Small Town Murder - #144 - One In A Ditch & One In A Bed in Forest City, Iowa

Episode Date: November 7, 2019

This week, in Forest City, Iowa, a young, aspiring school teacher is brutally murdered in her own bed, in a rural farm house. Police immediately look at her husband, a cocaine dealing farmer, but they have to change course when he is also found dead. What ensues is a mess of small town "justice" mixed with some really lousy people. The problem is, did they find the right lousy person? This one is twisty!! Along the way, we find out that Puckerbrush isn't something totally gross, that farmers can party just as hard as rock stars, and that just because you might have killed one person, it doesn't automatically mean that you killed two!!Hosted by James Pietragallo & Jimmie Whisman New episodes every Thursday! Donate at: patreon.com/crimeinsports or go to paypal.com & use our email: [e-mail] Go to shutupandgivememurder.com for all things Small Town Murder & Crime In Sports! Follow us on... twitter.com/@murdersmall facebook.com/smalltownpod instagram.com/smalltownmurder Also, check out James & Jimmie's other show, Crime In Sports! On iTunes, Stitcher, or wherever you listen to podcasts See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

You're listening early and ad-free on Wondery Plus. What if you married the love of your life and then stood by them as they developed 21 new identities? What would you do? This Is Actually Happening is a weekly podcast that features extraordinary true stories of life-changing events told by the people who lived them. Listen to the newest season of This Is Actually Happening on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. This week in Forest City, Iowa, when an aspiring school teacher is found brutally killed in her rural farmhouse bed, police suspect the husband until they find him dead too. Welcome to Small Town Murder.

Hello, everybody, and welcome back to Small Town Murder. Yay! Yay, indeed, Jimmy. Yay, indeed. My name is James Petrigallo. I'm here with my co-host. I am Jimmy Westman. Thank you, folks, so much for joining us again on another crazy, wild, twisty adventure we like to call Small Town Murder. We are going to have a good time today hope you enjoyed last week in new jersey outside of philly there that was a disaster and a mess and we have one just as messy today this one is don't ever don't turn

this one off at any point this is one of those where it's like you got to hear right to the end because it's it's going to be it's going to be strong to the end put it that way it's it's going to be strong to the end. Put it that way. The closing act is a big one here. The Pittman Potter Fest got a lot of attention. Boy, oh, boy. They are pissed that it's not sticking around. Damn Warner Brothers and their copyright. I don't blame you guys. I'd be pissed, too.

Copyright enforcement. Jesus. I want to thank everybody, first of all, for your reviews this week. Apple Podcasts, the purple icon there. Those reviews help. We don't know why, but they do for some reason. When you get reviews and people listen to your show, you go up the charts farther, and that makes you have more listeners, and that helps a lot on the business end. So if you want to help out the show, it's a really good way to do it.

Go to Apple Podcasts, that purple icon. Give us five stars. It doesn't matter what you say. No. It doesn't. Just say, these people are forcing me to do this, or I'm following instructions. It doesn't matter. Whatever you want to say works, but it really helps out a lot.

Also, go to shutupandgivememurder.com. Please do. All sorts of new merchandise up right now. Great. All sorts of cool new designs. Also, the site, they have new things now. These bags are on there. Oh, cool.

Shoes. We have all sorts of new stuff. Oh, my Lord. Sarah's been working hard putting things on on on items so check that out right away no tickets for sale for small town right now the rest of this year is sold out uh zany's in april sold out we're going to announce a full slate of 2020 shows very very soon but uh you know not yet uh but yeah there is uh april 8th crime and Sports at Zaney's in Nashville. There are tickets available for that.

Very few, so get them right this minute. They're about to sell out, so that is good there. See you in Houston tonight. Definitely, we'll see you in Houston and then in Dallas on Saturday. We're very excited for that. Both those shows are sold out, so you don't really have to plug them,

but we're excited to see you guys down there. We're going to drive. We're going to drive through Texas and then we're going to find a steak the size of our heads, and we're going to eat it when we get to Dallas. That's how we're going to do this. So if anybody has any suggestions for novelty steaks in Dallas, let me know. If you know Jerry Jones, and he's got a spare one hanging in some sort of drying...

I'm sure. He's probably got an aging room. An old 96er style just dangling from a metal hook. Yeah, we'll take that one. If there's two of those, we'll be over, Jerry. That's it. That's what we got right there. So direct us.

Point us in the right direction. Please do that. If you want to be a hero to the show, one of our producers who we're going to gush and glow about at the end of the show with a long list of our amazing credits here. You can join that list very easily by going to patreon.com slash crimeandsports or head over to PayPal and use our email address, crimeandsports at gmail.com. And we cannot tell you how appreciated every damn cent is that you guys send us. Thank you guys so much for everything.

And we're trying to put these bonus episodes out. We put them out every other week for the $5 and above level on Patreon. And they're usually a trip. We find really really crazy smaller cases. They're certainly a good time. They're a good time. So check that out. But we got to do the disclaimer quickly for anybody who might be

new to us and joining us. We've had some new listeners and so we got to talk to them. This is a comedy show. It's a comedy podcast. All the facts are real. They are. They're all real. Everything. Nothing's made up for comedic effect or anything like that. But it's all real and everything. What we try not to do, though, we try not to make fun of the victims or the victim's

family. Why do we do that? Because we're assholes. But we're not scumbags. Now you get it. That's what I'm talking about right there. We think that's good. We're making fun of small towns.

We'll make fun of a police force that messes up and lets a murderer go free or something like that we'll make fun of a murderer they deserve it they deserve it and what else are we going to do about it we have this show that's all we can do i don't have a badge or a gavel actually i have a gavel because people sent them to us but it's not official that's not official nobody listens to that nobody will haul anyone away if i do that so nor are they halt an execution somebody that doesn't deserve it exactly so with that said you know we're gonna have a good time and but if you think true crime and comedy should never go together they just don't ever mix then this show might not be for you you should certainly walk away you should walk away if you think those things if it's a if it's like a you know a thing that you have or they should never cross we're not for you no it's

a bad blind date okay we tried yeah everybody goes tried. Yeah. Everybody goes their separate ways. It's fine. But for the rest of you, we want to have a good time, and we're going to have a good time, because if you're here, you're going to have a good time. I think it's time. I think it's time to do it. I think it's time to shout, shut up and give me murder. Let's do it, Jimmy. All right.

Let's go on a trip. I'd love it. Shall we? Let's get out of New Jersey. Nobody wants to be there. No. Not even anyone in New Jersey. Trust me.

It's not great there. So we're going to go. We're going to flee to the middle of the country now. We're going to head back to the Midwest. We're going to Iowa. Oh. Oh, boy. I almost guessed that.

Corn country. I genuinely almost said Iowa. Well, when you think middle, you think Iowa. Iowa, Nebraska, Kansas. I just realized you probably put that seed in my head earlier. When I did the intro, yeah. When I told you where we were by recording an intro in your presence. God damn it, I'm stupid.

That is amazing. That might be where you... I was like, how the hell would I even get... Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that might be where you picked it up. I'm not an investigator or a detective or anything fucking incredible chances are i'm gonna say here well we're going to forest city iowa okay you don't think of forest you think of corn but forest city iowa it's in the north central part of the

state and i mean dead center very top county uh you know on the minnesota border there uh no pan handles in the middle there's a little pan handle on the outside of iowa but in the middle. There's a little panhandle on the outside of Iowa. But in the middle, it is just neat rows of square counties. They line up perfectly. They're like rows of corn. Really? Look at the county. To the county? Yeah.

They're like the corn. They're lined up so straight in these lines. It's so weird. Are they all small, too? Yeah. They're all these little tiny. They're all the same size. They're all these identically sized, like a really good chef julianne onions like that's what it's like

they're like these perfectly diced yeah exactly the same size counties isn't ohio very similar to that too the midwest they just did that they lost their creativity they're like oh listen listen we'll just lop it up like this and they didn't care in the west they started doing that with all the states too yeah fuck it square the states, too. They got, yeah. Fuck it, square the states off, too. Rivers, who gives a shit? Just right on the borders. There we go.

In our counties, they got super lazy, because they were like- 90 degrees. But our counties, there's only like 13 in this whole fucking state. Oh, in Arizona? And this state's enormous. It's a huge state. Holy shit. Well, there's nothing in it, though.

There's people in Phoenix, and a couple in in Tucson and like five in Flagstaff and then a shitload of desert. I think New Mexico is just one county. That's too much. New Mexico County. They should have to share something from eastern Arizona. They don't even deserve that. So this place here, it's two hours and five minutes to Des Moines, two hours and ten minutes

up north to Minneapolis. So it's a say equal distance to Des Moines, two hours and ten minutes up north to Minneapolis. So it's a say equal distance to Des Moines and Minneapolis for whatever that's worth. Not much, probably. It's about four hours and 15 minutes to Bonaparte, Iowa, which is episode 103, our last Iowa episode a minute ago. Yeah, that's all the way down in the bottom corner of the state down there almost a year ago. This is in both Hancock and Winnebago counties.

Winnebago. And that's where it's from. That's why it's called Winnebago. Really? Because that's where they make them. They make them in that county. And two of our participants in this story work for Winnebago. And one did and one does currently,

while the story's going on. Winnebago's play a factor in this. Do they live in one, too? Unfortunately, no, they do not. They live in another brand? They live, yeah, it's a different, it's play a factor in this live in one too unfortunately no they do not live in another brand they live yeah it's a different it's an airstream jimmy come on jesus you can't winnebago's expensive they are you know you just got to get a tin box winnebago's actually need to drive those things are pricey look 150 grand for these guys in them for christ's sake oh they're so expensive no my friend rod the baseball player rod becky was he had a giant

he had one of those giant ones that the sides come out. Yeah, the pop-outs. It was crazy. It was like $200,000 or so. I was like, holy shit. But it's like 1,900 square feet. Oh, it was insane in there. Dude, it was insane in there.

How is this even possible? It was like a swanky hotel suite in there. That's what it felt like. You're like, he had a king-size bed. Marble floors and shit. This is awesome. Kitchen with kitchen with the yeah blending drinks up while we're driving i'm like 60 inch tv he's literally like will you drive i'm gonna make i'm gonna make a daiquiri he's back there blending up shit i'm driving you're like i don't have a cdl bro this thing's too big for me dude i drove that thing to nevada in the pitch black at two in the morning. Not the whole way, but for a while.

He's blending strawberry. I had no idea. I was just driving going, I don't know if I'm going off the ride. I didn't even know if I was on the road half the time. The thing is enormous. It takes up three lanes. You're definitely going to hit oncoming traffic. It's a nightmare.

The thing's a goddamn nightmare. Best of luck in a U-turn environment. Oh, my God. They are crazy big. Yeah, they are. But he could whip this thing around in vegas in traffic i'm like what is going on does it make you wonder like how does a guy that drives like a little minivan to work and but and then he has one of those how the

fuck do you manage that's what i mean how do you do that dude in your fucking tommy bahama people who can just handle it people can manipulate large vehicles hats off to you i've said this a million to 18 wheeler drivers you watch an 18 wheeler guy pull up to a uh like a loading dock but a magic trick one time brain surgery looks way easier than that you take a brain surgeon and put him behind the wheel he'll never get it backed up to that dock ever i'm not saying the trucker could do brain surgery but you know it's not going to work the other way i've backed a trucker out of like a parking like a dirt lot yeah he's like could you just guide me back i'm like cool so i'm like i'm back in the road like

stopping traffic so he can get out and i'm like i'm going this guy's gonna hit the fucking fence i'm like yeah angle like waving my hand away from the fence away from the fence and he just kept going by by fucking three four inches they know unbelievable they know put it right in the traffic and then sped off well that's what they didn they do. Didn't even say thanks. They know what they're doing. No. Just run like a thief in the night. On to the next prostitute at the next truck stop. I got hookers to cut up.

So, yeah. Zip code 50436. Area code 641. Four and a half square miles. So, it's a small town. Yeah. And the motto here, where nature's close and friends are closer. Yeah.

That's weird. That is my nightmare. Right there. Keep nature away from me, and my friends can even stay on the other side of the street for a while. You only need a friend. That sounds terrible. Let's just say that. Nature and friends.

That sounds like a camping trip that never ends. I'm not interested. No, thank you. It's summer camp. Come on down. A hobo fantasy camp that's what i always camping is it's the most ridiculous thing ever stupidest thing i can ever think of i have a home but i'm not gonna stay there i'm gonna sleep outside with the animals because it's fun watching first thing people did when they got anywhere built shelter why fucking dangerous out there nature sucks that's why super sucks awful weather animals very unpredictable all of it that comedian car's getting coffee with with eddie murphy and seinfeld when he goes yeah yeah

you know who's probably pissed off about about campers the homeless oh yeah oh you're just out here now yeah oh you're just out here now. Yeah. You're just out here. That's exactly what it is. I've been doing this. That's what I mean. Yeah. It's fucking ridiculous.

I have the whole joke about the hobo fantasy camp. Eddie Murphy ruined it for me, but that's fine. I haven't used it in five years anyway. I haven't used that joke in forever, but it doesn't matter. Way worse, because now Jerry Seinfeld's like, can I have that? Yeah, sure. Great. Never mind. Now Jerry's going to that? And he's like, yeah, sure. Yeah, sure. Great. Never mind.

Now Jerry's going to tour that. That's good. Oh, yeah. He's going to tear it up all over the place for 10 years. He's going to have it. Now, Forest City, they first found it in about 1855. They platted it out in 1856. Wasn't the first name that they gave to it. In the beginning, it was known as Pucker Brush, sounds that sounds even more scary hairy butthole

that sounds like yeah you got too much pucker brush in there you want to trim that up a bit you know i'm gonna give that a trim probably you're gonna get dingleberries there's a waxing place called clearing pucker brush yeah y'all got dingleberries up in your pucker brush don't you it ain't good so that's what they called it robert clark that's so gross that's so gross that's one of the grossest things we've ever said probably yeah it probably is i'm not gonna lie that's probably disgusting the most disgusting ladies the next time you go get a brazilian i dare you ask him to clear your fucker brush y'all clear my fucker brush for me if you say that and then say it tell us on social media if you will snapchat me that

y'all won't clear the fucker brush out back that's that's how they clear the fucker brush out back that's that's how they clear the pucker brush i dare you and i want the video that is amazing it's too much good christ yeah a woman's gonna hear her say that right to her face some very surprised asian woman's gonna have no idea what she's talking about even if you're going to hear her say that right to her face. Some very surprised Asian woman's going to have no idea what she's talking about. Even if you're going to get your eyebrows, ask them, have you cleared any pucker brush today? So y'all clear pucker brush too or just eyebrows? Which one is it?

Go get your eyebrows threaded in the mall and ask them. Yeah, see if they'll do it. Find one of those kiosks that do it. You do it right here, you got a pucker brush room. Take you out on the back. Oh, God, it hurts. Just clear it out. The official founder of the city is Robert Clark.

Okay. Old Bobby Clark. Yeah. Jesus Christ. He said, we're not calling this place pucker brush. No. That's disgusting. That is gross.

Everyone's going to think it's fucking asshole hair. We can't have that. We're not doing it. Or it's the utensil used to straighten it. Either way, it's a pucker brusher. That's what you go bush hogging with out in your butthole. You know what I mean? Clearing the brush out. Oh, my God.

These are all terms I've learned on this show. I had no idea what that was before. But Stevie in that documentary was talking about hurting himself going bush hogging. Now, they called it Forest City because it's cut out of a forest. It's a forest. They carved out a section and said, it's a town now. Right. Yes.

They cleared out the pucker brush and put a put a city put a damn right there in the pucker that's right right in the pucker right in the brush he laid out the plot of the town he built the first log cabin it was stood until 1870 and then they tore it down another guy built a cabin in 1856 and uh they they he brought his family in a guy named a.t cole was the first family there oh so i don't know kids and a wife there he brings in so now there's you know that's different not just two dudes standing there jerking each other off or whatever they're doing for a year in this town by themselves staring at each other's pucker brush weird yeah want me to trim your butt i'll trim i'll

trim yours if you trim mine mine Mine's getting out of control. I ain't going to lie. If you're not going to trim it, at least brush it. You brush it for me. Straighten it out. So the next thing they built was they used logs to build a store. They built a store in 1856, and it was a store there. Then they built a hotel, and that hotel had a corner lot in town.

And for this corner lot to build a hotel and that hotel had a corner lot in town and uh for this corner lot to build a hotel a man paid five dollars yes he did for a corner lot in town big enough for a hotel unbelievable five dollars five bucks it's worth slightly more now a little bit iowa but not too much probably seven by now yeah it's seven eight bucks by now at least uh yeah so then they built uh they built an 18 by 24 structure robert clark did and he used it as a hotel as well okay i don't know how many people you're storing in there but 18 by 24 hotel that's a small one that's a that's a couple of rooms it's a very it's a boutique yeah it's a very small boutique bed and breakfast type place a couple

of rooms just very small ones so now the Civil War interrupted the growth here because people were kind of going to the war rather than out to go to Iowa to move there. But it was attractive to immigrants, this land. In 1879, a rail line came between St. Louis and Minneapolis and it went through here. That was a huge deal. People came from everywhere. Now people started to come here because they could get here easily. Swedish, Norway, the German people, people from Denmark, that sort of very sturdy white people built for farming.

Absolutely. And pumping children out. Sturdy, hipped white people basically yeah that's what we have here coming to town uh it was incorporated in 1878 uh there the first train arrived in 1879 at 3 30 p.m and they were very they all the residents in the whole town came out to welcome it and hey there's the train so important they documented the time oh yeah at 3 30 p.m all the presidents came to you could see imagine the people on the train just passing through from saying like these fucking hillbillies she's never seen a train before relax good christ these people don't even trim their pucker brush this place is

terrible i'm leaving a lot of sturdy pucker brush around here all it is just all pucker brush everywhere everywhere so uh yeah the rail service was great for this place because it meant they could take supplies and mail now by train and everything goes quicker easier you can do business more swiftly if you can send your products out uh instead of uh you know riding a horse dragging your shit somewhere you could just get in a car in a train car put your stuff on there and you have it uh farmers could ship their products right from the farm it was very good they had two passenger trains and two freight trains that departed daily from their train depots so they started to be a town they put telegraph poles in do that shit there uh christmas day 1879 the first telegraph message went out from the town

so they they came of age uh kind of like everywhere else and it was a very small town though it's very uh very norman rockwelly i guess you could say here uh they had they they put a lot of schools and and uh banks in they had a hotel that then turned into a college that we'll talk about which is very strange it's a small college 18 by 24 can't be that small. So they had the formation of the Farmers Cooperative in 1916. It helped really kind of do all the farming. I don't know what they did, but it helped. I don't know if they all got together to talk about different ways of farming. Everybody together.

It's like a union almost. It was advantageous and in 2007 they grew the largest average average county corn yield per acre in any county in iowa oh here so the most per acre put that in your pipe and smoke pipe and light it up jesus christ man so uh that's i don't know why that's important but uh they also they had City Community Schools. They built a wind turbine to their facilities in 1998, and they had power. That's how they're powering their classroom. That was an interesting thing there.

It was a physics project for the high school class. Yeah, they built a turbine that powers the school. It seems like it would take a lot of fucking wind to do that. Not really. You'd be surprised. No, I guess all you got to do is keep lights on, right? Yeah, and the fact that once you get, they're big. It would take a lot of fucking wind to do that. Not really. You'd be surprised. No, I guess all you got to do is keep lights on, right? Yeah, and the fact that once you get, they're big.

So once the wind starts, they kind of have momentum, too, which helps. And it's scientific. When you go through from here to L.A. and you see them moving, they look like they're moving really slow. But if you watch one blade, those fucking things are moving. Well, if you got in front of it, it would kill you. Put it that way. It'll lop your head off. It's nothing like that. Oh, well yeah i found a

review of the town here uh here's the review uh resident review quote there are the area is pretty and the locals are friendly enough the problem is that the town is controlled by i love this oh boy i love when it's a personal beef yeah you can tell one thing happened to a person and they're going to review the town's okay except for this big underlying thing that only happened to me because i'm crazy i love that so much but everybody knows about but won't say a word the kids here are super mean like that like yeah areas are blah blah locals are friendly enough the problem is that the town is controlled by the local factories along with the local college the student athletes have no regard for the community, and it creates friction.

This guy was in a McDonald's one time, and there was a group of football players from the local college there, and they were loud and cut him in line, and he just writes this review at one point. They have no regard. It creates friction, because I'm upset. No one else mentions it, but it bothers me. Therefore, friction. Also, what do you

expect out of student athletes they're dead that's the thing that's what they do it's two stars i guess one two two stars for friendly locals here and what what college is and i looked it up waldorf college oh for christ these athletes think they are they are being dicks i've never heard of where you play so i don't know who you think you are, but you're going to be selling used cars next year when you're done with this shit. Your captain will. The rest of you, you're going to go back working at that McDonald's where you were cutting in line. If you were at Ohio State, maybe you could hook on with some alumni or whatever. No one cares about you at Waldorf.

You don't fuck about Waldorf. Sorry. It's not the Astoria. Calm down. That's what I mean. So notable people from this town. calm down that's what i mean so notable people from this town i just got excited because when i wrote this down or when i copied this i said bye it's i thought it said bob barker yeah i was like awesome bob barker's from here but it's bob baker and he's a singing fuck is that a singing

cowboy in western films that died in 1975 well that's not bob barker no that's fine but he probably uh got some some speaking engagements and people showed up and they're like, who the fuck is that? Yeah. Who's this? Hey, can you can you get him to say, come on down? Is this the one who felt up the chicks who show you the cars and shit or what? Not a chick.

So guy has a washing machine. I don't know. No. All right. Is he the one that would let the female contestants get the dollar bill out of his pocket? But then he would hand it to the men? There you go. Go on down the rabbit hole.

Watch out for the pucker brush. It's thick this time of year. It's thick in the spring. Go ahead, Bernice. Grab that fresh $100 bill that's in my pocket. Hey, Todd, here's yours. Yeah, here you go, Todd. He balls it up and throws it over.

Fuck out of here. Yeah. how do you think about it also mike stenstrud uh senstrud stenstrud who's a uh he was a defensive lineman who played for the oilers and the vikings oilers that's the titans now yeah all you young people out there did he ever like do anything big was he no just an off defensive lineman he played for like 12 years well good career and shit right yeah i've heard of him, but whatever. When did he retire? In 1989. Okay.

Not a lot of money. No, probably not. He's probably farming now. Probably got a sweet cornfield. Oh, big time. Population of this town, in 1920, it had 2,100 people, and it pretty much kept that for about 50 years. Amazing.

40 years, and that's slightly ticked up. People right now 4083 that's not great so just not that many people down eight percent since 1990 uh female and male they're kind of right on the money couple more females a lot of under 18 a lot of kids and double the 85 and older demographic so great grandma and there's a lot of great grandmas watching babies right now i feel like so much for corn being poisoned that's what i know yeah they're they're thriving yeah so uh the married population is a little less than normal which is weird for a place like this you would expect maybe because of the young people and the old people you mix that and you get less married

people because the old people have outlived their spouse. Young people are obviously young and not married yet. You know how that works. So race in this town, 92% white. As when you think of Iowa, Iowa's motto should be Iowa, 92% white. Because I feel like that's what you think of immediately when you think of Iowa. Their flag is just like a... It's just white. Yeah.

It's just a white flag. It's cream. It's 98% white. Is that a true? is that a true no it's off like yeah it was a truce but it's just off white i don't get it what is that uh one point cream flag with a piece of corn on it some just an ear uh 1.4 percent black uh 1.2 percent asian uh so i mean not very not very uh what's the word I'm looking for diverse no here at all melting pot no not 66% of people are religious here it's normally 50 50 that's a lot 0% Baptist wow they like the mild religions in Iowa like not fucking fire and brimstone very nice around here relax yeah everyone calm down we're all very calm very calm. It's all Lutherans, Methodists, Presbyterians. Very calm religions.

Bring your corn to our potluck. Make your corn however you make it. Just bring it. Just bring it on down. We'll all talk about how we're all going to heaven. We're going to love it. So there's that 0.0%. Jewish, 0.0%.

Islam, mild religions. No Catholic really either it's just uh in winnebago county here uh 33 percent winnebago county is pretty conservative 33 voted democrat 59 percent republican 7.1 percent independent so it's a little high unemployment rate here is only 2.8 percent so it is low low low there's jobs here to be had but the household income is lower than usual it's usually about 58 000 here it is 47 000 so it's a little low a lot of jobs in manufacturing normally it's 10 here it is 35 okay so this place is uh thriving on the manufacturing so if that goes away they're gonna be yeah yeah that yeah there's a couple other things here, too. So Winnebago, is that like a Native American tribe or something?

I don't know if it is or not. I mean, everything up there with Winna and Minna is something that has to do with, you know what I mean, Minnetonka, Minnesota. Have you seen Winnebago Man? No. It is the greatest documentary. It's not a dude in a Winnebago just traveling around the world? It is.

It's a guy who sold Winnebagos and made this tape for a promotional, promotional made a promotional video for winnebago how do you know all the greatest documentaries i look for them he's the angriest man ever it's him every time the camera cuts he's like god that motherfucking son of a bitch and shit and he's throwing shit he's the angriest man ever it's so funny and then they find the guy because this was like in the 80s and it was a tape that just got passed around this hilarious guy and then they ended up this, because this was like in the 80s, and it was a tape that just got passed around, this hilarious guy. And then they ended up, this documentary, they went and found the guy, and he lives like in the mountains. It's exactly what you would think. He's gone off into this thing.

He's like a hermit now. It's amazing. Winnebago, man. You're welcome. I can't wait. You trust me. Where is it? Everywhere.

I think it's on, it was on Netflix last time I looked. Really? It's on something. When was it made? Probably 2010. Okay, so it's pretty recent. Yeah, on, it was on Netflix last time I looked. Really? It's on something. When was it made? Probably 2010. Okay, so it's pretty recent. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's all over the place.

All right. So cost of living here is an 81. That's housing is low. 58 for housing. Our median home cost here, 99,300 bucks. Okay. Very low here. And we'll talk about it.

And if we've convinced you, you need to get to the middle. Yeah. You can go to Forest City, Iowa with the forest city iowa real estate report your average two-bedroom rental here is about 664 dollars a month which is half the average in the nation. Not too shabby. I found a three bedroom, one bath, 1563 square foot little white house. Little white lot, little white house or not a little white lot, but a little lot.

Little white house. White flag with corn on it. 49,500 bucks. That's so doable. I mean, that's pretty good. How many square feet? 800? 1563. That's great. You can mean, that's pretty good. How many square feet? 800? 15, 63. That's great. That's not bad.

You can move your family in there. You know, a couple of kids. Four bedroom, two bath, 2,256 square feet. It's ugly. It's green and brown and pretty ugly looking and shit, but $89,500. Wow. That's a lot of square footage for that. That's great.

It needs a little touch up. Sure. For $89,000. What do you want? It's doable. I found a three bedroom, four bath. Very nice. Updated on four acres. Yeah. the you know for 89 grand what do you want it's doable i found a three bedroom four bath very nice updated on four acres yeah 2153 square feet yeah 284 500 bucks wow it's about the most expensive thing you're going to find around here you could take that green and brown piece of shit

and turn it into that put it in there you could put it yeah exactly turn it into that for cheaper than that four acres too yeah that's a lot of land. Things to do. There's the Tree City Music Festival. This is pretty funny. Used to have Giant Axe. This year, they had Dierks Bentley and Toby Keith and people I've heard of. I don't know. I've heard of these people. A bunch of people I've never heard of, obviously.

But yeah, yeah, yeah. And what ended up happening, though, is now Country Thunder took it over. Yeah. And they have like a touring thing here. That's in Wisconsin. Yeah. Well, they have Wisconsin and Arizona. Right. And up in canada there's one there's one up there there's five of them what and then they added this one now too what they're gonna be this is now gonna be country thunder because there's a big there's a lawsuit with the uh nashville company that does production services for the music festival filed a multi-million

dollar lawsuit against the other festival. So the guy who owned the other one filed Chapter 7 bankruptcy. So this one's going to get absorbed into Country Thunder. Yeah, that's what it is. Also, pucker brush days. Bring your trimmers on down. It's pucker brush time. Woo!

Pucker brush days? Days, yeah. I'll read you what it says. How is jokes how did you this is true at two in the morning researching this three be over the the couch i was i was like what is happening like what am i doing with my life the history behind the unique name of the celebration is an unusual one early on the town was surrounded by a dense bush called Pucker Brush. The bush had a berry on it. Oh, God, Jesus. It literally says it.

I swear to God, Jimmy, that's an exact copy from the website. You're damn right it had a berry on it. And when eaten, it would make you pucker. Oh, God, Jesus. It had better make you pucker. What the shit? Oh, boy. If it doesn't make you pucker, you are not human.

You are a vile monster. Although the bush has long been gone from Forest City, the name stands as a symbol of the city's history. Here lie the dingleberry. Holy crap. Yeah. Three-day celebration. Did they call it a dingleberry? No, probably a puckerberry, which is kind of worse, honestly.

So the Chamber of Commerce director said, I think every town should have an annual celebration of their dingleberry past face painting, pet parade, salad, luncheon, DJs and fireworks. Yeah. Come on down. Toss my salad down in Puckerbrush Days. No, that's not okay. Iowa, you're doing it wrong. You have no idea how many asshole puns you're into.

God damn it. That's not fair. It's almost like a... So many asshole puns. It's almost like a trap for comedians. It's like a cartoon. The coyote's laying something out for the roadrunner. It's like, I'll put a bunch of asshole puns.

All the comedians will fall into the net then, and the anvil will fall on them. The coyote just drew a white stripe into the side of a mountain and drew a big asshole on it, and we all just ran into it. That's it. Perfectly. And we keep trying. We're like, this is an asshole. Why won't it open for him? Good God.

Salad luncheon. Salad luncheon, Jimmy. Also, oh, God, I don't even know what to say about this. If you don't know what tossed salad is, Google, and then erase your search history. Yeah, God. I don't even know what to say about this. If you don't know what tossed salad is, Google and then erase your search history. Yeah, exactly. It's been explained here and there. So, crime rate in this town, besides salad tossing, property crime is under half the average of the national average. So, low.

And violent crime murder rape robbery and assaults the mount rushmore of crime jesus christ is uh is about two-thirds the national average so it's low too yeah it's a safe little place where everybody builds winnebago's and i'm a child and you're a child what am i doing here i can't help right here with you for christ's sake real yeah and they keep it going oh this is they're proud of this this is a thing that they're excited about douche country and pucker brush that's it holy shit dingleberries and douche country that's that so with that all said yeah pucker brushes laid out. Yeah. Let's talk about America. All right. It's all a lighthearted nightmare on our podcast,

Morbid. We're your hosts. I'm Alina Urquhart. And I'm Ash Kelly. And our show is part true crime, part spooky, and part comedy. The stories we cover are well-researched.

He claimed and confessed to officially killing up to 28 people. With a touch of humor. I'd just like to go ahead and say that if there's no band called Malevolent Deity, that is pretty great. A dash of sarcasm and just garnished a bit with a little bit of cursing. This mother f***er lied.

Like a liar. Like a liar. And if you're a weirdo like us and love to cozy up to a creepy tale of the paranormal. Or you love to hop in the Wayback Machine and dissect the details of some of history's most notorious crimes, you should tune in to our podcast, Morbid. Follow Morbid on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to episodes early and ad-free by joining Wondery Plus and the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Welcome to the small town of Chinook,

where faith runs deep and secrets run deeper. In this new thriller, available exclusively on Wondery Plus, religion and crime collide when a gruesome murder rocks the isolated Montana community. Everyone is quick to point their fingers at a drug-addicted teenager, but local deputy Ruth Vogel isn't convinced. She suspects connections to a powerful religious group. Enter federal agent V.B. Loro, who has been investigating a local church for possible criminal activity. The pair form an unlikely partnership to catch the killer, unearthing secrets that leave Ruth torn between her duty to the law, her religious convictions, and her very own family. But something more sinister than murder is afoot,

and someone is watching Ruth. With an all-star cast led by Emmy nominee Sanaa Lathan and Star Wars' Kelly Marie Tran, Chinook is available exclusively and ad-free on Wondery+. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. In May of 1980, near Anaheim, California, Dorothy Jane Scott noticed her friend had an inflamed red wound

on his arm and seemed unwell. She insisted on driving him to the local hospital to get treatment. While he waited for his prescription, Dorothy went to grab her car

to pick him up at the exit, but would never be seen alive again, leaving us to wonder, decades later, what really happened to Dorothy Jane Scott? From Wondery, Generation Y is a podcast that covers notable true crime cases like this one

and many more. Every week, hosts Erin and Justin sit down to discuss a new case, covering every angle and theory, walking through the forensic evidence, and interviewing those close to the case to try to discover what happened. And with over 450 episodes, there's a case for every true crime listener. Follow the Generation Y podcast on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to Generation Y ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus. I think it's time because this is a crazy story and this town obviously was absolutely ridiculous yeah you can't guys stop it stop it stop it would you stop it with the pucker brushing okay we can't have this anymore we can't you can't have a salad luncheon where

at some point someone tosses a salad at the pucker brush luncheon. And stop laughing at it. It's not funny. Maybe that's what it is. Maybe everybody just walks around laughing hysterically the whole time because everything says pucker brush on it. They're like, that says it there too. Oh my God, this is fucking awesome. Just taking pictures with signs. Next to it.

I can't believe they fucking wrote it out. They're calling this. Look at this. It's a pucker brush berry. I can't make this up. People bending over and spreading cheeks next to it. Trim me up. Trim me up, Johnny. I can't believe this is real.

It's real. Let's talk about a couple of people here. Let's talk about a couple people. Let's talk about a Jennifer and Bradley Johnson. Yeah. Bradley doesn't go. Okay. Goddamn Johnson.

Johnson. Johnson. Really? What the fuck is that? It's too much. Somebody's getting fucked in the ass today. Well, it's possible. You never know.

It's small town murder. Who knows what could happen? Anything could really happen. Wow. Bradley doesn't go by Bradley. He goes by Rob. Yeah. That's his middle name.

Robert. So he goes by Rob. And so his middle name Robert so he goes by Rob and so we'll call him Rob Johnson for the rest of the time Jennifer and Rob Johnson here now they're married

Rob Johnson worked at the Winnebago plant of course seems like as more than a third of the town seems to yeah before

he started he changed he switched he's like 21 years old. Yeah. But he switched out of the Winnebago making field. Had enough. To begin farming with his father out in Forest City.

That seems backward. It's odd. It seems like you'd get out of the fields and get indoors. It's an odd path to farming. Yeah. It really is. Normally, farmers are kind of bred. Yeah.

Born and bred. And this kid was like, I'm going to make some Winnebago's and do that. He's like, you know what? Farming is calling me. Right. Okay. Maybe he likes the fields. I don't know what he likes.

Seems like those would be a real bitch to put together, though. Winnebago's? Oh, my God. That's a huge pain in the ass. That seems like a nightmare. Probably why so many people work there. Right. Wiring harnesses fucking everywhere.

Shit is everywhere. Everywhere. All over the place. Yeah. There's a gadget every three feet. It's a house with a car attached. Right. What are two things that go wrong all the time?

Your house and your car. Right. You put them together. And you got all those problems. Holy crap. In one. Yeah. Now you're...

Too much. Yeah. Can you imagine that? They had to fucking payment on it. Yeah. Oh, Jesus. When you're driving in your car, you don't have a leak in your plumbing. No.

You know what I mean? That's not a thing that happens. That happens when you're driving in Winnebago. Or it could happen. I don't know. I'm sure they're built very well. The stove rarely goes out in my Jeep. That's what I mean.

Ever. It's super. My toilet's never clogged in my backseat of my car. Ever. It always flushes freely. You know what I'm saying? Ridiculous. It's super weird.

So now, the farm he goes to farm on is right on the edge of Forest City. It's a rural area. It's out there. This is fields and farms and gravel roads and shit like that. This is not the town or even anything like this. It's rural, man. This is out there. Picture corn.

You got it. And a lot of it. Sticks. And other things, I'm sure, are growing. Now, Jennifer. Jennifer's a couple years younger. She's 19 years old. We're going to go back to 1985 for this story at this point.

And that's how old they are in 1985. That's how old they are. Rob is 22. Jennifer is 19. Jennifer graduated high school in 1983. Yeah. So two years before this, she graduated from Forest City High School. From there,

she went on to, she ended up, we'll talk about it in a second, but she enrolled in college in, I think, Iowa State, and we'll talk about. And then she ended up currently, though, in 1985,

in February of 1985, where we're going to pick this story up, she was a student at Waldorf College, where the athletes are dead. Yeah, she's got a real ego about her oh she's just a jerk boy if she can throw a ball more than five feet she's going to cause a disturbance in the line at arby's every goddamn time it's gonna happen yeah so uh jesus christ uh yeah she went to northern iowa for a year i'm sorry here yeah she's born in 1965 in Mason City. And then they got married.

We'll talk about this. They started dating when she was in junior high. Or when she was a junior in high school. I'm sorry, not when she was in junior high. Jesus, James. That's junior high. He was three years older. That could have been statutory. That could have been a little creepy.

Yeah. Well, it would have been 15 and 13, I guess. But still creepy. Yeah. Yeah, because he could be 13 in eighth grade and the sophomore at 15 or whatever but still yeah so uh yeah she was a junior in high school and he was a senior in high school he was 21 i'm sorry not 22 so she seems like she went she graduated when she was 17 right so she's advanced and he's a year behind on it so that could be where your birthday's fault. That's also generally how women and men are. You know what I mean?

Yeah. In school. I never copied off dudes in school. Always the chicks. No. You copy off the ladies because they're doing that shit correctly. I copied off one dude once. Well, a lot.

And then he. But he was Asian, Jimmy. You got to understand. That's a different thing. I copied off him a lot. Don't copy off white dudes. Put it that way. And then he beat me. He fucked. The bastard on. Wait a second. I copied off of a lot. Don't copy off white dudes. Put it that way. And then he beat me.

He fucked, the bastard on, I think. Wait a second. I think I've. No one gets bullied by someone they copy homework off of, okay? That's the opposite relationship. People bully people that say, let me see your fucking homework. I got bullied by him, all right. He won, for sure won.

I've never heard of that before. That is the next level of bullying that you've just uncovered that I've never heard of before well everybody used to just look over smart bullies yeah we used to glance over at his paper well one time i was a little bit unprepared so i just kind of kept looking a lot throughout the test i finished and then i went up and turned my paper in then he went up and got a new paper and then came back and said that his is torn and then he redid it all over again with the right answers to motherfucker. I got all of mine wrong and the teacher was like, there's no way you could have done this unless you try.

You're not that stupid. Right. She's like, you did this on purpose. You get shit by accident. I swear I didn't. I'm really that dumb. Because the options there are either I'm a cheater or I'm the dumbest child you've ever encountered. Or i am a certain

problem has to look this woman in the eyes and say i'm the dumbest man alive i'm the dumbest child who's ever come across your classroom ever that's what i stuck i'm super stupid yeah she didn't buy no probably not i'm really. I'm really sorry, Ms. Morgan, for lying to you. I'm the dumbest person ever. And Josh Green, you're a genius. You beat me. Yeah, well, there you go. You won.

What a dick. You motherfucker, you won. Jesus Christ. Oh, what a mess. So after Rob graduates high school, they break up for a minute here. He goes to Wyoming for six months. Who the hell goes to Wyoming? Who goes to Wyoming?

I mean, I go there for like a day and get the fuck out. Yeah, like retired. I don't know if you want to go there like on some sort of weird rich person. Yeah, there's things. There's like rich people. Jackson Hole is that. Yeah, there you go. Ski places where there's rich people.

Yeah, where people go and spend shit piles of money. Places I will never go and have never been. You would hate it. Oh, yeah. Like, this is so expensive. This is ridiculous. My hot chocolate was $19. What the fuck?

It's Swiss Miss. I could go to northern Arizona and do this for like 50 bucks, the whole thing. I'm just happy anyone's here. This is terrible. I'm not doing this. That's Wyoming wyoming yeah i can't do that shit and you you hate it just on principle and the thought of it but once you get there it it's it would be guttural your hatred oh i can imagine plus it's all cowboy stuff too that's what i mean jesus the westerns the turquoise they have saddles for chairs saddles for chairs, James. Saddles for chairs? Yes.

What? Bar stools that are fucking saddles. Yeah, okay. Now, now. Too far! You're taking it too far! You're sincere? Get the fuck out of here is funnier than pucker brush. God damn it.

Sit down. Why? We have chairs, you dumb shit. is funnier than pucker brush. God damn it. Sit on it. Why? We have chairs, you dumb shits. If these were more comfortable, guess what everyone would be sitting on? Fucking saddles. You know what I'd be sitting on right now? A goddamn saddle.

Holding on to it like a four-year-old. Because cowboys and four-year-olds, those are the only people who want to sit on a fucking saddle. Yeah. Real cowboys and four-year-olds those are the only people who want to sit on a fucking saddle yeah real cowboys and four-year-olds and rich yuppie no one else yeah who are like isn't this the greatest i'm too old for my harley now so i'm gonna sit on the saddle i'm 72 i've aged out of my harley but i need something to piss my money away on 19 hot chocolates and fucking saddle seats it is some turquoise jewelry for my wife put it on the amex let's do it jesus next door to an american legion oh god damn it so he goes to wyoming oh that hurts so hard for six months to hate everybody yeah maybe he hated it he came back in six months he might

hate him i was better in wyoming what is this saddles he takes off go fuck out of here no i don't want a beer i did until i saw this well suddenly not thirsty i'll stand thank you he goes there uh she ends up enrolling in the university of northern iowa in cedar falls in the fall of 83 she wanted to teach first grade that's her goal here her goal all the way is to go to college and get her teaching certificate and be a teacher and teach first and second grade noble as fuck yes she wants to do and back then people still wanted to do that now they want to and then they look at it realistically and they're like oh god you make no money and you this is

no you have to be around people's brats all day for no money nothing you have to like put your own money into this shit into these kids that you don't even fucking know i got a fucking master i'm not responsible for these children i'm more educated than these kids fucking parents yeah so she but back then it was still kind of a profession that people thought of as a profession not now when you say teacher you go noble because you'd have to be to do it that's the thing and i'm not that's no disparagement of teachers it's you it is noble because you're getting bent over and pounded in your pucker brush daily i mean it's it's a yeah it's ridiculous it's a hammer it's not fair so uh now, when Rob Johnson came back from Wyoming, they got back together again.

I don't know. I guess I think they only broke up because he moved. That was the only reason. They get back together, and in June 1984, they get married. Great. So this is Jack and Diane. This is legit. Rob and Jennifer.

Isn't that where he lives? Indiana, I think. Oh, Indiana. This is legit. Rob and Jennifer. Isn't that where he lives? Indiana, I think. Oh, Indiana. Indiana and Iowa. They start with I's. They farm and shit. Fuck them. It's the same shit.

Sorry, guys. You're very similar. Everyone from the outside looks at it that way, too. If you're not from Indiana or Iowa, that's how we see you. It's like in the middle, you go, yeah, New York, New Jersey, same thing up there. Right. Same thing. Indiana, Iowa, same thing.

We're all ignorant. Enjoy. So, yeah, New York, New Jersey, same thing up there. Right. Same thing. Indiana, Iowa, same thing. We're all ignorant. Enjoy. So, yeah, they get married then. Now, he is from, Rob's family is into farming. That's the thing. They're like a well-known farming family. I think they got a couple of bucks and they got some farm. You can't be a well-known farming family, quote unquote.

Right. Unless you got a few bucks. Yeah. They're not this well-known struggling farm family. They're just barely... Everybody knows them because they're the broke ones. They're the broke ones. They're either great or terrible.

They're not somewhere in between. Like five years for a nickel on the side of the road. They've got some dad selling out of his broken down pickup. Flies hovering around his half-rotted corn. They're all hard. Ten years for a nickel, please. Takes a lot of butter to get these good.'ll be good after a while though you can cream it soak it soak it so that's right so it seems like he kind of tried to break away from that and be a you know a rebel i'm gonna

go to wyoming and i'm gonna work for winnebago yeah and then he's like i guess i'm a farmer i mean what are you gonna do you know yeah that's what i'm here that's my lot in life here all right so they start to they get married and they move to this farm which makes it much more difficult for her to go to school so then she just enrolls in waldorf college which is in forest city so it makes it you know it's a shorter trip for her to go she didn't want to drive all the way to cedar falls this is brutal that's yeah so what they're moving out but this is like what they wanted this they're excited they're young they just got married they're like you know 21 and 19 just got married moving out to a farmhouse

together she's going to get her degree and be a teacher he's going to be a farmer at this age though she doesn't middle america shit she probably doesn't even see that how much she's sacrificing probably just like this this is the step. It's 1984. This is what you were supposed to do. And in the Midwest, no offense, Midwest, but it's a little bit behind when it comes to that stuff. And this shit's super encouraged. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

They have more traditional values there in terms of shit like this and marriage and stuff like that. And especially it took longer for that to kind of flush itself out there. It still hangs around now. But in 1984, you were supposed to, you know, you're supposed to graduate high school and you marry your high school sweetheart and then you guys have kids and you do your thing and you raise a family. Do that shit young so that you're still young enough to enjoy your time. That's what you do. Yeah.

Then they get out of the house and whatever. But that's what they were trying to start to do here. But Waldorf College is a two year school and she's going to enroll there and she's going to get her teaching degree and everything's going to start to do here. But Waldorf College is a two-year school, and she's going to enroll there, and she's going to get her teaching degree, and everything's going to be great. She's described by her friends. She's got a group of friends. There's six of them.

They're from high school, and they went to college together, and all that sort of shit, and they hang out, and they're an impenetrable group of chicks here. Yuck. Oh, yeah. The worst. It's a lot of cackling going on. Oh, yeah. The worst.

It's a lot of cackling going on. And they know every horrible thing you've ever done in your life. That's the worst thing. I hate that. Every instance of whiskey dick that's ever occurred, they know about each other's things.

They know it, yeah. They share like a... Every terrible period story, they all know it. So, yeah, this... That's not a positive thing, by the way. No, we don't need to share some

fucking then again guys tell each other awful shit yeah but it's like you get what yeah but then they'll tell it's fun at 40 you know what i mean yeah yeah yeah the difference is we laugh about it they're like are you serious we're like are you fucking idiot you know what i mean yeah if you had a problem with your pucker brush i would laugh at you whereas women would be like really have you seen the doctor is it okay like they try to support each other where i'm like you fucking moron i think that's a symptom of hbv i think you should check that out yeah they would be care about it that's the thing they would care about each other's well-being and health we're like i don't know you're on your own jerk off we make fun of each other and we assume you'll take care of it on your own it's super weird

uh one of her friends here says quote she's a very friendly person she says uh she's someone you'd want to say hi to if you met her on the street. This is about Jennifer. She had a smile for everyone. The five of us who were always her best friends always called her giggles. That's her nickname. Giggles. They said she loved children and she worked in a nursery school like the nursery at the Lutheran church on Sundays. The Sunday school park.

That's where she worked on Sundays, because she won't like to teach, and she wanted to be a teacher. Yeah, and that's free. She's a nice person. She's a nice person. She's going to watch your kids for free. Not just underpaid, but also for free. And then telling them about Jesus, too. On her day off.

Gotta try to convince them of that, too, at the same time. Also, her friend says that Jennifer was on the B honor roll in high school. I don't know what that is. So she's B? I guess there's the A and the B. It's the second honor roll. Honor roll was A's and B's. So the B, maybe that's all 80s? Maybe she just had A's and B's. So B, maybe that's all 80s.

Maybe she just had A's and B's. All right, good for her. That's probably true. They were on the drill team together. So, you know, they did that. They were also in band and choir. So she's an active. Yeah.

She's in band, choir, drill. She certainly gives a shit. She gives a shit. She's trying. She's going to school. She's a hustler, man. She does stuff. And she's a kid with a motor she's going to school she's she's a hustler man she does stuff and she's a she's a kid with a motor you know what i mean she's trying to find some something

where to be in the world give an effort every time they got the six of them they said they were like sisters and they were you know had a whole big thing together yeah so rob and jennifer though they live together in a farmhouse it's it's it's an idyllic midwestern 80s story here also the beginning of a horror story also the beginning of just blood all over the corn one of the two so so it's a goddamn a horror novel the cover right now it's blood on the corn if you see just a cornfield with blood like a one of the corn is yellow bright bright yellow but half red with blood you're gonna go what is this this is interesting this one's for me whoa why would you murder someone out there

you're not you could just walk away there's a lot of room and that would be what interests me you know what i mean so uh yeah this is the setting for this whole thing now rob also in addition this is a this is where the story takes it oh boy It all sounds very John Cougar Mellencamp now. And then it takes a turn because they live in this quiet thing and she's going to teach second grade and teaches the kids at the Lutheran school on Sundays. And Rob is a third generation farmer and moving to this farmhouse and it's all ideal. Oh, Rob also sells cocaine. Oh, Jesus.

Not a... Rob. Rob. What is the last thing you expected me to say right there rob also sells coke out of the farmhouse yeah come on by the it's 10 years for a nickel and an eight ball for a buck 50 i genuinely thought you were gonna go somewhere with like needs multiple sex partners like something like that but it's even worse it's something illegal it's strange too it's just what what are you doing farm dummy are you growing cocaine no what the fuck are you doing you're just you're growing coca leaves angel what the fuck are you doing she's okay with it too that's the thing married couples where one of them deals cocaine right the other one's okay with it or else they wouldn't be there right you know if you're with us if you were still you know let's say you didn't

have emily and you found some girl right and you started going out with her and she you know you started hey i like this girl you went out a few times and then she's like oh by the way hold on i gotta stop and drop a bunch of cocaine off places you'd be like what the fuck wait that's in my car wait fuck out hang out with you yeah that's me you wouldn't want in your house in your car that's that's what i'm saying so i get arrested james does this shit on his own that's that's no fun i have to make fun of you yeah all the time that's the other part there's gonna be a small time order in the first half hours you making fun of me yeah it'll be crime and sports on jimmy and you'll have to make fun of yourself which will be terrible i'll be like come on let's go you can dish it out fucker

so so jimmy played high school basketball uh that's the extent grace grace now here's what happened so uh he dealt cocaine all around uh to the i guess the local people who wanted to do cocaine in the 80s in iowa i didn't know cocaine had made it to Iowa by 84. That's pretty impressive. Apparently it did. Yeah. It's got staying power. Cocaine travels fast.

It does. That is the rumor about cocaine. It's got some energy behind it. That's the thing. It moves quickly. It does. Peter's out at the end. Once it got to like, yeah, got close.

Once it got to Missouri and it kind of slowed down. Started to slow down and trickled in. Yeah. Yeah. That's the thing about cocaine, though, is it'll spread quickly because when you have something that people are like, there's this thing, it's magic. Right. That'll spread.

You are not going to fucking believe this. Fucking, here's what it is. You know, you feel kind of tired end of the day at the winnebago factory little bit of this you feel great and you don't you feel fantastic you can go out and you can drink all night long and not even be drunk it's amazing you're gonna love it yeah so that's a you know if people who are into that sort of thing they would go wow that sounds wonderful. And they'd find it, I would assume.

Yeah. So apparently they were very social. And that's the thing, too. They're, you know, 19 and 21 years old. They have a lot of friends because they went there from this area. Yeah. So they have a ton of friends. Right.

So they know all the young people from this area. So there's a lot of people hanging out at the farm. Sure. Tons of friends coming. When you're 19, people come and you have your own house. Yeah. Your friends are coming over. Oh, boy.

They're all going to hang out. You don't have anything nice. No. Everything is fucking trash. Everything has urine and jizz. It's sticky for some reason. You don't know what the hell's on it. It's disgusting.

Fucking pucker brush berries all over the place. It's disgusting. But yeah, that's how it is. But if you have your own place especially a farmhouse with some privacy right you're gonna be partying fuck yeah people are gonna party out there the cops coming from a while away that's and no one's gonna call them right you're on your own and then if they're coming you can see the lights on the horizon put the shit away 17 miles yeah you ever seen field of dreams how many cars are like and

count them let me get on the roof i'll just count them for five miles back. So they had a ton of friends and acquaintances that were always staying at their house and visiting and staying overnight or leaving or partying or, you know, kind of a party farmhouse, which again, weird. Now, February 9th, 1985. We'll get it down to here. February 9th, 1985. We'll get it down to here.

Now, after 6.30 p.m., nobody hears from them for the rest of the night. That's after 6.30 p.m. That's the last anyone hears from them. That is when a woman that they know that usually babysits for them asked if she needed them to babysit tonight because they said they might and uh rob told her no you're good and don't come over the house please that's what he said so which was odd because usually it's like anybody wants to come over can come over as long as they're home come on by and party it's one of those things no we're good but come by and have a drink yeah yeah no we're gonna be exactly come on by and start a line or do whatever but this time he says no we're good we're good and stay the fuck out and please don't come over yeah which is strange now a man

who we'll talk about because he's an interesting guy this is this is like uh there are so many characters in this story that are like shady and creepy and weird and it's in iowa and i picture all this shit happening in the cornfields and it's just a strange, it's the strangest scenario ever. This case, I just kept scratching my head and I'm like, is this the same one? I kept thinking I was getting different facts from a different case and I'm like, no, it's the same.

This is crazy. Did they veer off into another thing? What is happening? So a guy named Zoes Sklaventis. Yeah. Okay. Sklaventitis. No.

Yes. Sklaventitis. That sounds like a disease. Sklaventitis. It's a Greek. He's a Greek. Of course he is. He is like from Greece.

That's why I say he's a filthy Greece with a hairy pucker brush. The amount of pucker brush on this guy is insanity. So Zoes Sklaventis. Skav of pucker brush on this guy is insanity. So, uh, Zoes Scavalentis. Scaval... Whatever the fuck. Zoes. Zoes.

He calls Rob at 7.15 p.m. Okay. Okay? November 9th, 1985. And he said a male voice answered the phone

that was not Rob and said that the Johnsons were not home at that point. And this guy, Zoes, scaval... Yeah. Scavalabacalava here. said that the Johnsons were not home at that point. And this guy, Zoes, he says he was unable to identify the voice.

He said it sounded familiar, like somebody he might know, but not Rob, and he can't definitely identify it. Okay? Now, no one hears from the Johnsons for the rest of the night, which is a Saturday.

It's a weird thing that no one hears from them. They're social. People are going to come over. Yeah, that's when business is booming. That's the thing, and people are going to come over to see them, and they're not going to get any answer at the door and shit are going to come over uh uh to see them and uh they're not

going to get any answer at the door and shit like that it's very it's very strange so the next morning uh two a couple of friends came over that were there the night before looking for them and they weren't they they weren't there they were supposed to be there so they thought it was weird so they came back the next morning knocked on the the door, get no response again. Like, this is fucking weird. Yeah. Right. This is strange. So they ended up, they found an unlocked door to the house and went in the house because it's a rural Iowa farmhouse in 1984. Yeah.

I don't know how, you know, anal people are about locking their doors in this. I mean, if you have coke in the house, still. I would. I would. Yeah. I'm always locking everything you're not fuck that especially if there's drugs involved and if there's drugs exactly you're doing it for a reason so they enter the unlocked door and uh they look around

the house and finally in the bedroom they find jennifer in the bedroom and it's not great oh bye uh jennifer is completely nude oh no and face down on her bed in a pool of blood uh with clearly multiple stab wounds in her back oh shit a lot of them yeah more than five times she was stabbed in the back and neck oh no in her own bed in a rural farmhouse so you don't expect to be stabbed to death in your own bed in a rural farmhouse that's got to be the worst way to die that's fucking horrible apart from drowning in fire it's gotta be that's gotta be terrible i would think because you're just yeah that's terrible so uh they said the wounds appeared to be this all seemed to happen right on the bed like she wasn't stabbed somewhere else and dragged and placed on the bed or anything like that. They think this happened right in the room while this is going on. So, yeah, they found that a stab wound in her back pierced her heart.

That was the cause of death. And, yeah, no murder. They couldn't find the murder weapon, the knife at all. It's interesting. And so they don't know what the fuck right away. You know what I mean? They don't know what the fuck right away uh you know what i mean they don't know what to think about this they end up doing a little investigation and they're fine they find out that rob sells coke yeah and so they're like well there's that and also they

can't find rob where the fuck is he he's not here so they're like okay uh dead woman on a bed where's the husband is the first thing you're gonna look for if he's disappeared right he seems like a pretty good suspect if he's not around or if he's not dead next to her he seems he's probably a good suspect also disappeared sells coke maybe he's being held for ransom that's the other thing jesus christ this is too much for us yeah this is too much for iowa too much iowa you've gone too far this time with your pucker brush and your salad luncheons and your fucking farm murders it's too much oh jesus but this isn't what you expect no even police being called to the scene of anything and of rural farmhouse like that they're

gonna think okay you know it's gonna be this is gonna be domestic probably if it's anything or you know whatever a robbery a clear robbery or something but then you find out he sells coke and it's like oh my god everything it all opens up i got this job because it was a safe career path to retire no this is gonna be a pain well the problem with the coke is not only do you get also then you have to buy coke from people who probably are violent right you have that sort of thing but then you're also you know so many low-level scumbags that you sell coke to right that are who need it who need it and plus there's just a lot of people you're you're in the underworld at that point so you're gonna find

people who are shitty people around i mean you're dealing with scumbags below you and above you yeah there's a lot of drug people that are fine they just like drugs i've hung out with plenty of people who like drugs and they were fine they didn't bother me they were fine about it they were cool to hang out with and whatever their drug problem didn't affect me right knock yourself out they didn't have a drug problem probably that's why they just like doing drugs there's a difference wouldn't it be great if people had sold and did drugs were just super fucking above board with that'd be great it's like on the wire it's the same thing thing. It is. They're sitting out there. Why got to be about all this killing and shit, man?

Why? That's a D'Angelo. They're talking about it in the pit in the low rises one day. Why? It doesn't have to be like that. It doesn't. Why can't we just sell the shit and move on? Right.

That's the point. That's what I mean. But when it's all illegal. Yeah. That's what I mean. If you sell someone a loaf of bread at the grocery store, no one's going to come back with a gun about that transaction. It's not going to happen.

You give them the bread. They give you $1.69. We all fucking move on because it's a legal transaction that we've all seen. So I don't know. Take from that what you will. The legal breaking somebody's kneecaps for selling you a shitty product is Yelp. That's what I mean. Yeah.

Exactly. That is. Let's have that. Let's have drugs be legal and we just discuss it on we review you that's all we and and very much like uber back and forth we know what though we can review you as a drug as a drug and if your drugs were bad or if your drugs were killing people if there was like a bad batch or so everyone would know about it immediately it would be so fucking fast and probably shit would be tested out ahead of time so you would know it like weed with the store they test it out for thc level because they have to put what the thc level

is on there and then you gotta have a knowledgeable staff that's selling this shit exactly they need to try it that's that would be imagine that staff hey guy how's it going yeah let's see it all right yeah what do you got hey hey people in here this china white this china white this china white this china white is great imagine the line imagine the line. Imagine the line, people. Hurry the fuck up up there. Jesus Christ, God damn it. Just people fucking jittering. That's the jitteriest fucking line ever.

His bodega on earth. Oh, God. But I want to see it. Come on, God damn it. I bet people. It's better than this. It is. It really is.

I mean, I'm sorry. This is people. Then you got families being murdered at the fucking border because it's a mistaken identity. It's fucking horrible. People being murdered in farmhouses in Iowa. People are being, yeah. People are getting executed because they don't have anything to do with this. Legal business leads to very little violence, usually.

That's the thing. Unless it's a personal beef, it's usually not. At minimum, much lower. Much lower. Yeah, if people have a business together and one guy wants to screw the other guy out of it or something. But it's not a matter of this, where it's just constant. Your reputation will hold.

Because everyone's breaking the law anyway. So they might as well go further. Also, I'd really enjoy buying stocks of cocaine on NASDAQ or some shit. That'd be great. I can't wait until weed goes public. Oh, man. Fantastic. Fantastic. The fucking first offering. I'm in. Let's go. I can't wait until weed goes public. Oh, man. Fantastic. Fantastic.

The fucking first offering. I'm in. Let's go. I'm buying at the bottom. You're going to be referring to me. James, what do you think? This or this? You're like, well, Jimmy.

I'm his field guy. What do you see in the sour diesel future? What do you see? Sky's the limit, Jimmy. Buy, buy, buy. It's a bull market on on the sour day so uh how do you see that tangerine working out this fall well you know what honestly it's uh it's kind of a light i'd go light on that right now thc's testing out a little low so jesus christ strawberry futures strawberry my strawberry kush futures so she the uh this is big

business yeah it fucking right is especially like in canada where it's actually like legal everywhere like federally legal or nationally legal amsterdam it's it's bananas big it's been big. It drives tourism. It does. Yeah, ask Denver. So the people here are all, they don't know where Rob is. She's dead, and everybody wants to frame it as, and I'm not saying it's not true, but everyone, they're trying to frame it as this innocent girl who got caught up in whatever the fuck, whether her husband killed her or whether there was some drug thing or whatever it is, this innocent girl. Her friend said, quote, the fact that she was an innocent bystander in this whole thing, a kind, loving person who just simply got in the way is what upsets me.

Now, she doesn't know that. Yeah. But, you know, she's a nice person. Outside looking in. Exactly. And she she also says her friend says, quote, it needs to be said, too, that she and Rob both loved each other so much that I'm sure if someone was hurting Jennifer, he would have gone for him or done something. He knew karate. So if any 11 year old attacked him in a strip mall, he could take him down as long as he was a higher belt than him.

he could take him down as long as he was a higher belt than him. I don't mean to laugh at this woman's pain, but he knew karate is fucking hilarious. That's objectively hilarious. And this is the time Karate Kid came out right then. So it's like, he knew karate, so, I mean, he could do the crane thing. He could have craned the shit out of him.

No. Swept the leg. Yeah. I see him kicking him right in the pucker brush. Yeah, right in the pucker brush. I understand that anybody who's paid attention to the media would have to come to the conclusion that I killed my wife. Hi, my name is Zach Stewart-Pontier. I'm one of the filmmakers behind The Jinx,

and I'm excited to bring you the official Jinx podcast. We'll be revisiting all six episodes of part one and watching along with part two as it airs on Max starting April 21st. Bye-bye. The official Jinx podcast. Listen on Max or wherever you get your podcasts. It's all a lighthearted nightmare on our podcast, Morbid. We're your hosts. I'm Alina Urquhart. And I'm Ash Kelly. And our show is part true crime, part spooky, Morbid. We're your hosts. I'm Alina Urquhart. And I'm Ash Kelly. And our show is part true crime, part spooky and part comedy. The stories we cover are well researched. He claimed and confessed to officially killing up to 28 people. With a touch of humor. I just like to go ahead and say that if there's no band called Malevolent Deity,

that is pretty great. A dash of sarcasm and just garnished a bit with a little bit of cursing. This mother f***er lied. Like a liar. Like a liar. And if you're a weirdo like us and love to cozy up to a creepy tale of the paranormal, or you love to hop in the Wayback Machine

and dissect the details of some of history's most notorious crimes, you should tune in to our podcast, Morbid. Follow Morbid on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to episodes early and ad-free by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts.

Ow. Problem is, there seems to be weapons involved here. Right. He certainly didn't disarm the man while he stabbed his wife. Karate farmer over here. I don't see, I don't know what's going on here. Koki stabbed his wife. Karate farmer over here. I don't see. I don't know what's going on here.

Koki the karate farmer. Koki the karate farmer. There he is. So they at this point after they find him. Now the thing they need to do the most is find out where the fuck Rob is. Yeah. Like we really need to know where he is. A to just see if he's alive.

Okay. See if he did it. And tell him, by the way your fucking wife's dead super dead yeah they think he knows that other he either did it or knows it has been killed himself because he would have been around by now to find out you think and now he'd be right in the paper by the next day so yeah they said they're going to seek him uh the uh the chief of police here said we are looking for him and we have conducted a ground and air search trying to find him.

They are fucking APB. Nothing else going on in Iowa right now. We flew a kite with a camera on it. That's it. They said he's... Back then, that's what it was. It was a heavy camera. It was hard.

It's one of those big VHS ones with the battery packed, dangling off by a wire. We had to tie it to the back of the car and drive. That was rough. Johnson's being sought. He's 5'8", weighs 165 pounds, blue eyes, blonde hair, obviously. He's from Iowa, so we knew that.

We know. And he's wearing blue jeans, again, obviously. We know. Yes. He's basically dressed like a blonde John Cougar melon cam. Keep your eyes out. So they said, are you looking for him as a suspect are you looking for his body and they wouldn't say oh they said we were not we're not saying

yet basically they said uh right now they said though some of the director of the uh the department of criminal investigations he said that johnson at this moment quote is not a suspect we would just like to talk to him yeah you know and see if he stabbed his wife to death you know we'd like to have that talk with him i'd like to see uh if his clothes have blood on them still you know shit like that right we're looking what he knows so well what's up with rob basically here uh jennifer's friends now are very upset with the with what they call the innuendo all six of them which i thought yeah five five she's sick she's the six she's the six um they they keep in the paper they keep calling

it innuendo but doesn't that have a sexual connotation to it innuendo like by definition all right and well no as a yeah i mean that's basically what it's very much like like um uh whenever you say whenever you yeah it might mean, but when it's in our language, it means one thing. It means sexual. It means sexual. Innuendo means someone says you're fucking somebody, period. There's no other thing about it.

Exactly. So, or you're saying something because you want to fuck somebody and you're throwing a thing out at them. Or it just means that it's, it's essentially a sexual term. One way or another. It's a sexual term of some kind. It goes sexual. So, but they don't in the paper.

I don't know. It's a weird English thing that I find strange. are they saying they well they're saying a drug involvement they keep talking drug involvement all these papers and the friends are saying that this talk is they're they're tired of it it disturbs their her friends they say that it's damaged the reputation of their dead friend here they said that she quote her one friend said that Jennifer, quote, never ever touched drugs and never would. You know what? That's hard. I'm not, I don't want to speak ill of this.

She's a victim of a crime and all this. But the facts just say if there's coke in the house and all your friends come over and they party all the time, she probably fucking partied a little bit. She's tried it. That doesn't make her a bad person, though. That's the thing. In 1984 in Iowa, that make her a bad person though that's the thing there in 1984 in iowa that made you a bad person though you were a bad anyone who went near cocaine was a bad person drug people were bad people just say no jimmy this is reagan yeah horseshit fucking 80s the

problem just say no bullshit the problem with that approach and trying to clear your friend's good name is uh all that does is keeps the police from fucking investigating this that's the other thing you gotta you gotta have they just want her to feel well no well that may gives us a bad name the group of girls can't have cocaine involved it's iowa it's involved in this murder lady so shut the fuck up and swallow your pride that's all it is so uh she never would so they said that uh and now the investigators say that drugs might be an issue in the case but they say that uh they don't think jennifer johnson had any involvement in the drug trade herself she wasn't meeting with people or doing anything like that uh but they know that her husband is uh the forest city police chief here doug book said his name is doug book and

he's the police chief he goes by it book him that's right motherfucker that's me i go by it and i'll do it that means he punches you right in the pucker brush when they say book them you're like oh they're gonna take me oh it's doug again you turn around big smile on his face gotcha huh you thought i was gonna book you into jail i booked you all right my own way uh he says about rob quote he's he's been trying he's been involved drugs, but he was trying to kick it to get away from all that at this time. So there's a bunch of people who have said that Rob was trying to get his shit together and get out of the coke trade. That was his goal recently.

He was trying to pay some people off. But a lot of people say that. He had a drug debt that he was trying to get money to pay off, basically. So to his suppliers now he's going around saying basically he's gonna he's trying to collect money to pay them off so he could be done with the whole thing what does this go but no but that's what people say all the time when they're in the middle of gambler yeah right it's a gambler it's the same thing with someone who does drugs it's the same it's the same thing if you're doing drugs you're

like i'm just gonna do it this one last time and i'm going to party and do that but then when you're because then when you're and then when you're high you're feeling yeah this is fantastic i don't ever need to do this again because this feels great now last one and later on you want to be high again you're like fuck that's what happened great yeah so that's what we're yeah it's weird also but there's also other evidence his pastor comes forward here which he he's missing. And his pastor is publicly saying what they've discussed in private religious. Oh, what the fuck is fucking? It's positive in Rob's behalf. But you can't do that.

That's ridiculous. The reverend here of the Calvary Baptist Church. He said that Johnson had conferred with him about his past, about his cocaine use use and that he said that he didn't talk about dealing he said though that he was making an effort to stop and the reverend said quote he definitely is making a move in that direction to stop so everybody thinks that basically so uh what fucking is going on this this weekend here on february 9th when this when this whole thing happened uh this is like i said rob was concerned about collecting he was going around trying to is going on this weekend here. On February 9th, when this whole thing happened, this is, like I said, Rob was concerned about collecting.

He was going around trying to collect money from people that owed him money for Coke so he could pay his guys off. Oh, Jesus. He's trying to pinch and save. That's what was going on. He was trying to, you owe me money, you owe me 300. He's calling in his markers. Everybody's fronted.

Because, I mean, he might be supplying smaller dealers. You know how it goes. Some people are personal. Some people are going to get an eight ball and break it down in a little bit. You know, whatever. So they said, though, that police are ruling robbery out as a motive. They said because nothing of value was missing from the home. The two cars were still in the garage.

Yeah. There's, you know. Both cars. Two cars in the garage. He didn't just walk. That's the other thing. Oh, this is horrifying. Which, I know, both cars, two cars in the garage. He didn't just walk. That's the other thing. Oh, this is horrifying. Which, I mean, who knows?

But that would be if you were going to kill your wife and run away, doing it in your own car would probably not be the smartest move. Yeah, but also killing your wife and literally having to run away. On foot. That's terrifying. Yeah, that's not going to work. Up to Minneapolis. They can see you running away for days.

Yeah. Now, the police chief old book here old bookham says that uh information they gained in a recent traffic stops basically they were doing vehicle checks of traffic passing by the johnson home uh at the time it was up the street from there so they were they had they ran into a bunch of cars that were going that direction and they said they were they were uh uh they have that might have paid off and they said that might have paid off, and they said that they now have a bunch of new people to talk to when they went over those records. But still, into March, no Rob.

Oh, no. From February 10th. Goes into the middle of March. Oh, no. March 14th, finally, utility workers are working on the edge of somebody's rural property here, and they find Rob's frozen body in a ditch. God damn it. He's fully clothed and died of multiple gunshot wounds to the back of the head in a ditch on the side of the road. Not where he was killed, either.

He was killed and dumped. That's not the murder site at all. Obviously, they can tell that easily. Not the murder site. It's a dump job. Oh, no. So, yeah, he's fully clothed, at this point partially decomposed,

but also pretty frozen because it's February and March in northern Iowa. Yeah, absolutely. It'll maybe preserve evidence. Also, it fucks up knowing when things happen. The time frame is ruined. Helps some things, hurts some things. It's one of those deals.

So they find him there. I mean, with her, they know the time frame. You know what I mean? Exactly. At least some of it. They know the next morning they found her. So sometime between 630 when they talked to somebody, the babysitter, and she was heard in the background. And, you know, 10 o'clock the next morning.

Yeah. So 10 o'clock the next morning, she was o'clock the next morning she was killed him who the fuck knows what happened here uh these found in a ditch it's six and a half miles away from their house this ditch very rural area here four times in the back of the head at close range which sounds a very on purpose yeah and b uh sounds like people who do that often super personal would do that yeah back of the head at close ranges that's called execution style called cocaine death that's yeah execution style that's yeah but when you hear it doesn't sound like he oh it's weird we'll find we'll talk about it here so they said yeah he's definitely been shot somewhere else the

body was ditched there uh in a ditch yeah perfect place to ditch something. That's where snitches go. In ditches. Yeah. Well, stitches. There you go. No stitches. Not a snitch, but in a ditch without stitches.

All right. So that's how you know he's not a snitch. So it's all bullshit. That's how you know he's not a snitch because he had no stitches in a ditch. That's how it goes.

Jesus Christ. In ditches with no stitches or snitches. All right. Here we are are no murder weapon found here either it's not like there's a gun next to him anything like that nobody dumped him and then threw the gun on top of him or anything like this too yeah like mob style right then there you go there's your murder weapon yeah enjoy looking for it there it is no numbers no fingerprints in fun you wanted it anyway yeah there is. That's what they do.

It's useless also. Remember the Godfather. Put your hand on your side, drop the gun slowly, Mikey, after you shoot the police chief in the fucking forehead. Got to do it calmly. So, yeah, they examine. Now they have both their bodies so they can determine certain things. Pathologist examines both bodies and determines that from both of their digestive systems,

they ate the same meal at the same time before they died. So they ate together that night. So that they know of. They say that Rob died before Jennifer. Oh, shit. Rob died first based on the digestion. Wow. So that's very fucking interesting that means

she saw that shit who knows she's nude in her bed wow so that's fucking what the shit did he go and there's no sexual assault or anything like that this is not sexual there's nothing like that her body she was not assaulted in any way sexually just the stab wounds and that's it she wasn't beaten or anything like that what the hell so all i I can think of, did he say, I'm going to go out and do something, and it was getting late, and she's like, I'm going to bed, and then maybe she just sleeps in the nude. A lot of people do. Yeah, I do. And there you go.

She slept in the nude, and somebody- Sorry, I'm a pucker brush. Now you know. Somebody took him away, or somebody got caught up with with him out there and then she was killed out here. Who the fuck knows? Now they're pretty sure that he didn't kill her, though. Yeah. Pretty sure Rob didn't do it.

It's hard. Now they're looking at it. It's a hard go. If he died first. Four bullets and then he stabbed. That'd be tough. That's a tough one. And then threw himself in a ditch.

And he didn't bleed anywhere. That's amazing. Yeah. Very amazing. They found noodles and vegetables in both of their stomachs to be similar so that was their thing uh they estimated that jennifer ate about one to one and a half uh but not more than two hours prior to her death so this could have been somewhere in the 9 30 10 o'clock range if they ate at 7 30 or so seven o'clock in there maybe who knows uh but

rob died before that police have a lot of people to talk to oh god yeah they know so many people and they're they're like oh jesus christ first they thought farm they're like great they probably know three people we'll talk to their mom their dad and their cousin and that'll be the end the guy down at the feed store what shit now he knows everybody there's fingerprints all over this house yeah of people of probably people with criminal records too a lot right like that a lot of shit to sift through oh my god just made this investigation Fingerprints all over this house. Yeah. Of people, of probably people with criminal records, too. A lot of shit like that. A lot of shit to sift through.

Oh, my God. Just made this investigation ridiculous. They interview more than 100 people, which is, think about the population of the town. That's a shitload of people. Right. That'd be like if they interviewed 100,000 in Phoenix. You know what I mean? We interviewed 100,000 people in this murder.

James, there's 8 million, 7 million in the state. I know like 20 people. That's what I'm saying. Thank God. 100. Oh, I don't want to deal with coke ever again. That would be the biggest nightmare of dealing coke, because you have to deal with people. Being young, though, it makes you, I don't know, man.

Having people around feels so cool. It feels because you want people to like you. Yeah, because you're like, oh, they like me. No, they don't. Now you want people to like you so me no they don't now you want people to like you so you cannot hang out with right that's what you want i want you to like me so much you respect me and you don't want to be around it's the seinfeld joke as adults we i've said this before we want nothing more than to be liked by a large group of people who we

don't care for that's the goal jesus christ that's hilarious it's the truth yeah it's worded so it's efficiency on that james efficiency of words so i felt it's good always that's the leanest joke i ever heard lean and mean though dude it's so great you're still laughing about it it's wonderful it's perfect so they interview a hundred people yeah uh they say that uh uh they had one guy from garner uh which is a town near there and they thought that they had something here but then his alibi his alibi gets confirmed and he passes a lie detector test so they're like okay back to square one here like they're they're trying to find people anything here uh they say in the paper this is a great quote from the des moines register

the investigation has extended as far south as Iowa Falls, about 60 miles south. Oh, as far as 60 miles. Oh, my. 60 miles. Jesus, these are traveling. I could barely see that from a porch. Does he have a Winnebago? Oh, Jesus.

It's how do you get so far as far as Iowa? Fuck. Not all the way to Iowa Falls. Holy shit. That's like here to Iowa Falls. Holy shit. That's like here to Mesa, James. Oh, man. Jesus Christ. 60 miles.

It's fucking ridiculous. 60 miles. Huge investigation. Sprawling. Sprawling. Just spread out for days. Right. So, oh my God.

So, first they're thinking they find a couple guys here who are their cocaine dealers in town or in the area and they find they think they're they're the people here at first they think they have the guys okay uh they john rob johnson was deep in debt to these guys. And they said, Rob had told other people that these were the type of guys who, quote, broke legs of those who didn't pay their debts. So they're fucking coke dealers

who don't mess around. You pay coke dealers their goddamn money you owe them or they'll break your fucking legs. Pretty much pay all drug dealers the fucking money you owe them. That's the thing. That's why, again, legitimate business. You can say all you want about how credit card companies will screw you and the 24 interest if you don't pay it they won't come to your house and physically beat you that's the thing they can take shit from you but they won't they can't physically hurt you

they physically hurt you in another way when you go to try and buy a nicer car that's it yeah best of luck but they're not going to send some guy over in a polo shirt and khakis to break your fucking legs with a clipboard you jimmy wissman yeah uh let's see here it says here you're uh about four months behind on you you've been paying the monthly minimum but that's not enough anymore we're gonna we're gonna have to ask you for no and whips out a billy club it's one of those extendables starts fucking wailing on your kneecap tanya harding's the shit out of you and that's that you want to just pay this up front yeah jesus christ so uh start paying more we'll be back next month yeah i'm gonna come back all right puts it away puts

it back in his pocket have a good one gets in his like buick le sabre and drives away i gotta go over there weird so now johnson has a drug dealing partner a guy named uh william trosper he's 24 years old he's his partner he's his little you know they're whatever they're going in together on the whole thing yeah and he says about these two the the guys that they were buying it from the suppliers quote they were the people we were dealing with. They were the people who came around when I learned of the murders, he said at that point. So he says, though, the investigators end up concluding that the men they were looking into, the Coke suppliers, were not involved in the slayings. involved in the slayings so much so that they give these two men immunity from prosecution on drug charges and anything else around this case in exchange for their cooperation

in the investigation because they're so clueless about the drugs they have they don't they didn't know it existed right away they have no idea what to do they had no clue that this they didn't know that this existed and they don't know how to infiltrate a whole drug underworld from scratch. And they're hearing about Pablo Escobar in Colombia, and they are terrified right now. All you have to do is, if you watch the national news, it's going to be 45 people were gunned down in Miami today with machine guns in the street over cocaine. So they see this, and they go, next thing you know, there's going to be machine guns everywhere shooting them a pucker brush the whole festival is gonna be all over

the car all over the car so yeah not only did they give them all that and it got immunity in exchange for their cooperation they have been moved to an unknown location they put them in the fucking they protected them wow they gave two coke dealers suppliers fucking holy immunity and witness protection to testify and probably facilitated them on growing their fan base not only that they're we'll talk about it but it's wait till the end okay i'm telling you there's so much here dude this is crazy and it's about to get even crazier. So, yeah, they say, according to his friends, and they try to piece together Rob's last day, Rob spent his last day trying to round up $2,500 to $2,900. Not thousand, hundred.

This is why I'm like, you'd stab a 19-year-old girl and shoot a guy and drop him in a ditch for $2,900. Right, that's a lot. That seems's that seems excessive doesn't fit the crime well it's 2,900 bucks right so you unless you're trying to make a big fucking statement to everybody else that owes you money i guess it just seems like overkill it just seems like overkill to me like that that doesn't seem for 2,900 bucks but if you've got 20 people that owe you 2,900 dollars and you take care of one of them, you're going to get the rest of that money back tomorrow. Probably, yeah.

But it just seems like a lot. Yeah. It doesn't fit the crime. This doesn't seem like Iowa drug dealing. This is like Medellin-style shit here. We go in and kill everybody, wipe out families and shit. So they said by the time it got to evening he was still a few hundred bucks short he was working it up he's got almost two grand at that point

any drug dealer will take that and be like tomorrow get the rest you're obviously working on it he's gonna come back tomorrow for making an effort i'm gonna fuck he's obviously scared right so yeah and if he comes with 80 of it right and goes hey tomorrow i'll have the rest fucking first thing in the morning but but I got to hustle up tonight. You go, all right, asshole, and you take it. You wouldn't kill his wife. No. Even if you decide, fuck that guy, it's the 10th time he's done it, I'm going to shoot him.

You wouldn't go butcher his wife in her bed. That's just weird. You're six months behind on your car payment, and you've got 80% of it, and you're ready to pay that portion. They'll be like, all right, you're up to date. Yeah, people will work with you. We're going to have a chat tomorrow if you don't to pay that portion, they'll be like, all right, you're up to date. Yeah, people will work with you. We're going to have a chat tomorrow if you don't fucking pay more. Yeah, exactly.

A friend of his, or a Coke buyer, named John Humphrey, who's a guitarist for Mason City, he said, very professional, he said, quote, he asked me if I had any money for him, but I said i didn't he said it doesn't really matter bro i'm a guitarist from mason city no i don't have any

money for you i play i played for free last night and every other night he said it doesn't really matter because i'm going to get my legs broken anyway that's what he says so he's apparently these people are not going to be i don't know if we don't know how much he owed. So we don't know if the $2,500 was like what he thought would placate these people into whatever. Maybe he owed, I don't know. So they can't figure it out. They estimated that he sold, from what they figured out from his partner and everything, they figured out that Rob probably sold about $2, twenty five hundred bucks a worth of cocaine every week. It's a small time, but I mean, it's something to supplement whatever.

He's moving ten grand a month, though. That's a lot. I mean, I guess. But for Coke back then, Coke was expensive, especially in Iowa. That was probably. Oh, Jesus. That was probably not a lot of coke. That's an A-ball.

Yeah, it's probably really not. They said that that he he would give his his partner, Trosper, he would get to stay at the house, and he also let the Trosper, he'd give him money and cocaine for exchange in helping his drug sales. They weren't really partners. He kind of worked for Rob. A little employee. Yeah, he was like his kind of coke lackey, for lack of a better term.

He says, the coke lackey here trosper quote i went to iowa falls with 750 to pick up an ounce of cocaine to take to nebraska and sell that sounds awful yeah on my way back i was i was to stop in iowa falls and pay the suppliers some more money from what i sold in nebraska so rob even had him going now you do that drop that off on the way back drop that fucking money off to those guys i don't even want to see it so i guess the 750 was applied to a past transaction is what they said and he and johnson still owe the suppliers about four thousand dollars that's what that's what his partner says god this is why you don't do it this is a nightmare you're running around trying to this is very like like, you know, third act of Goodfellas. Right. Where it's,

da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, and fucking stopping short. This is horrifying. Yeah, going to pick his brother up at the hospital and his tomato sauce and helicopters. So much gambling. It's a goddamn mess. So another guy here, a Jeffrey Pitkin,

he's a, he goes to Iowa State University. He said he stopped at Rob's home the day before to pay him $150 because Rob had asked him to because he said he owed him $150. This guy, this Pitkin, says about Rob, quote, he mentioned that he was going to clean up his act. As soon as he collected his money, he was out of it.

He said, quote, these guys don't fool around and that they were going to break his legs. He said they'd broken legs before. So everybody that he's talked to he says that he's getting out of this thing and he's he's apparently scared of somebody yeah enough to get out of the coke game which is pretty you got to be pretty scared because people go through a lot right in that shit also he understands the value of legs that's the other thing he's like i need my fucking legs jesus christ how else am i gonna farm can't get out

in the field so they finally police hone in on a suspect and this is i don't know about eight months later my christ uh yeah they find a guy that they like uh for it named samuel jerome ohriger uh ohriger uh sam ohriger here uh he's born in 1961 so he's around the same age as rob a little couple years older. I did some research on Ulrich here. I found out that he was a Cub Scout. I found he was a Cub Scout in 1972 in Pac-21 in Esterville, Iowa. So there's that. He was definitely in the Cub Scouts.

You dug deep. You found the town. I did it in the newspaper. It was in Esterville. That's where he's from. Congratulations, you cubby. Yeah, he's from Esterville. Did he go any higher?

Did he get... I don't know. I couldn't find any information. I looked it up. I was like, promotion, Eagle Scout, Boy Scout. I couldn't find it. All right. So he was only like 11 at that point.

So whatever. He may have been a star scout. Oh, he was the best. Best knot tire, best wife stabber out there. He didn't... We don't know about that. So he's a known drug user and coke dealer. This O-rigger in the Iowa Falls area for the Greeks.

Now, much like the second season of The Wire, and from then on, second, third, fourth, and fifth, they get their supply from the Greeks. That's who they call. They call the Greek. This one wants the Greek as the connection. And Marlo, the whole plot of the drug plot is Marlo trying in the fifth season is marlo trying to steal the drug connect the greeks from proposition joe so you can cut him out of the whole thing and he can be the supplier of everybody so yeah he's some machiavellian shit though yeah so anyway there's the greeks the greeks are zoas and Aris Slavica Baklava.

Baklava. Yeah. Slavica Baklava. That's the guy? Those are the Greeks. And he's the guy who said he called them and heard an unknown male voice that just said, I couldn't recognize it. He started the whole fucking thing on the wrong path.

Super weird, right? You clever son of a bitch. Yeah, they find out that Johnson would receive weekly shipments of Coke from the Greeks and then distribute the Coke to lower level dealers and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Now, this is who Sam works for. Sam works for these guys. Sam, like we said, is born 1961 in Esterville. He went to school in Esterville. Before he graduates high school, doesn't graduate high school, he joins the Marine Corps at 17 in 1978. Why the Marines before he ended up in high school?

Well, when you get arrested for fifth-degree theft and driving while barred and you're already a habitual offender at age 17, a lot of times a judge will say back then, here's what you can do. I'm going to put you in fucking jail for six months or you can join the goddamn Marines or the military. They'll straighten you out. That's what judges used to do that all the time. And that would be an out and guys would do it. And he did it.

Especially back then because they needed people in the late 70s was not a big time to sign up. Vietnam had ended a couple of years. Patri patriotism had dwindled watergate everyone's like i'm not fighting for shit you don't trust these fuckers exactly so uh to join the marines was uh you had to really want that so yeah that's why possibly he joins the marines he's in the marines for four years uh he earns an honorable discharge from the marines in 1982 with the rank of number two private first class. He comes back to Iowa, finishes high school, graduates. So he did fucking nothing in the Marines.

No, no, no. He did nothing. That's fucking nothing. He hung around. Yeah. He hung around. He didn't get kicked out. That's what he did.

He got honorably discharged. Good for him. Which means he doesn't have to go to jail now. Didn't fucking move up at all. No. Fucking idiot. No. This guy He got honorably discharged. Good for him. Which means he doesn't have to go to jail now. Didn't fucking move up at all. No. Fucking idiot. No. This guy's got a couple issues here.

And we'll talk about it. He was doing other things. He had other concerns while he was in the Marines other than moving up the ladder or chain or whatever the fuck it is here. He finishes high school in 1982. And he ends up marrying a woman, a a lady named karen myers in july of 1983 and they have a young daughter named leah blah blah blah okay it's sometime in here that he's also busted for controlled substances a couple times uh two different times one he's given a uh a two-year suspended sentence and a 500 fine and and that sort of thing too.

And another one was dismissed eventually. So it gets busted a couple times. Also, in the early 80s, a domestic assault on his wife. God damn. Where he does two days in jail for this and it'll come up later where he allegedly put her head through a window. Oh, you piece of shit. So, yeah, we're going to, this guy, you're going to have mixed emotions here as we go through it because he's not a good guy.

No. But keep listening. It's a weird one. So, basically, Ulriger used to work at the Winnebago plant. Yeah. Like everybody else. Of course he did. This is, you know, I'm a coke dealer for the Greeks.

I put Winnebagos together, of course, on the side, too. I mean, I'm not fucking crazy. Everybody puts Winnebagos together. I'm a taillight guy. Come on. I'm a coke dealer for the Greeks. I put Winnebago's together, of course, on the side, too. I mean, I'm not fucking crazy. Everybody puts Winnebago's together. You're a taillight guy. Come on. I'm a taillight guy from way back. My dad was a taillight guy. His dad was a taillight guy.

We're a taillight family. My son is going to be a taillight man. I'm going to teach him. He might even one-up me and figure out that little blinky bulb. Oh, he's going to figure it out. He's going to do it. Get right into that turn signal. I don't know.

I mean, he's a smart kid. If he can move up the ladder to the turn signal department, I mean, who knows? Fingers crossed. I mean, we haven't been able to conquer that, but he's a smart kid. You've been telling me about this thing called the LED. I think he's fucking crazy.

He's full of shit, this kid. You never know. No, no, no. The kids are crazy. They might be on to something. What do I know? You know what I mean? Who knows? So the police investigate and they find out that he was on sick leave at the time of the murders yeah so they're like okay he wasn't working because they're like well let's

see if he was at work that day maybe this is an easy clear up you know he's at work from two to ten on that night well it's not him right you know so that's something like that. But they find out from some wranglings and some investigating on February 9th, that afternoon, the afternoon that their last afternoon, Rob and Jennifer, Rob went to see Sam at his apartment, Sam's apartment. Okay. Apparently, he had given Ulrich some cocaine before, and he was demanding that Ulrich pay his bill because he needed the fucking money to pay the Greeks. And he's like, dude, I need my fucking money.

Ulrich said, I don't have shit for you. I got nothing for you, homie. Sorry. Got shit for you. Johnson, Rob, at this point, tells Ulrich that he's supposed to meet with the Greeks that evening and pay them for a bunch of cocaine that they fronted him. And he needs about three grand more. And I need your fucking money.

I got to pay these guys this. I need three more thousand dollars. They expect the money tonight. You know, these guys are serious. Also, Johnson made statements to him saying that the Greeks are not to him, to other people that the Greeks had an enforcer who broke legs and all that shit. So, you know, it's in the air. Everybody knows about it.

So then Rob leaves Sam's apartment, and apparently they had arranged to meet later that day where Ulrich would have money for him, would have his cocaine money for him later on in the day. So at that point, Ulrich goes out, according to him, goes out to try to sell some of the cocaine that he has to raise money to pay his debt off so it's a chain of people trying to quickly raise money to pay their debt back up the ladder sounds so stressful dude it's like the movie used cars or something yeah it's so stressful it's it's it's it's geeking to uh iowa boogaloo yeah that's what it is it's it's gacked

out losers that are trying to pay off their their their gack bill that's before they before the city comes and forecloses on their gack forecloses on it it's true though that's what it is they're just going up the ladder up the ladder it's it's fucking that's why i get mad when people say that you know a drug dealer why can't they get a job that's lazy this is way harder than whatever you do god this whatever you do isn't this stress no unless you're like one of these commodities traders it's in a pit with a piece of paper yelling at people that looks really stressful otherwise this is way more stressful because this is that except you're screaming constantly it's

the same thing you have the threat of some enforcer coming and breaking your kneecap because you didn't finish the tps no never your time cards fucked up chief telescopic baton at your kneecap never once happens that's my point how many times i told you about the time card yeah this is the same yeah drug dealers, this is the same. Yeah. Drug dealers are lazy is the same response. I get the same level of eye roll as I get when people say, well, women can't be president with their emotions. And you go, Jimmy's cousin pumped milk out of her tit for three and a half hours while driving in the fucking rain and keeping what she pumped in a fucking cooler. She had on the goddamn passenger seat.

Without pulling over. Wow. That's impressive. That's multitasking. That's great. You can do that. You got my vote because I would just say my tits hurt. I'm staying home.

That's what you were saying. You're like, my tits hurt. I'm staying home. I'm not going to fucking drive with this shit. It hurts. I got stuff coming out. I'm going to be out of commission for about, I don't know, six, eight months months i love you jimmy i'm in pain i'm yeah this is what i'm saying so coke dealers are not lazy so uh yeah this is great work yeah shannon was awesome i couldn't

believe that it's like this piece of fucking that's amazing don't tell me that's what you said don't tell me women can't be president as soon as she said that i was like wow so i never want to hear that again man because that was amazing that was fucking awesome not only do i never want you to do it again i never want you to tell me that and she had just had a kid yeah two like three weeks ago oh my god i'd still be like that's still fucked too fucked up to travel. Now I got stuff coming out of my tits. I am never leaving the house ever again.

You know, I didn't ask how it may have been a C-section. Even worse. I know. Cut all her mind. That's my point. Six months. Yeah. I'm not coming out of the house for six months if this happens to me.

She may have C-section driven breast pumping. With a cooler. For three hours. Like a fucking monster. Icing it down. Like a breast pumping. With a cooler. For three hours. Like a fucking monster. Icing it down. Like a rock star. That's incredible. Wow.

Shaking it so it doesn't separate. Amazing. What a mom. That's what I'm talking about. So, yeah. So, apparently they had returned to their home that Saturday. That's Rob and Jennifer returned home that Saturday. That's without dispute because people called them at the house and they were there.

No one saw or heard from them after 6.30, told you about with the babysitter lady, except for Zoe Slava-Baklova. He called at 7.15 like we said, said a male voice answered the phone. He says when they talked to him that he was unable to identify the voice

conclusively but he said it resembled a person he knew as bubba uh-huh oh boy so there's bubba and in iowa who's how many exist well it's a nickname for a guy named terry uh ean hughes yeah e-e-n-h-u-i- boy. E-E is how you start your last name? Really? Get the fuck out of here with that. E-E. No. Double E beginning.

No. Sorry. There shouldn't be a word on earth that starts that way. Listen, asshole. You take Aaron with you and fuck off. Okay? Why does Aaron have two A's? I don't know. And why does Lloyd have two L's?

What is happening? One's enough. It's an L. We know what it is. What do you have to, Lloyd? And Lama's too. Yeah. One L is fine.

Plenty. We get the idea. Jesus Christ. So anyway, nine months after the murders here, they finally, they hone in on Ulrich as the guy. And finally, on December 24th, Christmas Eve, 1985,

authorities get a search warrant and they stake out Ulrich's residence here. They follow him when he leaves his apartment and they arrest him at a gas station, which seems like more drama than needed. He didn't resist arrest. He wasn't armed. He was just like,

oh, all right, sure. Yeah, cuff me. you could have done this in my front yard right you really didn't need to have all this going on but for them it's exciting right you know this is a hey we're gonna round i see what you guys they got dogs on leashes barking he's just like yeah it's cool dude just cuff me up i see what you're making a big show looks great you guys did oh wow this is good cameras gonna be on the news isn't I hope you got cameras. So the town... Take a picture of this wasted fucking taxpayer's money. Look at that helicopter. You know how much fuel for that fucking thing costs?

A lot. Guess who's not running? Let's go for a ride. Yep. Can you take me in that? Cool. It's already out. It's already out.

They're already wasting gas. So the town freaks out about this whole thing because they didn't even know there was coke or anything else in this town people were like oh there's a nice farm town and now they're finding out about fucking you know greeks we know they're greeks no let's say networks of greek drug dealers who are breaking legs all over town this is crazy killing teenage girls in their beds right literally so uh they the said that at that point, you have to consider 84. Right now, Coke is like anybody could do Coke or whatever. But back then, 84 Coke was for fancy people.

Coke was for people in New York and LA and Miami and Dallas down there. They're doing Coke. Twins of people. Rock stars do Coke and actors do Coke. And in this paper because i got a clip from the des moines register here where it says the town quote and this is a fact you can see that it's copied directly they learned that cocaine the substance associated with affluent jet setters the socially chic and the metropolitan affluent has made its

way out of beverly hills man Manhattan, and Aspen to sleepy county seat towns in Iowa, like Forest City, Iowa Falls, and Hampton. Oh, boy. Talk about the dripping. Yeah. It's just dripping thick honey out of that pen. That's disgusting. That's a hell of a writer.

He really- Beverly Hills, Aspen. Aspen. This guy's like, he's a novelist. He's like, I'm doing this for now, but I'm working on a novel. One of these days, get the fuck out of this town. He's like he's a novelist he's like i'm doing this for now but i'm working on a novel these days get the fuck out of this town he's like chevy chase and funny farm it's a casino heist film novel it's pretty good a bunch of squirrels yeah a bunch of squirrels one of these days i'm gonna be able to afford coke oh boy so iowa falls police chief dennis hawkins said

the cocaine trend is changing and it's doing it very rapidly. The caliber of people using it is not just the upper middle class and above like it used to be. Oh, the poll. The poll folks are getting into it now. Workers. It turns out workers at the Winnebago plant in Forest City were the bulk of Johnson's customers. So if you got a Winnebago, that's like an 84 and it's fucked up and you're like, why is none of this wiring connected?

Everyone was on coke. That's why they were all on fucking cocaine from this asshole. You wonder why there's a bunch of recalls. They're all on coke. Either that or they put out more than ever that year and they were fucking great. Sheep is fun. I feel like they were put out faster and worse than ever before. We're done. They're like, this has three has three wheels this is not enough what are you doing every screw is still loose what are you doing it doesn't even have any rivets the steering wheel just comes

right off you have to what is happening you gotta put bulbs in it this is not gonna work at all jesus christ the the after the murders though the factory security manager, Barry Bendixson, he said that the murders, he thinks it frightened a lot of the people at the plant into quitting drugs. They don't do it anymore now. They're good now. He says, quote, they suddenly realized that it was not just a recreational thing, that it could be addictive or, as in this case, life-threatening. This was still in the period where people didn't know coke was really addictive really in the late 70s early 80s that was one of the things that people would say when they had coke it's magic it's amazing and it's not even addictive that was the the like the thing the you know the advertising campaign yeah i mean people

who did it and were into it knew yeah better they knew they couldn't stop because they're fucking addicted. Yeah, but people, that was kind of just the word going around, especially in rural areas where people had less experience with it. The magic part wasn't a lie. It's magic. That's why it's magic. This is literally magic powder.

It's amazing. So, yeah, he's not just... Because the beginning part checked out, the second part, eh, whatever. Whatever, it's fine. It's all right. It's still fucking magic. It's not just because the beginning part checked out the second part. Whatever. It's fine. It's all right. It's still fucking magic. It's still magic.

So this is going to get even weirder here because there's a lot to unpack. Now, the prosecutor says he will not comment on motive until he just comments on motive in the same sentence that he says he's not going to. They say that they could not comment on the motive. Then they say drugs could have played a role in the crime, though. They say that drugs are a central issue in these murder investigations. Then, in the same breath as saying, I can't speculate on a motive, he says, quote, she was probably killed for what she knew, which is a huge speculation. Wow. That didn't even to say she might have been killed because of the drug trade.'s not a big jump to say she's probably killed for what she knew is a very specific

speculation of what you said and that's scarier than drug trade very scary because there's a lot of people in this town that know something about drug trade a lot about everything and they're now all afraid that their wives are going to get knifed out all of them so yeah the the uh prosecutor said that o'rigger was an acquaintance of the couple he uh he moved in this area recently uh he at this point has been separated from his wife who lives somewhere else and uh o'rigger has a child like we mentioned a daughter and he's being held on a hundred thousand dollars bond for two counts of first degreedegree murder. That seems low. Really low for that. That's really low. I mean, he might not have shit, but still, that's...

Still seems like bargain-based... Let's just slap a million on him and fucking call it a day. That's bargain-based for bail for double murder. It's a double murder. One's not even a drug thing. One is literally a teenage girl naked in her bed. Right. You know?

Let's hold it. Can you clear 100 grand? Is anybody going to be like, hey, that's excessive. He should be able to get out. I don't think so. His alibi here, he says that his wife and daughter, he was with his wife and daughter driving to Estherville from Wesley, where they lived at the time of the murders. He said his parents, John and Marion Overger, they said that he was there, too.

He was at their house. They said they got there. They arrived at their house they said they got there uh they arrived at their home between 7 and 7 30 they said the mother she says quote this is marion over here as far as i'm concerned sam is innocent sam was here with us the night this happened uh the night this supposedly happened oh boy now it definitely happened yeah that's not the supposed part this night he supposedly did it would have been a better way to put it, but whatever. And the other point is, she's definitely dead. We know when she's dead.

Yeah, we know that. And the other guy, we know he's dead before her. So we know when it happened. There's nothing supposed here. There's nothing supposed at all. Now, he ends up getting a court-appointed attorney saying he couldn't pay for his own counsel. Winnebago has since fired him. You know, they have a policy against first-degree murder. picky picky hr department sticklers on it sticklers that's it

no tolerance zero tolerance for first degree murder it's weird now at the trial here this is when it really goes crazy because this is all so fucking messy unexpected and just this is one of those things where is small town murder. And it's the small townness of it. And the inexperience in cases like this for everybody involved comes to the surface. And it's a mess. So at the trial and it's you'll see. Wow.

All right. At the trial, they two of O'Rigger's friends testified that o'rigger personally told them that he killed rob johnson oh boy okay he said no he told me i killed rob johnson two people said that two people now on cross-examination both witnesses said that they were uh both drunk and high at the time of the conversation okay that everybody was that ruins everything so yeah that makes the jury go well you can't possibly remember a conversation if you were high because the jury's a bunch of probably older Iowans

who've never been on any drugs at all and they don't know that you still remember shit, but whatever. The other part is if a dude's drunk and high and just starts babbling shit, I don't believe much of it. It could be shit, especially if it's coke talk.

People get out of talking jag on the coke. Sometimes it's super credible. Sometimes they go, yeah. Sometimes they open the vault and sometimes they're just, oh boy, this is all true. Yeah. Sometimes they're like, I went to Mars when I was 12. And you're like, fuck out of here, dude. What are you talking about?

You ride a fucking saddle at a bar up there? I rode a Wyoming bar saddle right on up there. So they also introduced testimony the state does from a guy named Todd Behrens. on up there so they also introduced testimony the state does from a guy named todd barons barons is a high school student that had been staying with o'rigger's parents from may to august of 1985 i have no idea why it doesn't matter i saw a look on your face like what the fuck is he that's fucked up i don't know that's a shit situation yeah something's wrong there with his family he says he testifies that o'rigger told him that he had killed two people in connection with a drug deal while he was in the marines in california so he's saying that that you know i don't know

anything about this but he told me in confidence that you know when he was in the marines he killed two people in connection with a drug deal so they're trying to put this in as it's amazing that they allowed that testimony number one because it's so vague and whatever it's not just vague it's fucking putting it entirely out of the realm of capability of this one and but but you're also putting it in where he killed two people right in a drug thing so that frames it as the time he's done it doesn't none of the other shit matters to the prosecutor just trying to put in these scared old iowans fucking heads that this is a bad, scary drug man like you've seen on the Miami Vice show on the TV. You know what I mean?

That's what they're trying to say. You know, those brown men on TV. Sometimes they're not brown. Oh, see him. So he does not testify. He does present alibi witnesses. They testify that he was at his parents' house the night of the murder. His wife claimed that she and him and their child left home about 6 p.m.

He was there the whole time with them, and they left at 6. They stopped in El Gana for dinner and arrived in Esterville between 7 and 8 o'clock. During their visit, Origer's mother did Sam's taxes for him. It's March, or it's Februaryary which seems early to do taxes um february never too early i i feel like this guy's not like i'm gonna get ahead of my taxes type of guy i don't know you get coke people usually aren't like let's get ahead of my taxes unless they're really on coke and it's four in the morning they're like you know what i'm gonna do my taxes and it's like fucking november this guy's got uh one w2 it doesn't matter yeah you can do it

right away. It's fine. It's super fast. It's super easy. And his father and brother helped install a new carburetor in his car. I guess his car was giving him trouble. And he also gave his mother money, Sam does, to pay some bills for him because his checking account is closed.

So he says, if I give you money, will you put it in your bank account and send a check in to this bill that I have. He's how old? 24. You got a fucking... Get a fucking checking account. And be a man. You have a...

Fucking stop relying on mom, bro. You have a wife and child. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, he's giving her the money to do it. He's not thinking you pay out of your own money, but he's still like, get your own bank account. You're a veteran.

Get the fuck to work. That's what I mean, too. Yeah. There's... Yeah. It's ridiculous. Oh, my God. You're a Marine, sir.

Barely. But four years in the Marines? Yeah. You did something, man. That's something. You're a Marine, sir. Barely. But four years in the Marines, you did something, man. That's something. I don't care. He made it. He didn't fucking accelerate. He wasn't a fucking general. He didn't take advantage of it.

He went through it. He went through it. More than I'd fucking do. More than I did. That's all I got to say. So apparently, she says they stayed in esterville until late the next day so i mean they were there that's it that's what everybody says this whole family says he was with them during prosecutors uh but during the cross-examination of the prosecutor comes up

and doesn't ask about where were you that night he says quote is your husband a nice peaceful man oh boy and she says sometimes uh. Uh-huh. Which is... Oh, God damn it, you bitch. That's an amazing... He's sitting there going, you fuck. Sometimes? Do you want me to come home or not? She is under oath.

Yeah. Sometimes, he says, the prosecutor says, has he ever injured you? Uh-oh. She says, yes. He says, smashed your head through a window once didn't he god damn it i quit i'm going home she says yes so at that point now they've painted a guy who says he killed two people in a drug trade there he's capable of hurting a woman even a woman who's his wife and mother of his child he's capable of putting her head through a fucking glass they're painting a

picture of this guy but not with evidence evidence of actual crime of this crime. It's all right. If you're going to trial, whether if the judge is, if the jury's job is to come up with whether he's a good person or not, fine, but that's not their job. If you're trying to see an asshole,

is his character flawed? Yeah, sure. And the fuck is, but he knows it. The jury finds the defendant an asshole everyone can leave now that doesn't happen hold on that doesn't happen see i got a gavel all murderers are assholes but not all assholes are murderers that's the thing right it's like

a rhombus in a square jimmy you get it yes so what the fuck? Oh, God. So anyway, there's... It's Gangsters and Raiders fame. That's what it is. Chicken and the fucking egg. Oh, God. Now I want to watch Winnebago, man. So bad.

I can't wait. I'm going to find it. Jimmy, you're going to... I'm going to lose my mind. I can't wait. And James, the best part is that you're thinking about how great this thing is. I get to discover it for the first time. I know.

I'm so jealous. Excitement and vigor. Where do you see his rage? You're going to go, oh, God, that's going to be James in 20 years making a video yelling at people and screaming and throwing shit. Unbelievable. The angriest man ever. I can't wait.

So circumstantial evidence here. That's what they're trying to figure out. Now, this is the evidence that connects them to the crime. if we make a list of it, which I've done here. Ulrich knew Rob Johnson. Okay, that's a fact. You have to know who he is to kill him, obviously. Well, you could have shot him in the back of the head unknown, but it helps to know. Rob had been in Ulrich's home earlier that day.

There's that apparently at 10 22 a.m there was a one minute phone call uh from the johnson residence to o'riggers residence okay which to me just says that you're home i'm coming over we gotta talk yeah i'll be over in a little bit cool all right i'm not talking to you on the phone about this that's it so that to me those two go together and it's fine that's there's nothing weird about what's not it was 10 22 p.m right so now we got an issue uh also uh olriger was selling coke that he got from rob so he was a supplier uh now another thing here a woman named crystal Deal. She testifies that she saw a car with four round headlights pull into her driveway between 6 and 9 p.m.

Okay? On that Saturday night, February 9th. The car headed south. She said the car slowed or stopped for a short time on the east side of the road south of her house. Her husband said

the taillights were rectangular. Pontiac Tempest. So it's a pontiac 63 pontiac tempest metallic mint green so uh yeah so uh now think about it brown four round head lights square to rectangular all i can think of from that era is those old beamers from that era well had those but there's several cars that have that, which we'll talk about. It could be, I mean, it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. It could be an old fucking,

it could be a 63 Tempest for Christ's sake. You know what I mean? An old fucking Cadillac. We don't know. It could be anything. From any time period. Now, where Rob's body was found is just south of these people's house.

That's why that's important. They think that might have been the dump car, basically. And they find that Sam Ulricher has a car with four round headlights and rectangular taillights. Now, also, Rob knew these deals that people who saw the car, Rob knew those people. Or not Rob. Sam O'Rigger knew those people, had been to that place many times, was very familiar with the area and knows these people and the body was at the edge of their property not on their property at the edge of which makes if i was going to dump somebody would be in a familiar place but not like on my friend's

property but over on the side it makes sense if you're stupid and coked up yeah so uh also uh gunpowder residue was found on the passenger side of his car. Gunpowder residue on the door and the upholstery passenger side of the car. Okay. But the prosecution's theory is that he was killed in the car. In the car, four shots to the head. That's a mess. All they find is gunpowder residue. No.

No way. No brain matter, no skull, no blood. It's impossible. Not a drop of blood impossible which is completely impossible but that's their theory of it otherwise they're saying he pulled up and then reached over to the passenger seat while the guy was outside and shot him four times in the back of the head from a fucking car below well he's still standing angle would be you would know that angle that's unlikely basically uh there was cash in the johnson house on saturday afternoon uh that he

was building up and sam had cash to give his mom to pay bills that night okay so they're saying that also and later on in the weekend now they're saying that there's uh uh the state says that there's evidence that rob and jennifer were killed at the same time which there's a lot of evidence says they're not they weren't killed at the same time as well and there's also they said uh the prosecution says you can make a fair inference that the person who killed one must have killed them both right maybe or one took one one way and one said i'm going to stay here with you who knows you know what i mean uh this is what uh the state argues this the state talks about they say that jennifer johnson was planning to stay home and do laundry that night.

There was no house key on Rob Johnson's body when it was found. So they're saying maybe they took him, killed him, took his house key, came back, went in the house while she was asleep and killed her. Oh, damn it. That's the theory of that. Also, they say Sam always kept a buck knife in his car, but now they can't find the buck knife. But how many people in rural Iowa have knives in their car? Everybody, probably. Literally everybody. a buck knife in his car but now they can't find the buck knife but how many people in rural iowa have knives in their car everybody probably literally everybody buck knife that's

yeah that's jesus they all have that on their belt probably over there so especially in the 80s uh he also finds that the state argues that uh after killing rob and dumping the body he then they said he took the the house key from his body went back let himself in uh they said he took the house key from his body, went back, let himself in. They said their theory. They either let him either let himself in or was let in by Jennifer. Well, unless they were fucking, which we know they weren't. She would not have let him in while nude or she wouldn't have let him in. Said, OK, cool.

I'm going to go get nude and lay in bed. Right. That wouldn't happen. I'm going to go do laundry. That's a break. Fucking all of it. Yeah. I need to get everything done. Even when I want to wear this tomorrow.

Jesus. Wear it again uh so they said that uh they think that he stabbed her to death maybe using the buck knife that he carried in his car they said that he killed her out of fear she'd be able to connect him to rob's murder if he if she was alive that's the uh that's what they're they're talking about they do a time frame here uh where say 11 a.m. is where he had friends over. Rob did at noon. Rob and Jennifer. That's when Rob and Jennifer came to O'Rigger's house, which would make sense from the phone call at 10 something. And then there someone came over their house at 11 and they went over to his house. So that made perfect sense.

Another friend came over their house at one o'clock. The Johnson's. He's got people coming and going all day. Another friend saw them at 1.30 at their house. Between 4 and 5, another friend named John stopped at the Johnson residence and found Rob and Jennifer eating supper between 4 and 5. So even if that was 5, by the time that phone call came in at 7.30, they're dead. Because they said it wasn't two30, they're dead. Yeah. Because that's,

not, they said it wasn't two hours after they ate that they died. So, that makes sense. You know what I'm saying? So, that phone call was either,

you know, I don't know how that worked out, but something is up with that. They would have been dead by that phone call. Yeah, the time frame is weird. Yeah, that 6.30 time, that seems like they were, don don't come over the house seems like there was some shit going

on something happening by 7 30 they're fucking dead though yeah yeah both of them so uh yeah 5 30 uh another friend saw them between 6 and 9 is the uh that that night is when the car with the four round headlights rectangular taillights are seen by that the deal house six and a half miles from the johnson house uh at 6 30 is when the holly steckle who's the babysitter talked to rob about babysitting and was told not to come to the house and all of that uh 6 40 there's a call from the johnson residence to mason city so they're still alive at 6 40 there uh rob called billy nichols one of his friends there at 7 10 marjorie hall drove by the johnson home and saw four cars in the house and the car and that was all lit up with lights

so 7 10 this is this is right around murder time prime murder time there's four cars there and every light in the house and every light in the house is on so there's people to fuck over at that point 7 15 that's when the allegedly the call was answered by an unidentified man at rob's house which might have been i don't know if i was ordering a murder you maybe call to see if it got done or not how'd it go no cell phone you know what i'm saying who know i'm not accusing anybody but i'm just putting it out there uh 7 30 uh uh one of their friends drove by the johnson and saw two cars there, not four. Now there's two.

Neither of them were Ulrich's car. Okay, that's another thing. They asked her if that car matched. Neither of them matched that. Another one here, 8.30, friend of his who was there earlier in the afternoon, a friend of Rob's, and his girlfriend returned to the Johnson home.

The house is locked up and the lights and tv are on but no one will answer the door no one's home okay that's at 8 30 so it's locked up so we know it's locked here uh so uh at this point a couple of their friends a little after that people coming over every 10 minutes crazy at like eight how did a murder happen that's what i mean there was people stopping by all the time fuck man at like 8 40 another couple friends stopped by their house they say the downstairs light was on and no one was home but one of the people said that they saw a shadow behind the kitchen drape like someone was in there hiding but not coming out so they didn't know if

they were just not wanting to answer the door or what but someone was home oh god that's so creepy creepy as shit oh uh jesus i'm shuddering it's so gross right fucking awful yeah it's it's it's horrible here so then then and then after that they assume sometime in there was the death you got to shake that one off right yeah that's so creepy hiding behind the farmhouse door there's somebody hiding in their house and there's possibly a woman bleeding out right now. Oh, yeah, absolutely. From a heart wound. God, fuck. Now, also, they say that Sam made admissions to two people about shooting Rob. One of these people testified here. This is a Dean Youngworth, totally different person.

He just talks a lot, this Sam. He testified here about statements made by Sam before Rob's body was found. So after Jennifer's body's found, well, they're still looking for Rob, and they don't know what happened. He said, apparently, Sam told this Dean Youngworth that he had a secret, and he had to tell him a secret. Oh, God. And so the prosecutor, this is the Q&A in court, he asked this Dean Youngworth. Oh, my God. He's going to tell me he loves me.

He's going to tell me he's gay. Shit. God was worried about this murder somebody all right we'll still be friends he is pretty handsome handsome man i'm not gonna lie handsome man uh so they said what did the defendant tell you the secret was and he says uh this uh young worth said the secret was the killings in forest city he said rob johnson and Rob Johnson and Jennifer Johnson came up right off the bat, and he looked me straight in the eye and said that he shot Rob. And I was like, I am so glad that we can still be friends. Thank you. Jesus Christ.

I mean, I was kind of looking forward to you jerking me off. I ain't going to lie. I ain't going to lie. You're a pretty man with a sparkle in your eye. And my pucker brush is puckered. This is ready to go. So they said they said uh just tell the jury the conversation tell the jury what sam told you that night

and he said quote this is young worth my next question to sam was uh after he says yeah i shot rob he said rob came in gun crazy and i had no choice dean i had to shoot him uh but what did you do with his body I said and he says well it won't be found for a long time and that's all I can tell you and I says well then who killed Jennifer and he says I don't know so even then he didn't he said

he didn't kill Jennifer to his friend he said he shot Rob said Rob you know got all crazy I had to shoot him no choice but I don't know who the hell killed Jennifer you dumped him on the side of a road man side of the ditch which they didn't find him for a month yeah but that's not a long time no one but if utility people didn't have to work on a line they wouldn't no one would have found him for a long time probably now another one michael hudson he uh he makes testifies about statements made by by sam he says uh they this is the question to him

well that well what started the conversation about Jennifer and Rob Johnson's death? And he says, I believe he brought it up, talking about Sam. They said, what did you do? This is the guy says, he said he went to their house, found the guy outside, and it was a mess. They said, what did Mr. Ulrich tell you that he did? He said he found the man outside and put him out of his misery. That's what he said. The question is, did he tell you how he put him out of his misery?

Yes, he said he shot him. Did he say where he shot him, what part of the body? In the head. So that's that. So it seems like he told a lot of people that he shot Rob Johnson in the fucking head. Yeah. But he's denying killing Jennifer. So they also asked whether Ulrich had ever told other people on the stand.

They just started, ever told you he's killed anybody? And then people that on the stand. They just started. Ever told you he's killed anybody? And then people were like, yeah, shit. Yeah. You know, the people in California. He's talking about killing people all over the place. Then on cross examination, the defense talks to the teenager in the house that said that the California murders and the Marines there. He says he gets further details that said that Uligger told Barron's that he killed two people.

It occurred while he was in the Marines. He shot them for it with a gun and that he was paid for the murders and the murders were related to cocaine. That's gets all this information out of him here. So this is interesting. They're trying to basically that's the defense who's doing this. Their strategy is probably the dumbest legal strategy I've ever heard in my life. But they're like, it's so crazy. It just might work.

It's one of those. Their strategy is to get as many people on there as possible to say that that Sam brags about killing people that he doesn't kill, that he's all talk. That's his thing. So he's going to get people. See how many people he tells he murders people, isn't the right approach you want that is an awful legal that is a bad strategy i'm not an attorney i'm not i know nothing about this shit i know that if my lawyer said this is a strategy i go you're fucking fired get out of here Not even we can work it out. You're an idiot, and I don't want you on my team.

You fucking stupid. We're just going to tell him I admit willy-nilly to murdering people? Are you fucking mocking? Johnny Cochran getting Kato on there. So OJ's just wielding knives all the time, right? Just all the time wielding knives. That's his thing. Willy-nilly, right?

Just especially when Jewish lawyers and white ladies are around. He just wields them, right? That's what happens. Or Jewish waiters. That's what I meant to say. Jewish waiters and blonde ladies around. He just wields them, right? That's what happens. Or Jewish waiters. That's what I meant to say. Jewish waiters and blonde ladies around. He just swings knives around, right? He doesn't mean nothing by it.

This is what he does. We're just going to say that I just admit to murder. What's next? We going to Wyoming to sit on fucking saddlebar stools? Is that your idea? What are you going to do? Lick my pucker brush? What's happening?

We going camping now? We going camping? Is that what i have to do so the defense argues that there's no that uh there's no evidence placing in them in the residence no evidence tying him to the johnson home no fingerprints no evidence of the percentage of cars having round taillights and rectangular headlights the prosecution didn't say that's only two percent of cars and in iowa city there's only 12 or you know far city there's only 12 registered cars by that that would have been helpful yeah if you could narrow it like that well you know how many are here for the yeah these just sheer

population and opportunity to be able to see that fucking car that's what i'm saying but if there's a shitload of them let's talk about that too yeah yeah thanks i mean that means nothing then there's no evidence of the type of knife uh knife used here all, so they don't know exactly what it is to even relate it to this buck knife that doesn't exist anymore. The state's contention was that Rob was shot in Sam's car, and other than gunpowder residue, there's no other evidence that a person was shot in there. No blood, despite a thorough examination, because they really wanted to find that shit. You find blood, it's a Yahtzee. They were looking for it, and they couldn't find it. This police force sucks.

I'm going to go out on a limb and say, yeah, they blow at this point. They really were overwhelmed when they saw this one. Oh, this is never on their heels. What are we going to do now? They're on their fucking heels. Oh, boy. They're the Browns every Sunday. They're playing

they're playing prevent defense here the whole time the whole time oh boy we're ill prepared so the defense argues that they established a strong alibi there's no physical evidence or really any other evidence other than him telling a teenager about some thing and some other drug talk with people that were high and drunk that That's your only evidence. No physical, no barely circumstantial here. So that's their argument. He was 70 miles from Forest City in Estherville with his mom and his whole family. Also, they also get other defense witnesses to testify that they had been, quote, road hunting from Sam's car before. quote road hunting from uh sam's car before where they go when it's cold they'll drive in a car looking for shit and shoot it shoot it out the window which is just fucking lazy yeah lazy

hunting you're gonna hunt and and actually you gotta get out there in the cold fucking do it get out there in the car i'm i'm mad the deer aren't armed to themselves but you at least got to get out in the cold with them for christ's sake jesus make it worth it don't let them die for nothing put on a coat pussy yeah so they said they've been road hunting before and they said that would explain the gunpowder resin residue because uh this gunpowder residue in a car would last up to two years they said in the upholstery because it would get in the upholstery so this could be from quote road hunting a year ago uh. So 1986 in May, finally, more than a year after these murders, the verdict comes in. There's a verdict. Now there's two counts, one for each person, a first degree murder.

And they find him guilty of both. Oh, my Christ. First degree murder, guilty of both. Wow. Which is a little. He has to be stunned. there is no evidence that he went anywhere near jennifer no none none i could see the rob thing because he told someone how he said i met him outside he got a little crazy i had to shoot him there's nothing i could do that you

could put in and say i'm gonna believe that still zero physical evidence there's no evidence of it nothing corroborating other than this other, some teenager who lives in his parents' house. So we don't know what fucking problems he has. A road hunter maybe can hit his friend four times in the head before he hits the ground. I'm saying, I think, yeah, that's true. So it's still, so Rob, Jennifer, they have not a lick of evidence other than whoever killed Rob must have killed Jennifer.

That's literally the only theory. If you're dumping a body, you've got to put it in the vehicle. Yes. The head doesn't fucking keep holding blood. It's going to be something. There's four bullet holes in it. It's going to be something. Holy shit.

Unless he field dressed him like a fucking deer or something. Unless he drip dried him in the yard and then took him over. Hung him from the oak tree. No, this is ridiculous. So he appeals, as you would imagine, the application here. He claims ineffective assistance of counsel at the trial and the appellate levels, prosecutorial misconduct, newly discovered evidence and insufficient evidence, which I think is the big one here. It's the one that matters. Yeah, that's the thing. And they said during this,

they found out that much of the evidence that the defense counsel relied on was the state's investigation. They didn't do anything on their own. They just used discovery on whatever the state found and tried to use that as their defense. Whereas the state's not looking for exculpatory things for you. That's the thing.

They don't want to find exculpatory things for you that's the thing they don't want to find exculpatory things they don't they don't want because that means that they'd have to look at that otherwise they're you know prosecutorial misconduct so they don't want exculpatory things they're looking for guilty things so you can't you have to do your own investigation discovery is great you might find something but otherwise you can't just depend on them you can't just take somebody as a piece of shit and just be like, this piece of shit's probably a murderer, too. That's the thing. Also, they introduce evidence that there's a guy named Michael Mallory of Iowa Falls who's bragged to several people that he's the one who committed the murders.

Oh, boy. There's another bragger here. However, the defense counsel never went to Iowa Falls to conduct an investigation or follow up on this evidence at all. We don't need to. We got the guy that throws his wife through windows. Didn't even make a phone call. That's his, not the prosecutor, his defense counsel. They knew about it? Yeah, because

the prosecutor knew about it. They released it in discovery. The defense counsel found out about it, which you would see that and go, I'm calling that fucking number right now. Here's my shit. Didn't even make a phone call. Just went, well, that's fucking I don't, that's far wow i don't want to go all the way to iowa falls it's like 60 miles i can't go all the way down there oh boy it's far in iowa i thought that was how far the investigation went you should go that far too not him the police go 60 miles he

doesn't also the defense council never conducted an independent investigation to determine whether there's any validity or substance to the todd Barron's he killed people in California story. Because you could look into that and find out if people were murdered around that time, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And, you know, that's something you could you could at least look into. They also found that his counsel provided ineffective representation based on failure to conduct a dependent investigation, lack of independent investigation under the Mallory thing, the guy in Iowa Falls, failure to object to the prosecutor's cross-examination of his wife as well.

This is what they all find. They also find defense counsel could have objected on a hearsay basis and such objection would have been meritorious to all of the, he's told me he killed people shit before. Also, they said uh the state was entitled at that juncture to present evidence in rebuttal of the implication defense council was attempting to make in the cross-examination of todd barons that

overgar was was bragging instead they tried to they played it up yeah like yeah he was bragging right yeah tell us about betty was saying how many other people did he kill that was the defense strategy yeah smart uh oh my god yeah so they said that uh uh the defense council didn't conduct an investigation into the california murders and did not have any invested any information on them to cross-examine anybody with because they didn't do an investigation they didn't know shit the california murder story involved a man and a woman shot uh shot to death over cocaine so this is a you're laying out an exact prior scenario you have to you have to refute that if you're the defense you can't just go he bragged about it didn't he yeah that's right that's not an okay strategy because you're too lazy to look into something because california is far bullshit get your head out of your fucking ass and stop giving lawyers a bad name fuck me

so yeah this is ridiculous here they said uh even if relevant and material the probative value of such evidence would be substantially outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice he should have been objecting to this shit he should have been doing his own investigation at the post-conviction hearing defense counsel indicated the decision to further cross-examine barons on the murder in He should have been objecting to this shit. He should have been doing his own investigation. At the post-conviction hearing, defense counsel indicated the decision to further cross-examine Barron's on the murder in California. So he did brag, right?

That was part of his strategy. He went in and told a group of other people, a panel of legal people, that was my strategy. How someone didn't throw a gavel at him, I have no idea. They should have stripped him of his fucking license to

practice law immediately on the spot and pantsed him at the same time like that murderer on mind hunter when he's like yeah that was my strategy that was my strategy i told him don't go looking into this stationery yeah obviously everybody gets it yeah say duh then they don't have to look yeah that's what's going on here This is the dumbest fucking shit ever. Wow. It's so stupid and ridiculous. So, uh,

yeah, they say that this, uh, that for him to do any of that would have felt fallen under the normal range of professional competency. They said basically bare minimum, bare fucking minimum you could have done and you didn't do it. Defense council also has a duty to make reasonable investigations or make a reasonable decision that makes particular investigations unnecessary.

You can't just say, I don't feel like it. You have to say, I didn't do it because this, this and that. Right. Period. Because I had a strategy. Yeah. Also, the choice to cross-examine an illicit testimony about the California thing was made when no independent investigation had been again uh this was it had been rebutted it's ridiculous also following that two different

inferences could be made uh from that they say that they're saying you could say basically you could either say that what he said he did in california what sam said he did in california was probably true or that he's just a bragger and he has no basis in reality for anything i think if you're a jury and you got him sitting there you go i'm not taking any chances no you know that's what people are going to do uh yeah also the uh the district court here says that this case is a close one but uh baron's testimony on cross-examination creates two types of prejudice uh it allows we explained it obviously here uh so yeah the failure to investigate is a big deal and there's another one too he failed to investigate

in april 1985 lori eagleson or engelson haven't heard of her yet right that's because they didn't investigate her why uh she was interviewed by the prosecution by the prosecution by the criminal investigations unit but not our department of Criminal Investigations. She reported that she overheard a Mary Jo Payne say that she knew who killed the people in Forest City. Mary Jo Payne then would testify that following Origer's arrest, she saw Mike Mallory and Ken Schwebke playing pool at a bar located in Iowa Falls. She heard Schwebke accuse mallory of the murders at that point this is another person with this mike mallory it's another thing according to mary jopain schwebke said quote he thought it was pretty funny to have a white boy take the rap

for what he did and get away with it scot-free that's how that goes and when mary jopain asked mallory whether whether this was true mallory said what's it to you? So, I don't know. Murder. So, yeah. I'd like to know. Yeah. Also, Billy Payne, Mary Jo's brother, testified that on February 9th, 1985, Mallory looked anxious and nervous, told him, Mallory had told Billy Payne that Mallory was going to

Forest City, quote, to take care of business. And that Billy Payne also says that Mallory had told him several days later that Mallory was going to Forest City, quote, to take care of business. And that Billy Payne also says that Mallory had told him several days later that Mallory had, quote, wasted these people up in Forest City. But why? Why what? Why would he do that? Because he works for these drug dealers. Oh, he's their guy.

He's possibly their guy. He works for them. I don't know if he killed them. I'm not going to accuse a person on a podcast of murder who I have no idea about. But alleged. That's the story. So the defense counsel here says that they're saying that they did a complete shit job. Also, the evidence that Ulrich smashed his wife's head through a window, there was no objection to that at all.

And the defense had called no witnesses to testify to O'Rigger's traits of peacefulness. So once they opened that up to the character, they could then bring people in to go, he's a nice guy. And they didn't do that. They have one person who's his wife saying, hey, put my head through a fucking window. And a bunch of people saying, he says he shoots people. That's all they have for this guy. And his mom going, he was with me. And I saw some circle lights. Yeah, and I saw some circle lights yeah and i saw some circle lights that's what i mean so uh uh yeah this is

this is fucking crazy though and prior to the trial the defense council knew about it right from discovery and failed to file a motion to exclude it and then even failed to object to it so what happened? later this will come up at the post conviction relief evidence is introduced to show at the time of the murder the Greeks lived with a Kathy Rainbarger Kathy's it was from Kathy's home that Zoes called the Johnson residence on February 9th 1985

and he said he believed he talked to a guy named Bubba phone records show a number of calls were made from the Rainbarger residence to Smitherman at the time approximate to the Johnson murders. We're saying there was a lot of phone calls going on, a little bit of chatter, a little bit of chatter going on. Yeah. Like on the wires, a very wire, like a wire Iowa edition.

Sure. O'Rigger says at the time of the trial. Also, there's no indication of the magnitude of the relationship between the Smitherman and the Greeks. Because you know why? His lawyer didn't fucking look into it. Nobody did. Nobody did. So this is getting fucking crazy. So here's what ends up happening. Based on the ineffective assistance of counsel, O'Reilly received.

We are convinced O'Reilly did not receive a stare trial, a fair trial. Jennifer Johnson murder conviction overturned. Yeah. Rob's is still there. Oh, no. Because they have evidence of that but they have zero on jennifer and they even have evidence more pointing to other people even more than him so uh his that murder conviction is overturned now yeah 1992 uh he appeals again and he's got even more evidence now uh at this point it's affirmed again but there's a strong

dissension now uh the dissension this just justice says i do not find that gunpowder residue is on the passenger side of the defendant's car to be probative of any material fact connecting the defendant to the crime they said i was wrong here the state's expert witness testified the residue could remain on upholstery gunshot residue for 10 to 15 years wow years on upholstery oh you better keep your guns out of your car i guarantee you he didn't buy that car new no this could have been somebody else's fucking who knows or it could have been him shooting people out the window we don't know there's no evidence though indicating the victim was shot from a vehicle so they're saying that's your either in or for or from. There's no evidence that he was shot in or from a vehicle.

And that's your theory of the case. You got to have a better theory than that. It's better to go. We don't know where he was shot. Then you say, at least if there's a theory, there has to be some evidence that backs up that theory. This one sure doesn't do it. Yeah.

And also the medical examiner said that two back wounds were caused by such close range shots, maybe an inch or two. Yeah, you can't do that. You can't do that from a driver's seat. That's what I mean. Across the car? No. Absolutely not.

There's also no evidence or blood or tissue there. Also, they don't find the fact that there was cash in the Johnson's house the day of the murder. And then Sam had cash later on to be a connection because they all had cocaine. And he had a job. He had a job. And he also had coke, though. He had a thing of of coke he could have went out and sold it instead of giving the money to the johnsons he could have kept it for himself and paid bills who knows uh there's no evidence that the that his sam's money was in the same amount or denominations as the victim's money

uh they said the defendant was a drug dealer and a sum of otherwise unexplained cash would not be unusual right fair enough. Two other factors. They said one quoted saying, they talked about that he shot Rob Johnson in the head. The victim was found shot in the head. I don't find this fact statistically significant. The number of murder victims killed by shots to the head are many. There is nothing significant about the type of murder that the defendant's statement is significantly corroborated

by someone saying he said he shot him in the head. Because that's what most, yeah. That's a pretty good guess. Good guess, exactly. Also, they said that it is quoted saying that Johnson's body wouldn't be found for some time. It was found lying in a ditch, and it was not found until a month later. He said it's more significant, but not significant enough to corroborate a murder right you know what i mean uh so he says uh that he would reverse the conviction uh for also rob yeah but anyway that goes on that's affirmed stays in jail for a minute then

he gets a new attorney a guy named david grind yeah okay he's gonna grind it out this guy uh is like a magistrate now he He's like a big shot now. He's a sixth judicial district magistrate now. That sounds impressive. He's a judge. Before this, he was a public defender. And he said he never wanted to be a prosecutor. He said that this case was the case that every criminal lawyer has at one time or another

that fuels their passion for right or wrong. This is the case that makes people want to become defense attorneys you want to be a lawyer yeah he said this is when one way or the other this thing makes me want to prosecute too and makes me want to get the right guy something he said this is when you get to use the law in the purest form to free the innocent which is yeah if you're you know an idealistic person uh now uh he ends up he says quote i was in lynn county at the time and i was contacted about the case and i found out the man sam's parents took care of my grandparents yard in esterville we had a connection and this was just a travesty of justice i took the case pro bono wow this guy

takes the case pro bono and he ends up getting the rob conviction thrown out as well and he gets uh and sam has to plea basically they get him to plea to a lesser crime that has nothing to do with all this shit like we need to save face all right type of thing and he's given a sentence of you sir may fuck off time sir back home time sir oh yeah they he's let go yeah uh um and maybe the charges he had to plea to was while he was in jail he was uh charged with forgery okay uh sam we're all like yeah we don't want sam to go down for a murder he didn't commit he's not a good guy but you don't want him to go down for this if he kills someone put him away but whatever uh forgery in prison uh there uh which it didn't matter because just convict him for the

right thing at that point he was in prison for life so they didn't it didn't really matter uh they gave him two suspended blah blah blah and then also somehow in prison in 1990 he's charged with receiving uh receiving and transporting and possessing a firearm by a felon fuck in fucking prison what are you doing, man? I don't know. That gets him an extra five years tacked on his sentence, which is insane, but it doesn't matter because he's released in the early 90s.

In like 93, December 15th, 1994, Sam Overger gets married to a woman named Nicole. They end up having five children together, including a junior. I thought you were about to say he got murdered. No, no. Including a junior. Of course.

Obviously. They said he's all into the church and all that shit later on. August 16th, 2013, Sam dies at home at age 51. Jesus. Don't know what happened. Heart attack or something. I don't know. Stress of the shit life he lived?

Stress of being in prison. Good lord. Who the hell knows here. Yeah, that's the thing tough life man really tough life uh so he is now dead that he had been moved he moved to colorado he was living in loveland colorado for a long time for the last few years his wife and kids yeah yeah i mean he moved there from esterville i think he just had to get out of the area yeah i'd want to get the fuck out of there too bye moving out of here to somewhere with hills anywhere else yeah i don't care i'll go to i'll go to indiana anywhere that's not flat and they haven't convicted me of murder one of those to any of these two colorado's both sold done uh so bradley rob johnson here uh he is buried at the oakland cemetery in forest

city in winnebago county and j And Jennifer's buried right next to him. They share a tombstone together. Sad as fuck, man. No one else has ever been tried or convicted of their murder. God damn you. Like it never happened. What? Like it never fucking happened.

Awful. Awful, right? A naked teenager stabbed to death. A naked teenager stabbed in her own bed in a rural farmhouse in the middle of the country. And we got nothing. Got nothing. Oh my God. What are you going to do? We had something. I'm scared the middle of the country. And we got nothing. Got nothing. Oh, my God. We had something.

I'm scared to death of Mallory. I'll tell you that right now. Oh, yeah. Who knows, man? It's horrifying. The Greeks and Mallory. There's so much here that could be said. I'm never eating baklava again.

Please don't. I'll never wear a balaclava. Well, you're not going to be able to not wear that, Jimmy. Let's be honest here. Jesus Christ. What's next? What's next? You're not going to wear your wooden clogs from Amsterdam? Is that what you're going going to be able to not wear that, Jimmy. Let's be honest here. Jesus Christ. What's next? What's next? You're not going to wear your wooden clogs from Amsterdam?

Is that what you're going to do? Come on. You're not going to be able to resist it. So, good Lord. That is Forest City, Iowa. That is one of the most crazy cases. I think we can say that's a top ten crazy case. It's pretty wild.

It's interesting and weird. We never do unsolved. No. Because this was solved never do unsolved no because this was solved and that's what i mean this is what happens it had closure and then it didn't unclosure and then unclosure disclosure yeah but this is small town shit this is what i mean this is a small town unprepared that's a police force that was so overwhelmed police force a defense a public defender's office that's completely has no idea what the fuck they're doing. Nowhere with all to fix. What are we going to do?

It's a mess over there. Absolutely. And if you've gleaned nothing else from that, it is to watch Winnebago May because you'll love it. I can't wait. That's going to be the best. But if you enjoyed that show, I know how you can. I thought of it.

How you can tell us by all you have to do. Get on Apple podcast, that purple icon. Give us five stars. Just say something. It doesn't matter what you say. You don't have to type something. It's annoying, but this took a long time to put together. It's much easier to just say, these guys made me do this.

James had to get through pucker berries. Yeah, at three in the morning, which is a tough thing when you're stoned. So you're laughing real hard. So yes, do that. Give us a review. It really helps. Five stars would be wonderful. Helps drive you up the charts.

We don't know why. Go to shutupandgivememurder.com to get all of your stuff. So much new merchandise on there. All sorts of new items and new designs and everything on there. All sorts of cool stuff. Also, you can get tickets to live shows, which there are no Small Town Murder live shows with tickets available right now. They're all sold out, but we will be announcing a huge slate of shows

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listen twice and that man still likes us and he likes us and tweets at us and he doesn't care so i mean that's the thing we can make someone we make fun of for five hours over the course of two episodes like us somehow so whatever listen to the damn show and if you want to find out when that new slate of small town murder live shows is dropping for 2020, you can do that very easily. Get on our social media because that's where we're going to announce it first always. And get on there. It'll really help out you.

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oh boy, I think we booked too small of a venue because it sold out in a fucking day. Pittsburgh was like 11 minutes. Yeah, it was crazy. Pittsburgh, St. Louis, a bunch of those. Anything that's like under 400 seats sells insanely fast. So yeah, do that. Get on there.

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That's worth five bucks or two bucks or a buck or ten cents or whatever the fuck. Who cares? It doesn't matter. It's the fact that you go out of your way to make an effort to do something that you don't have to do just because you enjoy the show. So we appreciate that so much.

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Shut up and give me names of producers. Fantastic. Hit me with them, Jimmy. This week's executive producers are Carol Fe with them jimmy this week's executive producers are carol feely who don't she's so fucking sweet of her she donated and then and then went over to patreon and jumped in there also wow thank you you're a sweetheart thank you carol uh mikey giovanni garcia uh winalia no will nalia uh merced that's her name okay i'm never gonna get that. And she donates quite free.

Thank you so much. Thank you so much. Nikki Ritterhoff. She's up in Chicago. Thank you, Nikki. And Tanya Volanek. You guys all have a difficult, except for Carol, everybody's name makes me stumble. And our other producers this week are Thomas Smith, Mike Oxmall, Ann with no last name,

Smith, Mike Oxmal, Anne with no last name, Kobe Nykerk, Travis Hall, Alexandra Poderaki, Anthony Cannella, Eric Rodriguez, Lindsay Sullivan, Ashley Veo, Lucas Malik, Michael Bartolomeo, John Lash, he donated twice, thank you, John. Thank you, John. Bartolomeo, John Lash. He donated twice. Thank you, John. Thank you, John. Aspen Cloud, Alexander Calder, Cara Barcroft, William Wheat, Justin Anderson, James Marder, Kelly Rappelagoggle, Jesse Strickland, Jesse Hartman, Laura Williams, Tara Miller, Michael

Stull, Josh Brooks, and Mike's donated a bunch of times. He's coming to the show in Texas. I forget which one. Rebecca Schaefer, Taylor Hahn, Cheyenne, Anthony Colon, Reagan Shalkley, Megan Long, Ray Kuhn, Peyton Meadows, Liz Leslie, Clifton Brown, Ryan Sim, Kayla Peel, Zach Keaton, Gary Howard, Jessica Cat, or Jessie Cat. I think it's Jessica Cat. Yeah. Thank you.

Rebecca Oxford, Joanne Ahern, Jennifer Flores, Brian Keithley, Ryan Persad, no, Blake Jacobs. Jake Blake-ubs or Blake Jacobs? It's the same. One of those two. Jessica Schaefer, Heather White, Benjamin Lane, Mark Foster, Naima Shea, Alison Abernathy, Charlene Colvert, Jude Kendall, Angela Pena, Evie Hansen, Cameron Mitchell, James Hawkins, Taylor Nicole, Justin... Cameron Mitchell? Yep. Like the actor? I think so. That's amazing. Is there a Cameron Mitchell, James Hawkins. Yes. Taylor, Nicole, Justin. Cameron Mitchell? Yep. Like the actor? I think so. That's amazing.

Is there a Cameron Mitchell actor? Yeah, he's like the B-movie king, and he's, never mind, it's hilarious. It's not him. No, he's dead, so it's definitely not him. Well, then, yeah, for sure not him. That's great, though, that they share a name. Justin Miller, I said that. Elizabeth Dibble, Nat Hulsling. Hul Singh.

Taylor. We've had a deluge of Nicoles and Taylors. Taylor Codwallader. Mark Gooding. Jocelyn Cooksey. Jordan Bennett. Thank you, Jordan. Teague James. Kay Deke. Yes. No. Peake. Is that a Peake? Kay Peake, I

think. Ramon Saucedo. Susan Keller. Robin Anderson. Carl Bittner, Cara Joseph, David Karius, Chloe Carlson, Martha with no last name, Jim Crow, not that one, Jacqueline Donaldson, O.V. Films. Jesus Christ. Chris D'Aolini, I think. I think so. Emily Wilkins, Aaron with no last name. Adam Smart. Sarah Nicole. Kai Sakura or Key.

Mary Fouse or Foose. I think it's Fouse. I think I was right. Yeah. Madison Court. Courtier. Nick G. Roosh.

Roosh. Rush Rosenberger. I think. Roosh. Rosen. Militia. No. Milita.

Milita. I'm so sorry. Militia. Day Morrow bonnie milne uh sharon hill adam shawick shawisk uh max mathias the the galagos family sam lang rebecca kaiser rice Charlotte Galway, Kyrie Campbell, Jacob Scrabba, Alyssa Camacho, Allison Heimer, Brittany Mead, Richard Radcliffe, Kaylin Peaston, Dakota Clever, Lana Nikitin, Derek Romer, Molly Miles, Lauren Vargas, Mike De mike de grief uh the three geo no the what is that damn it the three geo the third the third arc archangel is that what i wrote the 360 i can't help you with that ian bourne jacqueline m uh ashley scarlett drew badger reed whaley uh jordan lee or leah uh jean Jeanette Brown, Jessica Hubber, and all of our Patreon supporters.

You guys make this show possible and make our lives worth living. Thank you. Thank you, everybody. From the bottom of our hearts, we are so excited. It's unbelievable. Thank you. We're just, we're proud and we're humbled and thank you so much for every goddamn thing you do for us.

What if somebody wanted to thank you or humble you? How could they do it you find me at wisman sucks w-h-i-s-m-a-n sucks over on twitter instagram snapchat and it's it's really just uh it's that i think that's the word is it's humbling and it's fucking it's really really mind-blowing and incredible that you guys give a shit that much about us to not just send send a or support the show, but just listening and telling six friends or telling five friends. And what they do when they follow us and shit. It's amazing.

If someone has a crossword to say to us, they come out swinging. Oh, my God. Oh, hell no. And they come out swinging, people taking their shoes off. It's fucking awesome. The things you guys send us in the mail are insane, too. Everything that you guys do for us is deeply appreciated. And I assure you, none of it is taken for granted.

Where can they find you? You can find me at Jimmy P is funny or just copy and paste my name from the show description and find me that way. It'd be a lot easier than trying to spell it yourself. But with that said, I mean, other than watch Winnebago, man, I think we've covered it this episode. I'm going to go do that. You were going to go home right now and do that. and then we got to get on planes and go to houston see everybody in houston can't wait until next week everybody it's been our pleasure Hey, Prime members, you can listen to Small Town Murder early and ad-free on Amazon Music. Download the Amazon Music app today.

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