writes an essay, in the form of a letter to his mom. Can you read how he ends the essay? Yes, he writes, Why should I be inquisitive and doubting at the university and not at church? The individual's conscience and the weight of authority or public opinion

are thus pitted against each other so that the individual either denies them to himself at the expense of personal honesty or hides them from others and lives in two worlds. To me, what he's saying is that he's in university and he's taught to be thinking critically about the world, but then there's this other world of the church where you're expected to just accept what you're told. And I do understand that, and I think it is a very common

crisis of faith for younger people or people who are kind of entering the real world when they grew up very religious. Yeah, it feels right on schedule. And Mark wrestles with admitting that he's an atheist, disappointing his parents and effectively blowing up his life, or trying to live in two worlds. Just a few months later, he makes his choice. Mark marries a devout Mormon woman named Dora Lee Olds. Dora Lee, who goes by Dory, is a home economics student with dark blonde hair who just turned 22.

Mark's parents love her. To them, she's the perfect wife for a man on track to become a leader in the church. And Mark has learned from his mistakes. He never tells Dory about his real beliefs. Dory quits school to pay their bills and have children while Mark keeps studying. After all, he'll need a good job to support a big Mormon family.

But secretly, Mark has another plan, and it's not becoming a doctor. Mark starts forging old Mormon money. He figures out the right ink recipes and learns how to oxidize and age the paper bills so they look authentic. It's the natural evolution of his teenage coin scam. About a year later, he's ready to pivot to a new con, fabricating documents. Mark's about to go all in on forgery

and make good on his dream of shaking the faith of the church itself. It's late at night, and Mark is holed up in a room he keeps story locked out of. He's hard at work forging documents. It turns out that Mark's childhood love of chemistry was perfect preparation for his con. Mark mixes his own ink from old recipes he finds in the library

and uses heat and chemicals to spend beat up natural oxidation processes. He makes an old-fashioned quill pen using a turkey feather and a razor blade. And he runs a vacuum cleaner over his documents, transferring the ink to the underside of the page, making it look like it's settled there over hundreds of years. I'm kind of tickled by this because I feel like in our stories, there are so many episodes where we deal with people who are trying to make something look old, like a document look old.

and they usually just literally do the tea bags and paper things that you do when you're a child. It's the same thing we were doing when we were making old maps. This is a little bit more sophisticated. They're usually not thinking about the natural oxidation process. Yeah, a new strategy for sure. A few months after his wedding, Mark makes his first major play by forging a document called the Anthon transcript.

It's a copy Joseph Smith supposedly made of the original hieroglyphics found in the Book of Mormon. According to church lore, the copy was shown to a Columbia Classics professor named Charles Anthon back in the 1820s, and it's been lost for over a century until now. We actually have a picture of the document mark fabricated. Sarah, can you describe it? Yes. So this is a black and white, I guess, like photocopy or image of it.

And it looks ancient for sure. The text, I don't know how to even describe it, but it looks like... It's hieroglyphics. Yeah, it looks like Mormon. hieroglyphs. If I saw this, I would think like someone going through something is writing secret messages from

a paranoid delusion. Yeah. But if someone told me it was ancient, I'd be like, sure, I've never seen anything like this and it looks old as hell. It's a believable forgery. And once the document is done, Mark uses a sticky black gum to place it inside the pages of an

old King James Bible. Then he meets with a curator of rare documents at Utah State University. The curator offers him $5,000, which tells Mark that this forgery is good enough to make him some real money. Mark takes his fake anthony transcript to the church's historical department, so an in-house handwriting expert can analyze it. Three days later, he receives good news. They've concluded that the document is real. Mark is brought to the office of the three highest leaders of the church to tell them what he found.

They understand the significance. These hieroglyphs are supposedly the actual markings on the goal. gold plates Joseph Smith discovered. If they can be translated by modern scholars, it would prove the validity of the Mormon church's origin story for good. Six days later, the church makes a formal announcement that the anthem transcript has been found. Overnight, Mark becomes a Mormon celebrity.

Here he is in a TV interview talking about his big find. It appears to be the earliest Mormon document and the earliest Joseph Smith hologram. Also, I think it's exciting just to think that apparently this piece of paper was copied by Joseph Smith's own hand. I mean, this is all happening really fast. I would think it would take a lot longer and a lot more verification for this to become a new story in the center of their religious world.

Like Utah is the center of Mormonism, and it was that easy? I'm a bit shocked by that. I feel like there's a level of almost like wishful thinking happening here where they're foregoing, really looking into how valid this is and going about this very quickly and making announcements really quickly because they kind of want it to be true almost. Yeah, they're too excited to properly vet this.

The church rewards him with a first edition copy of the Book of Mormon and several rare coins. Mark tells his parents he's abandoning medical school. He wants to make a career out of dealing in rare documents. Mark can hardly believe how quickly his life has changed. Or maybe he can. After all, the anthony transcript is actually his handiwork. Mark found a way to fake old documents so believably,

even actual professional historians can't tell. And because he made the audacious choice to forge one of the church's most high-profile documents, he's gained their trust. Now, he can focus on his two favorite things, deceiving people and undermining the origin story of the Church of Latter-day Saints. Throughout the early 80s,

Mark becomes a big name amongst Mormon history buffs. These are professionals and amateurs, believers and skeptics who meet up in local bookstores to discuss their shared interest in church history. They call themselves the Mormon underground.

Two of these enthusiasts are Gerald and Sandra Tanner, Utah historians in their early 50s who both come from prominent Mormon families. Sandra is, is literally descended from Brigham Young, but by this point, they both left the church. They now run a Mormon skeptical bookstore

out of the foyer of their house in Salt Lake City. Gerald and Sandra have watched with amazement as Mark found document after document, including ones that actually undermine church doctrine. One even suggests that church leadership should have passed to Joseph Smith's son rather than the church's recognized successor, Brigham Young. Gerald and Sandra have no reason to question Mark's string

of incredible discoveries. He claims to be the world's only full-time collector of Mormon documents, which means he can spend long hours going through public records, perusing rare bookstores, and even going door-to-door in rural Utah to hunt down his finds.

Sure, he's cagey about his sources, but that's not unusual in the world of rare documents. And Gerald, Sandra, and the rest of the Mormon Underground want to believe that all of his finds are real. I feel like this is such a common theme, when someone has fake documents or created like a fake source of history changing information.

Like we saw it with the guy in the Hitler Diaries where there are these people who should know better because it dedicate their lives to facts and figuring out what is real, what isn't. But they always shut their brains off when they want something to be real so badly. It's so interesting to see people shut themselves off just to think something's real, which is kind of what he hates about religion. Yeah, it's true. Mark is, at his core, a huge hypocrite.

And in November of 1983, Gerald and Sandra hear about the white salamander letter, the document we mentioned at the beginning of the episode, which claims that a white salamander led Joseph Smith to the golden plates. At first, they're really excited. Earlier that year, they published a book supporting the longstanding theory that Joseph Smith and his family were into folk magic and the occult. So the white salamander letter should be huge for them. But as Gerald digs into the letter, he can't shake the feeling that something is off.

First, he notices that the salamander letter is suspiciously similar to other early Mormon documents. And it doesn't really sound like the guy who supposedly wrote it. So he starts to wonder. What if Mark has been forging documents to try to shape the narrative of Latter-day Saints history? I mean, yeah, you're on to something. He kind of is. I'm glad that someone is opening their eyes at least a little bit. Yeah, huge relief. In August of 1984, Gerald publishes a pamphlet that questions the salamander letter

and all of Mark's finds. Sandra isn't totally convinced, but she wants to support her husband. So she joins him at a Mormon theological symposium, where they distribute the pamphlet. And at least one of the other attendees is pretty unhappy to see them, Mark. The next day, Mark shows up at their husband. house. Sandra's home, so she sits down with him, and he's upset. Mark says he can't share the source of the salamander letter because he's already sold it to Steve and promised to keep it a

secret. He tells Sandra he can understand doubt from the church, but not from critics like them. Sandra later says that Mark gets so worked up, he's almost in tears. I could see how this performance would work. Mark probably is genuinely emotional, just not for the reasons they think, because he really wants him to believe this because, again, he's trying to undermine the church. But I think this is one of those things where, like, their instincts should take over what they see in front of them. I think if you do have doubts about something like this, it's worth exploring until the end, right?

Yeah, I think so. Mark's frustration actually makes Sandra more convinced that the letter is real, but Gerald stands firm. And he does manage to draw some attention to his concern. His pamphlet gets press coverage in the Los Angeles Times, as well as an influential Utah paper called The Desire News. But people close ranks around Mark, defending the authenticity of his documents.

A couple of months later, church elders warn that Mormons should stay away from doing historical research that could threaten people's faith, essentially validating the letter. And a couple of months after that, physical testing also seems to confirm that the letter is real. Gerald should be relieved, thrilled even. But he can't let go of his doubts.

And soon enough, he'll be glad that they only got one visit from Mark Hoffman. A great meal starts with a great egg. Whether it's breakfast with the family, lunch with friends, or a late-night bite. Make it better with Conestoga Farms Eggs. Proudly produced by local Ontario farmers, Conestoga Farms' eggs are known for their award-winning naturally golden yolks. Conestoga Farms Eggs brings quality and sophistication to every dish, perfect for plating, posting, sharing, and impressing.

Follow them on Instagram at Conestoga underscore eggs. Conestoga Farms, because local matters. On Boxing Day 2018, 20-year-old Joy Morgan was last seen at her church, Israel United in Christ, or IUIC. I just went on my Snapchat and I just see her face plastered everywhere. This is the missing sister, the truth. A true story of a woman betrayed by those she trusted most. IUC is my family and like the best family that I've ever had.

But IUIC isn't like most churches. This is a devilish cult. You know when you get that feeling, man, you just, I don't want to be here. I want to get out. It's like that feeling of like I want to go hang out. I'm Charlie Brink Coast Cuff, and after years of investigating Joy's case, I need to know what really happened to Joy. Binge all episodes of The Missing Sister exclusively an ad-free right now on Wondery Plus.

Start your free trial of Wondery Plus on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or in the Wonderry app. I feel like a legend. In April 1985, the church publishes the Salamander letter. They acknowledge that it seems authentic, but argue it could have been. been forged back in the 1830s to discredit the church. By this point, Mark has become one of the most important dealers of Mormon documents in the world, but he isn't just focused on church history. He's also fabricating secular items, including documents he claims were written by George

Washington, Betsy Ross, Mark Twain, and Charles Dickens. His work is so convincing that one of his fakes, a supposedly undiscovered poem by Emily Dickinson, actually gets published and analyzed by literary science. scholars. Mark makes frequent trips to New York to sell his pieces and acquire more rare books and documents. But he's also living a double life in The Big Apple. At home in Utah, Mark appears to be an observant Mormon who doesn't drink alcohol or coffee. But when he's on the road, he pounds glass after glass of whiskey. To a lot of outsiders, this is pretty tame stuff. But for a Mormon, it's downright scandalous. And while Mark is off drinking and dealing, he, he,

expects Dory to manage their home and take care of their three small children. At this point, Mark is pulling in six figures by forging documents. At least that's what he says later. But he's also found another way to make money. Mark knows plenty of collectors willing to pay a premium for rare documents. But it's expensive to buy these documents in the first place. So Mark starts recruiting investors. He tells them that if they pony up some cash, he can acquire documents, flip them, and cut them in on the profits. In some cases, he promises investors special perks, like first dibs and other rare documents he finds.

But in reality, it's a classic Ponzi scheme. He uses their money to pay other investors and then spends whatever's left over. You know, it is pretty innovative to add a Ponzi scheme when you already have a whole forgery operation. I don't know. it really is adding a pretty crazy layer to all this. Yeah, sounds about right for our show.

Well, Mark blows hundreds of thousands of dollars on trips to the East Coast and fancy toys like a home video camera and a hot tub. And when it's time to buy a new car, Dory wants to get a minivan to accommodate their growing family. But Mark wants a flashy sports car. So he buys both. And he promises Dory that they'll move into a huge, half a million dollar house with a swimming pool,

tennis court, and a guest house in a ritzie Salt Lake City suburb. But his big-ticket items are rare books, real ones. He pays more than six grand for a first edition of the Lord of the Rings, which is about $19,000 today. He also builds an impressive collection of rare children's books for his kids. Mark's spending is totally out of control, so it's no surprise that by the spring of 1985, he's running out of cash. When Dori asks for money to buy groceries, he says no

and tells her to dig into the emergency food supplies in the basement. Mark is in a tough situation, but he has a solution. A forgery so valuable, it can make all his financial problems go away. By this point, Mark is more than a million dollars in debt. Desperate for cash, Mark decides to forge something even more ancient than the founding of Mormonism. He goes all the way back to 1630. when the very first printing press in the British colonies was established in the Massachusetts Bay Colony.

The first document produced there was called The Oath of a Freeman. It's a landmark text about religious and political freedom, and it's probably the most famous missing document in U.S. colonial history. Only about 50 copies were ever printed, and none have been found. Until now, Mark claims he founded in a rare bookstore in New York

and bought it for just $25. bucks. To get away with something that's brazen, Mark has to invest in new tools. He orders special printing plates from a local printing shop, and it pays off because Mark hooks a huge buyer, the Library of Congress.

But the Library of Congress box at Mark's asking price of $1.5 million and the deal stalls. It is totally bad shit that now the Library of Congress is involved in this somehow, even if

the deal does stall, that it got to that level is just, ugh, God, this guy. Stressful, isn't it? Well, luckily, the oath of a Freeman isn't his only forgery, Hail Mary. He tells church leaders he's come across a trove of documents from William McClellan. McClellan was an early follower of Joseph Smith, who eventually broke with the church. When he left, he took tons of secret documents with him.

This cash of anti-Morman goods is known as the McClellan. McClellan collection, and it would be Mark's most dangerous find yet. Mark says the collection includes a letter from Joseph Smith's wife that contradicts Joseph's account of being visited by God three years before an angel revealed the golden plates. If the letter exists, it would massively complicate the church's origin story. The church, naturally, wants to see these documents and control what happens to them. Mark is betting they'll snap up the McClellan collection to avoid a wave of negative publicity.

It turns out he's right. Steve even steps in to help make it happen. In June 1985, at Steve's urging, a church elder helps Mark get a bank loan of $185,000 to acquire the collection, and the church agrees to buy it from him for the same amount. But Mark is double-dipping. He's already gotten another dealer to give him $150,000 to buy the collection.

But months pass, and Mark can't come up with the goods. His ambition got the better of him. even someone as skilled as he is can't produce this many authentic-looking documents this quickly. It seems like he's really letting go here. He's spending a lot of money. He's over-promising and spiraling in this way because there was a time where he was making sure

they seemed really authentic. To me, it just shows how delusional he is that he just can't keep up with his own grandeur in a way. Yeah, he's getting sloppy, and he's starting to panic. His creditors want their money, and the world of Mormon document collectors is small and tight-knit. So he knows it's only a matter of time before the wrong people talk to each other

and find out that he's been conning them. Finally, in early October, 1985, six months after announcing that he'd found the McClellan collection, Mark's finances catch up with him. The check to pay up on his church-backed loan bounces. Steve keeps pressing Mark to show him the collection so the church can close the deal. And he warns Mark that if he doesn't deliver the documents,

he could face criminal charges for defrauding the church. Steve sets a deadline. On October 15, 1985, Mark has to finally hand over the McClellan collection. Mark freaks out. If he shows up empty-handed, his reputation, his business, and his standing in the community will be ruined. So Mark takes a drastic step to buy himself more time, one which will cause tragedy for everyone involved.

It's a night before Mark is supposed to hand over the McClellan documents. But Mark isn't creating last-minute forgeries. Instead, he's working on a pair of pipe bombs. He built them with parts he picked up at Radio Shack. He's already built a test bomb, driving 20 minutes outside of the city to detonate it. So he knows they will work. After assembling the bombs, Mark put them in packages addressed to Steve and Steve's business partner, Gary Sheets.

Then, a little before three in the morning, he drives to Gary's house and puts one of the bombs outside of his garage. When he gets home, his daughter is crying. Dory finds him and asks him to take care of her so she can go back to bed. A few hours later, he heads to downtown Salt Lake City where he places the other bomb outside of Steve's office.

Mark has two goals, to stop Steve from discovering his scam and exposing his forgeries, and to throw police off. off of his trail. He hopes it'll look like someone is targeting the financial company that Steve and Gary run,

which has been struggling. Mark is willing to kill innocent people to cover up his fraud, but he settled on using bombs because this way, he doesn't have to come face to face with any of his victims. I didn't see this going from forgeries

being potentially exposed to the only solution being like, I just have to bomb. It is such a jump, and I can't really get a proper grasp on his mind, like how it works and what he thinks is normal. It's a wild, wild leap. At 8 a.m., Steve arrives at the office and picks up the package, detonating the bomb. He is killed instantly. Nearly two hours later, Gary's wife, Kathy, picks up the package addressed to her husband.

It explodes, killing her in the driveway. This is a huge local news story, and Mark assumes that with Steve gone, the church will delay any discussion of the McClellan papers. But he's done too good a job of throwing people off of his scent. Since the church doesn't see Steve's death as related to the documents, they simply find another Mormon leader to handle the deal and reschedule a McClellan handoff for the following day.

Mark is back where he started before committing murder. and now he'll have to come up with the goods or face the music. So he comes up with a frantic new plan, which is about to blow up in his own face. The day after the bombings, Mark's wife Dory is shocked, sad, and afraid. She's worried the killer is still at large. There have been more bomb threats called in,

and Salt Lake City is full of frightening rumors about religious death squads and mafia assassins. Some people have even... and fled the city. Then, Mark calls and tells Dory that she and the kids are in danger. They need to go to her mom's house. Later, she gets another call.

A third bomb went off. This one was in Mark's car, and he's severely injured. Horrified, Dory rushes to the hospital, and Mark is lying on a hospital bed wearing a gown, and his face is covered in glass. He's getting x-rays and a cat scan,

and he's lost some hearing in one ear. Dory can't believe what's happening. why would anyone want to hurt her husband? Then, the situation goes from scary to strange. A police officer approaches her and asks for a key to their house and the alarm codes. They have a warrant to search the home because Mark is now a suspect in the murders. Dory's mind is racing. She doesn't understand how that could be possible.

The officers ask her if Mark was home the night before the first two bombs went off, and she says yes. She remembers finding Mark in the middle of the night and asking him to tend to their daughter. And he was home when the bombs went off. Later that night, she sits in the hospital and watches on the news as the cops search her house. She cringes as she realizes that she didn't even finish cleaning

and she forgot to close the dishwasher. Somehow, things get worse. When Mark's parents show up at the hospital, they tell Dory that the bombing is somehow her fault. Then, Mark's dad says that if Mark is guilty, he has to confess and agree to be executed. According to an ancient Mormon doctrine, some crimes are so awful

that the blood of the guilty party must be spilled for them to join their families in Mormon heaven. The modern-day church has disavowed the doctrine, known as blood atonement, but Mark's dad believes in it. Dory's world is turning completely upside down. It's really telling of where his mind is that, like, he remains in the church

that he actively undermines secretly, does all these things that are against the church to make money, but also is so scared of the consequences of people figuring him out that he's willing to kill. At that point, leave. I just feel like it's such a weird jump. Yeah, he really is acting as if he's trapped, but he could have left.

And now, Mark swears he isn't guilty, but the police investigation sure seems to point to him. Dory learns that a witness saw, someone at Steve's office building the morning of the bombing, carrying a package with Steve's name on it and wearing a green high school letterman jacket. When the police searched Dory in Mark's house, they find a similar jacket,

and they find bomb-making materials in Mark's car. When Mark gets out of the hospital, Dory is happy to have him home, but she can't shake the feeling that something is off. When they watch the evening news, Mark doesn't seem horrified by the media naming him as a suspect in the bombings. Instead, he seems excited to see him.

his face on TV. You know, I feel like I started out kind of understanding Mark's initial feeling, but seeing how far this has gone where, like, he's a suspect here and there's no real reaction. Like, there's no indication

here that he feels like he's gotten too far. To me is so scary. Yeah, it's all really uncomfortable to think about. Dory understands that the evidence is circumstantial and the cops don't have enough to make an arrest.

They also don't have a motive, and Mark passed a lie detector test. But when a new investigator comes on the case, Dory and the world are about to learn about Mark's forgeries, and how far he's willing to go to cover them up. It's a few weeks after the bombings, and George Throckmorton is sitting in a recliner in a Salt Lake City living room pouring over a copy of the salamander letter. George's in his early 40s, tall and thin with close-cropped gray hair and a mustache. He's a forensic document examiner

with the Utah Attorney General's office. He's not officially working on Mark's case, but like everyone in Utah, he's been following the story closely, especially since everyone involved was buying and selling rare documents. The police investigation into Mark seems to have stalled. The cops can't figure out the motive,

but George is pretty sure he knows what happened. He's also Mormon, and he recently asked a church historian to let him review some of the historical artifacts they got from Mark. After spending a few hours with the material, he's even more convinced about his theory. Mark sent the bombs to cover up the fact that he was forging documents. Most of the Mormon document collecting world believed the East Coast experts who reported that Mark's finds were genuine. But George is shocked to learn that these quote-unquote experts don't actually have a background in forensic science. They're historians, and he doesn't trust their conclusions. I think this is the part of the story where someone using real logic enters and is like,

wait a second, you're foregoing this very crucial step. Like you need a background in forensic science to do forensic work. Yeah, when someone with a level head shows up, that's usually not great for any of our scammers. Well, George calls the district attorney who invites him to formally join the investigation. He and his partner begin examining Mark's papers, and they notice something. All of the documents he sold have ink that appears cracked. Other documents from that time period don't. George isn't a chemist, so he can't explain why this is happening,

and it isn't necessarily evidence of forgery, but he knows that this can't just be a coincidence. In February of 1986, Mark is finally arrested for the bombings on the strength of other evidence. But the cops still need a moment. motive. So as the investigators billed their case, George approaches the task of exposing Mark's forgeries with the same level of technical obsession Mark used to produce them. When they went through Mark's belongings, the police found a book called Great Forger's and Famous Fakes. The book contained

a recipe for Iron Galatanic Inc, the kind that would have been used in 18th and 19th century documents. But the chemicals mentioned in the recipe were pretty obscure. Things like gum Arabic, Roman vitriol, and green copperas. Then, in November in 1986, about a year after the bombing, George gets lucky. While Christmas shopping, he notices a toy chemistry set,

complete with instructions and all of the ingredients needed to make this old-fashioned ink. Later on, he found out that Mark got these same chemicals at a toy store. And amazingly, this homemade ink was good enough to fool even the FBI's lab.

Wow, that is such a a stroke of luck to just be able to see that, like to put that together when buying Christmas gifts for your kids. It's pretty impressive. You've got to give it to them. Well, George and his team use the ink recipe, and lo and behold, it cracks. After solving the mystery of the cracked ink, George identifies one more smoking gun. Mark got lazy and didn't make his own plates to print the oath of a Freeman. Instead, he had them made at a print shop under an alias, which later gets linked back to him. George ultimately concludes that Mark forged

about a quarter of the documents he sold and possibly even more. Up until now, Mark has maintained his innocence, but with the results of George's investigation, he and his lawyers are in a tough spot. So on January 23rd, 1987, Mark walks up to a federal courtroom in Salt Lake City wearing a dark blue pinstripe suit

and his 80-style glasses. When a reporter asks how he's feeling, Mark says, Obviously, I feel sorry for what happened. Obviously, I feel worse for my family. But I think we'll all live through it all, right? Inside, more than 20 members of the victim's families gather around the jury box. Mark had agreed to take a plea bargain, admitting to two counts of second-degree murder

and two counts of theft by deception. The prosecution dropped 26 other felony charges. Mark chooses not to make any comments at the hearing. He was supposed to get a chance to say goodbye to his family, but at the last minute, he requests not to face them and asks to be taken directly into custody. His lawyer hands letters of apology to the victim's families. In exchange for avoiding the death penalty,

Mark agrees to tell prosecutors how and why he killed Stephen Cathy. But for someone like Mark, a confession might just be one more chance to do what he does best, manipulate everyone around him. In November 1974, IRA bombs ripped through two Birmingham pubs killing 21 innocent people. Hundreds more were injured. It was the worst attack on British soil since the Second World War. When a crime this appalling and shocking happens, you want the police to act quickly.

And boy, did they. The very next day, they had six men in custody. Confessions followed, and the men were sent down for life. Good riddance, you might think, except those men were innocent. Join me, Matt Ford. And me, Alice Levine. For the latest series of British Scandal all about the Birmingham Six. It's the story of how a terrible tragedy morphed into a travesty of justice

and how one man couldn't rest until he'd exposed the truth. Follow British Scandal now wherever you listen to podcasts and binge entire series early and ad-free on Wondery Plus. It's your man, Nick Cannon, and I'm here to bring you my new podcast, Nick Cannon at night. I've heard y'all been needing some advice in the love department. So who better to help than yours truly? Now, I'm serious. Every week, I'm bringing out some of my celebrity friends and the best experts in the business

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Join Wondery Plus right now. Mark spends the spring of 1987 in Utah State Prison and while he's there, he sits down for a series of interviews with prosecutors as a part of his plea deal. These conversations cover a ton of ground from his early coin forgeries as a teenager to losing his faith to his thought process plotting the murders. Mark tells prosecutors that he intentionally blew himself up with the car,

bomb in a failed suicide attempt. He says he put some of the fake McClellan papers in the car, so people would think that the collection had been destroyed along with him, even though it never existed in the first place. But even now, Mark is still lying. Later, investigators say that he was trying to deliver the bomb in his car to a third victim, another Mormon document collector, but he accidentally set it off instead. That's such a desperate lie to pretend you were trying to commit

suicide and instead destroyed all your documents. He knows that this stuff can be recovered in some form. Like, you know, it just doesn't make any sense. No, it's just a really bad plan. About a year later, in January 1988, Mark is set to have his state-mandated sentencing hearing before the Board of Partons. So he writes down his explanations and reasonings in a letter. He claims he committed murder to protect his family

because he was desperate to keep his lies from coming out and negatively impacting them. But while he's trying to appear sympathetic, Mark's letter does not help his case, because in it, he also describes the pleasure he takes in fooling people and the sense of power it gives him. The Pearl Board upholds Mark's sentence of life behind bars, and outside the prison walls, the most intimate victim of his betrayals is left to pick up the pieces. Dory has a hard time after the bombings. She gave birth to her fourth child with Mark, before he was sentenced, and people in their community take Mark's crimes out on her. She loses friends, and her kids are bullied at school.

One of her local church leaders won't even shake her hand. At first, Dory believed Mark was innocent and stood by her husband. She held hands with him in court, visited him in prison, and brought the kids to see their dad. But before long, she accepts the truth. In August, 1988, a few months after the parole hearing, she files for divorce. After that, she struggles to raise four children on her own. Mark left her with a million dollars of debt. She loses her house, and eventually, things get so difficult,

she sends her kids to live with relatives. That is so sad, and that he never set it up that she wouldn't be in debt is also just, like, so telling of how evil and careless he is. Yeah, this is like some of the worst of what Mark has done. And Dory doesn't speak to Mark after the divorce is finalized, which means she's left to follow the news like everyone else. She reads that he tried to kill himself through drug overdoses in 1988 and 1990.

Mark also sends letters from prison threatening to kill George and members of the Board of Pardons and parole. Over the years, Dory pulls herself back together. She spends decades processing what her husband did and learns to stick up for herself. In the process, she gets help from a surprising source. In 2000, 15 years after the bombing, her son is planning to go on his own overseas Mormon mission.

Dory struggles to cover the costs. But when Steve's father, who owns a clothing store, hears about her money problems, he provides Dory's son with free suits. Meanwhile, more and more information comes out about Mark's crimes. His fake Emily Dickinson poem isn't discovered until 12 years after the bombings. Hundreds of his fakes are still out there,

and experts say that some may never be detected. In 2009, a collector finds a real McClellan notebook. It contains criticism of the church, but nothing as earth-shattering is what Mark promised. In 2021, 36 years after the bombings, Dory is finally ready to talk about her ex-husband. She's in her 60s, and her blonde hair is streaked with gray, and she's sitting down for an interview for a Netflix documentary called

Murder Among the Mormons. As Dory speaks to the filmmaker, you can see that she's a different person than the compliant young wife that she was in the 1980s. Back then, she didn't know what her husband was up to in the locked room

he forbade her from entering. Now, Dory is outspoken and clear-eyed. She works as a life coach and a hypnotherapist, helping other women work through their trauma. Like many in the Mormon community, Dory is learning to forgive, but she'll never forget.

Sarah, I know you're a woman of God. You must have a lot of thoughts about all of this. I do, you know. I think it's really interesting how this started with a crisis of faith. That's like really, I think, relatable for anyone who has grown up religious. It's very common and understandable. I feel like I just can't let go of how far it went just because he didn't believe in Mormonism, right? Yeah.

Like how close he stayed to the church itself. It's just so confusing. I feel like Mark's story is quintessentially about somebody's terror at stepping out. Because like, okay, so he says that he's figured it out. Mormonism is a lie. Whatever. Fine. Instead of just leaving and accepting the risk, you know, accepting that you're going to have

conflict with your family and with your community, it's not going to be the same. You're going to be sort of viewed as a disappointment. Instead, his plan was to make everybody who loved him and who he loved feel stupid. by tricking them into thinking that he had stuff that wasn't real, him being able to like laugh behind their backs, like all the way into brutal violence, like the worst possible decision you could make. It's such a story of cowardice.

Like he's so weak. Yeah. And also so sinister to believe that he is so above all of these people in every way and that they're all idiots and he's the only smart one. Religious trauma aside, he behaved in such an evil and manipulative way. It also had nothing to do with changing or holding the Mormon faith or the institution of it accountable for anything real. It was more just his angst directed towards how he grew up.

It's not like he was like, oh, better rights, better this, better, like it had nothing to do with improving anyone's life, but for him to take advantage of people he found too stupid. Yeah, he just wanted to make everybody feel stupid for his own gain. It's also interesting to think about just how angry he continued to be, like writing letters to the parole board, threatening them, leaving his wife in so much debt, you know, not being present for their kids, presumably. He did a lot of awful, awful, awful stuff, but that is like high on my list, that poor woman. You know, I think in a lot of situations you're really,

you know, did the spouse know, did this person know, but I feel like she probably was raised to kind of honor and believe her husband above anything else, right? So it's not like it would have been really easy for her to question anything. I think that's also true of like how the church responded to all of this. Like the scam got this far because there were people in power who really wanted to keep this, you know, like Steve and the Mormon church wanted to protect the legacy of the church. and then the people who verified the documents, they wanted the documents to be true. Everybody had a vested interest in maintaining these lies.

Yeah. And everyone had their own motive as well where it was like more about what was, again, good for them rather than all these people who were influenced by them. You know what, Sarah, here's what I'm going to say. I think a lot of children of immigrants, a lot of children of people of color, children in families, non-dominant religions, let's say.

I think we learned how to have a double life. to go to Temple with our families and still be able to like do whatever we want on a Saturday night. And if this guy could have just fucking figure that out, his life would be different. That is so funny. But you know what I did?

I took my makeup to school and I put it on at school and I took it off before we went to Temple that night to do puja because I understood that I needed to live like that and that was his issue. Thank you so much for saying that. You're welcome.

Because, yes, everyone figures it out, whether they continue figuring it out or they kind of just have a teenage phase, whatever it is. Just have a double life, grow up. Everyone knows how to be like, listen, mom and dad don't understand. I'm just going to test the waters here. And you've got to get creative. And I don't mean that kind of creative. No, no, no, no.

This is the problem. Listen, if you are listening to this and you are having conflict with your family about something very fundamental and you don't know how to create a comfortable double life, just find the nearest brown girl. And she'll help you. It's like not that hard. We've been doing it for a really long time. I mean, what else can I even say?

That is really the exact point. Yeah. Loving scam influencers, get exclusive episodes and early access to new ones all ad-free on Wondry Plus. Join now in the Wendry app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. Before you go, help us out by taking a quick survey

at Wendry.com slash survey. This is Mark Hoffman, the Mormon murderer. I'm Sachi Cole. And I'm Sarah Haggy. If you have a tip for us on a story that you think we should cover, please email us at scamfluencers at Wondery.com. We use many sources in our research. A few that were particularly helpful

were the Netflix documentary, Murder Among the Mormons, interviews with Dory, George, and Mark's cousins on the Gospel Tangents podcast, and the books The Mormon Murders, a true story of greed, Forgery, Deceit and Death by Stephen Naifay and Gregory White Smith and Robert Lindsay's A Gathering of Saints. Susie Armitage wrote this episode. Additional writing by us, Sachi Cole and Sarah Haggy.

Eric Thurm is our story editor. Fact-checking by Kalina Newman. Sound designed by James Morgan. Additional audio assistance provided by Augustine Lim. Our music supervisor is Scott Velasquez for Frieson Singh. Our managing producer is Desi Blaylock. Our senior managing producer is Callum Pluze. Janine Cornelow and Stephanie Jens are a judge.

development producers. Our associate producer is Charlotte Miller. Our producer is Julie Magruder. Our senior producers are Sarah Eni and Ginny Bloom. Our executive producers are Jenny Lauer, Beckman, Marshall Louis, and Aaron O'Flaherty. For Wondry.