Small Town Murder - #408 - Never Saw That Coming - Townshend, Vermont

Episode Date: July 28, 2023

This week, in Townshend, Vermont, what appears to be a nice story, of a couple, living a nice life, turns very dark when it's least expected. This leaves one member of this couple brutally beaten to death, in the driveway, after the other spouse had been carrying on a weird affair with a neighbor. This story includes guard llamas, Grandma & Grandpa friends with benefits, and the murderer telling everyone they know that they committed this murder. But will this unlikely killer be held responsible?Along the way, we find out that Vermont can turn anybody into the movie "Funny Farm", that old people apparently get very horny, and that just because you hide the murder weapon, doesn't mean you're innocent!!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. Hello, everybody, and welcome back to Small Town Murder Express. Yay! And choo-choo!

Oh, yay indeed, Jimmy. Yay indeed. My name is James Petrigallo. I'm here with my co-host. I'm Jimmy Wissman. Thank you, folks, for joining us so much all aboard the murder train, pulling away from the station. We some weird unexpected stuff today as usual every episode you're like oh well it can't get weirder than that well it's weirder it's always weirder so let's get into this oh boy uh before we do though just want to say head over to shut up and give me murder.com oh yeah what's that get your tickets to live shows oh yeah chicago august 12th oh we cannot wait it's gonna be going to be our biggest show

ever, so be a part of it. Beautiful venue, nice stuff, and a Chicago-only live show. So if you want to hear a story you can't hear anywhere else in the country, this is where you go. Chicago, August 12th. Also, only a few other cities have tickets left. Most everything is sold out.

Dallas, Atlanta, Charlotte, and I think Philly has a few tickets left. So Philly, get in there. I know it's in November, but I'm sorry. They're going quick. Thank you for everyone for buying tickets and to everyone for buying tickets. Shut up and give me murder.com. Also, Patreon.com slash crime and sports is where you get all the bonus material.

Anybody $5 a month or above, you get tons of stuff. You get tons of bonus episodes. That's what you get. get you're gonna get a couple hundred of them to binge on and then new ones every other week one crime and sports one small town murder and you get access to it all this week we're going to talk about for crime and sports the 1919 chicago black socks scandal the world series throwing scandal which is really dirty and underground and lots of gangsters and oh it's fun stuff. We'll talk about that. They made movies about it, for God's sake.

And then for small town murder, we're going to talk about some weird Titanic stories. Oh, all the Titanic stuff. Yeah. We're going to talk about some survivor stories, some strange stats that I don't think people are aware of, some reasons for sinking that aren't really known. And also a couple other sea mysteries we'll talk about. And survivors had some weird times. It's strange.

That is patreon.com slash crimeandsports. And you get a shout-out at the end of the regular show as well. Also, your stupid opinions. Hey, it's coming. Apparently there's going to be like a campaign for it here for a couple weeks. So we'll be able to give you a date here in a minute, and it's going to be pretty cool. We'll push it and hopefully you know we'll network will do the same and hopefully it'll get put out there but it's going to be soon promotion two men have ever done oh

my god especially for something that they've done and can't wait to put out we have this thing and we're like oh we can't wait to give you this we made this pie and it smells so good and the whole kitchen's been smelling good for months and we can't wait to give you this. We made this pie, and it smells so good, and the whole kitchen's been smelling good for months, and we can't wait to serve you this. But we'll make a fresh one, obviously, because we don't want to feed you a month's old pie. But still, your stupid opinion is coming. Fake sense of life.

That said, I think it's time to get into this. I think it's time. Everyone, wherever you are, I don't care where you are. It doesn't matter. You're in a PTA meeting. You guys talking about, yeah, you need new, the soccer field needs new sodding. I don't care. You know what? I don't care.

Kick over your coffee. The big giant Starbucks that you need to stay away. Kick it over. Jump up onto the table. Look these dead-eyed parents directly into their maws. Arms to the sky and you shout dead-eyed parents directly into their maws, arms to the sky, and you shout SHUT UP AND

GIVE ME MURDER! That's right, Jimmy. Let's go on a trip, shall we? Let's do this. We're going all the way to Vermont this week. Townsend, Vermont, which is T-O-N-S-H-E-N-D. So there's an H in there.

No, it's not. Yeah, it's kind of the British way to do that. Because there's British people. That's kind of the British spelling of Townsend in a lot of people's names. Townshend? Yeah, kind of Townshend, I think. But I think it's Townsend anyway. Southwest, people will tell us if it's not.

It's in southwestern Vermont, this place here. It's about two hours to Albany, New York, is the closest city here. And then three hours to Boston on the other direction. And then it's about two hours and 45 minutes to our last Vermont episode, which was in Fletcher, Vermont. The intentional accidents with the one with the public access and the TV show and the guy's head. Oh, my God. That was a crazy story. This place, population 1,641.

Oh. Not many people here. Very small town. A lot of farms and things like that. This is farm country. Median household income here, about $52,000, which is a little less than the national average. Our median home price, though, is less than the national average as well. well it's 288 600 so for the northeast that's amazing and this is with the town where

they filmed the town stuff for funny farm and when you read the story and them moving out there you go oh it's like funny farm these people they move to red bud basically and that's what's going on and then i read or then allison found that yeah this is where this is funny farm was from so perfect it's perfect it was named after charles townsend who was the secretary of war under king george the uh the third jesus i was gonna say the fourth but i got to catch myself secretary of war with third with fucking uh catapults and shit oh yeah ship wooden ships and catapults and shit. Oh, yeah. Wooden ships and catapults.

Yosemite Sam type shit. Right. Shit that'll explode in your lap. Between 1755 and 1761, plans and occupation of this town were abandoned due to the impact of the French and Indian War. So they had this grant for a town, but it had to be settled within five years. And then there was a war, so they couldn't do it. So then they had to get it re-granted again and all this type of shit. So when they finally got in here and got settled, they have really fertile soil around here. So they're growing everything, just all sorts of stuff. Problem was there was tons of trees that had deep roots everywhere. So they had problems with that and a lot of issues with that sort of thing.

After the Civil War or during the Civil War, they had a population of 1,376. So the town has grown zero in 150, 160 years. Stop. Has the same population now? Pretty much almost the same, within 100. Wow. And about 120 men fought in the Civil War from this town. So that's almost 10% of the population went and fought in the war.

And they had cash bounties. They would give people $500 to sign up, which back then was a shitload of money to buy a house when you got home after that. So they did all of that. A lot of people, though, after this, when they were done with the war war they didn't come back to vermont they went moving other places which the civil this happens with a lot of wars especially the civil war there's a lot of people from farms who had never been never mind they've never been out of their town they've barely been off their farm they've only been like to town to sell things they've never gone anywhere then when they leave and go to the civil war and they go to all these different places they're like oh to all these different places,

they're like, oh, shit, things are different places. I might want to explore a little bit. And they realize they can and they do. So that happened. Do people think that it's just the same all over? They don't know. They have no idea. Remember in The Wire when he thought the radio stations, it's like there's other radio stations

in different cities that you have no idea. Radio stations existed. That was in like 2011 or something so 2006 i think it was or whatever so yeah it's it's it happens now reviews of this town there's only a couple because it's a small town but let's find out what do you think everyone's gonna say it's perfect and and quilty and yeah quilty and plaid and dude i gotta tell, being in Vermont, you don't want to leave. It's so fucking gorgeous. It really is. It's nice.

It's just it'll funny farm you. It'll drive you crazy. That's the problem. If it's like that, it will. Yeah, it's that town. Reviews of this town here. Four stars. I like that it is a very tight-knit community, but it would be nice if there were more things

to do. Yeah. Well, then it wouldn't be as tight-knit because you'd be a bigger place. That's how it works. Yep. Three stars here. Okay. Right in the middle.

It's a long commute to the nearest town, so be prepared for a whole day spent on grocery shopping. Oh, boy. Yikes. The schools in town are okay, but the nearby town of Brattleboro has a better high school, and I'm sure they are better elementary schools. The pizza place in town, in the town center, always says it's opening, but never does. You're going to have pizza soon. Hey, we're jacked for pizza.

No pizza. It's like your stupid opinions, except the pizza version. I know. I know their pain. Oh, I pizza version i know i know they're paying oh i know they're paying yeah they're like god damn it another fucking inspection thing we just want to open the goddamn store our pizzas are so good they're so good we have the best and great fuck papa fuck papa Watch. Wait till they see this. You could, I'm sorry, but you could pull a sanitary napkin out of a dumpster and sprinkle some, like somebody's dandruff on top of it.

And that would be a better pizza than a Papa John's. I just mean that it'll sell. I'd buy that over a Papa John's. A pizza is the worst. Why do they do, Why do they sell? What is it? Because people, they don't know pizza places. Unless you're from somewhere with good pizza, you're like, that's pizza.

I think that's what it is. It's also affordable. And that fucking buttercup is so good. But Papa John's isn't even cheap, though. Those places. Yeah, you're right. I don't even think they're that cheap. Maybe I have specials three for whatever.

We're off base here. Still $20 a pie. It's a classic small town with classic small town problems is what it says. So nothing to do. Who knows? Boring. Things to do here. Speaking of boring, this is the thing to do.

The Townsend Pumpkin Festival. Yes. They love it. They love it. All sorts of pumpkins. There's going to be pumpkins and what is this a local a day for the local community filled with joy laughter and the vibrant colors of the season holy shit embrace the bounty of the harvest season with open arms yeah i would like we should go there and embrace the bounty of the harvest season with open arms

can you picture us doing that? Just the two of us here. Brown, orange, some amber. Oh, look at this. Wearing our sweaters. Yeah. I think it'll be good. Experience the magic as you stroll through our picturesque common, adorned with pumpkins of all shapes and sizes,

showcasing the artistry and creativity of our community. That's right. Get your Tims. There's also going to be local bands. So that's going to be. They're going to ruin it. They'll ruin the whole thing. You'll hear birds chirping and shit. And then you're just going to hear taking care of business again for the fourth time.

Because that's the only. They only know like four songs. So that said. You're bored. There's nothing to do. You're waiting for the pizza place to open. Let's talk about a murder in the meantime. All right.

Tide you over until you can get yourself a nice pie. All right. Let's do this. Until they fire up the ovens. Until they fire up the ovens over there. Let's talk about it. Let's talk about a man first here. Okay.

And we're going to talk about these dates when they're born, and you're going to go, wow, this is like an old-timey murder. Now, this happened in the 2000s, so don't worry this isn't a black and white murder this is a okay this is a color in color murder okay robert schreiner let's talk about okay robert schreiner he's born in 1925 this guy jesus yeah he's he ends up in vermont but it takes a lot to get him there he was raised in the bronx so he's from the bronx originally robert schreiner he went to school in the bronx and all that he went he graduated from bronx high school of science yeah uh he was a veteran of world war ii hell yeah is that 1925 that's you

know oh boy he was right in it perfect time. Yeah, he was like 18 and 43. I mean, Jesus. He served in the U.S. Army Air Corps like Archie Bunker. If you watched All in the Family, that's where Archie Bunker was. That's the Air Force today. As a bombardier with the 245th Army Air Corps Base Unit here. He was honorably discharged from service in 1945, and he went to Syracuse University, had the GI Bill, and went to college.

He earned a Bachelor of Science in Landscape Architecture. Shit, damn. This is like the third time people. That's so, yeah. That's not trimming hedges. That's figuring out the grading and where things are going to go. That's like the architect for outside, basically plant goes here yeah exactly and also they have to figure out drainage and there's a lot of science that goes with that too so he was apparently a

very good landscape architect and owned and operated his own firm schreiner and schmidt in port washington new york so years, years he's doing this. By the time the late 50s comes around, he's married, he's got a few kids, but he gets divorced in the late 50s, which in the late 50s, that's, you know, that's scandalous. Sure. Get divorced. You know, this guy. Yeah.

This guy's a goddamn. He can get divorced. He's a fucking hero. God damn it. He's a bombardier. Yeah. Jesus Christ. He fought Hitler. He beat Hitler. He did. Wemit. He's a bombardier. Yeah, Jesus Christ, he fought Hitler. He beat Hitler!

He did! We have to give him something for that. So he gets remarried as single man back then needed to find someone to, you know, those guys didn't know how to cook, they didn't know how to do things. Oh, for Christ's sake, yeah. A single man with like three kids back then was worthless. He had to have like a housekeeper. He didn't know what he was doing. That's where Alice and Mr. Brady came from because he didn't know what to do.

He had a bag of beans, a bag of rice. He's like, how do you make this food? I don't know. Can anyone make this food? Do they teach you kids home ec at school? Somebody make this food, please. I have a ration from the army i can whip up but other than that just have water yeah he gets remarried in the early 60s to a woman named hope so hopefully

this hope will give him some hope so she's a few years younger than him she's born in 1931 she's a nurse by trade and they get married and they each have several children they they form a brady bunch this is an absolute great brady bunch scenario that really bad things happen later but he had three sons from his first marriage think about that same yeah mike brady kids. And she had five kids already. Holy. So they make the Bradys look like pussies, these people. They're like, fuck, six.

Here's nothing of it. Yeah. So they'll end up with those eight kids, and then they have a kid together as well. They got nine all together. A son named Scott. So they end up with nine kids altogether in the house here. And he immediately, as soon as he can, legally, he adopts her five kids as well. Okay. So total Brady Bunch happening here.

He adopts her kids, and the two of them go on to have the son. Like I said, they make their home for years in Claverack, New York, which is you've been to clavarack new york as a matter of fact yes you have because that's the exit you take off the taconic to go to great barrington is clavarack you go on that exit and that's that's what's there i think that's where that diner is right there's that's clavarack it might not be though no clavarack is before the border clavarack i believe is where that crazy guy with the fucking crazy bearded guy with the flags that sits outside daring you to come take his guns. Like no one.

You're in the middle of nowhere, bro. He's sitting out there like he's like waiting for like they're coming for me. It's like you're in a field. No one cares what you do here. You can have all the guns you want here. No one is interested in you. Somebody tweeted they're coming. Someone sit on the patio and wait.

I'm going to sit out here and wait. Put my flags out so they know. Jesus Christ, man. Have a Coke. Chill out, bro. Chill. Chill, man. Someone's going to be like, I've seen that guy.

I know it. It's the wildest fucking thing. Going to Great Barrington. It's crazy shit. By the solar farm there. It's right near there. It's right across the street. So January 1993, though, they're getting older now.

I mean, Christ, he's almost 68. She's a little older now. So they move. They're retiring. She retires as a nurse. He sells his landscape business. And now they're going to slow down a little bit here. And they're going to move to rural Vermont. Why not? Wow. Townsend. Funny farm, baby. That's where they're going to slow down a little bit here, and they're going to move to rural Vermont.

Why not? Wow. Townsend. Funny farm, baby. That's where they're going. Absolutely here. They move. It's two hours northeast of where they live, and so they do that.

Robert has a lot of health problems by now. Oh. He's led a wild life, if you think about it, and it's caught up to him here, he's got a lot. He limps around a lot. He has a hard time walking sometimes because he was in a very bad car accident in the 80s. So that's a problem. He has a lot of health problems by his 70s. He's got he's got glaucoma, which is an issue. And he also lost a lung to cancer.

He's a one lunged. No, I is one leg around. Poor bastard bastard and in the one lung he has he has chronic pneumonia chronic chronic keeps coming back constant pneumonia also he's always got a good cough going as well robert's it's things are rough for robert but somehow feeling like this he just continues on doing things well people who fought Hitler did. You know, you've got to plug on, you know. So he was elected to, when he moved to Vermont, he was elected to the town council here, I guess. He had a seat, a select board.

That's what it was. He has a seat that goes all the way through 2005. It's supposed to go. He loved gardening for years he did volunteer work just to help maintain the gardens at the grace cottage hospital in town as well so he was just like a volunteer groundskeeper wow he'd come in and do stuff just because he liked doing that shit i did this for money i'm probably the best qualified person here i may as well just do it might as well

right and then hope is also later on she'll be volunteering as a librarian for a while as well so this is a pretty mild-mannered couple here it seems like probably the best marrying he's ever done based on what he experiences later you know what i mean seems like it yeah it's a retired nurse well done friend founder in the 50s and he's like i'm gonna be sick someday i'm very sick i'm gonna need someone who's willing to put up with some gross stuff you into that i feel like you've seen worse so let's go honey yeah you know so 1993 let's catch up with them they're're just moved to Townsend, and they have discovered they have this farm. And let's enter a new animal to our lexicon of small-town murder animals and all of our murder birds and everything else.

Let's add in murder llamas now. Stop it. Murder llamas. They bought llamas? They have llamas. And there's an article in the Brattleboro Reformer when they get there, which is a newspaper. And it's about Hope Schreiner saying that she became interested in llamas about five years ago, but didn't know at the time that they're actually used as guard llamas. People have llamas as a defense to their house instead of dogs.

Like an attack llama? They have attack llamas as a defense to their house instead of dogs. Like an attack llama? They have attack llamas, yes. It's a guard llama more than an attack llama. Wait till you hear how llamas kill things. It's fucking, these things are vicious. They're like hell's angels. Do they stomp? They knock you down and stomp you to death.

That's right. Yeah, I do know that. That's horrible. Yeah, they the fucking psychotic animal that's how you get killed in maximum security gen pop for fuck's sake do they like do they rape you first this is horrible like what a disaster they are they are straight gangsters i think i think they spit on they spit too right don't they spit on you? Yeah, they hiss too. They spit on you and stomp you. And stomp you out. Like low-life scumbags.

What's up, bitch? It's like Hell's Angels. That's what they're like, these things. But they're huge also. Yeah. You can't fight a llama. You have long necks that can bob and weave away from your fucking bunches. They're tough.

So she said that llamas had become kind of an in-pet, like they were like a trendy pet at the time, and people were doing it as an investment. They were raising llamas and selling them. They'd buy, like, stock in llama farms. It was like a punchline in the 90s of a joke. What are you going to buy stock in an ostrich farm or shit like that? So they said that her veterinarian, Hope says,

who is also a llama raiser said that you know you can use llamas to guard animals on your farm and she said wow she said quote ideally you should have one gelding to bond with the flock and she had one available but she suggested to try two because they like companionship they didn't need another llama to hang out with obviously yeah you got to talk about llama things you can't just be you know are all around the sheep all the time so they want you to have two geldings and gelding means that they're like fucking uh neutered they they don't they don't mate so the male but then she has a female as well who's just planning on breeding at some point here but not with him obviously no apparently not no i don't think so his name is boris by the way and her name is rachel those are the two llamas they sound like ass boris and

rachel that's a dick couple yeah they sound very picky he's got white oakley she's got an apple watch this is a problem you know what i mean so a couple of dicks. Yeah. So people out there looking at their Apple Watch going, hey, it has nothing to do with you. If you're mixed with a guy with white Oakleys, then we might have to talk about it. But other than that, you're okay. I'm controlling this show with that watch. Yeah, hey, god damn it. No, you're fine. It's not you.

It's a very specific person we're discussing. So she got these geldings and this's just gelding this other one she bought seven sheep as well yeah and uh from a former neighbor of theirs when they lived on long island for a while and so that's what they end up hope says quote one enjoyed chasing the sheep there uh he was doing what he was supposed to except with the wrong animals so he's supposed to he like chasing them around she did see that they could be good guard guard animals because one of their dogs snuck into the barnyard at one point and quote they immediately focused on the dog's movement

and charged it they would have stomped him to death we barely got him out in time he got kicked for fuck out of here dog yeah you're not doing this. They said a stranger recently approached the barnyard, and Rachel went on alert doing, they hum, I guess. They go, hmm. Really? They do like a hmm. That means they're not thrilled with what's happening right now. Yeah.

And was staring at this person, and they said that the llama followed this person all the way into the barn, humming and all this type of shit. Oh, boy. Yeah, they're naturally protective. And they said that the humming was an indication that she was doing her job. So this is crazy. She's a straight gangster.

She says, quote, that when they're humming, she said, then when they do a high-pitched hum, she says, that means they're upset and questioning. That's also the way they communicate. Right. That high-pitched tom is whistling farmer in the dell that's what that is she said they're much more friendly than sheep and they're usually placid and kind of like dogs to people she said they're quite friendly with people i heard that they spit but mine have never spit when charging a predator they will spit they are very aggressive yes there you go they said llamas are used effectively out west

on large sheep branches to stomp coyotes to death. There we go. So she's been hanging out with llamas and librarianing, I guess. They stomp coyotes to death. To death. Stomp them. Just take that, bitch.

All right. Fuck away from my sheep. The roadrunner just needed to make friends with a llama. Done. Just wait. Arms crossed. The roadrunner just needed to make friends with a llama. Done. Just wait. Arms crossed. What's up now, motherfucker? Hope you got an acne first aid kit, bitch.

She's going to stomp you. Got some acne gauze, you son of a bitch. So she says that during the early 2000s, Robert begins to change, she starts telling people. It's just changing. She says that it's weird she become he she she's quoted as saying that he's a quote hard man to know he's becoming becoming a hard man to know claiming he's mentally abusive and all this sort of thing she told somebody quote he's impatient with me he yells at me and watches me because i don't always do what

he wants right away i think he's gotten worse as he's gotten older. Yeah, I could see that, too. He's going to be, you know. Yeah, and especially if you're limping, you can't see, and you have one mnemonic lung or mnemonic lung. I think that you're going to probably be like, this sucks. One lung he can barely breathe out of. Yes, he's having problems here so enter a guy named donald boret uh b-o-u-r-e-t he is 77 years old same as robert sure and he became friends with

the shriners around 2000 when he moved to vermont from north carolina he would often help robert shriner around the house with stuff that he needed to do. Chores, outside stuff that Robert liked to do, but couldn't quite physically do nowadays. I understand that anybody who's paid attention to the media would have to come to the conclusion that I killed my wife. Hi, my name is Zach Stewart-Pontier. I'm one of the filmmakers behind The Jinx, and I'm excited to bring you the official Jinx podcast.

We'll be revisiting all six episodes of part one and watching along with part two as it airs on Max, starting April 21st. Bye-bye. The official Jinx podcast. Listen on Max or wherever you get your podcasts.

It's all a lighthearted nightmare on our podcast, Morbid. you get your podcasts. people. With a touch of humor. I'd just like to go ahead and say that if there's no band called Malevolent Deity, that is pretty great. A dash of sarcasm and just garnished a bit with a little bit of cursing. This mother f***er lied. Like a liar. Like a liar. And if you're a weirdo like us and love to cozy up to a

creepy tale of the paranormal. Or you love to hop in the Wayback Machine and dissect the details of some of history's most notorious crimes, you should tune in to our podcast, Morbid. Follow Morbid on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to episodes early and ad-free by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. And he also would attend events with Hope.

If she wanted to go do something, he would escort her to do it because maybe robert didn't feel good or whatever so legs acting up or yeah to rain and he would literally say would you take my wife to the thing because you know please take my wife yeah take my wife please i take my wife everywhere but she finds a way home please don't say that's funny and that's not our jokes these are henny youngman jokes from like the 40s. I said one of the Goodfellas jokes like two months ago. And somebody was like, I had to pull my car over. That's so funny.

I'm like, that is not my joke. Remember that? Because you commented on it too. I was like, that is absolutely, that is Henny Youngman from the 40s. People just thought it was mine. I'm like, no, not my joke yeah definitely not my joke that was like that was literally from goodfellas i appreciated the laughter don't get me wrong but i was like please don't give me credit for a joke that someone else wrote

like fucking before my parents were born my parents were children before that even it's like the 40s christ it's way older than my parents were born. When my parents were children. Before that even. It's like the 40s. Christ, it's way older than my parents. 20 years before my parents were children. Please. Oh, man. They said they, he said he liked them very much. He liked Robert very much.

He said we had a lot in common. Like they're the same age. I'm sure he was probably in World War II also, and they had a lot to talk about. He said, the Boré guy here says that after his brother died in November of 2003, he was very, very upset, obviously. And he said that Hope was very nice to him and gave him a comforting hug. Sure. And he said, quote, that's when things started. The hug?

It doesn't take much, I i think if you haven't god jesus we are such easy target just uh that's when things started a hug to be sorry your brother's dead it wasn't even a horny hug she didn't rub his ass on him it was a it's a pity hug and he was like that's when my dick got hard. Maybe she'll pity fuck. Who knows? Well, that's what ends up going on. They begin an affair together. Granny affair. This is 72-year-old woman and a 77-year-old man getting it on.

Wow. Wait till you hear later how old people describe being a friends with benefits relationship, quote unquote, totally different verbiage. And it's hilarious for old people. So this they they're going all over. They're meeting up for sexual rendezvous here. They're meeting up every few weeks or going to motels together. Oh, my God. Gross and hilarious.

And also cool. I mean, it's nice to hear old people fucking. That's cool, I guess. I mean, no one's going to get pregnant or anything. Who gives a shit? It's not like she's going to get in trouble. That would be a record. Can you imagine? That would be terrifying. He'd be like, what?

We got to take care of this. Jesus Christ. Obviously. I have great grandchildren. This is crazy. Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. Oh, man. So they're hooking up and plowing each other all over the place these two, which is just wild. I think that's the oldest sex we've ever talked about on this show.

78? 78. I think so. So Hope is like super jacked about this she tells her daughter uh-huh so you know her daughter that was adopted by robert here tells her that all about it and she's so excited and hope said her daughter said that her mom appeared giddy during a visit to california when her mom came out to visit her and she said quote she had something to tell me, and she was very excited. Like, they were like, Mom, what do you say? You seem so happy. And she's like, I'll tell you later. I'm just excited. She was loving life in a way that she had not for a long, long time, the daughter said.

I guessed what the thing was that was making her so happy. I said, have you been seeing someone? And she said yes and proceeded to tell me it was a neighbor and a friend and they had known each other for a long time and had gotten intimate recently oh my god she described how that happened how they became lovers and then her daughter went home and put bleach in her eyes and poured acid into her ears so she could never see nor hear anything ever again. You don't want to hear how your parents...

Anybody out there want the details on that? You want the details of your 78-year-old parent cheating on her husband, cheating on your dad i don't want to hear that at all it sounds i'd be like oh god please stop mom please please no more she blew another geriatric penis oh jesus how far did his balls dangle down mom how low were they tell me you're not gonna believe this Two old men fuck me now. Two. Man, she said that she was tired of taking care of her husband because he's ill, and she looked forward to him going to bed at night so that she could spend time with Don. Wow.

And sneak out of the house because he took Ambien at night to sleep. Oh, okay. Yeah. So the daughter said, quote, she had to do everything and it was awful for her. She said, I can't wait to be alone so that I can move on

with my life. Jesus. She said that Hope's dream, Hope wanted to start a new life together and then even asked Beret if their relationship could grow,

you know, if Robert, because he's sick and, you know, if he ends up being put in the hospice or something or the VA hospital or something, or something you know maybe we could we could add on to this but he will say that he told her quote i told her definitely not just like it like this listen lady i am playing the field right now okay i am 77 i'm a little too young to settle down. He said, I didn't think we were compatible.

They're compatible to fuck, but they're not compatible to watch Jeopardy at night together. You know what I mean? Like, listen, I don't know if I want to sit there with you all day and night. That's a different story. Those are compatible, but nothing else. When you're elderly and you're finding someone new, you have to be like extra compatible because it's not like someone goes to work for eight, ten hours a day. And you know, like it's all day every day.

You got to see this person complaining about what ails them. Extra compatible. Yeah. That's the other thing. I have to be into the same thing, have the same amount of health problems. And I think there's a lot that has to line up. There's a lot that has to line up. He says, Bure said that he and her, it was about a two and a half month affair in 2004 here,

and said that even though he was a willing participant, he was uncomfortable seeing her too. He felt bad about banging his friend's wife and all. Especially with the condition his friend is in. It feels shitty. I would hope it felt shitty. Except for, he's like, it feels shitty. I would hope it felt shitty. Except for... I was going to say... He was like, it felt terrible most of the time. And then it didn't, and then it did again. So he said that...

There's a little bit that wasn't so bad. Exactly. He told people he didn't think their affair was right. It wasn't the right thing to do. He said he told her that that her life, quote, he told him or Shriner said that her life as a husband and wife was with Robert. And, you know, that's where she should be. So the Shriners here. He doesn't know about the affair, obviously, Robert, but they appear to be working it out here. Beyond all of this stuff, they appear to be planning for the future together. They sold their house recently and were in the process of having a new home built right up the road. So that's planning for the future when you're building an actual, like, you know, deciding where you want to put closets and shit. That's for the future. So then June 2nd, 2004, it's been a month or two since the affair has cooled down and everything.

Hope, in the middle of the afternoon, 2 o'clock or 1.30 in the afternoon, Hope calls 911. Oh, boy. And she says, oh, my God, I found my husband bleeding in the driveway. Oh. Which, I mean, he's that old and has all these health problems. That could be from anything. But still, she said, I don't see his chest moving. There's blood out of his nose.

It looks like he fell. Okay. So she's, that's, what is it? She's dying of noising, yeah. How is that relevant? Yeah, that's not relevant. What do you need? Because that's what I remember before.

That's exactly what it is. The dispatcher told her to ask if he was okay, and she did and then said he's not responding. So within 10 minutes, people are there, which is actually impressive for like a rural area. It's not bad. Not too shabby. And they discovered him in the driveway. She's there too, but he's on the ground, obviously. And they said that they observed dried blood on him and near his head.

So they concluded he's been dead for at least two or three hours here. Dead? It's probably been dead a while. Gone for two or three hours. Gone for two or three hours. Now, dried blood, it is June, so it's warm. So blood will tend to dry quicker, but still, maybe two, three hours. So now she is there.

Hope is talking to the medical personnel. Obviously, she said that she arrived home about a half hour ago before she called, but she went and didn't see him over by the car. She said she went inside briefly because she was out doing shit. She came home, didn't see him in the driveway next to the car. So she said she went inside and then came out and discovered him lying there. Okay. Called 911. So then about a half hour later, police officers arrive.

That's a while it takes. Sure is. But it's because they found out that he's dead at the scene. They can't revive him. So that's it. There he is dead. And so now they have to have police officers make sure that it's an old man falling and not something terrible. So she hope talks to the police officers and said that she came home from playing tennis.

She's out playing tennis today. She is so active working on her backhand. She's fucking. She's playing tennis. She's got a lot going on. She's a rearranging books going to California, going to California. she's a rearrange in books going to california going to california she said that she got home from playing tennis between 40 minutes and a half hour before calling the cops or 9-1-1 she went into the house to look for robert and then discovered his body upon taking the dogs out for

a walk so she's gonna give a little bit differing versions of that over time here but that's okay timelines are weird so injuries on him let's find out what's wrong with him. Why is he bleeding from the head? Well, he's has a lot more than that wrong with him here. He's been brutally beaten over the head with a blunt object. He didn't fall. He might have fell afterwards, but... Oh, he fell at some point.

Yeah. Some knocked him to the ground, though. So hard that gravel from the driveway left a deep impression in his head. There's gravel in the skin. He's been beaten while he's on the ground hard. They say that the regional medical examiner here found holes in his head and his skull fractured in two different areas as well. He's hit with something kind of pointy and kind of like a diamond shape, they think, maybe something like that, pointy but also blunt.

They said that there is blunt force trauma resulting in several puncture wounds and marks that showed a wedge-shaped pattern with three prongs is what they see. They said there's nothing around. They look around. They don't see anything within the area here. So they also, after the medical examiner's done, they figure out that he ingested what they describe as an extremely large dose of Ambien. Oh. It's 2 in the afternoon.

Why would he do that? Yeah. They said sometime in the morning, not the night before, equivalent to about seven 10 milligram pills. Oh, that's way too many. You only need one or two of those. Way too many Ambien's. Yeah. It was approximated the pills were consumed around 8 a.m. that day.

They said he had a prescription for Ambien, which he had stopped taking in April of 2004. His last refill on the bottle on his prescription occurred in September 2003. Wow. So, yeah, that's how this goes. Now, police talk to Hope, and she says, I have no idea how he got injured. I was playing tennis. I don't know. She said, I think it looked for me.

If I'm, you know, can I play detective for a moment if I might? If I may, if I might. Looks like he fell out of the car, face planted onto the rocks. That would be my guess, you know? Oh, you're bad at this. Yeah, this is in the house while this is going on. You know, they're putting, like, tape up and covering him and shit, and they're talking to him and her inside. And she said, that's what I think, probably fell out of the car.

So they're like, she's, like, doing stuff around her house while they're talking to her, like walking around. She tries to wash towels and her sneakers right in front of the cops. There's a bunch of towels, and she takes her sneakers off and puts it all in the washer and starts trying to wash them. And the police go, bup, bup, bup, bup, bup, bup. No, no, no, no, no. Hold, Hope. You can't wash things around where a dead body was that we that's that died suspiciously especially not okay so they said you know what you need to leave the house

while we search the house and look around and look for a murder weapon and things like that even if we're not suspecting you you're gonna fuck something up yeah this you can contaminate the scene so when they pull the things out of the washer no water had been put in yet she just threw them in there and they stopped them the towels and the sneakers had blood stains on them oh that's not good um she was also adamant that she had to right now before she left or did anything feed her cats down in the basement okay you gotta feed them right now you don't understand like llamas they'll get angry and stomp you to death. So she started cleaning out.

They were like, I guess. So they walked down with her. She started cleaning out the cat litter bag or the cat litter box and was dumping it into an old dog food bag like they were using as a garbage bag in front of the detective. He stopped her and said, wait, wait but wait, just don't do anything.

You know what? Don't do this. Feeding the cats is one thing. You're doing other shit. They get her out of there. They look in the dog food bag. In addition to cat shit and litter and clumps of cat piss, there's also blood and three bloody garbage bags in there as well. Hope, what are you doing?

She's like, if I put poop on top of it no one will want to look at it it'll be gross you know oh boy so she leaves the house and goes with her friend okay her friend picks her up and you know she's emotionally distraught her friend wants to help her her friends diana wickland witchland she says that while driving hope to a friend's house on this on this day she said why what happened like why is what she said i guess the her response hope's response was that quote i just snapped her friends like okay you just snapped what's going on then she, you just snapped. What's going on? Then she said, I just snapped.

Then Hope says, listen, I need you to get a bag of cat litter from the basement because it's full of blood. She said, I'm not doing that. That's crazy. The cops are there. Just sneak it out. Like, what? I'm Diana. I'm driving you somewhere.

I'm not in the mafia. What are you talking she used tidy step i guess so maybe to to soak it up yeah so her friend here said asked her well why didn't you just leave and come to my house you could have come to my house why'd you have to do this and she said i did leave but you weren't home so i went back and had to kill him. I came over and you blew it. You could have saved his life. Sorry. If I went to your house, you weren't there. I went to the pizza place.

They hadn't opened yet, even though they said they were going to be open. And then I said, I have no choice. No friend, no pizza. Got to kill. That's all I can do. So she said that, yeah, she said, please, if you could do anything, woman said, what can I do for you? Can I do anything to help you? And she said, take care of my dogs if they take me in.

And she said, also, get this dog food bag in the cellar that's got kitty litter in it. Go ahead and put that in the trash, but not on my property. Take it to like a business and throw it in their dumpster. I get a feeling they have that hope. Yeah, and she said, there's blood in the bag there, and she said i'm not doing anything that like that yeah so that i don't think this woman wants to be a part of hope incriminating herself to her i feel like she's like please stop telling me things right can you picture in the car can you stop telling me things that can make me have to go to court everything that you say from here on out keeps me on the stand longer stop just stop so bad can make me have to go to court everything that you say from here on

out keeps me on the stand longer stop just stop so bad i'm gonna have two idiots on a podcast in 20 years talking about me i can't do it they know my name damn it so then she comes out with this is the quote from her front friend diana quote she said i put sleeping pills in his coffee wow and then she just kind of rambled on about playing tennis and that he hadn't died from the sleeping pills. Quote, he didn't die. And then she said there was so much blood. And then she said, quote, I used a bag. I think she did kitty litter and then put that bloody litter.

That'll soak up blood, I assume, decently. And then put that in a bag. because that'll soak up blood i assume decently and then put that in a bag tried to soak the blood up with towels and shit put it in a bag there's bags involved here and a lot of blood so this diana said that she told hope that she can't take she can't throw evidence away for her and um she said quote i looked at her and she said he didn't die then she said that she used a bag, but not for what. Then she just said there was so much blood. Yeah. So Diana said, I started to cry.

And she said, I don't want to hear anymore. She told her, I don't want to hear anymore about this. And then Diana said that she said that one of her, I guess, one of Diana's sons is a lawyer. So she said, you don't you one of her i guess one of diana's sons is a lawyer so she said you should talk to her and diana said or uh hope said quote my life is over yeah yeah they said that wow so diana said you're probably going to be going to prison huh i mean right that's generally where people go that do this yeah that's that's where they put you and hope said that's okay because i've been living in a prison anyway oh god jesus so the daughter asked how her this is the a different daughter she said how did dad die adopted dad but still dad since the like 1962 it's been 40 years it it's dad. How did dad die?

And she said about her mother, quote, she looked right through me and said, I can't tell you. Oh, Jesus. Uh-oh. Another one of her friends, Susanna Palmer, heard about, obviously, the death here. And she had volunteered at the library with Hope. She's a fellow volunteer librarian in a small town in Vermont. You can't get any more mild than this.

Very me. Yeah. Wow. She said, quote, Hope said to me, I want to get rid of my husband. I mean, I just laughed and said, what do you mean?

Are you going to poison him? Like it was a joke. Yeah. Whoa. And she just looked me right in the eye with these rather intense look and said yes uh no no i just want to get him into the va in bennington so she said yes and i was like no no no i just want to get him like put in the va hospital forever there that's

kind of how we're going to get rid of him out to pasture so she also told her that uh yeah she just wanted to get her husband's insurance money once he died. That would help out a lot once he does die and that she wanted to get rid of him. And she also said that Hope told her that she went out at night all the time after her husband went to bed to visit a male neighbor who was nice to her. It's all a lighthearted nightmare on our podcast, Morbid. We're your hosts. I'm Alina Urquhart. And I'm Ash Kelly.

And our show is part true crime, part spooky, and part comedy. The stories we cover are well-researched. He claimed and confessed to officially killing up to 28 people. With a touch of humor. I'd just like to go ahead and say that if there's no band called Malevolent Deity, that is pretty great. A dash of sarcasm and just garnished a bit with a little bit of cursing. This mother f***er

lied. Like a liar. Like a liar. And if you're a weirdo like us and love to cozy up to a creepy tale of the paranormal, or you love to hop in the Wayback Machine and dissect the details of some of history's most notorious crimes, you should tune in to our podcast Morbid. Follow Morbid on the Wondery app

or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to episodes early and ad-free by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. In May of 1980, near Anaheim, California, Dorothy Jane Scott noticed her friend had an inflamed red wound on his arm and seemed unwell. She insisted on driving him

to the local hospital to get treatment. While he waited for his prescription, Dorothy went to grab her car to pick him up at the exit, but would never be seen alive again. Leaving us to wonder, decades later, what really happened to Dorothy Jane Scott? From Wondery, Generation Y is a podcast that covers notable true crime cases like this one and many more. Every week, hosts Aaron 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. Welcome to the small town of Chinook, where faith runs deep and secrets run deeper. In this new thriller, available exclusively on Wondery Plus, religion and crime collide when a gruesome murder rocks the isolated Montana community. Everyone is quick to point their fingers at a drug-addicted teenager,

but local deputy Ruth Vogel isn't convinced. She suspects connections to a powerful religious group. Enter federal agent V.B. Loro, who has been investigating a local church for possible criminal activity. The pair form an unlikely partnership to catch the killer, unearthing secrets that leave Ruth torn

between her duty to the law, her religious convictions, and her very own family. But something more sinister than murder is afoot, and someone is watching Ruth. With an all-star cast led by Emmy nominee Sanaa Lathan and Star Wars Kelly Marie Tran. Chinook is available exclusively and ad-free on Wondery+.

Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Palmer said she was taken aback by this and said that she, quote, really didn't know Hope Shriner at all. No kidding. I thought we were just rearranging the classic section. This is fucking insane. kidding i thought we were just rearranging the classic section this is fucking insane so she said that she went on to make other incriminating statements about also putting sleeping pills in her husband's coffee maybe ha ha ha it's uh she also made an admission about the sleeping pills to her son as well said i put him in her in his coffee then a neighbor said that

when she can this is amazing this neighbor talked to hope a couple days later and said i'm concerned you know this poor guy was murderous poor world war ii veteran was murdered in the in his driveway there could be a murderer and on the loose in this neighborhood none of us are safe hope leaned in close to her and whispered quote don't worry i did it what the fuck is that don't worry you're safe you're it's it's me so you're good for you clearly you're not my target so don't worry about it i got the one i wanted we're good the neighbor was like oh god okay oh good i suppose like good news bad news what are we talking about here wow so she also told this person that she wanted to get her husband into the the home in bennington

at another time and said that he wasn't sick enough to go there yet wow said that he was she also told people at this point now the cops talked to her and she starts telling the cops he's been verbally and mentally abusive and their last few years of their life together has been very difficult since he's been ill, and that he took his anxiety over his medical problems out on her. Ma'am, he's 84. It's almost done. Yeah, 77, 77, 78 at this point. Sorry, he died at 78. So she's 72.

She's 72. He's 78, yeah. So he had all sorts of stuff here difficulty walking he had eight prescriptions he took on a daily basis for all of these different ailments the the uh his oldest son steven said that although he wasn't very close to his father he doubted that he was father was mentally abusive to hope he said quote i never heard that from anybody i would say she had much more power over him she said that he said his stepmother was basically controlling at times and also controlled the timing of the circumstances of when he visited his father so he said many years ago i wanted to visit my father and she said no, it wasn't possible at that time.

She set the schedule. No overnights. He wouldn't contradict her. He wasn't strong enough to go against her. Quote, he has to live with her or he he has to live with her all the time. So he has to acquiesce to her wishes. He told me that some time ago. I guess he had told her that. Yeah, that's she he said, quote, I wanted to get I wanted to get to know my father better, but she wasn't interested in that. And he just couldn't put his foot down. So he said he was conflicted about this. You know, his stepmother may be killing his father.

He said, quote, I'm not angry at her. I still don't want to believe she did it, even though I didn't like her very much. Like, I don't like her, but I don't want to think that she did it dna evidence here is interesting dna evidence presents that there are traces of his blood robert's blood on the doorknob into the shriner residence okay so once he's been beaten about the skull he's probably not walking around opening doors so that's somebody else put that there yeah Yeah, and also in several garbage bags handled by her. She was trying to get rid of. On the storm door in the basement near her vehicle as well.

Not his, her vehicle. She's going everywhere. There's blood all over the place. There was evidence here also that she, like we said, wanted to do laundry right away to wash these things that ended up having his blood on them. So the day after his funeral, detectives arrest her. Okay, they arrest Hope, charge her with first-degree murder. She briefly fell down when they arrested her at her home. Yeah.

They said medical assistance wasn't administered because she appeared to recover quickly. The cop here said she just fell forward but was never out. Okay. Okay. she appeared to recover quickly. The cop here said she just fell forward but was never out. They also, when they got her down to the police station here, that she had some real bizarre behavior. She said that Hope said she felt responsible for not being able to save her husband's life. That's what she

was saying. So her lawyer will later say, Hope was in shock. Of course she was. She was a bloody mess. Of course she felt responsible. So they said while she was in shock, she was asked if she had anything to do with it. And she said no. And that was that. She was shivering the whole time in there like she was whatever.

They asked Scott here, the son, do you have any comment about your mom's arrest for killing your dad? And he said, I just buried my father. I'm still grieving. That's sad. hear the son do you have any comment about your mom's arrest for killing your dad yeah and he said i just buried my father i'm still grieving that's sad yeah so first of all is she crazy no i mean she had dementia or something maybe she's in her 70s it's possible well it was raised to police and uh they said that her daughter-in-law and another daughter had called the police and saying they were worried for her mother's safety and that she wasn't acting like herself. So they should check her out. The daughter told people that her mother was delusional and she believed that something terrible had happened the week earlier and that her mother was responsible.

Okay. attempts to have her put on Paxil, an antidepressant, and sent to the Brattleboro Retreat, a private psychiatric hospital for treatment and evaluation. But after an emergency evaluation by a clinical social worker from Healthcare and Rehabilitative Services of Southeastern Vermont, they said that there was no indication of mental illness or mental incompetency. The social worker said she was well aware of the roles of her lawyer. The judge, state's attorney, knew what was going on. She was free of hallucinations or delusions. She denied being suicidal. She was fine. The judge said he was on the verge of ordering her to a state hospital.

But then they said, I guess she's fine. Never mind. Fuck it. Proceed. So the trial comes around her lawyer is going to say that uh that he was he was dead before she ever got there he she couldn't have been there she said she arrived between 1 30 and 2 and he was already dead and uh they said that she was playing tennis from 8 3030 that morning till 11.15 when she

left the River Tennis and Fitness in South Londonderry to go to Manchester Centre to have a lamp repaired. She then drove to the Charter One Bank in Jamaica where she received a time-dated receipt deposit stamped at 11.21

from 12 or 12.21 not 11.21, 12.21 PM from 1228 to 1238. She drove home, went into the house, walked the dogs. Then at one 30, she noticed he was dead. She's saying, so they said, that's when she calls nine one one. So they're like, she couldn't have done it because she was at the bank at 1221. And they're like, okay, well that's fine. But where the fuck was she between 1115 and 1221? Right21 right well it doesn't take that long to kill an old man and the other part is

he'd been dead for they said at least two hours at 130 at one and they got there like 145 so if they get there at 145 and 45 is when he has to be dead. And she was done with tennis at 1115. So she's done. Yeah. She was at a bank at 1221. But that's fine. She also also they could be off on the time of death by an hour. And sure, she got home and killed him and then went inside and acting like nothing. Who knows? So that's what they're trying to say, though, is that the timeline doesn't work.

And they also say our defense remains the same. She wasn't there when he died. They don't have a murder weapon when he died they don't have a murder weapon still and they don't there's a big controversy about her daughter the day before the funeral her daughter took a three-pronged rake from the house why would she do that exactly and so they said that that was a big deal so they were suspicious about that that that could have been the murder weapon but they don't know if it was or not blah blah blah they said they don't have a murder weapon and they still don't have a really good motive well they have plenty of motive that'd be the worst fucking way to go i

think in your 80s while someone almost 80s while somebody pummeled by a fucking you and and pummels you with a fucking yard instrument and he fought back too they said his hands were like he tried to fight back and he got hit like he got hit on the hands with whatever he got attacked with. They said that a fireplace poker was seized from the house. But that came up negative for everything except rust. And the attorney for the defense says they do not have a murder weapon. Which, just because you hid the murder weapon well doesn't mean that you get to not go for murder. That's the problem.

And her problem is she told everyone she did it. That's her main issue. Her main issue. Don't worry, I did it. If she said right from the beginning, I didn't do it, I don't know what you're talking about, and then they don't have a murder weapon and the timelines are a little sketchy,

they'd go, oh, shit, that's a lot of reasonable doubt. But when you go around telling literally everyone you know that you did it and why you did it and that you're sad you did it, don't worry about it, I won't murder you know that you did it and why you did it and you know that you're sad you did it don't worry about it you know i won't murder you that's not good so yeah they do all that her sons the thing is here too her sons from robert's sons from his first marriage and also one of hope's daughters stephan, they all believe Hope's guilty. She broke the ranks with the other ones and went over to the Shriner side of here.

Three of the sons, though, attended the hearing, which is interesting because she has her own sons. Three of those sons attended the hearing. One during a two-hour recess in the hearing uh the eldest gary he's a lawyer from long island he yelled hi mom we love you hang in there hang in there ma it's all right yeah at the end of the court hearing gary and scott her youngest son the one who's that they had together um were allowed to hug and kiss her mother before she was left led away at the end of one of the days. So they get Donald Bure on the stand, and he is embarrassed as all get out, boy.

Couldn't be more embarrassed about this. Just red-faced. He never wanted anyone to know this was going on because he felt like it wasn't right. And now it's literally an inquest where he's an inquisition where he's sitting on the stand and he has to answer questions. He has to talk about his own elderly sex christ he's so embarrassed this generation is like oh jesus christ you know he told the court that you know he did because they asked do you have an alibi for that day and he said no i don't but i had nothing to do with it i don't know you know had nothing to do with it i broke it off with hope i didn't do it he said that he agreed with the attorney of the uh her attorney when it was called this is this is friends with benefits uh elderly style friends who occasionally

had an intimate interaction is what you call elderly friends with benefits daytime lovers nighttime friends yeah that's the one he said that neither he nor hope believe their relationship was would last he said that he initially denied the relationship when the police asked him about it but that was because he was embarrassed yeah and he was just that generation just doesn't talk about that sort of shit the old people like that so it's at this point that a letter comes into the district attorney's office. Here we go. An unsolicited letter from a guy with one of the greatest awful names ever, Bob Hurlbutt.

Which sounds like a Wayne's World insult. Yeah. It sounds like that's a diarrhea euphemism. I got Hurlbutt, man. It's just flying out of there. Hurlbutt. Bob Diarr got hurlbutt, man. It's just flying out of there. Hurlbutt. Bob diarrhea hurlbutt here. He's an inmate at the state prison in Berlin, New Hampshire.

And in this letter, he says that he, quote, has a hunch. Now, who's better to solve crimes than Bob hurlbutt from the state prison in Berlin here? He said he has a hunch that a Vermont man, who may or may not be his cousin, possible, had something to do with this Shriner murder. Okay? Hurlbut said that his second cousin may have been involved in this murder,

and they said an investigator, so obviously Hope's team puts out an investigator to investigate Hurlbut's claim, and in an interview with Hurlbutt his cousin said that he quote had to take care of some old dude in townsend who owed him money for work on a car he's owed money man uh hurlbutt also said his cousin admitted to committing several unspecified murders in the early 2000s yeah so his cousin's a serial killer. It's a bad man.

It's a bad man. He told these investigators that his memory was jogged about his cousin murdering people when he watched the Shriner trial on Court TV that's been going on. They've been showing it live. They've been showing it. So he said he devoted a lot of Thursday's coverage to the story and all that kind of thing,

and the man said that he didn't know. The man he said, who's his cousin who did this, said, I don't know this Hurlbutt guy and he sure as shit isn't my cousin. I don't know what the fuck he's talking about. So they learned that the man with the same name as his cousin was living in Hartford, Vermont, and ran an auto salvage company. It's insane. And that the cousin was one of the suspects in an unsolved

murder of a woman in 1987 they uncover so in addition the defendant the hope son also tells defense counselor that robert had purchased auto parts from a salvage yard and refused to pay for them because they didn't work oh so over a a couple of bad salvage parts they're gonna come murder an old man and beat him to death beat a guy with one lung to death like a stretch so they said that uh the court had an oral request for continuance of the trial to try to find this man but the court said there's no specific information there's no actual accusations there's no specific anything in this this is just a letter from a guy named hurlbutt sitting in prison who's bored and has nothing else to do and watching fucking court tv all day what are you talking about yeah so they said no can't do that so they they have a motion

for a new trial as a matter of fact just just before closing arguments, saying, if this hurlbut thing comes through, it's a game changer. Obviously. And they said, get the fuck out of here with that hurlbut shit. Don't worry, it won't come through. No. So when the defense is closing, they said that they ridicule the police investigation and the rush to judgment on Hope. They said, did that woman kill her husband? Did she?

I don't see it. I just don't see her husband? Did she? I don't see it. I just don't see it. I can't. I can't see it. She baked cookies for all of us today. She said that she called the police investigation a witch hunt. Okay. Well, yeah, if witches murdered their husbands in the driveway.

We're hunting them. Yeah, they're hunting them. She said, quote, they were not Romeo and Juliet. They'd been married 43 years. She didn't kill her husband. She didn't kill her husband. Let her go home and grieve. Let this family go home and grieve.

She pointed out the police never found the murder weapon and said that Hope was doing errands. She's playing tennis. She's getting lamps fixed. I don't know what the fuck you're talking about. There we go. So they said the police also, what about she telling all of her friends she did it?

The police twisted those comments. These people testified on the stand to say exactly what she said. She said the police twisted the comments. They made the comments themselves from their faces

in front of these fucking jurors. So that's a dumb thing to say. Prosecution, they're closing. Seems like a, they don't have a murder weapon that they said though there's blood stains matching his blood found in the basement of the home on towels and sneakers and garbage of shit she was trying to throw away get people to throw away and wash while the cops were there they said that she asked her friend to get rid of the bag she asked her friend d Diana Wickland to commit a crime and asked her to destroy the bag.

Also, the high level of sleeping drug found in his blood and Hope saying to her friends that she had tried to kill him by doing that. Quote, these actions are consistent with guilty knowledge. So, Hope does not testify in her own defense, which seems smart. During deliberations, she collapses again. Again. Another one here. Not an deliberations, she collapses again. Again. Another one here. Not an arcle, I've seen this, Braun. She has a medical issue,

but that turns out to never be anything. The jury, once they're deliberating for eight and a half hours, they request a replaying of the testimony of Dr. Stephen Shapiro, the medical examiner who did the autopsy. So they want to hear about the head injuries again. Steven Shapiro, the medical examiner who did the autopsy. So they want to hear about the head injuries again, a few minutes into the tape,

because this is played in the court, a few minutes into the tape, hope collapses again and has helped out of the court. When the judge declared a recess at the request of her attorneys, after a few minutes, they decided let's, it was like eight o'clock at night. Let's just pick this up in the morning.

Yeah. So her collapse was another whole deal here, and it's happened a bunch. She was shaking uncontrollably and everything else. So she did a whole performance. The verdict comes in. 13 hours of deliberation, by the way. Wow. Nine men, three women on this jury. And the deliberation isn't necessarily over did she do it or not.

It is because they can either find her guilty of first or second degree murder or not guilty of anything, obviously. So they come back with a verdict of guilty of second degree murder. Oh, boy. That's like she's an old lady. She's not going to kill anybody else. Somebody says, who cares? Fuck it. She's an old lady she's not gonna kill anybody else somebody says who cares fuck it she's also 72 she's never getting out but well yeah let's well let's find out the uh family they said the family was very divided on one side were two of robert's sons and one of hope's daughters and on the other side were hopes remaining three children uh the two

groups of siblings haven't talked to each other at all during the trial and wouldn't even look at each other okay the lawyers try to get her bond like bail while she awaits sentencing they pointed out that she appeared in court every time since her arrest she checked she checks in with the sheriff's deputies daily as part of her release during the trial the prosecutor though told the judge that they received information that she had been planning to travel to Montana after the trial and asked for the $100,000 bail she posted to be revoked. They said that she's going to go to the Montana.

The defense attorney said only if she was acquitted, she had those plans. They said her son lives there. That's why. So she was going to go visit her son and all that kind of thing. Why not? And they said, what about her collapse? Was that all phony baloney horse shit? And her lawyer said it was a long day.

She has 30 years on me and I was pooped. She was wiped out. Pooped. Pooped. Thank you for your legal expertise. Officially, legally pooped. So sentencing comes around. Legally pooped. So sentencing comes around and the it's about, you know, family, the relatives testify and about how it affects their lives. And family was divided. Obviously, like we said, it's been kind of going back and forth here. They talk about, you know, we knew they didn't have the happiest of marriages, but she could have just left him yeah one does one kid described her as a dominating unfaithful and vengeful woman who kept her husband from having contact with his children from his first marriage

and he said living in a bad marriage is a common thing unfortunately i think in this world but killing your spouse is not that was timothy schreiner and uh the older brother steve he said i have one request for the court let's hear When she dies, that she would not be buried next to my father, please. Oh. He said his final resting place should not have to be beside his killer. That's fair, I think. Not bad. I think that's fair.

And one of the daughter who's not on her side, Stephanie, she wrote a letter read in court by a victim's advocate. And she testified against her mother. And she said that she's been ostracized by other family members she said i am permanently traumatized i have no more hope no more family no more strength jesus christ so yeah only one of the daughters out of everyone they came only one of her daughters spoke in her defense deborah she asked the judge to overturn the conviction and return hope to the grandchildren who need her. That's not how this works.

No, that judge can't do that. She said she was wrongfully convicted on incomplete evidence and it was insufficient. And she suggested someone else was responsible and that her dad would not have wanted his wife to suffer like this. Wow. She said, no matter what I say here today, she's still going to spend the rest of her life behind bars. My mother also suffered through this. And the judge says, well, those who think Hope is innocent are, quote, in denial.

This is the judge's sentencing here. He said the evidence against her includes witness statements, DNA, blood found at the home. Quote, I understand why some of you may feel this way, but Mrs. Schreiner was convicted of murder because Mrs. Schreiner killed Mr. Schreiner. Yes. He described it as a savage and brutal killing that shocked the community. And he said, quote, if she is capable of this horrible act, then who among us is also capable? It is hard to think about but it's important for us to think about you granny schreiner may fuck off 17 years to life okay

and she will become the oldest female inmate in the state of vermont at that very moment and the second oldest inmate total there her earliest parole dates 2023 when she'll be 90. Yeah. Oh, she's got to do all 17. She said that, thank you for support. No, no, that's less than. It might be, actually. You might be right.

She said, thank you for supporting me through this. To her family, I hope you keep your support and love for the rest of this journey. Yeah. The son said, quote, the 17 years will probably be the rest of her life anyways. Justice is served. And he walked away. I guess fucking.

The D.A. said there's no pleasure in taking from imposing this kind of sentence today. There's a lot of victims here today. She did a bunch of appeals based on fucking hurlbutt. Based on just different things. By the way the rake that was taken when they way, the rake that was taken when they actually found the rake that the daughter took, it was too weak to have beaten a man to death. It would have broke before it broke a skull.

You know what I mean? It was one of those. So they said that wasn't it. They said all of her appeals lacked any kind of merit. She's just pretty much fucked essentially here. She told so many people she did it. It didn't quite work out there's also a fight over the will of course and they said a one-half interest in each of the three

properties formerly owned by hope schreiner and robert schreiner as tenants by the entirety and described here in blah blah blah blah blah blah where is it here um i guess she gets it shall be held in a constructive trust is what it is. And they said that if Hope Schreiner's conviction is upheld after all the appellate things are exhausted, one half interest so decreed shall vest in the estate of him, and that'll go to the kids. So she's not going to get anything, basically. We're going to whittle it down to one ninth. If you give a ninth to everybody, that's going to be nothing. Unless it gets overturned.

Now, in 2014, she's 81 years old and she's granted a medical furlough and moved to a nursing home in Vermont. State officials said it was due to a terminal or debilitating illness. But couldn't have been that terminal because apparently from what I found she's still fucking alive for what i can find um hope from what i can understand here she is alive i think i found her in long on long island also where one of her sons lives and that's that son's a lawyer so he probably has enough money to keep his mom in the house or nearby so i think she's still alive at 90 also i found a hope shriner with a vermont linkedin that said retired at uh at none arts and crafts myself only so she was like she doesn't know how to do phil in the linkedin which is an old person i think that's her yeah and this was done on a few tv shows here there nobody did it really in depth they did like a third of a you know 40 minute show on it they did suburban secrets in in uh 2007 i believe did a thing on it and i think

maybe snapped might have done like a short segment on it she snapped it was right there that said there it is everybody that's vermont fucking crazy time in vermont i'll tell you what llamas and old lady fucking and all sorts of shit gives me hope james that i'm gonna still be fucking in my 70s that's great all right no shit hey maybe fingers crossed yeah hopefully uh you'll be the fucker and not the guy in the house on ambien so anyway that said definitely leave a review any after listening on it helps a lot five stars does that shut up and give me murder.com is where you get everything tickets august 12th chicago biggest show ever chicago live show only only other tickets available dallas atlanta charlotte a couple in philly do that shut up and give me

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