Small Town Murder - #371 - Dear Murder Diary... - Muscatine, Iowa

Episode Date: March 23, 2023

This week, in Muscatine, Iowa, a man's unhinged, and horribly graphic murder fantasies are discovered in a notebook, making him the prime suspect in what police originally believed to be a murder/suicide of two women, who seemed to be romantic rivals for the man's affections. The whole thing is a mysterious head scratcher, complete with a suicide note, that might not be a suicide note, and a blindfolded "suicide" that sends police scrambling for a murder suspect. Was it a murder/suicide between romantic rivals? Or, a very cold blooded plot? The whole thing is a mess of nepotism, and disaster!!Along the way, we find out that not all scarecrows are created equally, that two women don't usually fight over one loser, and if you want to have detailed murder fantasies... maybe keep them off paper!!Hosted by James Pietragallo and Jimmie WhismanNew episodes every Thursday!Donate at: patreon.com/crimeinsports or go to paypal.com and use our email: [e-mail] to shutupandgivememurder.com for all things Small Town Murder & Crime In Sports!Follow us on...twitter.com/@murdersmallfacebook.com/smalltownpodinstagram.com/smalltownmurderAlso, check out James & Jimmie's other show, Crime In Sports! On Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, Wondery, Wondery+, 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.

Wondery Plus subscribers can listen to Small Town Murder early and ad-free right now. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. 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 Muscatine, Iowa, when two people are found murdered on the same morning, it becomes a huge mystery. Was it a murder-suicide motivated by jealousy or a dark, twisted plot

set up to make it look that way. Welcome to Small Town Murder. Hello, everybody, and welcome back to Small Town Murder. Yay! Oh, yay indeed, Jimmy. Yay indeed. My name is James Petrigalloallo i'm here with my co-host i'm jimmy wissman thank you folks so much for joining us on a crazy man this one is twisted too i can't wait iowa not gonna let us down it's interesting we'll get to it though i always is they come hard iowa on the murder they really do that didn't sound right they come hard on murder i just said that. Right in the cervix. Wow.

Unbelievable. So we'll get to that quickly. First, head over to shutupandgivememurder.com. You definitely want to get your tickets for live shows. Holy hell, the whole year's available, 2023, and tons of them are selling out fast. Yeah, they are. Boston in November's already sold out. Salt Lake's sold out.

San Diego's almost there. Denver's almost there. Minneapolis is almost sold out. Salt Lake is sold out. San Diego is almost there. Denver is almost there. Minneapolis is almost sold out. Get all these tickets. Chicago also. Get your tickets to that. Still a few for Portland and Seattle tonight. Portland and Seattle.

Yes, if you're listening to this when it comes out, we are there the 23rd, 24th in Seattle. Two shows. And then we are in Portland on the 25th for two shows on one night. So get there for that. Also the 5th in Detroit, the 25th for two shows on one night. So get there for that. Also the 5th in Detroit, the 6th in Pittsburgh of May. Get there for those. And then the whole rest of the year. We can't wait.

And they're moving. April 20th, virtual live show, 420 show. I am going to get Jimmy stoned and tell him a murder story. And he's going to giggle until his head explodes. Wait until you see the different apparatus I have for him to partake in. What? Oh, it's going to be, Jimmy, you have no idea what you're in for. It's going to be amazing. I am not putting on a helmet.

It's not a helmet. It's all sorts of other stuff. It's going to be a lot of fun. Check all that out. ShutUpAndGiveMeMurder.com You can get that virtual live show. You can watch it or watch it again or whenever for a week after the 20th also. So get your tickets right now. Shut up and give me murder.com.

Also, you certainly want to head over to Patreon for patreon.com slash crime in sports and get all the bonus materials. That's right. We got four years worth of bonus episodes on there. Tons of stuff to binge on. Anybody $5 a month or above. You get all of that. And every other week you get two new episodes. Great. One sports one small town murder you get access to it all this week which you're going to get for crime and sports we're going to talk about the worst beginning of

a professional sports franchise in history the oh and 26 tampa bay buccaneers and how that happened why their uniforms look like a creamsicle why is there a man winking at me from the helmet what's going on there? They may have been 0-26, James, but they were 26-0 in games they lost. That's every time. Every time. And then for Small Town Murder, a very requested one. We're going to talk about Jodi Arias and find some crazy stuff to talk about there because, man, was that a wild case. And we were both in Phoenix for it, and I've read a few books on it, and there's a lot to talk about with Jodi Arias.

So we'll talk all about her. Yeah, Jimmy loves Jodi Arias. So a lot of fun unless you're going to take a shower. Then you're going to lock that door. The bathroom door, not just the shower. That's what I mean, bathroom doors I'm talking about. Close that room off. It's a bad bitch.

Patreon.com slash Crime and Sports is where you get all of that. And you'll get a shout out at the end of the show where Jimmy will mispronounce your name while he would love so much to get it correct. That said, disclaimer, this is a comedy show. We're comedians. That doesn't mean that the story isn't real. Unfortunately, every detail of the story is real and meticulously researched and everything like that. But jokes will be made here and there as well. They are. We're comedians. It's going to happen. We're going to make jokes

about small towns and you're going to take it like a roast and be an adult about it. And we're going to make jokes if a police force messes up something for five years, let some murderer walk free. We'll make fun of that. We'll make fun of murderers because that's the only recourse we have as comedians. But what we do not

do, what we go out of our way not to do is we don't make fun of the victims or the victims' families. Why, James? Because we're assholes, but we're not scumbags. There it is. And that's how that goes. If that sounds good to you, holy hell do we have a story for you. And I think you'll definitely want to sit back. Yeah.

You know what I mean? Where are you? Getting ice cream with your kid? You getting a nice cone right now? A springtime cone? Well, I want you to look your kid right in the eye like you're doing something very sweet. Wipe the ice cream from their cheek. Then slap it off.

Slap that ice cream right off the cone. Stand up. Arms to the air. And shout, shut up and give me murder. Let's do this, Jimmy. What do you say? Let's go on a trip, shall we? Okay.

We are going to Iowa today. Yes, we're going to corn country indeed. We're going to Muscatine, Iowa, which, like we said, sounds like a drink order for an older gentleman. Or an apparatus that you put a bitter drink in. Something, yeah. Put it in the muscatine. I want it in there.

That'll be much tastier. Carry it around in my muscatine. This is in eastern Iowa, which is right on the Illinois border, just the river separating Iowa from Illinois. So it's right there in eastern central Illinois, in terms of north-s's central yeah um it's about two and a half hours to des moines about an hour and ten to cedar rapids two hours and 12 minutes to albia illinois which was our last illinois episode which was actually or iowa i

said illinois which was actually very wild beer sex and jealousy was the name of that so that tells you a lot this is in muscatine county of course oh town and the county that was the name of that, so that tells you a lot. This is in Muscatine County, of course. Oh, town and the county. That's the name of it all. Area code 563. Motto of this town, the Pearl of the Mississippi. I'll bet it is. Or the Pearl City.

Oh. So, yeah, a lot of pearl stuff. There are no pearls there, are there? Well, we'll talk about it. There's buttons that were made that look like pearls that were made for muscles so yeah that's that's what they made there they're going with muscle pearls the muscle pearl well they're not really pearls they just it's the shell it's interesting stuff we'll talk about this here uh mark twain lived in the city briefly during the summer of 1855 while working at the local newspaper, the Muscatine Journal. That's interesting.

His brother was a partial owner of it. So there you go. Here's what he said about Muscatine, Mark Twain. I love when Mark Twain has quotes about shit because he's like a comic, so he roasts everything and it's hilarious. He said, and I remember Muscatine still more pleasantly for its summer sunsets. I have never seen any on either side of the ocean that equaled them. They used the broad, smooth river as a canvas and painted it on every imaginable dream of color, from the mottled daintiness and delicacies of the opal,

all the way up through cumulative intensities to blinding purple and crimson conflagrations which were enchanting to the eye but sharply tried it at the same time all the upper mississippi region has these extraordinary sunsets as a familiar spectacle it is the true sunset land i'm sure no other country can show so good a right to the name the sunrises are also said to be exceedingly fine i do not not know. Oh, he saw one sunset. You know, he's a late night guy is what he's saying. He doesn't get up for sunsets. He's like, I don't fucking get up that early.

But I hear they're nice. I heard tell of some nice ones. Yeah, that whole paragraph was to joke about how he doesn't get up early. That's not bad. Yeah, that's well, 1800s to you. Very Norm MacDonald. You could really go a long way around to get to something in the 1800s. There wasn't exactly, you know, it wasn't like a YouTube or a thing where you're like, oh, 10 seconds.

Click it off. You had you had a while. So you better sit tight. So buttons were a big thing here in 1884. J.F. Beppel, B-O-E-P-P-L-E, Beppel, Beeple, either one, a German immigrant, he founded a pearl button company. And he produced buttons that look like pearls by a machine punching them from freshwater mussel shells. So it's the shells. It's the inside of the shells have that kind of pearly.

Yeah, the purple shell, yeah. And, yeah, this was a big deal apparently and then in 1915 weber and son's button company inc was the world's largest producer of fancy freshwater pearl buttons and they were there too and muscatine became known as the pearl button capital of the world well which we don't make the shirt but we'll send you we'll send you the button yeah they're like basf we don't make the shirt that you're wearing we make the buttons on your shirt better so they had uh they're still manufacturing buttons in 2004 they celebrated their hundred uh hundredth anniversary of button making so if you have a fancy button that looks like a pearl it's from this town probably more than

likely but is it it's got to be buttons right not not snaps is it do you think it's a snap it's probably pearl snaps you could probably make buttons out of them too fancy buttons i don't think we buy the type of shirts that have pearl buttons right now i'm wearing a hoodie with frayed sleeves and you're wearing a spud web t-shirt like we don't i don't think this is for us i think we could sit here all night and we're not gonna get it right. But I wonder, are they selling them to Wrangler for their pearl snaps? Are they broad-stroking what a button is?

I think they're fancy. Or are they just doing a button? I think this is for a lady's blouse that's got a big button. Something from fucking Paris? Yeah, yeah. Something, a shirt you need cufflinks for. Some fine shit. Yeah.

How many shirts do you have that need cufflinks? Zero. Thank you. Yeah. So this isn't for us. Do you want to know what I own? This isn't for us. I own one.

I own one pair of cufflinks and zero shirts I can put them in. I own one pair and I only got it because my grandmother died last year. If I didn't, that's it. You got a French cuff. And I didn't even know what it was. I bought a shirt and it turned out to be, I was like, oh, fuck, now I got to buy cufflinks? I can't fasten these. I didn't know where to buy cufflinks.

I didn't know what to do. So that was just another issue that I had. Great, I got a useless shirt. It took my grandmother dying for me to be anywhere near this. I didn't even have a suit before that. So, all right, let's get to reviews of this town yeah oh by the way muscatine's also known as the watermelon capital of the world well the south is gonna have something to say about that it's apparently no they have a lot of water i mean

iowa grows they have soil there i mean shit yeah they can grow anything in iowa it's all farms the whole goddamn place is farms i didn't know it was warm enough for watermelons long enough right besides that one baseball field it's all farms okay that's it so five stars here's the first review here five stars muscatine has many things to offer anyone who comes to visit okay right away they're laying it down in broad strokes go Recently, the city of Muscatine added a new hotel called the Merrill. Well, it's not the city that did it. Someone opened a hotel there. Right? The city is not like, we need a hotel.

They're giving broad credit to everybody involved in approving it. The whole council. The Merrill is perfectly placed on the newly renovated River Drive overlooking the Mississippi River. In addition to the hotel being directly downtown, you are surrounded by the many family-owned shops and restaurants located up and around 2nd Street to visit on a stay in Muscatine. There are always things to do in Muscatine, such as painting classes at Booney's on the Avenue. Okay. Oh, boy. Karaoke on Wednesday nights at Mississippi Brew.

Yes. And they spell Mississippi wrong on purpose. Or Mississippi, not Mississippi. They say it Mississippi Brew. A Muscatine crafted beer from Contrary and Activities at Weed Park. What? A muscatine-crafted beer from Contrary and Activities at Weed Park. I don't know what that means.

I feel like. Contrary must be a brewery, right? I don't know. I feel like this is either that or it's speak to text and they're fucking it all up. These are just a few things to do on a visit to Muscatine, Iowa. Well, none of those sound good, so I'm moving on to four stars. You didn't sell me on it, but thanks. Four stars.

Very small, but a character-filled town. Does that mean people have character, or there's a bunch of characters walking around? Which one? I'm worried about the characters. That's what I'm saying. Many well-decorated, funded, and organized boutiques boutiques cafes and family community events beautiful nighttime slash daytime scenery of the river and light up bridge good for boating fishing floating and sledding well it's a river so it's going to be good for what they do boating

and floating and fishing all the things you do there's to do small town vibe with smaller communities in contact about 20 minutes away. Close approximation adds to high school experience and business relationships. I don't understand any of these people. I don't even know what they're saying. That's the thing. Do you know what they're even talking about? It sounds like a bunch of people that just like boating and floating and drinking.

I guess. That's a good day. That's a nice Sunday. That's fine. If that's what they're saying, great. But they could make it clear more clear uh three stars i haven't had to deal with much issues of crime in the police however we did have several instances with our 17 year old daughter that the police did nothing about what did she do i'd say i want to know more about that this is that sounds like your mistake it's no shit we we didn't keep an eye on our kids at all.

The weird part is it's so they're either overly detailed telling us when karaoke night is, literally what night it's on, or completely vague of several instances that the police did nothing about. Like someone help me here. Three stars. Not always noticeable, but always on my mind what what the fuck does that mean is that a willie nelson lyric what's happening what are you people doing to me that feels like an investigator put that out there looking for the serial killer i'll put the information on on niche and you respond i'm getting angry right now like these reviews are

making me physically angry i don't like that that is somebody's utilizing that as craigslist misconnections that's what i mean but always on my mind dot dot not dot dot dot not a full ellipses not a period yeah you'll know by the bad pronunciation or the bad this is the bad punctuation that it's me it's me you'll know here's two stars i have lived in muscatine all my life and it has only gotten worse as time passes that's not good there's nowhere to shop in this town so if you want clothes you'll have to go to davenport or iowa city which are both an hour away that sounds great you got amazon the roads are not good and will do damage to your car if you don't avoid potholes.

That's a lot of places in the Midwest. Michigan is, like we said, you might as well. Oh, boy. Turn your car in. Just turn it in, yeah. Ride the bus, friend. Or get a monster truck to go over these things. The schools are okay.

They're not anything special, but they're not the worst. Muscatine does not have a community college or does have a community college, which is nice, and there's lots of places to be employed at. But none of them sell clothes, apparently. So that's a problem. You got buttons. The next one is one star. And what is it? I'm going to hold on.

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine. Nine. And then that's ten. So ten. One, two, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9. 9. And then that's 10. So 10. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. This is 58 times written let's go with an exclamation point. What? 58 times let's go.

We wrote let's go 58 times. Let's go space exclamation point. No space. New let's go. Okay. So I space new let's go okay so i don't know somebody's in traffic let's go let's go and their phone just they happen to be reviewing something earlier there's also racial slurs in it and shit what is this you jesus uh he's there's apparently an asian woman he's not happy with is what i'm gathering from the from all these let's go from the uh other stuff that's in there i believe that's what that is population of this town 23 579 a few more females and males that's normal median age is a

little bit low it's 35.9 nothing crazy a couple more married people than normal here, you know, the way a small town in the Midwest usually is. A race of this town, 73.9% white, 3.4% black, 1.2% Asian, 19.4% Hispanic. So that's a lot for Iowa, I guess. Is it? No? I'd have to assume. Seems high for Iowa. I don't know.

I don't know how that works. Religion in this town, 41.4% religious, so below the national average. And they're spread around. This is Iowa, so you're going to get some Catholics, a Lutheran, some Methodists here and there, Presbyterians. They're pretty easygoing there in Iowa. 0.0% Jewish, though. No Jewish people there. We do have the last election in Muscatine County here.

45.3% of the people voted Democratic, 52.4% voted Republican, and 2.3% Independent. So that worked. Median household income here is $44,535 which is $10,000 below the national average but the cost of living is lower too. $100,000 is average here at $75,000. Not bad. Housing is the lowest

of all. Median home cost here $163,800 and there is not a lot of expensive real estate here at all. Oh, that's wonderful wonderful and if we've convinced you damn it that you need buttons and pearls and whatever else goes on here muscatine cups and karaoke on wednesday nights at the mississippi bar let's go let's go it's the muscatine iowa real estate report Let's go.

The average two-bedroom rental here goes for about $910 a month, so below the national average. Here is I don't know what this completely gutted on the inside. It's a shell. Literally a shell. Ready to start over. Nothing. It's an older house and it's weird. Here on the inside. It's a shell. Literally a shell. Ready to start over. Nothing. It's an older house and it's weird.

Here's the listing. This duplex has been gutted down to the studs and is ready for someone to come in and recreate. That's what you'd have to do is recreate. The demo's started. The home is solid and could easily be a single family home. Ready to finish any way you

desire. that would be great that's great unless you'd like to move in and live somewhere then it's not so great because there's nothing there's not even a floor yeah but if it's a duplex and you it's already opened you can just fucking do whatever you want 40 000 bucks too it's cheap wow so i mean you'll have the money to do other things with it here's's a four bedroom, two bath 2140 square foot house. So good size family house. It's really it looks like shit on the outside.

Yeah, the outside's just dumpy looking. Could use a paint job. Inside is very average. There's no light coming into this place. It feels a little like a dungeon, but it's not my favorite house, but it's a decent house and for the price it's not bad 144 900 bucks for that fantastic so not bad now here's the most expensive listing in town

okay five bedroom three bath 2063 square foot it's a big rectangular ugly house it looks it it almost looks like there's like a like a like a, maybe like a lodge restaurant on the bottom floor and like, you know, like a hostel housing up top or something. Oh, it's a two-story too? Yeah, it's a big rectangular two-story. It's very ugly. $219,500 for that. That's a pretty good deal for a 5'3". That's the most expensive house in town.

So that's your The High Roller. Things to do here.3. That's the most expensive house in town, so that's your high roller. Things to do here. Oh, here's some. The Muscatine Scarecrow Festival. Yeah. They really like farming here. They love it. They have a petting zoo and crafts and all sorts of horse shit.

Is the idea of a scarecrow festival to make it the scariest you can or the most like uh traditional do you think there's three categories as a matter of fact he's getting that the three categories and the favorite scarecrow are traditional whimsical and awareness i don't know what the fuck that is this is my autism scarecrow that's what i'm gonna make for my here's my whimsical one it's got fairy wings that's got fairy wings traditional is you, to scare actual crows away. And then awareness is like, you know, this is my aid scarecrow that I made. What the hell is that? Be aware of it.

There are a bunch of names on it. I didn't need much hay. It was easy. It's got seven tooth picks. Super easy. So. it's got seven tooth fix super easy so um sorry

masses don't scare this one no can't scare me not flammable at all not flammable very little hay we call him kindling it's very little poor guy because yeah sometimes yeah not a lot of hay no feel a lot better now for that one good i'm glad that you got that out uh entertainment here yeah uh lyle beaver will be here oh boy who the fuck it sounds like a cartoon beaver that plays songs doesn't it that's what it sounds like or a guy that just makes a lot of sexual innuendo jokes in his music yeah i'm lyle beaver wink wink you know what i mean and then finally

gunny the clown will be there so you can't miss gunny the clown's fucking demand performance um i have no idea a terrible person he's a clown so awful people um here to scare children muscatine county fair you need to go to yeah as well obviously here uh take a walk through the 4-h livestock barns and project sheds yeah watch some of the live judging and re-experience the fun you remember as a kid remember all that fun as a kid of watching fords to work on the farm cows remember how fun that was um then there's also a demolition derby that's fun oh yeah midway carnival rides and games which you shouldn't get on because crackheads are operating them uh trailer races trailer races what is that i think it's pretty self-explanatory i think but like how do you do

it it's a trailer so it's got no i think you push it no motor you push it maybe but you know i'm interested i want to see it. I want to see who gets hurt in this. The guy with 14 kids wins every time. He pushes it much faster. How is it not safe? Then there's also musical entertainment, which they don't tell you who, except for Rodney Atkins will be there. Oh!

Is that a guy you know? He's great! Oh, he's so funny. He'll be there. He's there, baby. He's got a song about his penis he's got songs about boobs i like him he is squished right in between the ecipa tractor pole and the demolition derby and that's a great day and the trailer right no no the different days not on the

same day and then you got to come back for that what do you think you're going to show up for rodney atkins and then see a trailer race? Jimmy, come on. Jesus Christ. You want it all, don't you? You better come back for deer penis. You want it all, man. Come on now. And then there's also the Buck Skinner's Rendezvous. Oh.

Which I just thought was a wild name. Take a step back in time and get the pioneer spirit during this weekend event situated in the scenic Wildcat Den State Park. spirit during this weekend event situated in the scenic wildcat den state park apparently there's crafts and activities and you catch a glimpse of what it was like back in the day before electricity oh sounds great it sounds good jesus christ remember when you were cold or you can just wait for all those thunderstorms and tornadoes that will knock your electricity out anyway uh crime rate in this town what we're interested in obviously here the crime rate uh property crime slightly above average so not quite perfectly safe but not bad and then violent crime murder rape robbery and of course assault the mount rushmore of crime we would expect that to be super low um would no that's high also is that right a good amount high too like 20 25 not great really high

stop bringing in singers that sing about the penis no shit i think it's all the it's the what is it the uh the trailer race is bringing a bad element couldn't remember what they were called they also have impact pro wrestling at the county fair by the way which is i think tna which they've oh i think they've gone all the way down to performing at the Iowa County Fair, or the Muscatine County Fair. Not good. That said, let's talk about some murder, people. Let's do it.

All right, Jimmy, let's get into this. Let's talk about a guy first. Let's talk about a gentleman, unfortunate gentleman. And by unfortunate, I mean mainly his scalp. He's a very unfortunate looking man. He is. His name is Brian Kirby Barrett. Double R. Double T. Barrett.

Brian Barrett. And he is born in 1951. And by 1979, he is bald as fucking Homer Simpson. I mean, oh, no. He's 28 years old and he's he looks he's bald he's got a beard he's got glasses he looks exactly like will ferrell's character in on snl when he was in the hot tub with rachel dratch and they called each other lover over and over again he looks exactly like that guy a mixed beat no not that that guy and the and the the guy who plays the fucking

piano with and they sing they sang new songs but all the music teachers yeah when he did the music teacher bit he looks like that google it he looks like will ferrell in a bald cap and and a stupid beard that's what he looks like like he looks like a character doesn't even look like a real person you're like this guy he's got a he's got a disguise on or something, right? That's a disguise? No, that's a man? Holy shit. That's your face?

Wow. His father, Ronald, is a senior vice president of Stanley Consultants, which is a worldwide engineering firm based in Muscatine. So he comes from a family that has decent money, you know, upper middle class. And also education is very, very pushed in his family. As we'll talk about, his brothers and sister are also very smart. His brother's an engineer. And he's got a brother named Stanley who's an engineer. His sister is a nurse.

So, you know, he does all of that. Now, Brian was an Eagle Scout when he was a kid. I mean, he is typical Midwestern. You took a kid from 1960. This is the kid. I mean, 4-H and Boy Scouts and Eagle Scouts and probably losing his hair already. I don't know. He's got problems.

So, yeah, he does that. He's an Eagle Scout straight-A student at Muscatine High School, an honor student at the University of Iowa as well. Brian is. He graduates with a degree in accounting. So get a nice steady job, easy. Not easy, but like a nice – you can get a job as an accountant. Easy job getting. He graduated Muscatine High in 1969.

1977 he graduated the University of Iowa. So I don't know why it took him eight years to get an accounting degree, but maybe he was doing other stuff. I'm not sure. That math doesn't add up. No. And 69. And from what I know, he wasn't in Vietnam. Oh.

So you graduate. Oh, maybe he fucking prolonged school, dragged it out to not be in time to not be in the draft oh that's what a lot of people did back then genius yeah like i read this book that uh hunter thompson it's a book of all of his letters and there's a lot of letters to his family to his younger brother who was at the university of kentucky in 1969 and he was saying i don't give a shit if you want to go there or not right stay in school don Don't flunk out yet until the drafting stops at least. Get some Cs, bud. Just hang out there and hide out in there if you don't want to go be on the front lines because that's what you're going to do.

So I don't know if that's what he was doing or what, but he got a job as an accountant for an Iowa City construction company. Did very well here. company did very well here um now his father like i said is a very kind of important guy senior vice president for a you know a worldwide engineering firm sure he does pretty well for himself here's a description by the way of brian brian this is a this is a great description quote he is a balding slender man of medium height with wire rim glasses and a full reddish brown beard and mustache oh this is what i'm trying to describe to you big red beard bald he looks like a nerd but with a big red beard and glasses it's very weird it's a very weird look and balding is generous by the way yeah that's a really generous yeah he's bald as the night is

dark i mean he is yeah fucking bald i mean i can. That's a really generous. Yeah. He's bald as the night is dark. I mean, he is fucking bald. I mean, I can gross a little bit of hair, but it's. You're balding. You look at you and go balding. He's holy shit. You're bald. You're bald. As a fucking eagle.

Look at you. Start looking at it from different angles. Wow. From down here. There's a glare that's just wild from down. Look, it's reflecting off the wall. Holy shit. That word balding implies that it just started.

It's thinning. Yeah, he's a little thin on top. No, no, no. Fucking horseshoe. Horseshoe. Total horseshoe. Done. Welcome to the small town of Chinook, where faith runs deep and secrets run deeper.

In this new thriller, available exclusively on Wondery+, 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 in the Wondery app or on Apple 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, 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.

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. Done for. It's not ing anymore. It's over.

He gets married here, and maybe that's what he was doing too in the meantime of not graduating because he gets married to a woman named Diana in 1975. They have a son named branson in 1976 also a lot of b names in this family he's um he's brian and then there's there's other ones too that we'll talk about his brother's bruce um yeah and then his son is uh i think they what is his son's name i just said? I just lost it. Branson. Branson, his son, is like Missouri.

Bruce is a name that's gone away, huh? It's hard to look at a baby and see Bruce. Bruce is a guy with a mustache, that's why. It's hard to see a guy with like a Tom Selleck mustache when they're a day old. And also, Bruce became kind of synonymous with like being a gay name in the 70s too. Yeah, yeah. Not that it was, but people would, that was, oh, with being a gay name in the 70s, too. Yeah, yeah. Not that it was, but people would... That was, oh, Bruce is a gay guy for some reason. I don't know why.

Hmm. You know, Bruce Lee's one of the toughest people on the planet. In the 70s, yeah. Bruce Springsteen was cool. Right. Bruce Lee. He had all these cool Bruce's, and you're like, Bruce is a... He's a homo, that Bruce.

Look at him. His mustache. That's men just being fucking weird feeling shitty yeah those two bruce's are better than one guy named bruce one time fucking blew a dude and now yeah everybody's bruce so in 1976 he and his wife get divorced though so it's a short-lived marriage a couple of years one kid uh she's a lab technician and uh she takes i guess possession of branson the son she takes custody i don't know why custody couldn't come out and possession was what i could think of it's a good word too so during the

divorce proceedings and during the child custody proceedings which he is very much fighting with her over custody issues he wants to see his son and she wants him to only see him on this times and they're all they're fighting like crazy over that jesus so according to his uh his attorney his divorce attorney his divorce attorney encouraged him to keep a journal of his feelings yep not for any legal things just for sanity's sake not for also for sake. Also for legal things, too. If she does this, write it down. But also, just write out your thoughts, and it might help you.

In a week, you'll think something different. You look back, you look at it. I don't know of many lawyers that also handle psychology, but apparently he found a full-service guy. My lawyer never really told me about journaling. Never told you about your mental state? Jimmy, how are you feeling? Have you tried journaling, sir? Let's talk about it.

I'll tell you what. I sit in a hot bathtub with a lavender bomb, and I just journal my little head off. Try candles and bath bombs. Try that. Riesling in a journal. That's all I do at night. Boy, you should try it, Jimmy. I never heard of lawyers doing that.

But perhaps my lawyer understands that I'm pretty good. I got these well in hand, these emotions and feelings. I'm doing all right. Maybe he knows you have another therapist. Yeah. So he does. He writes what you could call a journal or a diary or just a book of weird shit. More likely.

Manifesto. Not really manifesto, but plans and fantasy plots and weird shit. Yeah, we'll get into this. He left his notebook. He keeps a notebook with him. That's his diary, notebook, journal, whatever the fuck. He's at the Burger golden pal or the burger palace restaurant in iowa city in 1977 two different places you very much palace and the

golden palace uh golden burger palace he's at this restaurant in iowa city and he he he leaves the notebook behind oh no he was finishing up his accounting studies and going through a divorce and doing all this type of shit at the time. So a restaurant employee picked up the book and was like, intimate thoughts. What's this? And started flipping through it and found what the police would later deem, quote, details of a plan to terrorize, injure and murder his wife and then cash in on her insurance policy. Right. So now the they the restaurant employee called the police and said you know i found this book and it seems like there's

like murder plots in it and shit maybe you want to take a look at it so the cops came and at first the iowa city police just thought because i mean cops are the time you tell them if you tell them that there's five guys pointing a machine gun at me, they're like, it's probably a dog that barked at him like they don't believe anything. They're very cynical about shit like that. And so they were like, yeah, whatever. And at first they were just like, he's a college student. It's probably some kind of literature. It's probably some kind of fucking class project that he's got to write.

And you're an idiot and you think that it's that, you know what I mean? He's probably had to write like a fictional story maybe a murder who knows i mean jesus look through my fucking notes holy crap it's disturbing so they made copies of the notebook the cops made copies of the notebook and then returned it to the restaurant and said give it back to the guy if he wants it but they made copies of it and kept them on file in the police station well that tells me they took it a little more seriously than they're saying they're yeah they were like well we'll just keep copies just in case so document it then brian comes back to the restaurant and says i left the notebook in here and they go yeah sure here's your notebook so he takes it back and he doesn't know

that the cops have now taken it and copied it and and all that they didn't tell him by the way we were freaked the fuck out by this he doesn't even know anybody read a line of it he just thinks they picked it up off the table and threw it on the counter and said there's a notebook on the table if anybody comes in looking for it like someone left their sunglasses behind or something that's what he thinks so he has no clue so would you like to know some of the things that he uh wrote in his journal yeah i think i want to he called it by the way his diary of a madman at one point in there which is a bad before uh long before yeah that was aussie right yeah it was aussie aussie and then also gravediggers so oh yeah yeah so yeah, yeah. So you got that.

And Diary of a Madman, he says, quote, the trick is to make the plan as simple as possible. Dig a grave, kill her, and plant her. Include no one and act as if nothing's wrong. This is quotes. Then he said in another one, these are just different snippets, another time he said, quote, This is quotes. Someone else's. I have honestly thought about killing her to ensure that and that Branson will remain with me. He wrote that on April 20th, 1977. Not taking the spirit of 420 at all to heart.

Like, where's your chill, bro? You know what I mean? Like, dude. Grab a gummy. You know what I'm saying? You give this guy 10 milligrams of an edible his whole his writings are going to be way different way different much more fun he's gonna be writing rodney carrington it's gonna be hilarious hilarious adkins not caring yeah yeah damn it yeah oh did you confuse him oh you've already gotten five fucking tweets don't worry about it how much better rodney carrington is than adkins i know i don't know who either of those people are by the way rodney

rodney adkins is a terrible songwriter bad music the weird part is both of those people probably live in 30 000 square foot houses and i've never heard of them once never there's a whole culture going on that I have no clue about. It's a whole economy, culture, world that I'm just like, I don't know what the fuck you're talking about. Boot scoot your ass that way because I don't know what you're fucking saying. Leave me alone. Rodney Adkins plays county fairs. Rodney Carrington plays theaters. That's the difference between them.

Oh, okay. Well, there you go. Rodney Carrington's hilarious. That tells you a lot then there's a big difference there yeah so he wrote that now he took out by the way on april 14th six days before he wrote that last little one about wanting to kill her to ensure that the son would stay with him six days before that he took out a ten thousand dollar life insurance policy on diana without her knowledge oh no anytime someone takes a life insurance policy out without someone's

knowledge i think it's suspicious oh that's very suspicious to me i'm like what the fuck is that you wouldn't want to why would you not tell someone that they have insurance on their life that's crazy there's only bad if you're not if you're playing a death pool and you're not doing it that way you're doing you're a chicken shit that's not gambling gamble like this unless it's like a birthday surprise like i bought you life insurance unless it's something like that like a you know christmas gift or something yeah you should really probably tell the person and even then you're going to tell them eventually can we get a life insurance on bob barker can we do that why not we can do it on anybody i feel like well i guess you have to be married to them they were still married technically so i don't

know i have no fucking idea i'm not married to my kids i got one on them do you have to be related well kids are different because you can you can do anything with your kids you can take them can you you can take them all sorts of weird places and it's allowed but we should be doing that take out life insurance policies on people that are about to die. Yeah, that's what I mean. This kid's seven. What the hell do they need a life insurance policy for? So now this journal, wow.

He also, there's a lot of them, outlines on how to build and use what he called an acid telescope. What is that? Dude, this is so weird. Which, okay, an acid telescope, that was a telescope where you'd have acid on the lens. So he'd go, hey, look at this amazing thing. And then his wife would come to look at the telescope. And instead of having like a shoe polish around her eye, like one of those little tricky things. This would be acid that would blind her instead.

That would shoot out into her eye. How much acid? Oh, he's got like a nozzle on it. I think he's got a pump mechanism set up where he just presses a little thing. Like a clown flower. Yeah, like a clown flower. Yeah, anything like that. Jesus.

Like fake blood in a bad horror movie, however you want to do it. anything like that just jesus like fake blood in a bad horror movie however you want to do it so a later entry by the way would be on killing her and burying her body again another one from including the one there's another very specific one at the end here and also not only that he has set up in his book what he has deemed a quote revenge list of 21 people who he described as family or friends of his and diana's these are people that he blamed for encouraging or assisting the divorce or people who have abandoned him or rejected him in some way just your typical your typical lone maniac sitting alone at night making a revenge list of people who have wronged him you know that list that everyone makes thought throw that on the xerox and let's let's get back to whatever we

were doing they thought yeah i mean this is it could be that we don't know what this is but let's let's go ahead make a copy pass it around the office because that'll be hilarious something to talk about at the christmas party on the bulletin board and then give it on back to the burger palace we're gonna have to do later by arrest this man what the you can't just have that who has that it's insane i don't have a fucking plan of murder and revenge in a journal that's ted kaczynski yeah i don't like some people the unabomber had that yeah that's we keep this show for that actually never mind that's why we have this show so in the journal too like you can tell that mentally he's having a hard time as anybody who's going through a divorce and custody of kids it's hard so he's having a hard time where some

days he's not mad at his wife and he just loves her and he wants her back and then some days he hates her and he's talking about killing her so it depends on what the interactions were that day how he's feeling and but how do you go from one extreme to the other because you know i mean i i certainly understand the love and want to get back together but i certainly understand dislike enough to not want to ever work on this with them together again yeah how do you how do you have a middle ground in there how do you have those two extremes? I don't understand that. His middle ground is very small, too, because I'll tell you this.

On page two of the journal, he said, all I can think about is Dine and Branson and how much, and then he went on to talk about how much he loved them. Then three pages later on page five, so only two pages between them,

he said, quote, if it becomes absolutely imperative, I will destroy her rather than become a non-parent what the fuck so that's two pages how much could have gone by in two pages because he's writing in this pretty pretty frequently so yeah i don't know wild swing it's yeah he's going huge swings i think it's just day to day uh may of 1977 here we'll talk about some of the journal entries from May of 77. That was April. He said that he feared becoming a complete loner because at this point he didn't really have anybody around.

He was going to school. He had his wife and kid, and that's kind of it. He didn't really have a big social circle or anything like that. So now that they're gone and he was just kind of going to school and studying he really doesn't have he's feeling lonely yeah but like i gotta tell everybody has it's great it's great he wasn't he wasn't with his wife long enough for it to be great okay that's the thing that's a good point yeah if you got divorced when your son was one you wouldn't you would have felt much differently than when you got divorced and ran out of the house with your arms extended above your head going freedom

never again he did the mel gibson and braveheart when he like rushed the fucking line of english i think that's that was jimmy going out of his house and goodbye i'm running so but i it's now more evident why his lawyer told him to do this because his lawyer if he's probably have a conversation with that guy a guy that swings like this this randomly and this wildly you got to tell him dude write this shit down tell him don't bring it to me what i was gonna say what that's saying is don't tell me yeah tell tell a composition tell a composition book and then keep that hidden away somewhere and don't leave it in a burger restaurant, please. Yeah, don't ever let anybody read that.

That'd be terrific. Burn that motherfucker. He also feared becoming a daydreaming withdrawn ghost, he said. He talks about suicide a little in his book. Maybe I'll just kill myself. That'd be easier. This is a fucking mess. You know, I hate this.

He also picks up more violent plots against his wife maybe i'll kill her this way maybe i'll kill her this way then he says well why kill her she's seeing this man why don't i just kill him that'd be easier so he talks about that um and he said that he was friends with him and this guy that he knew that's who his wife is dating. Dating one of his friends. So he thought his friends been disloyal to him. And he's mad at his wife. So the whole thing's making him crazy. But some of them are very silly.

Some of the things are like silly. And then some of them are serious. Like I could kill her like this. And then like a murder plot that could work. You know what I mean? Some of them are very just, you know, obviously just blowing off steam. So in May though,

here is one of his plots that he has. This is a, this is quite the long one here. He says, this is to kill Diana quote. I may be insane, but I'm determined. He wrote at the top of it,

by the way, which is insane and determined are two things you don't want together in a human being. Right. When they're together, that's dangerous. That's how Hitler happened. Insane and determined. You don't want that. You want insane people to also kind of be lazy, hopefully.

The most lazy. Very lazy. I'd love to kill everybody, but fuck, I'm exhausted. And there's something good on TV. That's what you want out of super insane. Determined. Not good. So he wrote that.

This is the acid telescope, by the way, thing he talked about. He wanted to blind and disfigure her in this one with the acid telescope. Then he was going to frame someone else for the crime there and he was hoping that his wife's blindness would then assure him custody of the son because how's she gonna take care of him with her eyes burned out by acid she can't see when the water's boiling she can't see nothing so uh that's what she's yeah and he said and long shot but possible she might be so distraught over being blind and not having her son that she'll just come back to me that is a she is gonna need so much that's a man that's willing to take care of somebody disabled that he made

disabled just to keep on purpose that's bad that's not good at all. Think about the mindset of I'll kill, I will blind her and then get her to come back to me that way. Like I'll hurt her and then she'll need me. So dependent. Wow. That is fucking wild. He said, quote, I'll get away with that part. I'll move on to Marshall and the others. That's the man she was seeing.

Then he's going to go down the list of his 21 revenge plots starting with her then going down a list and when the cops are sitting around going wow 21 people have had weird really like comic book level fucking inspector gadget kind of plots done to them yeah like in town all of them know this one guy. Super strange, right? He didn't think that would be a thing. He's fine. And he's the benefit to all of these bad things. What if, by chance, Marshall's the sweetest man on earth and he's like, I'll take care of a blind woman. Then what are you going to do? Blind woman and her fucking her urchin child with a blind mother. Doesn't matter. So he said, in fact, it may prove so challenging that it could be habit forming.

Maybe I could even make a living at it. I think mostly it's just fun making the plans. That's what he wrote, quote unquote. So he's like, I can sit. Yeah. He goes, I can get away with that. That'd be awesome. It'd be super easy.

He likes the planning aspect of it. Why doesn't he just become like a party planner or something? I figure that'd be easier. Table settings, centerpieces, hors d'oeuvres, things like that. Get a nice charcuterie platter together. That takes planning. You know what I mean? Do that.

Yeah, a nice fruit tray. I don't know, something like that. Instead, he thinks it's fun to make murder plots. And what if this becomes addicting? Shit, I'll make money at it. I'll do that. I can make a little money. He goes, mostly it's just fun making plans. It's just fun fantasizing about blinding my wife that's

hilarious so 1977 july here now he's like shit started to get a little bit serious now he's gone from all this yeah this is fun and games too he said quote i've had a change of heart in the past week or so. I don't like that. He said, in fact, I've changed to having no heart at all. I've decided to kill Dine, that's the nickname, within the first week of August, he says. Okay. Here it is. Quote.

This is awesome. Wow. I'm sure now that Dine has to go. It will either be the first or second week in August. So this journal will not be around much longer. You know, he's going to have to destroy the whole plot, the whole plotting. He doesn't know that. Obviously, there's copies of it at the Iowa City Police Force and some fucking.

He said, I'll let her think I'm going to set her free. Talk nice for her to her for a few minutes to build up her hopes, then slap her around and scare her again, then bury her. All capital letters. No body, no crime. No body, no crime. He came back. Said, I remember when I blinded my wife. I used a telescope and I said. Unbelievable.

Nobody, no crime. It keeps happening. He said it in capital fucking letters. Awesome. At the bottom, nobody, no body no crime wow hell yeah i remember when i killed my wife that's what he said man he wanted to i love it so much he wanted to take her out tie her up get her take make her take all her clothes off terrorize slap her around, then tell her he's going to let her go, get her hopes up, and then kill her and bury her.

Wow. And no body, no crime. In Trenchtown. In Trenchtown. Going to bury my wife in Trenchtown. Un-fucking-real, man. This is fucking wild, dude. This is fucking wild, dude.

So July 25th, 1977 is when his journal got taken by the police. So this is all after all his plots. Now, at that point, they waited a couple of weeks. Then they brought him in and actually questioned him. They kept an eye on him, see what he was doing. They're like, well, he just seems to be a college student. He's not doing anything. So let's talk to him and say what we did and uh that's when they asked him about that and he was like i'm just writing stuff my lawyer told me to write stuff there's fantasy stuff from school

projects and they said there's nothing that they could file charges his wife isn't hurt so nobody's hurt take a look in the back there's a whole whole list. Are any of those people alive? They're all alive. If I blinded any of them. I didn't have a telescope. Duh. Other strange things in his journal here. Yeah. This is a different journal that I'll have later on. More strange stuff here.

There's a kidnapping plot to kid. This is OK. He wanted to, according to his journal, kidnap a Des Moines Register. That's the newspaper. A Des Moines Register paper boy. The paper boy. A child. Oh, it gets way bad.

He wanted to kidnap a paper boy, sexually abuse him, murder him, then frame someone else for the crime and collect the reward money. What? I could set up this whole crime and collect the reward money. What? I could set up this whole thing where there's reward money. I'll turn someone else in and then I'll collect the reward money and I guess have the satisfaction of murdering and sexually abusing a boy. I don't know what he's into here. That's not good for being a dad. That's going to get your kid taken away from you. Yeah, I wouldn't want to give this guy custody of a fucking hamster at this point.

It'll be up his ass in 15 minutes. I wouldn't know what was going to what he's going to do with it now or a paper boy's ass or a paper or someone. Yeah. So he wrote about the plot in a red notebook. Like we said, he wrote about that. That was very weird. This was also, though, a little bit after there was disappearances of two paper boys. So he was thinking, like, huh, maybe I'll just do that. That's a good idea. So he's not even original with his fucking murder plots. No, he heard about boys disappearing, and he's like, I could do that. Yeah, that's what you want to do for some reason.

So 1978, late 1978, here it comes. And his divorce is final. He's making all these weird murder journals and all this type of shit. And then it gets weird. And now it gets weird. And now it gets weird, yeah, as if that wasn't weird enough. Yeah. So 1978, 79, he gets a job as an accountant at the Holiday Inn.

So he's the holiday accountant for the hotel. There, he meets a couple of young ladies. One, now keep in mind he's, what, 28 at this point? 27, 28. He meets Carol Ann Willits. Carol Ann? Go to the lot, Carol Ann. That's all I'm going to think the whole time.

Oh, God. It's not Carol Ann, one word. It's Carol Ann'm going to think the whole time. Okay. It's not Carol Ann one word. It's Carol Ann Willits. It's now one word. One word. W-I-L-L-I-T-S. Carol Ann Willits. She's 21, Carol Ann.

She comes from a big family, by the way. Her parents are Colleen and Marion, her mom and her dad. She is one of 10 kids. My God. which is a lot of kids to be having. They're not Mormon or anything. They're just 10 kids. Just doing it. Farming, I guess. I don't know.

So she moved to Muscatine in 1978. So she's kind of new to the area here. She meets Brian in 78. They both worked as auditors at the Muscatine Holiday Inn. Oh. And, yeah. Now, Carol, a little bit about her. She's apparently very funny.

She was voted class clown in 1975 at her high school. Okay. And she's big into church activities at the Mulford Evangelical Free Church. She likes to go to church singles events and stuff like that. Oh. Yeah, trying to meet a nice church-going guy, that sort of shit. So that's what she's doing. She works the Holiday Inn for a while.

Then she leaves, and she works at the First National Bank of Muscatine. Okay. She's done auditing. Now she wants to do that. Yeah, she's got a better job, better than the Holiday Inn. But it looks better on the resume to work at a bank than rather than the Holiday Inn. So I imagine the numbers stop at some point at the Holiday Inn at the bank. The numbers never stop. They never stop. Yeah, they never stop. Everybody said she was pretty religious.

Also, she said she dated, you know, once a week, a few times a month, that sort of thing. People from the singles groups and that sort of shit here. She had gotten a promotion at the bank. She just started there and they gave her a promotion pretty quick. And, yeah, so she gets a promotion. She's very excited about that. The vice president of the bank here of the First National bank of Muscatine said she's supposed to be a teller at the bank.

She got a promotion to a teller. I guess that's a promotion. She was very excited. And her boss said that she's enthusiastic to go to the position. She had been making two 90 an hour. She's going to get a raise and everything else. So she also seems to have a bit of a fling with Brian. Okay. Bit of a fling. It seems seems to be, from what we can gather here.

Now, here's another young lady. Enter the picture. Cynthia K. Walker. Cindy Walker. She's 19. So another young lady. Yeah, she is from Maryland, but she's been here for 14 years. Since she was five.

Been here forever uh she worked the holiday inn on the night shift um everybody said she's kind of outgoing and daring and wanting to do fun shit and if you said we're gonna go bungee jumping she'd be like sounds great like she's that kind of that kind of person yeah she's fun she lives with her parents uh she wanted to be a stewardess at the time that was a flight attendant that's what she was trying to do which back then people would still aspire to that job not be like fuck god damn it I gotta fly in this shit box

so yeah she left home in 1977 when she graduated from high school she got an apartment with another a friend of hers another girl and then for a little while then later moved in with a boy named David Titus. And she lived there for a while until she ended up moving home again in December of 78.

So after she moved home, everybody said that she is Cindy and this Titus guy, David Titus, were still planning on getting married in May of 1979. So they said she's engaged, but they were living together and she moved out, but they're still engaged. One day we'll get married. Yeah. Now, Cindy's mom will say that the reason Cindy moved out, well, at least the reason Cindy told her mom, was that a couple of David's family members had also moved in and it was overcrowded. So she just wanted to get out of there. But in actuality, they had some problems.

And we'll tell you what those problems were about. She just didn't tell her mom stuff is what it is, Cindy. She told her mom what she wanted her mom to do. No, like most 19-year-olds do. Right. And that's certainly an acceptable reason to be out of there. There's too many people. I can't put up with that.

Yeah. And it makes it sound like David's still a good guy. He won't make the family hate him. Oh, he's a sweetheart. Yeah. He's going out people. I can't put up with that. Yeah. And it makes it sound like that David's still a good guy. He's not, that won't make the family hate him. Oh, he's a sweetheart. Yeah. He's going out of his way to take care of his fam.

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. 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 Jinks podcast. Listen on Max or wherever you get your podcasts. Yeah. Cindy wanted to attend a business college in Des Moines. That was her goal.

And she told her parents she wanted to be a stewardess after because she lost 60 pounds in two years oh so she felt really good about herself physically and back then back then that was still the time of like flight attendants had to be kind of good looking they you know yeah that's the way it was very young yet yeah yeah and if you lose a bunch of weight and get hot as shit she's like i i want to yeah i can get a job that my looks count now. Absolutely. I can travel and do fun shit. She just felt confident.

She felt confident there. So, yeah, her mother said she had big ideas, but she just didn't have the money to back them. She wanted to get away. She wanted to see the world. She wants to get out of Muscatine, essentially, is what I'm hearing here. She's from out of Iowa. She wants to get out of Muscatine, essentially, is what I'm hearing here. She's from out of Iowa.

Cindy worked the graveyard shift at the hotel, and Carol Willits, Carol Ann, she worked the 3 to 11 shift, second shift. So their shifts backed up into each other, but they didn't work together. But they knew each other, as we'll find out. They knew each other, high-fived on their way out the door. Yeah, peace, see you later. So they're described similarly in a lot of ways because they're just both young ladies who are trying to do stuff. They're described as not ready to settle down, but then the one's engaged and was living with a guy. So I don't know what the hell they're talking about there. Her family, I don't think.

Seems like her family didn't know her as well as they thought they know her at the time because she's 19. Yeah, 19. You don't tell your parents shit. No. So Brian met both of these ladies while working weekends as the night auditor at the Holiday Inn. He met Willits there, Carol Ann, when she started working there in April of 78. She worked the night shift just prior to his, and they would talk for a while into his shift.

So he'd arrive in the morning, she'd be finishing up, they'd sit and bullshit. Then he met Walker in November of 1978, shortly before he quits the Holiday Inn. He helped train Walker, Cindy, who ended up taking over his job as the auditor so that's how that worked so he knows them both from work he uh he said he said and some evidence backs up the fact that he had

some sexual relationship with at least one of if not both of these women wow okay um i don't know how i don't know how a will ferrell in a bald cap pulls that off. He's not cool. He's not like there's nothing about him that would be like, oh, yeah, like a fucking young lady. Other than if he's I don't know. They felt bad for him. Maybe they felt bad. Maybe.

Yeah. They like lost puppies. I have no idea. But he said even even what he says is Walker was they had sex a lot. And then he started seeing Carol Ann Willits as well and only had sex with her a couple of times. But she apparently, from what he says, was very much into this relationship and was kind of Willits was. Yeah. So that becomes something.

Willits was. Yeah. So that that becomes something. Now, Cindy Walker, Cindy's mother says, quote, Cindy didn't have any romantic involvement with Brian. But we kind of know that's not true based on some factors that happen here. And we'll get into that. Her mother said, though, she was engaged to another man. She was going to marry the following May 5th. But in the same conversation, Cindy Walker's mother says she did plan a trip to go with Brian in a car to California. Who plans that? So if you're. Yeah. Yeah.

I'm sorry. But you don't go. You don't drive cross country with someone as friends when you're engaged. You know, some guy that you may have to to a beach destination. Yes. You know, like that's very romantic yeah absolutely um but for this trip by the way uh her parents were not thrilled that she was doing this for this trip he decides to brian decides to take out a fifty thousand dollar double

indemnity life insurance policy on Cindy Walker, telling her that he was going to take her to California and he thinks the policy is a good idea if you're going to go on a cross-country trip to some other state. Just in case. Just in case, which is very – maybe if you were taking your fucking horse and carriage, your buggy across in the 1840s, but not really now. You ever gone on a road trip with a friend and been like, we should get life insurance on you?

Bro, I'm going to insure you just in case. You never know, man. It's the 70s. It's not like, it's so weird. So her mother, Cindy's mother, said, we got very upset about the situation. But of course, for a 19-year-old girl, this was right up her alley, the trip, not the insurance. She said, just because someone is riding in your car,

you don't take out an insurance policy on them. Right. Which I've never, ever, ever thought to. Who's in the car? Everybody, am I the beneficiary of everybody's life insurance in here? Okay, let's pull out of the driveway then. Good.

Everybody insured up? We good? We good. Did you pee first? Me? You got pee? A double indemnity? Is it double?

Okay. Let's go. So he said it was a good idea. And she, I don't know if she believed him because he was older. Yeah. Maybe. And seemed like, no, I know the world. This is what you do.

He's got a kid for Christ's sake. I have kids and, you know, I have health insurance and things like that. So February 16th, 1979 comes around. He's not working at the Holiday Inn anymore. So that night, Cindy Walker's mother said that Cindy did not spend the night at home. She told her parents she was going to Cedar Rapids with Brian Barrett to visit his friends. She left with a nightshirt that she slept in to sleep in, but she didn't return with the night shirt.

She said she left it in Brian's car. So there's that. Her mother said, did you have a good time? And Cindy replied, no, it was one of the most boring times I'd ever had. So there was that. That was all that she said to her mother, though. I'd know it was one of the most boring times I'd ever had. Okay. Um, so there was that, um, that was all that she said to her mother though.

And then her mother tried to ask followup questions and she just kind of shut it down. And that was that. Okay. So that's what she told her mom happened that night. Now that night, Brian has a different story. He says that that night he and Cindy were getting it on and Carol came to his house and caught them. And he had just started having sex with Carol in the last couple weeks.

And Carol Ann Willits came and caught him in bed with Cindy Walker. She popped by with no warning. Yep. Did the old pop by and said, oh, my God, look at that. So that's what Brian said happened that night. And Cindy, though, did not tell her mom that. She just said, no, it was the most boring night ever. And then it wouldn't answer follow-up questions.

But she also didn't explain why she moved out of that apartment. Exactly. Exactly. She doesn't tell her mom shit. She's going to tell her mom. I don't know. Unless you have a relationship where you discuss intimate details with your mom, you're not going to tell her, like, I was fucking this guy and this other chick walked in. And then it was a big argument because apparently, according to Brian, there was a giant argument between Carol and Cindy.

Carol was very mad and was calling Cindy names. And they were going back and forth. And he was, you know, they were all both yelling at him. Cindy's mom may be a church-going lady who that kind of story might not jazz her up. No. Yeah, that's what I mean. Who the fuck knows? They had a threesome, but not the kind you want. They had No. Yeah, that's what I mean. Who the fuck knows? They had a threesome, but not the kind you want.

They had an argument threesome is what he said. So February 22nd, 1979, six days later. Yeah. Let's go through the girls' days here, the ladies' days here. Carol Willits. Here's her day. Carol Ann here. Pretty ordinary day.

She lived in a downtown apartment, 309 East Third Street. And a friend of hers named Maureen Keller, who worked with her at the bank, said that, you know, she came into work, went to work. After work, Carol went to a grocery store to buy ingredients for a spaghetti dinner that she planned for former co-workers of hers. So she used to work at a place called Nielsen's Clearing House in Muscatine, and she invited four ladies who she used to work with from there to – Come on by. I'll make space. Yeah, we got to catch up. You know what I mean? We lose touch with people that way. So they all said – all the women said she was in a good mood. She showed them family Christmas pictures and spoke that she couldn't wait to go to a trip to Ireland that she was planning with her friends for some time.

They were putting it together. They said she was real cheerful and everything like that. But she does receive a phone call from Brian Barrett that night that they all don't dispute. OK, well, she's well, the girls are there and we're all having spaghetti. Everybody's hanging out. Yeah. Yeah. Now, Cindy Walker was her mom said she was in the greatest mood that night that I've ever seen her that I've seen her in a long time.

That's because she just got a promotion. So she was very she had a promotion that day and she was supposed to start her new job Monday at the bank. So she was very excited. supposed to start her new job Monday at, you know, in the bank. So she was very excited. Um,

she, like we said, moved back to her house in December, um, to her parents' house where she would, you know, just kind of hang out and didn't do a lot. She would crochet and do macrame and shit. Like she's,

she's bored at her parents' house. She went to, um, Pam's house, her friend, Pam's house for dinner that night. Then they went out driving around and visiting friends. And she came home by 9.30.

Oh, early night. Yeah. Her mom said that we sat and visited for a while. She came home. They talked. Her dad said she was giving us a bad time about supper, saying for the first time that week she hadn't cooked supper

and they were eating leftovers. And she's like, I don't cook dinner one fucking night and you guys don't make anything the shit i made last night i come home for two day old share yeah two day old shake and baked chicken i don't want this i made this i don't want it yeah so her friend her best friend for six years so high school throughout here pamela Skidmore, said that they were hung around as friends all the time. She said that she didn't know anything about Carol Willits and never heard Cindy mention Carol's name. Cindy ate dinner that night. That's where she ate dinner that night at her friend Pam's house. And she heard that night her friend Pam from her house heard Cindy make two phone calls.

One to Annette Connor, a friend of hers, and one to Brian Barron. Yeah. Yeah. So he's talked to both. Later on, Pam and Cindy went to visit some friends before Pam and her husband took Cindy home about 930. And she said that she wanted to be home by 10, Cindy did. Why did she want to be home by 10?

What was on? Brian was supposed to call her back at 10. Oh, shit. Yes. Okay. So when you're out with friends, and nowadays, obviously, this isn't a concern because you don't have to rush home for a phone call. But think of pre-cell phone times if you were out with friends and you had to get home before a certain time because someone was going to call you

yeah how into that person are you you got yeah you're changing your whole life around to be somewhere specific to be home hear their voice yes even you don't want them just yeah think about that shit that's that's interesting there yeah so c So Cindy received the phone call right at 10 o'clock. He's an accountant. He's very punctual. Yeah, he's very studious. Her mom was nearby, Mrs. Walker here. She only overheard short responses from Cindy, which, again—

That indicates anger. Not anger. Also, it indicates I'm not talking in front of my mother. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. I don't want to hear on this as a teenager you know how to have conversations about dubious and illegal shit with your friends on the phone with your parents standing right next to you right there you know absolutely how to do that and so does so does she i think anybody does it's just a a thing you do so it's not a bad thing it's just no you have to do that to keep your privacy as a

kid so after she got off the phone she told her mother that the caller that called right then because she had talked to brian also was a girl named carol who was going to come down and pick her up okay so carol's gonna come pick her up she said they were going to stay overnight at carol's apartment then leave their leave from her apartment the next day to go to iowa city to see a mutual friend's new baby that's what she told her mother so either that's what the phone call was or she is a really quick fucking liar and can make up awesome stories on the spot or she's a great teenager you know what i mean just terrific at it just so good at it i was not that good of a teenager you know um now cindy said this is what her mother said later cindy said the girl's name was

carol ricketts or willards mix those together and you get willits um it was a name i was not familiar with okay so this is a new thing that they're together. Then sometime after 1130 p.m., Cindy left and left the house to go with Carol. Like she said, she's going to come pick her up. And another family member said that she went to the basement to take a shower and she was like looking out the window waiting for the car. She seemed very like, you you know anxious to do this um they also said when she left though her family said she did not take her night shirt with her that she usually takes when she goes to over do things overnight right so she didn't take that so that was different and also that cindy's purse was found she left

her purse at the house she left her purse with her id at there at the house which ever do that usually you take your purse if you're a woman the id the wallet back then was if you weren't going to buy anything it was a lot less important because you didn't have debit cards for the most part or anything like that you had cash you threw a few bucks in your pocket and you went um so it's um it's not that strange though Sometimes she does leave her shit home, she said, too. She'll forget sometimes. Yeah. Now, David Titus, the guy she lived with, let's find out what really happened there.

He said that he didn't know Brian Barrett. He never met him. But he did know that there was another person that Walker saw occasionally, Cindy. Another man she would see. person that walker saw occasionally cindy another man she would see um he said david that he was working the night shift from 10 p.m to 6 30 a.m on february 22nd uh so he didn't see her he was at work he said the reason she moved out of his apartment was quote she said she had a lot of thinking to do uh-huh which is not what she told her mother this is what i know she told her mother that yeah she tells her mother the convenient thing that makes her mother feel good which is what

you do as a young person things over keeps everybody from being angry at anybody and also justifies not being there well i'm gonna live my life so i'm not gonna argue with you about it i'll just make up something that makes you happy and then we're fine because who cares it's not your business anyway so um he actually said that the thinking was about him meaning titus him brian barrett and other things whether or not she wants to be with him as of december yeah she was confused saying she didn't know whether she wanted to be with this guy marry him him, live with him, be with Brian Barrett. She was a little confused, and they asked him if he was – because she had feelings for him and Brian, and he said, yes, that's what she told me.

So she's got – there's something going on with Cindy and Brian, obviously. But that's a very mature thought for a 19-year-old to have. Yes, super mature. Very mature thought for a 19-year-old to have. Yes, super mature. And very aware of how immature she is while being mature enough to face that. That's wild. Yeah, they're smart young ladies, both of these young ladies here. And Brian is also a smart guy but a weird guy.

So a lot of smart people here. So February 23rd, this is the next morning mind you 22nd remember uh cindy said she was leaving going with carol to spend the night and then leave the next morning to go somewhere in carol's car and left at 11 30 now the next morning 6 30 a.m okay uh february 23rd cindy is found in the middle of Brent Road which is a gravel road three miles south of Muscatine okay she is dead she's fully clothed

and been shot three times twice in the twice in the head and once in the abdomen okay she's been shot she's dead been left there just dumped clearly so yeah that's the once in the back of the, once in the side of the head, and once in the stomach. She went with somebody named Carol.

Yes. Not Pamela. No, no, no. Yeah, Pamela's her friend that she was hanging out with that her husband dropped her off. Carol is, yeah, she was going with Carol. Ricketts or Willards, which is, yeah. So, somebody driving to work noticed the body, and that's, you can't even avoid that.

It's in the middle of the road. Like she was in the middle of a gravel road. You can't avoid that. Fully dressed, wearing a ski jacket, so it wasn't like she was indoors and she was dressed to be outside in the cold. And she, like I said, shot three times, head, abdomen, back of the neck.

Evidence, they said, the autopsy said that she, it looks like she would have died very quickly from this. This wouldn't have been a prolonged, not a prolonged thing. Now here's something small townish that happens only on this show. The third cop to get there, the first investigator, because first it was two cops that were called, then they called in an investigator the first investigator to show up is cindy's first cousin oh no so that that immediately put some oil in the in the uh in the vodka there that's not good good at all no uh

daryl werner is his name he's an investigator oh detach himself from this scenario this is fucked with the muscatine county sheriff's department uh he yeah he's a he's a cousin by marriage first cousin by marriage so he's still close though you know that's still very close um he said that he identified her immediately he showed up and went that's my fucking cousin cindy holy shit like he knew a second later an hour later okay uh an intersection a few miles away and uh this is i'll give you the exact intersection in a minute though but an intersection a couple miles away there's a car it's a ford granada a piece of shit ford granada yeah running with the lights on and a dead woman inside of it oh no in the driver's seat and it's carol ann willits really she's at an intersection she is shot once in the temple once in the temple and a 38 caliberama pistol is on her lap. Like suicide.

Like on her lap. And this pistol, by the way, is the weapon that killed Cindy. And it's traced back to Carol purchased this recently, this gun. She bought it. What the fuck, Carol? Now, this is where it gets really weird, as if it's not fucking weird enough already. She was blindfolded.

She had a blindfold on, looked like what appeared to be a ripped section of a fancy pillowcase. Maybe with pearl buttons. We don't know. Maybe that's what they're for, fancy pillowcases. And we'll talk about it. There's a note written in the car as well on the dashboard. Lights on, car running um they said that right temple very close range like someone putting it against their head

she's blindfolded and wearing men's work gloves at the time which is strange um also they find in the car cigarette butts carol didn't smoke at all cynthia cynthia smoked though they found cigarette butts the same brand that cindy smoked in the ashtray of carol's car as well also in the car they recover hairs from both women okay sand found on the bumper of car Carol Ann's car was compared to and found similar to the sand found at the scene of where Cindy's body was discovered. Sand in Carol Ann's shoes was similar to sand found in Cindy's shoes. So both of their shoes had the same sand in them as well. They've been in the same place, yep. so both of their shoes had the same sand in them as well in the same place yeah they figured walker died sometime between 10 p.m and 1 a.m and willits died sometime between 10 30 and 1 a.m

okay so neither neither of them died at 10 because we know where they both were at 11 30 so that's that's not possible but that's that's what the medical examiner put in as his window, which is fine. So are there any witnesses to this? These are two separate public murder scenes here or murder, suicide, or whatever you want to call it here. Two separate dead person scenes. Any witnesses to anything? No. There was a farm dog across the street that began barking when the shot that killed carol happened in the car

that's what the dog owner said they heard a shot the dog started barking so the year um they they're the only witness they can find they find two witnesses who said they may have seen two cars on the road where cindy walker was dumped the, at about 12.30 a.m. and about 12.30 a.m. At 12 a.m. and 12.30. Yeah, at midnight. One of the cars was a Ford Granada, which is the car Carol drove, which we know it was there from the sand.

The other car, they didn't know, but they just said it had rectangular headlights. It was dark, so not small headlights, or not rounded headlights. Also in the car, a three-page letter is found with Carol. It's what the court and later the cops call a Dear Jane letter. It's a, I don't want to be with you anymore letter. This is the 70s form of ghosting. You just write a letter and then it's over with.

You don't have to deal with it. So we had to at least write a letter this was as opposed to you know telling someone face to face which now is like forget about it that's a crazy thing to do you don't even even ask them out face to face yeah you swipe on their face yeah fucking gone i meant like with a relationship now you don't even have to do it face to face. So this letter here was a letter that they asked Brian about. He said he wrote it and sent it to Carol after she had discovered him in bed with Cindy Walker on February 16th. It was a letter saying that basically, look, you're a nice girl, but I don't want to be with you. I like Cindy and sorry about that.

Sorry I led you on the wrong way type of shit. But it's three pages long. That's a lot of explanation. They find another note in the car on the dashboard. This is attached to a spiral binding of a notepad. It's got those little pieces of paper. And this is a note in Carol's handwriting, by the way. Quote, Brian.

Okay, so this is to Brian. I'm sorry i caused you so much trouble you're a good friend and i'm sorry i misunderstood your attention the problem is that i love you and i'm selfish if i can't have you i don't want anyone to have you maybe i should have killed your ex-wife instead of all the things i did try. You're a nice guy and I hope you find peace. I found mine. Love and goodbye, Carol. P.S. I was always blind to so many things, so why not now? Huh. Now, that looks to be an indication of why we've got a blindfold on.

Why we have a blindfold. That's what they said. Well, that might explain the blindfold. There's a blind reference in there.'s that it's in her handwriting and so if you just read this you would think okay this girl she might just be not wanting to talk to him anymore or saying okay i'll back off but if she's dead in a car with a gun in her hand this looks a lot like a suicide note sure does yeah you know especially the goodbye and loving but you'd also say that if you're saying okay cool i cool, I get what you you know, I get you don't want to have anything to do with me.

It's all right. You'd say the same shit. So I'm not sure. So they look into the whole thing. Carol had applied for a permit to carry a weapon at the Muscatine County Sheriff's Department on January 14th, 1979, which is a month before. just recently which is a month before um then two hours later called the sheriff's department saying she had applied for the wrong permit and that she wanted a permit to purchase a weapon because she didn't have one yet okay now um carol's so they're at first they're taking this as it looks like a murder suicide looks like these are rival rival women for the same guy one killed one went and killed herself because she whatever. So it makes sense. But her friends, Carol's friends, say there's no way she would do that, which most people's friends say that.

You wouldn't be friends with someone who you would assume would fucking murder somebody. It's a romantic rival. Because saying that, yeah, that sounds like them, that's now you. That's bad judgment by you. So no one says that. I don't think I've ever heard anybody say, yeah, I knew this was coming. That's what I mean. That's why they always say their neighbor was quiet and never caused any trouble.

You noticed shit. The fact that you didn't notice shit means that you're a moron. So you're not going to say that. You're going to go, they were a master at keeping to themselves instead. If we could see any of this happening, it never happened. Yeah. Her friend here said, quote, I absolutely do not think she did it. There's no way she could have. They said she was afraid of guns and she didn't like guns. And she also said Carol valued life too much. She was a Christian above all else.

above all else. Okay. Now, the blindfold, the cops, the one thing they say is that the one detective says they know of no cases where a suicide victim, person, whatever, person committing suicide, had blindfolded themselves before pulling a trigger. Yeah. It's a very weird thing to do. They also indicate fibers believed to be cat hairs found on the blindfold and no carol doesn't have a cat okay cindy doesn't have a cat

cat hair though is one of those things that if you're around a cat four years ago you still have cat hair in your house somewhere you know what i mean it does not go away it carries it carries You know what I mean? It does not go away. It carries. It carries. It's like a virus. So they also said, though, but the blindfold in the note, it says it's pretty.

It sounds like it's explaining the blindfold. So they're like, you know, it's a weird thing. But she also talks about it. So, fuck. I mean, so she came up with something new. What are we going to fault her for? Like, sometimes things happen for the first time. That's what I mean. They all everything that's ever happened had a first time at some point.

So the car, the dear Jane letter that Brian wrote to her is a three page postmarked letter. So he mailed it from Brian to Carol. The letter informed her that he wasn't into her and all that kind of shit. However, there's no cancellation impressions on the letter the pages of the letter what does that mean when they stamp the the letter like in the post office oh when they cancel the stamp yeah exactly okay yeah that'll make an impression on the inside paper as well if you're you know under a microscope but they didn't see that there um they said that it was as if they were putting the envelope after it had been mailed so also they found in the car a valentine's day card in an envelope addressed to brian

from cynthia walker that was torn up and they found strands of cynthia walker's hair so yeah she's got a valentine so it seems like she's she's super pissed about brian and cindy torn up and they found strands of Cynthia Walker's hair. So yeah, she's got a Valentine's. So it seems like she's, she's super pissed about Brian and send rageful. Yeah. More on the suicide note now. Okay.

They found a torn up rough draft of the note. Uh, and also from a spiral steno notebook was found in the trash at Carol's apartment. Oh, which this twice yeah which i we've seen a couple times people do multiple drafts of this kind of shit um they said several crossed out notations appear in the margins on the reconstructed rough draft these include

several misspellings of carol's name what spelled k-a-y-r-o-l and k-a or i'm sorry and c-a-r-y-l it's c-a-r-o-l that's her fucking name not k-a-y-r-o-l and this shit and not c-a-r-y-o like daryl yeah no so also they said a postscript added to the rough draft was also added to the final draft as a postscript not incorporated into the body. Meaning she wrote the rough draft, put a PS on it, which means I forgot this. But then when she wrote the new one, yeah, she didn't put that in the letter. She just PSed it again, which sometimes you want something to be a PS though. That's a part of it. Like here's what I'm talking about.

By the way, this is some important shit at the bottom. PS, feed the dog. Exactly. Exactly. Has nothing to do with the rest of it. here's what i'm talking about by the way this is some important shit at the bottom yes feed the dog exactly exactly has nothing to do with the rest of it but also i love you you're the most i miss you so much feed the dog yeah so uh they also found a yet another uh draft of the letter found in the car uh was had a a torn corner still attached to the spiral notebook and the rest of that draft was never found so it got ripped out but the whole page had a torn corner still attached to the spiral notebook, and the rest of that draft was never found. So it got ripped out, but the whole page didn't come out and left a corner of it, but it was clearly a draft of this note.

So there's at least three times this was written. Now, the Warner, her cousin, and the lead investigator in the case, he doesn't even recuse himself. They don't even say, hey, since this is your cousin, why don't we let somebody else handle it? They go, cool. He knows what's going on. High five. Yeah. Sorry about that. You might want to solve it. Bet you know more about her than any of us. So you're probably more inclined to searched Carol Willett's apartment. They searched four times, twice to see if they could find any connection between the two women, and they did, and then twice to check for any other evidence involved. Who knows? In the final search, they said they opened, unfolded, and examined every item in the

household, every piece of paper, everything, which I think they should do on the first search probably. Probably more thorough the first time. Yeah. They were like, let's just see. We'll use the wide comb this time, the wide tooth, and then we'll get more fine as we go. The searchers also included a piece-by-piece examination of her interior garbage basket and two exterior garbage cans as well. The only reference to Cindy Walker found in the house was a note with Cindy Walker's name and phone number on it lying on the kitchen table near the phone. You know, like she called her shortly before leaving the night before.

Like she said, other notes which were there were also found in the trash as well. They said they found letters in Cindy Walker's garbage as well there, and they were addressed to Barrett, and they said, love Cindy. So they're starting to piece something together here. One note discovered on top of the remains of spaghetti that she had eaten the night before carol here that was in the garbage uh had been torn into very tiny pieces after it had been taped together they said it appeared to be the rough draft of the note they found in the car they took the time to patch a piece yeah with spaghetti sauce on them and shit

never bad it's probably terrible, too. Iowa in the 70s, you know, it was like Prego or some garbage like that. It wasn't a can and it wasn't tomatoes that was simmered. It was already made. Oh, it was absolutely ragu. And that would be if they were pushing it. They said that a leaf from the notebook was also found torn into many small pieces. They did not find any other paper in the apartment similar to the notebook was also found torn into many small pieces. They did not find any other paper paper in the apartment similar to the

notebook paper. Other notes written by Carol were on paper with a first national bank heading their their letterhead. And that's the bank she worked for. So there's that one of the notes found in the garbage had an apparent order for pizza on it. It then said call 530 both days, 354-2200. That's the phone number.

38 caliber. It says, rev, meaning revolver, short, lightweight. So this is an ad for a gun that she's going to call to buy a gun. They said the phone number that the investigator said the phone number was that of the Finn and Feather Sports Shop in Iowa City. Oh. Yep. And they also found a check torn in half made out to Pizza Hut from February 18th, 1979.

So she ate bad pizza and bought a gun. We know that. We know that much. So, fuck, man. This is super weird. And they're really trying to – they're calling it a murder-suicide. They're trying to figure out, they say it just sounds like something's missing. They also get search warrants for

Brian Barrett's home, who said he knew the two women and they were probably fighting over him, so that made him put himself right in the middle of it here. In the first search of his home, they seized a life insurance policy on Cindy Walker, the one that he bought for the trip, a towel, a

curtain, and two notes. In the second search, they removed three pillowcases, samples from two carpets, samples of fabric covering a chair, and the contents of a vacuum cleaner bag. Yeah, he's gotta feel nervous now. I would think. Jesus,

whether you did something or not, this isn't looking good. They took your vacuum, man. Yeah, Jesus. That's thorough. What kind of a sick bitch takes the ice trays? This is one of those. They took the vacuum bag? Jesus Christ.

What kind of sick bitch takes the Eureka bag? Good God. So they talk to him. He does an interview with the cops, Brian Barrett. He says, yeah, Carol caught me and Cindy in bed the week before. She's been kind of pissed. He said, I wrote her the letter telling her, Carol, that I didn't want to see her anymore. And, you know he was surprised that Carol showed up is because her car was in the shop and she would have had to walk 20 blocks in zero degree, zero degree temperatures, which the cops were like, I don't know if she'd do that.

But to me, that's very fucking possible. Jealousy. Yeah. Keep you warm. Yeah. For 20 miles or 20 blocks. Not even my rage. Rage is so warm.

It's sweaty warm. And love makes you do crazy shit. Sure does. That fucking astronaut lady drove across the country with several dumps of fucking shit in her pants. Love makes you do weird things. Sure does. That wouldn't be out of the realm of possibility that someone would do that if they thought she didn't even have to shit on herself it was just walking i've been i'm married now and i've been married before 20 blocks in the cold is nothing if they think you're banging somebody

period easy peasy easy fucking peasy so um yeah they were uh they also issue a search warrant for a Ford Pinto owned by Brian as well as his residence as well. They're looking for a journal or document describing the means of the slayings. They're looking for four.38 caliber cartridges from a box purchased by Carroll and a piece of bed sheet and gunpowder residue. Basically, all the physical evidence that would make him be the murderer, they'd love to find that shit, they said. It'd be great, yeah. Yeah, they don't really find much of that, though. They said that Barrett told the cops here, Brian said that he undersigned, the way he put it, he gave Carol a $100 bill on February 20th, 1979.

Carol, $100 bill on February 20th, 1979. She purchased the.38 caliber pistol on February 21st using that $100 bill. So they said that they didn't know, you know, if that had something to do with it. But, you know, that makes a lot of sense that she got the money from there, even though she had her own money. So police, though, are suspicious of Brian here. Very suspicious. They find the insurance policy on Cindy, naming him the beneficiary. But his dad said that's ridiculous to think that he'd want to murder someone because he got an insurance policy.

His dad said, quote, he's very emotional, but it's the kind of emotion you find kind-hearted. You find in kind-hearted, loving people. He's emotional, but it's the kind of emotion you find in kind-hearted loving people. He's emotional, but he's sweet. Very sweet. Now, a criminalist for the Department of Criminal Investigation for the state of Iowa and a document expert named Jerry L. Brown, he explained the procedure involved with testing documents to determine whether they have mechanical indentations or impressions on them, meaning the letter that he sent her in an effort to determine whether this letter had actually been sent in the envelope. It was found that Brian sent to Carol. It was postmarked February 20th with a muscatine cancellation. muscatine cancellation or if brian had substituted the letter after the death after the death or something and you know trying to do some shit investigators ran tests on 105 envelopes at the

muscatine post office 105 the guy said he purchased and filled 100 envelopes with three pages each of mead spiral notebook paper you you know, your classic paper. The Mead that everybody, you know. That's the most common. The most, yeah. Everybody, every school kid has that shit. He then ran them through the Muscatine post office cancellation machine over four days, and he also explained that an electrostatic instrument referred to as an ESDA was used to test the pages for indentations. After all were canceled, he removed the page nearest to the front,

so where it would have been the most prominent, and processed it on the machine. He said, we were looking for any evidence that we could find of a cancellation. On each of the 100 envelopes found that they did, they found cancellation impressions on at least one of the sample pages. Every one of them happened? Every 100%. He also said that he was able to find impressions on the second and third pages. He said we could definitely find it on page two and fate ones on page three.

In other words, there's going to be an impression. It's like carbon paper. It's going through. It's happening. So it was all of them. Then there was the five sample envelopes that they did as well, and they all came back with impressions too. So 105 out of 105.

Uh-oh. So they said that's not great at all. Then there's pillowcases that they're talking about. They said that these pillows, there's a similarity to pillowcases in Brian's home that used to belong to his parents that he now has and her blindfold in her car. They said also there's evidence that two cars that we told you about, one with rectangular

headlights, were seen on the road on the night of the murders, one matching Willett's car, and one matching, just it has rectangular lights, matches Brian's father's car, and half the cars on the road. Let's be realistic here. Yeah. He said that his father here said that throughout the fall of 79, and before that,

they've had one of their granddaughters living with them. During February, from the 10th to the 25th, Brian was house-sitting for them. So when this happened, Brian was house-sitting at their house for them while his parents went out of the country on vacation. So he had availability of their car. And one of the cars they owned was a 77 buick that had rectangular taillights so like we said though that could be anything he said though he had no idea about hand-sewn pillowcases or any of that bullshit so doesn't they don't know now his mom though brian's mom

said she did have four or six pairs of embroidered pillowcases in her house which had been sewn by her mother and mother-in-law she was shown two pillow cases including one with pink embroidery toward the edge and she said she recognized them as one from her home when asked by the police if each was taken from a pair she said yes originally but when you have young people moving in and out you don't know where they go sometimes you lose one they steal some pillow cases um yeah she said she has several ones without mates also like one pillow not a set not a pair she said the family also used to own a pet cat but doesn't anymore she said the last time was one was in the house

was 1977 but her daughter took daughter took it with her when she moved from home she also said one christmas her mother-in-law brought her cat with her for a visit. Who the fuck brings her cat with them for a visit? The senile people in Christmas story. That's that's so. And the grandparents and fucking Christmas vacation. That's what I was talking about. What did I say?

Christmas story. Christmas story. I meant. Yeah. Yeah. They come with the fucking wrapped cat. Yeah. That's what I was. Wow. Christmas story. I said. So, yeah, that's with the fucking wrapped cat. They wrap it up, yeah, on accident. That's what I was, wow, Christmas story, I said.

So, yeah, that's what's going on. They said, that's so fucking weird. But the cat is happy you're gone. Leave it alone. Get a sitter and go. Get the fuck out of town. Jesus Christ. So she said she didn't know what year that was, though.

So there could have been a cat there. Now they go to scientific evidence. Okay, this is important here. They have a forensic pathologist, and he says, in his opinion, Carol Ann Willits in the car was murdered. That's what he says. She didn't kill herself. These are his six factors that he bases this on. The presence of a blindfold, which he said he's never seen in a suicide before.

The knot on the blindfold was tied by uh on the left by a right-handed person he said caroline was left-handed oh they said that she was wearing large cotton work gloves which would have made it difficult for her to tie the knot uh and which would have become bunched on the trigger of the gun yeah who puts gloves on after they tie a knot? Or before. Right, but you'd have to put them on after. Then you'd have to find the gloves. Feel around for the gloves. And put the right one on the right hand.

And then where's the gun now, because that wasn't in your hand. So it's difficult. They said Willett's hand was found in her lap with the gun on top of her hand. Yeah, that doesn't happen. They said, also, there was an intact paper bag on the seat, which should have been flattened by the gun. He said that each of the factors standing alone could be discredited, but all six of them, in his opinion, make it homicide, is what he said. 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. He said that after the victim blindfolded herself and tied the knot, she would have then had to feel around for the gloves and put them on, just like we just said. He said, I'm sure it's possible, but the problem is there's too many improbabilities and it doesn't make sense.

Right. It's weird. He said that the location of the gun on her lap violates a couple laws of physics. That's what he said. He said if you put a gun to your head and fire it, it will recoil and tend to go back out of your hand. Instead of recoiling, it appeared to have just dropped straight down. Right. Which doesn't make much sense.

And he said it had the appearance the gun was placed over her hand. It's not the way a hand falls or a gun falls. He also said that it was weird that the paper bag wasn't disturbed. He said physics also dictate that it should have been moved. Also, the wound itself, the examination of the blindfold and the wound indicate the gun was vertical at the time. He said the unlikelihood of the position of suicide. he said it was just a weird angle for that. He said it was more consistent with a bullet from Willett's head and exit through the driver's window. It was very straight is how it went. He said you're stretching out all the tendons in your hand and it's not normal. What's the purpose of it?

You're contouring your hand so you can feel the pain because your hand is at an unnatural position. To be perfectly straight. You'd be more at an angle going up. So they said that they did verify that the bullet entered the head at a perpendicular angle that would have been unnatural for a way for someone to hold a gun to their head. They also said that the suicide note was unbelievable, the guy said. The cop said, quote, I've never seen anything like this. It doesn't look like a suicide note. We've read some weird suicide notes.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. This is bizarre. Yeah. He said the unusual parts of it included the fact that it was written neatly and with a postscript, both the first and second drafts, obviously, like we said. He said, people who write suicide notes will write roughly and talk about what's bothering them and their writing degenerates toward the end.

Yeah, but that's if someone is writing right before this is going to happen. If they're in a clear-headed mind and planning this out, buying a gun the day before, it's a different story. So you never know yeah but that's the other part about suicide it's rarely like planned out like that it's often yes most of the other thing uh spur of the moment fucking in the heat of the moment heat of passion shit like that yeah but then when you get people who aren't like say drinkers or things like that a lot of times they make a full plan they go go to a hotel room. They have it set up. They know exactly.

But if somebody's including murder in that, oftentimes you've got to do some forethought. For real. For real. So Cindy's mom here said that a month goes by, nothing's happened. They're searching everywhere. They can't find anything. And she said,

this never happens to you or someone you know. She said, especially in a town like this. She said, then you find out it can happen. Then you wonder why. And chances are, we'll never know. So April of 1979, investigators try to get library records as evidence. They try to find out what brian was taking out of the library they want to know what books he had legal right well the library board and the iowa civil liberties union blocked them from doing that yeah that's illegal you can't do that now we've found out tons of times where librarians will just tell the cops yeah here's the shit they don't care yeah as we found we've had people even message us go my aunt's librarian she doesn't give a fuck she said she'll totally tell on somebody so june 1979 they exhume cindy and carol we've buried them and now we're bringing

them back up holy shit apparently they didn't get fingerprints very well the first time what yeah they didn't get good enough fingerprints so they had to fucking dig these poor women up. Disturb the resting place because we fucked up. We fucked up. And they end up never getting a good one on Carol, ever. Of course not, because that shit goes away. Yep, that's soft tissue there. Jesus. Werner, the investigator and cousin here of Cindy, he said this is going on because it's going on months now.

He said new leads are being received, but the process is painstaking. He said it's like everything else. He said being a police officer, to solve a case is self-satisfying. If you can't solve one, especially a big one like this, you think about it a lot. You think about how it was done, what the person did with the stuff that's missing how it's disposed of where it's disposed of you try to read people's minds i guessed he said i only missed about two hours of the investigation when i went to the funeral so um yeah and it's my family so it makes it a little worse yeah and so yeah the family said too you know there's a lot to hold on to here. We just hope somebody figures out what the fuck happened here.

Cindy's mother said that they're looking for some resolution, quote, so we can put the bad behind us so we can continue our life in as normal a fashion as it will ever be after you lose one of your children. So they also said the Willits and Walkers are becoming close friends as well now because they're going through this together. Yeah. So October. Yeah So October 1979. Oh, my God. Yeah, it's months. They've hit a dead end. They have all the evidence they're going to get at this point.

They have nothing else, nowhere. No witnesses are coming forward. This is it. So basically we can take what we do and take our shot at it now or it's going to be gone forever. So they take Brian to a grand jury to indict him for murder. Take what we do and take our shot at it now or it's going to be gone forever. So they take Brian to a grand jury to indict him for murder. Okay. Based on very, very scant evidence.

Shaky. Yeah, especially because she purchased the gun the day before. It's a lot. So they take it to a grand jury there. And after hearing two and a half days of testimony the seven member grand jury refuses to indict him yeah there's nothing there they do and it's you can get an indictment for anything yeah you don't have a defense in an indictment in a grand jury you're not allowed to question their witnesses or put on a defense it's just the evidence and yeah what do you think and it's just like it's a lot of just you know assumptions too

and shit like that it's just the prosecution's case with nothing else oh so still they decide to not and uh indict him so there is still a pending decision in court on who will collect the proceeds of a hundred thousand dollar life insurance policy that he took out on her for the trip remember um yeah so uh the walkers are disputing his claim because he tried to claim it. Now they can't get him to indict it. They can't get an indictment on him. So they said that the walkers are bringing a civil suit against him over the insurance claim.

Okay. They're going to sue him for trying to claim the insurance. But Barrett, Brian just drops his claim because he's asked to him for trying to claim the insurance but barrett brian just drops his claim because he's asked to give a deposition by the insurance company for the deposition you'd have to testify under oath oh so he just says fuck it never mind um yeah so uh that's how that goes now right after that a couple months or be within a month of the grand jury not returning an indictment he moves away he gets the fuck out of here leaving town now whether i did it or didn't do it i think i'd move away too um it looks bad if i didn't do it every time i go

into the fucking the cafe everybody's gonna be you know whispering about me and all that i'm getting the fuck out of this town absolutely um his mother said he moved to california with his sister his sister lives out there she said he was not running away it's been a heartbreaking time for all of us she did say the the pressure of the town and everyone knowing him and knowing his business has made him want to leave um so he told his friends at first he didn't say he was going to california he said he was going to liberia on the west coast of africa to work for his father's company there oh okay liberia's yeah and uh instead though he just moved to modesto i mean oftentimes modesto can probably feel like Liberia. Same thing. Same thing.

Yeah, I mean, it's hot probably. It's not a nice place. It's quite boring. Yeah, same thing. His sister was working as a nurse, so he went there. Iowa authorities said they kept tabs on him without his knowledge also. So wanted to keep an eye on him, make sure he didn't disappear. 1981, two civil suits are filed against him.

A wrongful death suit seeking $900,000 in damages was brought by the families. That was dismissed in 1981. Dismissed. Dismissed because they don't even have a court. They have nothing. At least Ron Goldman had the evidence from court. They don't even have a trial's worth of evidence you know what i mean um a second suit was brought and that ends in 1982 when he says he doesn't want the insurance money anymore anyway so they have no more claims to him yeah so he's

just out in modesto yeah just figuring life out he's living with his golden retriever named easy yeah and his two fucking parrots. How do these birds keep coming up? He's got two. Who gets two? Two parrots named Mel and Queekway. Okay. K-W-E-E-K.

Uh-huh. He's a fascinating man. I don't know. He worked on the graveyard shift at the Del Monte Cannery as well. Also had some odd jobs at Ply Pack Building Materials. Did some remodeling and repairs to shit houses. Some man with a college degree. An accounting degree, no less.

And he's working in Modesto Cannon shit at Del Monte? And the overnight shift. Yeah. Yeah. The the overnight shift. Yeah. Yeah. The skank shift. Yeah. This is like if you come from back then, if you came from Czechoslovakia back then, you'd take that job and be happy and be like, oh, this is much better. Terrible job.

This is not great. Yeah. So he had an apartment as well. The Surfside Apartments on College Avenue where he lived. Surfside Apartments on College Avenue where he lived. He tried to start a remodeling business, but he did a large job and it worked. So he was like, maybe I could do this for a living here. The manager of the apartments, Albert Hollander, said that he doesn't believe any of this bullshit about Brian that they're saying in Iowa.

He said, I won't believe it until I see it. I don't know what that means. I need him to murder in front of me. I need him to kill a lady in front of me, and then I'll go, all right, he kills women. He said, I saw him every day for a year, year and a half, and I never saw anything unusual about him. He said that Brian would talk about his high school football and track days and about Brian's 11-year-old son. Or, no, about this guy's 11-year-old son. And Brian also had a son that we know about, too. He said it was because of his son.

And his son was back in Iowa. He decides to move back to Iowa in 1984. So five years later, he decides to move back. He said he doesn't want to follow in the footsteps of his father. He said he resented his father not spending time with him growing up. You know, so he wants to be with his son. He said he was very good at showing the part of him that was good, but he felt that he was smarter than his friends or bosses. That was the only negative. He said he felt he could outthink anyone and win any argument,

and he liked to pick on people's shortcomings. He would tease a fat person about being fat. He's a hack. That's what I mean. He's just a hack. Hey, what's up, fatty? All right, well, that's... There's a lot of other things wrong with him, I'm sure.

Shovey fuck. Yeah, that's just... That's what I mean. It's not a matter of, oh, that's mean. It's a matter of come up with something that's not so obvious, you fucking hacks. Go better, dude. Dig harder. That's what we feel about tons's not a matter of, oh, that's mean. It's a matter of come up with something that's not so obvious, you fucking hacks. That's what we feel about tons of comedy that's like that. It's not a matter of we don't like it because it's offensive.

We don't like it because it's hacky. Everybody does it. Yeah, we don't like it because everyone did it in 1973, and now you're doing it. That's what's going on in the world right now. It's fucking pathetic. Come up with something better and funnier. So they said that he couldn't maintain a lasting relationship they a lot of people said he gets along best with and tell me who you've heard this quote about he gets along best with children and animals oh boy uh can you

say fucking billy jean is not my lover because that is exactly i i read two very long books about michael jackson that is exactly what everyone said about him gets along best with children and animals yeah that's a bad sign for an adult an adult man anyway yeah that's a guy that's not adjusted well yeah yeah and it is you can say what about a woman no way different for a woman because they're not putting their dicks in as many people that's why so that's a veterinarian, and she's a sweet lady. Leave her alone. Yeah, she's probably nice or a teacher or some shit. He is almost arrested in California, not for murder but for something else here.

He was working at the cannery and doing all that kind of shit, and a woman who he lived with for a while said that he tried to collect $2,000 of her home insurance policy when his belongings supposedly were stolen from her home in December of 82. She later found the missing items in a trunk that Barrett had stored in her garage. Barrett never collected the money, by the way, but she returned the settlement to the insurance company and said, oh, there was a mistake. We found it. Here's the money back. So it's not insurance fraud at that point. Not stolen after all.

And she kicked him out at that point. And the county district attorney declined to file a complaint against him because they said the case did not appear strong enough. Okay. So no. It's like misplacement, I guess. A mistake. Thought it was there. He could very easily say it was a mistake

and that would be fine so i didn't realize it was in the garage in a trunk and the money was returned so it's like i thought it was on my nightstand turns out it's not and the insurance company once they got their money back they don't fucking care anymore yeah so they're literally not going to be involved in this so you just it's there's no evidence so So November of 1984, Brian moves back to Iowa. And the reason the cops found out that he moved back to Iowa is because the guy, the landlord there that said he's a nice guy, I guess Brian had a friendship with this man's seven-year-old daughter. Oh, dear Lord. That they would write letters back and forth. Hey, creepy guy, don't write fucking letters to my seven-year-old daughter oh dear lord that they would write letters back and forth hey creepy

guy don't worry fucking letters to my seven-year-old absolutely not um that's i get that oh yeah he's being a nice guy no it's fun to get mail watch no it's not it's weird from grandpa tell grandpa to write her a letter give me a fucking break here so they uh so they found out based on his return address on an envelope that he'd sent what his address in Iowa City was. So that's very interesting. So they noticed all of that. That is a silver lining of that. You can keep tabs on the creep based on his fucking mailing address. Absolutely.

So November 5th, 1984, they arrest him. He's back for like four days in town and they pick him up. Okay. So he is arrested for murder. Yeah. Oh. Absolutely. Now, that night, his mom said she went to his apartment in Iowa City the night he's arrested to pick up a few things and bring back some pets.

Huh. To pick up his birds and his dog, but also who knows what else she got out of there. Yeah. huh to pick up his birds and his dog but also who knows what else she got out of there the cops allowed a murder suspects family member to come in and just pick some shit up from his apartment stuff oh my god think about that why would you do that i don't know because you're the why would you let the first cousin be the fucking one of the lead investigators why would you do any of this shit there's so much conflict there's so much bad work it's just a mess it's the whole thing's a mess so they said that um uh they said her husband had told her to pick up a red spiral notebook she said which she did she didn't know why and didn't look in the book she said neither did she remove any pages and she said

that she didn't see her husband remove any pages either her husband had visited with brian's attorney prior to asking her to pick up the notebook she said so her husband went there they said if there's any notebooks pick them up and that's what they did they end up getting the notebooks though from her so cindy walker's mother said it's been five fucking years sheames the, let's listen to this shit. Okay. Not only is the fucking one of the lead investigators, the first cousin of one of the victims, but Cindy Walker's mom blames the Muscatine County chief prosecutor at the time in 1979, Steven

Peterson for not presenting a strong enough case to the grand jury. She says, quote, he presented only what he wanted them to hear. grand jury she says quote he presented only what he wanted them to hear then she says i have found out since then that steve peterson is a good close friend of barrett's older brother bruce no all of this is why we do this show because it's like what the fuck man um now peterson denied any preferential treatment adding that he involved state prosecutors just like him and it's all fine even though he was the guy in charge it's still you know um so the prosecutor in this case is james ramey is his name he says for this next for the trial he says it's the most unusual case i've ever seen it really is fucking weird and there's a lot of mushy parts to it a lot of just kind of nebulous

conflict of interest conflict oh that too i mean in the actual evidence of the actual case and then in the in the prosecuting of it the whole thing's a disaster um so he said that uh you know this guy's ready to to do this here he said the only case, he only had one case where he lost a murder trial. So he says he's ready to fucking go, man. He said, we could have asked for a change of venue, the defense attorney says, but we're confident the people of Muscatine can render a fair verdict. I only know of two people who could tell the whole story. One is dead and the other is the defendant. That's what the prosecutor says.

So now the prosecutor, because right away they have a person who has what's kind of a suicide note and a gun on her. It just doesn't look good from the outside. It looks like it's an obvious murder-suicide unless you get really into the details. He said that he doesn't think it's a suicide note, though. He said there's no direct reference to suicide, which a lot of notes don't have a direct reference to suicide. That's very common. They don't go, I'm going to take this gun and put it in my mouth.

They just tell you what's concerning to you. Right. And no mention of Carol's family and no explicit account of Cindy's murder, which, again again is not detailed account doesn't matter it's in carol's handwriting he does admit that it's impossible to fucking deny it uh he says though that it was artfully drafted and said that uh carol didn't write it with plans of killing herself that's what he thinks they said to the prosecutor well why do you think she wrote that note like that and And he says, well, I can't

answer that question. I know what it wasn't for, but I don't know what it was for, which is not a good answer also. The defense attorney say that the discovery of the rough draft in her apartment suggests that she planned and wrote the note out. That's why it was nice and neat because she fucking did it three times. She was kind of studious.

So the defense lawyer says he thinks it's weird, too. He said, I don't think I've ever read or heard a case that was so much entirely based on circumstantial evidence. They said the prosecution does not have a single piece of physical evidence linking Brian with the crimes. None. They're not putting him there. Somebody saw a car near there with rectangular headlights or taillights. And his father has a car with rectangular taillights.

That's poof. That is not enough. So they said, quote, this is the defense attorney. We feel that if one looks at the evidence with an open mind and not just pick out a suspect and try and convict him, that there's more than a reasonable doubt to this case. Brian wants a bond here. He wants to get out. He says, I'm an eagle he said i'm an eagle scout and an honor student who's never been charged with a criminal offense in

my life this is ridiculous i'm an accountant i'm the most boring person on the planet look at these glasses huh look at this head does this look like the head of a man who goes out and fucking does crazy shit hell no so um a friend of the family uh who's a manager at the Lumber Mart in Muscatine, signed a court affidavit promising a full-time job for Barrett if they'd free him on bond. I'll put him to work. Another affidavit submitted was submitted by someone you wouldn't expect, his ex-wife, Diana. Oh, what does that? Submitted one. She said, quote, I don't feel that Brian Barrett is a threat to my life or safety or to the life or safety of anyone else oh babe i got a spiral notebook for you yeah that's what i mean about

you um so she wants that lowered but the prosecutor said what are murder suspects supposed to look like some look like jim clint who was a murderer in iowa some look like klaus von bulow i've never seen a murder suspect with blood dripping from his fangs like come on who cares if he's a mild-mannered looking accountant so 1985 here pre-trial they want the notebooks excluded i would too yeah i would too yeah um they said that there was never any in the notebooks there's nothing about killing these two women so they're like this doesn't directly relate to the murders this is just shitty and makes my client look bad that's all it is yeah well i mean this is like he could say i was a creative writing exercise i mean you can't take

somebody and go well these screenplays they wrote obviously they murdered somebody like that's not how it works um so they said that uh um you know they kept this packed with references of how to commit the perfect murder. The plots are spelled out to the finest detail, the prosecutor said, ranging from concocting incriminating letters to strategically placing hair samples to throw investigators off. They said he's not just thinking about ways to murder a person, but he's talking about how to place the evidence. Page after page shows clearly that Barrett is a person familiar with physical evidence and familiar with police techniques. OK, they said that. Yeah, Jesus Christ. The his one of his attorneys said it may not be an appropriate way to respond, but this is what he was going through a divorce at the time. He said it may not be the way you or I would respond but that's the way brian barrett did it's a journal written by a man who

really didn't have anyone else to talk to she said he doesn't have anybody to blow off steam and go i fucking just want to she doesn't have that person so he does it on paper you got a mirror i guess the defense attorneys also say that the book was improperly seized and that its contents had nothing to do with the case. And so this is ridiculous. Can't take everybody's writings. So they said the writings were irrelevant. They asked the judge to exclude the diaries and they let the diaries both in. This is the 77 notebook that was photocopied and the later notebook that had the I want to kill and fucking molest a paper boy and all that shit

so uh the defense is it's a it's a love triangle yeah which carol shot cindy then shot herself and that's that and uh leaving him alone that's what we got yep and he even says before the trial starts the the defense attorney says in years, the defense side of this case hasn't been told. So yeah, they said Brian Barrett firmly believes that by the end of this month, he'll be vindicated. I would suppose he's feeling some level of relief. He's about to go on first degree murder. He's feeling relief. Okay. But the thing is that really, it's not his job to to explain why he's innocent it's their job to explain why he's guilty yeah absolutely and the quad city times on april 14th

1985 laid out the scenarios very well everything succinctly here this they lay out they lay out the innocent scenario the guilty scenario and i'll read what they wrote because it's pretty perfect. Fair. Innocent scenario. Okay. Both Cindy Walker and Carol Willits, who knew each other but aren't close friends, became infatuated with Barrett. One night, Barrett brings Cindy to his favorite bar, Jody's Tavern, and they meet an insurance friend of Barrett's who sells them a life insurance policy. Because that's, by the way, how the policy came about.

Wow. A friend of theirs was at a bar who sold insurance, and he was like, well, we're going on that trip. We should get you insurance. Okay. So it's not like he called somebody and said, hey, we have an appointment tomorrow. They were out having a drink. The friend, Tom Howell, now living in St. Louis, notices that both Cindy and Barrett

are excited about their relationship and to tell him plans of taking a trip. Barrett explains to Howell that the insurance is necessary to protect him financially in the event that Cindy would die in an accident during the trip and her parents would sue him for liability. That is a really weird thing to think about. But if you sit around drinking with somebody and that's their job, you can get from A to B there, for sure. Their insurance people are always trying to sell you insurance, too.

Always be closing. Fuck yeah. A few days after the shootings, Carol walks in on Cindy and Barrett in bed at his home. Court documents refer to a subsequent three-page letter from Barrett to Carol postmarked on February 20th in which he explains his relationship with Cindy and concludes,

I am the way I am. Sorry. The next day, a distraught Carol borrows $100 from Barrett and buys a.38 pistol. On February 22nd, Carol goes to the supermarket to buy ingredients for a spaghetti dinner that evening in her apartment. She invites four female friends to share the meal. One of them is Pam Skidmore. She thinks Carol's in great spirits. But after the meal, Carol telephones Cindy at 10 p.m.

spirits. But after the meal, Carol telephones Cindy at 10 p.m. Cindy tells her parents that Carol invited her to spend the night and the two of them were going to Iowa City the next day to see someone with a new baby. In the meantime, Carol writes a suicide note in her apartment. Actually, she writes two notes, a rough draft that's later discovered in the trash with spaghetti that wasn't eaten and a carefully worded, neatly scribed final product. When she meets Cindy that night, Carol drives to a dirt road and fires three shots into her. She then parks her Ford Granada at the intersection of US-61 and Burlington Road, leaves the engine running, places the suicide note on the dash,

covers her eyes with a blindfold, and shoots herself. The driver's side window shatters completely after the bullet passes through her head all the while barrett is at home asleep that's their scenario that is a very interesting story and very possible story too is it though i mean well physically physically outside of the physical evidence of the gunshot all the rest of that is logical and follows it's just an interesting uh that that means that that girl was so distraught she wrote a letter of suicide with plans of murdering somebody after inviting four friends over to have dinner and have a fun nice dinner right that's it's just very implausible it's it it's like it's odd listen mental health

makes you do wild shit that's the other thing but the guilty scenario let's read about that this is guilty brian barrett isn't just the very emotional person his father describes but is a smooth con artist who resents women and has plotted against them since his divorce of his wife in 1977 in late 1978 he strikes a romantic relationship with Cindy Walker and in December of that year convinces her to sign a life insurance policy after promising to take her on a trip to California. Then he begins to play on Carol Willett's affections. A few days before the killings, Barrett gives her a $100 bill to purchase a pistol,

perhaps after leading her to believe her life is in danger. They have no proof of that, by the way. On the night of February 22nd, he arranges to meet with Carol and Cindy, either together or separately, and drives them to the countryside. He somehow talked Carol into writing him a note before she ventures out that night. This is what I mean. Why did she write that fucking note? It could be interpreted as a suicide note, but it also could be interpreted as a note to break off the relationship.

For Barrett's purposes, the note comes as close to a suicide note as he could have hoped for. At their rendezvous, Barrett shoots Cindy and leaves her body on a dirt road. A short time later, in Carol's car, he wraps a blindfold around Carol and shoots

her as well. Why would she allow him to blindfold her for what all right put these gloves on like it makes no sense um and uh he shoots her as well the bullet passes through her head and makes a hole in the driver's side window he then plants the murder suicide evidence in carol's car including carol's suicide note strands of cindy's hair and a letter supposedly written from him to Carol that suggests that she had caught Barrett and Cindy in bed together. He puts that letter in an envelope, postmarked February 20th. In his haste, he forgets to remove Carol's blindfold. He exits out of the passenger side.

So he did everything meticulously, including planting hairs, but then he just left the blindfold on the murder victim. Everything meticulously, including planting hairs, but then he just left the blindfold on the murder victim. So he's either the most meticulous, perfectly, you know, perfect con artist, but he's also a fuck up. But you can just reconcile that. I think he did it. I'm not saying he didn't, but there is no evidence of it whatsoever. The letter, though, is weird because the misspelling of the name on the rough draft is weird. Even all that. Who says he did that, though?

That's what i mean you were saying if carol didn't do a murder suicide then he must have killed them right but there's no evidence putting him in right yeah so you know what i mean other than he might benefit from character from the death outside of that they don't have any fucking actual evidence which is a problem um so and when he shuts the opposite window with the bullet hole uh the the opposite window with the bullet hole crumbles from the impact so he slams the door and then the bullet yeah with the appearance that cindy was killed by carol barrett figures he can cash in the insurance policy he tries but withdraws his claim to the benefits when cindy's parents challenged the

policy in court three years later in modesto barrett begins living with a nurse named Cecilia French and asks her to take out a life insurance policy naming him as the beneficiary. She refuses. In late December 1982, Ms. French discovers her house had been burglarized and several items belonging to her and Barrett had taken that were insured. She later finds a notebook of Barrett's with a list of items stolen above the words $1,500 profit. So he likes to write everything down. Sure does. So the strategy of the prosecutor, those are the two scenarios. So clearly they said that they will be able to convince the jury to envision a plot that would frighten anybody here.

They said this plot, it's outlined in his in his book. She he calls it carried out by a man, quote, totally bound up in complex homicidal plans for profit. I'm on cross examination. They have the doctor up there. He gives all the stuff we said about physical evidence. They have a small exchange. They said, you reached a judgment on the 29th day of November and you haven't changed it, have you? He said, nothing's been presented to me since then changed my opinion.

And then the defense attorney says, then you're about to. You're 99% right and you're not about to change your opinion, are you, Doc? And he said, I change my opinions when you present material to me to show me I am wrong, then I'll change my opinion. So they have this thing. The defense attorney calls him so inflexible or dogmatic that he would never change his position if presented with contrary evidence. And he said, no, that's not true. They went back and forth about a God complex. Do you have a God complex? He said, yeah, he doesn't have a God complex and all that kind of shit.

He thinks he's God or afraid of God? Thinks he's God. Doctors have a God complex where they think they know everything people say and shit like that. So Brian testifies and he said, yes, he did write shit. I did write schemes to blind and murder my former wife. I did do that, but I never intended to follow up on them. I was just blown off steam. Yeah.

You know, you know, he said that he called the plot to kidnap a paper boy. Jesus Christ. He said that was just the result of a fascination with kidnapping because he'd been reading about it a lot. What's with the sexual assault of a child? That's the thing. He said, I guess you'd call it maybe a morbid curiosity. That's one way to put it. That's sick.

Curiosity is one way to put wanting to fuck a fucking paper boy, I suppose. That's weird. Curiosity is one way to put wanting to fuck a fucking paper boy, I suppose. That's weird. So, yeah, they said that the schemes he wrote in 1977 constituted a, quote, release of the feelings I had, blowing off steam. He said he didn't want to kill his wife. He said writing the schemes were my fantasy revenge or something I felt I could do. He said his feelings of bitterness and frustration and helplessness at the time caused him to have no other choice but to write the shit down.

So he felt like he had some control. Yeah. Okay. Now closing arguments here. This is interesting. The prosecutors are trying to say that they, he's a lurid and graphic and disgusting diaries. And, uh,

you know, obviously he did it. Anyone that would write that as a sick fuck and he has it all in his brain and he would do it. Um, he said And, you know, obviously he did it. Anyone that would write that is a sick fuck and he has it all in his brain and he would do it. He said that, you know, quote, this is from the, this is what he's talking about the book, not the evidence of the trial.

He said, we're talking about castration. We're talking about sex slavery. We're not talking about anything in this case. That's what the, that's what the defense attorney said. He's talking about bullshit. The prosecutor said, though, the diaries showed that Barrett was capable of coldly plotting

a murder for profit, and there was legitimate evidence. He said, this is not your ordinary street killing. It's one of those things from which movie plots are made. Or a good podcast. Yeah. So, they told the jurors also the prosecution that carol was not

the type of person to commit murder or suicide he said the evidence will show that i did show that carol was a very very clean wholesome young lady who was active in her church did not smoke drink or use profanity and had told her friends she intended to remain a virgin until married. Is that right? To me, if I'm the prosecution, I don't want the jury to know that. Because that says that would make more sense of why she did what she did. If she said, I'm going to save myself for marriage, then she fucked this guy, and he told her, hey, not interested banging this other chick, that might make her crazy.

To me, that's more reason for her to do that, more motivation of just that would, whatever. I'm not saying that made, that she did it, I'm just saying that. So the verdict comes in, and this is, I mean, could go any, any way here. Oh boy, yeah. They, it's seven women and five men on the jury. Uh-huh. They deliberate over five days for 23 and a half hours they deliberate this

is a tough one and uh this is you know two first degree murder charges and they find him guilty of two first degree murder charges really yep um that's that's tough man um that's one of those where it's like shit you don't want to say he did it too well, but he didn't leave a lot of evidence. Or too terribly. Or too badly. The weird shit that's involved makes it far too, like, if you're going to make something look like a murder-suicide, make it go away easy and fast. This didn't go away easy and fast at all. No.

No, no, no, not at all. So sentencing comes around. Yeah. fast at all no no no no not at all uh so sentencing comes around yeah and he is told you sir may fuck off two life sentences no parole oh wow two life withouts he got that is with that that's what i mean well that's the thing if you find him guilty the judge doesn't like you know doesn't like reconcile it with well i'm not, so I'll give you a light sentence. It's either you didn't do anything or life without parole, one or the other. Working out on appeal.

I don't know what to tell you, man. So weird. Well, 1986 is an appeal, obviously, of this. You'd think there's going to be a fucking appeal here. Um, the, uh, Supreme court decision said that judge Max Worling from the first trial did not err by admitting the evidence of a 143 page journal that Barrett wrote several years before the crime. That journal, when considered with other evidence suggested among other things, a plot to kill his former wife and collect insurance proceeds. kill his former wife and collect insurance proceeds he said quote the journal was admissible under the iowa rules of evidence as tending to dispel an innocent explanation for the defendant's purchase of life insurance on one of the victims so because he mentioned life insurance in there he said that would be similar however the supreme court ruled that the the judge ruled incorrectly

admitting the second journal the one about molesting fucking paper boys and stuff yeah that journal also recounted plots for hypothetical crimes they said the hypothetical crimes discussed in the second journal while inflammatory bore no similarity in motive or method to the crimes charged here right it's just inflammatory it's hard to say you're not a murderer when you're willing to molest and murder and kidnap a child, a child who's just trying to deliver a shitty paper. So they said the second journal was therefore inadmissible under the same rule of evidence because its only relevance was to show a character trait suggesting that the defendant acted in conformity therewith on a particular occasion. that the defendant acted in conformity therewith on a particular occasion. The high court also said that the three rulings made by him were correct, though. The photocopying by police of the journal there, they said, was not an unlawful search and seizure and didn't violate his Fourth Amendment rights.

The journal was found and read by restaurant employees who then turned it over to the police, so the police obviously could read it. The admission into evidence of the journal did not violate the right to freedom from incriminating himself and admitting evidence concerning certain experiments conducted by investigators on some of the evidence. The state was not required to show the scientific reliability of the experiments as a prerequisite. So that's what they said, And so they overturn his conviction. Overturn. What are you going to do now?

New trial. New trial. The new trial. Yeah, they're going to do another trial. Boy. Yeah. The they said that the the defense said we cannot agree with the trial court's decision to admit the contents of the other journal. It's difficult to imagine a more inflammatory subject matter for purposes of inducing prejudice into a trial.

That's rough. So, yeah. So the reaction is his defense attorney said, I'm pleased that he will now get a fair trial. The mother, though, what is it? Cindy Walker's mother said that she predicts an easy second conviction. Oh, you are very confident. She said, I have no doubt that he will be convicted again. I wasn't pleased with the news.

She said, we always knew the possibility of a new trial, but we were hoping we wouldn't have to go through this again. She said, a second trial will be easier than the first. We've seen the evidence and we'll know what to expect it won't be easier emotionally though i could see that um she also said that the family members will attend the second trial she said we thought it was all in the past and now we find it isn't we're facing another long drawn out drawn out ordeal i guess we'll have to go through it again um so retrial he comes around retrial this one it's the same evidence they allow the same exact shit and that's the first one second journal yeah all right that's it otherwise they allow all the same shit um they deliberate

for six hours only from 23 and a half to six and And they find him guilty again on two counts of second degree murder. Oh, boy. Sentence to you, sir. May indeed still fuck off. Yeah. To life without paroles. Oh, my God. Okay.

What is with Modesto creating people that are thrown away for some questionable shit? That's wild. That probably did it. That probably did it. Yeah. That probably did it. That probably did it. Yeah, that probably did it. So he also, the prosecutor said, you know, he expects still appeal again. He said, quote, I haven't seen a murder case yet where an appeal wasn't filed. There's always a possibility of another trial when an appeal is filed.

If there's a third time, I'll be here a third time. He said, I did expect the jury to take a little longer in deliberations. I'm very pleased with the jury's verdict. It's easier when 24 jurors have found this. Now this is twice. He thought that the second trial was tougher than the first. He said, you lose your edge. I was more intense the first time.

Yeah, because you had more evidence. Yeah, well, he said that's the other thing. he said the evidence is what he said to the jury it's it's not about pieces it's about a jigsaw puzzle one piece does not mean anything but you put all the pieces together and you have a nice picture of what happened it's my cousin vinnie's card thing right yeah yeah there you go identical identical so uh the brother this is bruce barrett this is the guy who's friends with the first prosecutor who didn't get an indictment here. They get two convictions. That guy couldn't get an indictment. Same evidence.

So they said that he said this all stems from a botched police investigation. That's what Bruce said? That's what Bruce said, the brother. He said this whole thing. He said the opinion of Bruce Barrett is that he said, quote, I don't have any hard feelings toward anyone. The biggest thing I feel is that the original investigation was botched. He said evidence was not collected. The investigation was not to seek the truth but to convict my brother.

He said that, yeah, he said this is, yeah, this is silly. He said that the jurors considered the prosecutor's antics in the courtroom more than the evidence. He did a little ball shuffle shift fucking deal there. He said he was extremely surprised the jury could have reached the verdict in so short of time unless they had been greatly influenced by knowledge of the prior conviction and the theatrics in the court. He said Ramey convinced them, convinced them, not the evidence. They said the jury couldn't have looked through 150 pieces of evidence in six hours, said no one has yet explained how my brother did it, how he could have gotten the girls together. But they did.

He did call the last eight and a half years a horrendous situation for his family. He said the real tragedy is that two girls died and I feel for the families. But three families have suffered and will continue to suffer. But another tragedy is happening. My brother has been in jail for three years and he shouldn't be there. So February. I see him being manipulative and getting that girl to do this stuff. Absolutely.

And then he killed her after. see him being manipulative and getting that girl to do this stuff absolutely it's just so after they haven't even put together like a a way of a timeline let's say they haven't said here's what happened from start to finish she doesn't know that other girl though uh consistently enough the only thing she has is her name and number next to her phone that's only he told her to call her maybe yeah why'd she write that note then? Why'd she write it three times? Why'd she do? There's so much that's just, it's a lot. If I'm on a jury, I'm like, that's too much.

It's just too messy. It's too muddy. Too muddy. February 89, there's an appeal again here. They said, wow, this is very interesting. During the proceedings, evidence was given that Barrett had been linked romantically and all that. And they said they talked about no indictments the first time. His lawyer said that over 50 percent of the first panel of jurors had some prior knowledge of the case. And that didn't mean he didn't get a fair trial. They said the evidence does not support a guilty verdict. They said, though, the prosecutors say they do. And the Iowa Court of Appeals, it's a six-person panel, which makes no sense why you would have a tie be possible. But they have a six-person panel, and they split three to three on upholding the conviction, which a tie goes to the convictions upheld.

Of course. So, yeah. So he remains in prison may of 1996 a u.s district judge rules that prosecutors at the second trial violated his constitutional rights by admitting a journal written prior to the deaths of they let the 77 journal in again um he also ruled that testimony by the pathologist about his colleagues was hearsay because he said a few things that like oh well my colleague thought this well where's he testifying? God damn it. Get him up here. May 5th, 1998, a three judge panel of the eighth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. That's

getting up there. Yeah. Concurred that the the forensic doctor there, his testimony was hearsay and they also overturned the decision that the journal written by power by barrett was inadmissible this decision leads to the possibility of a third trial a third trial the attorney general's office asked the entire eight judge panel to review the decision so cindy walker's mom said quote it's a mess i just can't believe a couple of judges can retry the whole thing over a little phrase said wrong we we thought we were home free in 87 the jury took only six hours to deliberate but i'm confident a third trial will still result in a conviction the truth never changes what was said in the courtroom in 84 was true what was said in

87 was true and it will still be true if you go to trial tomorrow okay ma problem is they never retry him no he's just in life they don't because he doesn't get it it doesn't get uh dismissed so it doesn't get overturned so there's no reason to retry him he just stays in prison for the next oh really 25 years yeah there's no they read so there's no no overturn no overturn okay they looked at it more and then nothing ever happened so he just ended up staying there we just don't like the way this happened but keep him yep but you can hang on to him for a while february until february 11th. So in the last couple years, Brian is pronounced dead in prison. Yep.

Dead due to an unexpected medical emergency at the Anamosa State Penitentiary. Foul play is not suspected. And they're going to do an autopsy to determine the cause of death. He's a 60-year-old man living in prison. I'm going to say a heart attack, stroke. He probably died of 60 years old in prison. Yeah, that's mean so there you go so he's dead holy shit that's muscatine iowa and what a fucking mess i don't know what happened there oh my god i'm pretty sure he did it i'm 98 sure he did it um i'm also 98 sure that they had their heads firmly up their asses the entire time they fucking investigated

a lot of fuck ups i mean this is just a mess this is the essence of small town murder is this you know what i mean yeah but it's mom's it's mom's embroidered pillowcase on the girl's face yeah maybe they don't know they it's similar fabric they said yeah right it's not a match that's what i mean her family made them so she's gotta know right she said that's some could be but i mean it's a it could be other things too and they don't have 100 didn't commit suicide there's that don't think so no don't think that happened no and then also they don't have like a pillowcase that that piece was ripped out of so they don't have that we don't have no way. So wherever that went is gone. They don't know.

They don't know anything about it. And they have the forensic evidence looks like a girl didn't shoot herself when she bought the gun the day before herself and was with this. Clearly there was something going on there where she was upset with him over her. Yeah.

Because obviously that happened. I didn't mean to fucking, you know, take your attention the wrong way right obviously means that he told her at some point whether that letter was in that mail or not he told her at some point i'm not going to see you anymore because she said sorry about that didn't mean to press or he didn't tell her that uh and he he figured out something else and he put that letter in there. Well, yeah, yeah, that letter wasn't mailed, so he must have switched out the letters.

But in the letter he did write her, he must have told her something similar, just with less detail, possibly. I don't know. Maybe just this letter he thought was better. But, I mean, if he did, too, he did a – like I said, if you're going to try to frame something up, I mean, it's about as good as you can do it. Yeah. You know, in a bad way, obviously. try to frame something up, I mean, it's about as good as you can do it. Yeah. You know, in a bad way, obviously. He was convicted, so I mean. Not great.

Evidently. Yeah. No shit. That's very weak evidence. Very, very weak. I mean, Jesus Christ. Compared to OJ, that was like nothing. You can't even put the gun in his hand, for Christ's sake. No, not at all.

At least OJ had a cut on his hand. Yep. She bought the gun, and in the end, the gun was in her lap. There's never any time of, oh, and then Brian was holding the gun. No one's ever seen him with the gun. It's her gun. So it's crazy. That's Muscatine, Iowa, everybody, on the river.

Oh, the pearls, the pearls and the scarecrows. There you go. Tall glass of Muscatine. Holy shit. If you enjoyed that, tell the world about it get on apple podcast or whatever app you're listening on give us five stars it really does help a lot it helps drive the show up the charts we have no fucking idea why but it does so thank you for doing that yeah it's helpful and it takes two seconds it's an easy way to help your boys out

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I need to hear the list of people who aren't dirty or filthy at all, unless they're being cool about it. So hit me with the names of the dirtiest, filthiest, coolest motherfuckers on Earth. Hit me with them now, Jimmy. This week's executive producers are Karen from Alabama, Adam Simon, Brian Whitney. Happy birthday, Brian. Happy birthday. Sophie Sazanto, Santo probably, and her sister in Austria, thank you so much.

Thank you. Jordan Bennett in Canada. Of course, we love her. Florence Cullerton, Stephanie Saliff, happy birthday, Stephanie. Happy birthday. Robert David, Matt, and Devin Jennings, thank you so much, you guys, for everything you do. Other producers this week are Corporal Carl Kirshner, Carly Mann from Home Run Espresso, Liz Vasquez, Peyton Meadows, Anna Liu, I think, Cody Leversy in Detroit.

We'll see you soon. Aros Whiskey and Tequila at Centeno Kennels in Canada. Catherine Collado, Andrew Youngberg had a cat. What is this? Had a cat named, oh, Andrew had a cat named Bergu. I imagine that cat is dead, and I hope you didn't eat your cat. Oh, I hope not either. I hope they didn't turn it into Burgoo.

His dad named it Burgoo. That's wild. What a weird place we live in. Carrie Clemeck, Nicole Clausen, Janice Hill, Mary Kip Soosley, congratulations on your divorce. Dan Dan's mom, Anita Penis. I hope she gets it. Mike Hawk. I hope you're proud of that one as well. Darcy Standifer. You'll Never Make the Six. What is that? Oh, who said that? In what movie? You'll Never

Make the Six. I think that's Planes, Trains, and Automobiles, right? Oh, You'll Never Make the six. I think that's Planes, Trains, and Automobiles, right? Oh, you'll never make it. Yeah, probably. I think so. Tatum with no last name. Keelan McCollin. Alex Patterson. Laura Varney. Maybe Jim's daughter.

Jim's wife or daughter. Laura. Amelia Boyd. Rachel. Rachel Ugele. Banjo Bobby. Samantha with no last name. Jen Lacombe.

Adam Clark. Annie Skelton. Mike Lendy, Chris Furness, Holly Tregertha, Brendan Small, J.D. with no last name, Taylor with no last name, Catherine Cook, Mama Lovejoy, J.D. Uwalt, that's what it is, Welts Tovo, boy, oh, boy, Toiva Nenen. Toivonen. Welts Toivonen. That's not right. Yeah. Ben Bauer. Cassie Pereira. Janet Lund. Isabella Moore. Michelle Trash.

Oh, it's Thrash. Sorry about it, Michelle. Jesus Christ. Jack Welker. Nicholas Waldowski. Michelle, you're trash. Megan McCausland. Sarah Murphy.

Nicole Schlutz. Schlutz. Tanya Smith, Juan Reina, Mary Skaggs, Jordan Freeman, Rome Upton, Amanda Meyer, Babelcher, Babelcher, 1999, Ashley Loveless, Aaron Winston, Marcy Ron, Chaz, Chaz, Spicer, Chaz Spicer, Spicer, Morgan O'Leary, Julie Ramsey, Pam, oh, Karen Kerensky. Yep. Sam Richardson, Richards. Richardson. What the fuck is happening? That's not real. Jessicaica who says that jessica

it's real it's it's it's the uh it's the classy way of saying richardson richardson sir richardson party of four oh my god jessica rotondo allison davis, Reed Haim, Rosalind Reinhart, Nathan with no last name, Theodore Glossmeyer, Tim Rose, Heather with no last name, Wnava123, Genu, Genu, Caretz, Geneu, Caretz, Cortez, Alexandra Keller, Joshua Baker, Jennifer Hayer, Lisa Harper, Tabby with no last name, Michael Sack, Jake with no last name, Amy with no last name, Amy, Allie, Allie, yeah, Sprague, Rachel Sauter, Joshua Cates, Alas, Alas, Rocham, Jen Dahl Colson, Caitlin Bauer, Cass Ratcham, Jendal Coulson, Caitlin Bauer, Maria would know last name,

Jariah would know last name, Samson, 72, Dante Prince, Stina would know last name, Chad James, Siddhartha, Siddhartha, Saunders, Siddhartha, Saunders. I'm saying it the same way four times. I apologize. I haven't changed a thing with that. Richardson, Richardson, Richardson, Richardson. Obviously. Megan Wilson.

Brian Freeman. Smokey McPot. 30. Matt. Giovanni Gibolini? Gibolino. Is it Gibolino or Gibolino? Gibolino?

What do you do? How do you say that? What do you do there? It could be anything, honestly. I'll go with the good, though. I'll go with the good though i'll go with the joke all right certainly not giovanni gibolini gibolino might be it's it's very nice i don't i just don't know it's very operatic but we don't know how to say it i gotta go sally dustin how uh kelly with no last name cleo the crime cat kim, Kimberly Kaiser, Mary Kate Smoulier, Mallory,

Mallory Ledford, Steve Hollins, J.R. DeGraw, maybe it's Junior, Danielle Hunter, Tammy J. Van Dyke, Rayon, McVay, Rayon, Rain, it might be Rain, Dana Blake,

Rayon, followed by N Brandon Roth, Rayann. Followed by Nylon McGee after him. And Silk Stevens. Brandon Roth, Adam Caswell, Christina Dietz, Chris Eggleston, Adria, no last name. Sean Howard, Chris Motley, Melissa with no last name. Brittany McBriar, Heather with no last name. Sean Howard, Chris Motley, Melissa with no last name. Brittany McBriar, Heather with no last name. Carter Black, Leslie Savage, Savage maybe. Clarissa Phillips, Lori Wolf, Justin Ballou, Kevin Feig.

Oh, boy. Macy with no last name. June Hall, Jessica Pedigo, Jason, Jason maybe. Asia D. I don't know. It's a capital J-S- j s o n n is that jason or is it jason that sounds like a tag like somebody's fucking tag does yeah age asia asia b amanda j dakota martin april sergeant sergeant sergeant stephen walters wilt wilt wilters There's no A. It's an E. Wilters?

Welters. Welters! Hey! Like a welt. You know, like E's make the S sound. You know how that goes? I'm trying to do it like Stuart. That was amazing.

Wilters. Just welter, I think, is probably easy. Just read just read the word dummy it's just like a you were saying i'm like is he he can't mean this and then i'm like i think he does mean this i better say it ah jaws with no last name pasqua digina chatasmo what is that name? Degea Deagenton Masso. It's fucking a challenge. Arian Diaz. Jillian Alston.

The other player, Timothy Towson. Emmy with no last name. Rebecca Hiltz. Jennifer Lamas. David Gerrard. Tony Villa. Loretta b robert david stephanie martin carston podi podi look uh poda look uh poda luke luke luke rudder blue nanagu nanagu joshua rosado taylor meufelder uh w co Cox, Nexus Infusion, CJ McCann, Zanna Roth, Lena Mao, I think, Arizona Mom Stacy, Laura with no last name, Mary Ballway, Heather Hawkins, Harrington, Michael Klein, Matt Stapleton, Maddie Peleshi, Molly with no last name, Sherry Lee, Catherine Mahoney, Josh Jordan, and all of our patrons, thank you so much.

Thank you, everybody, so much from the bottom of our hearts. We honestly cannot tell you how thankful we are. We really wish we could. It's really overwhelming. We wish we could do a whole show on just how thankful we are, but that would be very boring and no one would listen to it if you cancel your patreon this is boring and we've been through hell and you've changed our lives so thank you they've cried three times already this is pathetic so no one wants to hear that so check us out if you want to find us on social media very

easy to do that head over to shut up and give me murder.com buy your tickets there and while you're doing that grab those links up at the top that take you over to our social media pages and follow us and keep coming back and seeing us every week because we're not going anywhere and 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. Or you can listen early and ad-free with Wondery Plus and Apple Podcasts. Before you go, tell us about yourself by completing a short survey at wondery.com slash survey.