Small Town Murder - #495 - Turning A Husband Into Flowers - Lopez Island, Washington

Episode Date: May 30, 2024

This week, in Lopez Island, Washington, a well traveled & colorful sea captain, who once collapsed a bridge, disappears from his home. His wife insists that he left to be with another woman, but blood, statements from relatives, and rumors of a meat grinder say otherwise. Finally, a surprise witness brings it all together, with the details, but will anyone end up convicted??Along the way, we find out that some people just aren't cut out for island living, that there are people who were attacked by both The Kaiser & The Nazis, and that even if there's no body, it doesn't mean there isn't any crime!!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. We've all turned to the internet to self-diagnose when some random ailment pops up in our lives. Even though our minds often go to a worst-case scenario when we experience these things, most times it's nothing to worry about. However, for an unlucky few, their weird symptoms are just the start of a terrifying medical mystery. Listen to Mr. Boland's Medical Mysteries wherever you get your podcasts. This week in Lopez Island, Washington, when a well-known boat captain disappears,

his wife says he left her, but blood stains, tips from relatives, and a meat grinder tell a much different, much darker story. 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 Petragallo. I'm Oh, yay indeed, Jimmy. Yay indeed. My name is James Petragallo, I'm here with my co-host. I'm Jimmy Wissman.

Thank you folks so much for joining us today on another wild one. What a, I'm gonna say it every week, but just a crazy wild unfolding tale. We've never told one quite like this before, and you'll know what I mean when we tell it. It's so, it sounds like you're gonna think I made it up, and I didn't. That's just, I'm just gonna tell you that right up front here. So that's how crazy it is. Very quickly, shut up and give me murder.com. Tickets

to live shows. There they are. Here we go. May 31st, Durham, North Carolina, you are up. Get your tickets last minute. There's a few left. Nashville next night is sold out. After that, they're selling quick, so get them, Minneapolis for September, get those, Boston, Kansas City. We opened up more tickets. There was another tier to the theater, we opened it up, so now there's more tickets, those sold out very quickly,

so get your tickets before, they're all gone too. Austin, Oklahoma, all these, get your tickets right now. We're very excited. Shut up and give me murder.com. Also, new shirts are up too, some, all these. Get your tickets right now, we're very excited. Shut up and give me murder.com. Also, new shirts are up too. Some very funny ones. So check those out. You certainly also want Patreon.

Patreon.com slash crime and sports is where you get all of the bonus material. Tons of it. Anybody five dollars a month or above, you get a huge back catalog. Hundreds of episodes of bonus stuff you've never heard. New ones other week one crime and sports one small-town murder and you get access to That's right So this week which you're gonna get for crime and sports don't really need to have any interest in sports for this

We're gonna talk about the OJ trial. We've talked about the did his son do it? We talked about we did an episode on crime and sports But this is the actual trial what how do you have DNA evidence and all this stuff and not convict the guy? Well, you are incompetent, so we'll talk all about it. I've watched all 493 parts of the trial on YouTube. So it's a lot trust me and then for small-town murder We're gonna talk about what's inside Ed Gaines house. What's there? What's in there or worse off his shed? Yeah his house What's he doing there? What's a life that day in the life so gross Ed gay? Oh, it's disgusting We'll talk all about it patreon.com Slash crime in sports is how you get all of that stuff

So please do that and you get a shout out at the end of the show too, which is wonderful You're gonna love that. So that said, I think it's time, disclaimer. Sure. It's a comedy show, everybody. We're comedians, we're gonna tell jokes, people are gonna die, but we know how to do it. We're professionals. And what you do is, what we do is we never make fun

of the victims or the victim's family. Very easy. Why, James? Because we're assholes. Yep, but. But we're not scumbags. Simple. Good for you. There you go. But we're not scumbags. Simple. Good for you.

There you go, so if that sounds like a good policy to you and you wanna hear a crazy story and you wanna have some fun, I think it's time, everybody, and you're gonna love it. But if you think true crime and comedy should never go together, maybe you won't like the show. I don't know, but give it a shot and no complaining later. That said, I think it's time, everybody, to sit back.

Let's do this. I don't care where you are. Where are you right now? Yeah. Where are you right now? Are you at the deli counter at the supermarket, putting chicken strips in one of those weird paper bag things for people?

Yeah, what is that bag? Slam it down on the ground. You look them dead in the eye, and you shout, shut up and give me murder. Oh, there we go, let's do this. Let's go on a trip, everybody. Can't wait. I can't wait for North Carolina and Nashville to see how good of shut up and give me murder yellers

they are, because. Nice little southern run, let's go. Usually they're enthusiastic down there, so we'll find out. Let's go on a trip, we're going to Washington State okay we are going to like way not even in the mainland of Washington State on an island near Canada yeah oh north there northwestern Washington in the water between Washington and Canada it's a fascinating little area it is it's a different pretty so totally yeah it

seems this this area to these islands, these are the San Juan Islands. These people are not playing. It's a different lifestyle completely. Yeah, they've made it. They're all boat people. You know what I mean? There's a or or watercraft aircraft people. Yes. Oh, yeah. Yeah. There they have. They're the type of people who have pilot's licenses that live on this island. Yeah, they're they have they're the type of people who have pilots licenses It's fucking crazy, so we'll talk about that. This is Lopez Island, Washington It is it's three hours to Seattle and that's you can drive it But your car is to go fuck Seattle's on the ocean you guys car has to go on a ferry Yeah, and the ferry takes 45 minutes to get to the mainland. Wow.

And then it's another two hours after that. So it's up there. It's seven and a half hours to Deer Park, Washington, which is our last episode, episode 450 that was in Washington. You are not the father was that episode. And that was a fun one. I remember that San Juan County, because this is the San Juan Islands and the motto of this particular island of Lopez Island is quote, the jewel of the San Juan Islands and the motto of this particular island of

Lopez Island is quote the jewel of the San Juan Islands. Okay. So it's considered I mean it's old Cuba. It's beautiful. Yeah. San Juan kept throwing me off. I'm like Puerto Rico. What are we talking about?

And it's no it's you couldn't get farther away from Puerto Rico. It's the exactly different climate entirely different culture, people. It's oh so different. Well, an island in the extreme south east and an island in the extreme northwest. It's just it's all there. A little bit of history. We got to go. We got a lot of show and story. So we'll go through this pretty quick. The archaeological evidence suggests that this island had people hunting and gathering about 8,000 years ago here Holy shit, somebody else knew it was amazing. It's it's a beautiful place There's water, you know, if you're live here fishing is abundant. This is a place you can live

You know what I mean? The climate isn't bad either During the Wilkes expedition this island was actually given the name Chauncey Island After an American naval commander named Isaac Chauncey, but when the British reorganized the official naval shit in 1847, they removed many of the names from this expedition, basically. They started naming it other shit. So they named it Lopez for Gonzalo Lopez de Haro,

the Spanish naval officer who was the first European to sail to the San Juan Islands. So, they're like, don't do an American from that continent. Just whoever was the first European will name him after that. So they did. How the hell did that person get there? Did they go around the horn or did they go?

Yeah, they went around everything. Before Lewis and Clark did their expedition, there was a lot of Europeans in the Northwest, but they had to go all the way the fuck around. That's how they got That's a long ride man. This is before the Panama Canal or any of that shit You had to go around around South America around Africa around South America. Oh Go all the way around. It was a long trip That's why that was so important to try to find a route to the ocean through the land.

Because it would take a lot shorter of a time. Reviews of this town. Here is Five Stars. I've been to Lopez Island twice now and thoroughly enjoyed it both times. Yeah, the island lifestyle is so laid back. No one's in a hurry. Everyone is friendly.

It's on an island. You'll get there eventually. There's so much natural beauty. I drove past the senior center and they do tennis on Saturdays. Oh, room for two more? Sign us up. Can we? Because we'll school some seniors in tennis, man. What does that lifestyle cost? Holy shit. Me and you doubles against old people. I think we're going to fucking crush dude. Let's go Athol. Come on. Come on.

What are we doing here? Let's go. Old people with their drop foot. Yeah, come on. Yeah, clutch your chest now because you lost. Yeah, make excuses. Okay. Yeah, lie on the ground and be motionless.

Oh shit. There's a group I can outrun. Oh shit. Can we get group I can outrun. Oh shit, can we get an ambulance for Fred? I think Fred's dead now. They'll be very impressed with my physical prowess. Oh my God, they'll be like, how old are you just gone?

I'm 69. Holy shit, you look great. He said, I can picture myself retired on Lopez Island, playing tennis and hiking some of the trails that offer spectacular views. I can see myself living the best life ever. I can see myself living on an island playing tennis. Yeah sure, I bet you could.

Who the fuck can't you idiot? Yeah, you jackass. 4 stars, I'm currently at Lopez Island and it's great. I would give it 5 stars but when me and my sister went swimming, we got stung by jellyfish and my sister thinks it's something called stinging kelp and the weight for the fairy. That's how they spell it. Not fairy, fairy. You gotta wait on him. He's coming. He goes, hi. And he takes you, whisk you off to the hospital. Now it's the

weirdest thing ever. It was long and boring as well to the hospital now. It's the weirdest thing ever. It was long and boring as well as the ferry ride, but all the locals were nice and waved and smiled and overall is a nice small community. I've enjoyed my stay so far. So you're the only thing that's wrong is you went in the ocean and there was ocean shit in there that you didn't care for. That's the whole reason I'm not going in the fucking ocean. No, so you penalized the review. Okay, two stars.

I was expecting something special, but reality was another matter. Oh boy. This isn't special for you, a beautiful majestic island? It was rather disappointing to be totally honest. Overall, I found the shop owners to be snooty and everything was overpriced except for the Lopez Village Market. You're on a fucking island. Yeah, it costs money to get that shit there.

To get to Seattle, I gotta put my car on a fucking ferry. So as they say, or locally. On his back. Yeah. I gotta get on a ferry with my fucking car to go pick shit up. It's gonna be expensive. Sorry. I gotta take a ferry ride.

I gotta take a ferry ride. But that's in the, you fly in a ferry ride, so that's better. They sprinkle pixie dust also, which helps. Yeah. It's fairy dust. Yep. The farms at Al were nice, but honestly,

I could get the same thing in Mount Vernon, La Conner, Enumclaw. Well, no one's ever heard of those places, so. That's why. And Ocean Shores kicks booty compared to Lopez Island. Oh at least at Ocean Shores the gorgeous sandy beaches right at your tiptoes literally and they have great food and endless shops to visit. The only difference is that Lopez Island is an island. Well yeah that's a big difference.

Huge difference you just mentioned right there. Landlocked? Attached to other towns? Or is it all on its own? Oh, God, that's the only difference. Oops, and also way overpriced. Because it's a fucking island and the other one you can drive to the store. Holy shit. We get a lot of shit in Omaha.

Somehow in Honolulu it's more expensive. Yeah, it's a little pricier. That's why they like spam down there. Right. Need less room to grow it. I know you don't grow it, but still. Finally, the two hour wait for the ferry and the 45 minute ride was way too much time

sitting on one's booty. That's two mentions of the word booty in one review. I'm sorry, that's ridiculous. Unless you're a rapper from 1991, I don't wanna hear you say booty more than once in a paragraph. Practically six hours total when including round trip. Not worth it, will not be back.

Seems like you don't have the mindset for the lifestyle here. Stay on the mainland. Or the wallet. So yeah, stay where you can, that's all. People in this town, 2,588 people here. So still, very small. Not a lot of people at all.

And that's actually, it's gone up because it was less, yeah. More female than males because the crowd is older and women live longer, so that's the reason there. The median age here, 59.7. Yeah, of wealthy motherfuckers. There's no way they're not. No, tennis playin' bastards, these people. Family here, it's about almost 60% married,

very low divorce rate. Only 9% of the people are single with children. Wow. Because they're old. Yeah, it's divorce eggs. Yeah, that's it. Race of this town, 89% white, 1% black, 1.1% Asian, 5.4% Hispanic, and 31% of the people

here are religious. Highest religion Catholic, actually. It's actually Catholic, which is, as we all know, Catholics are the Baptists of the extreme Northwest. The end of. Yeah, the Pacific Northwest. Median household income here is $67,938 a year, which is just normal. Really?

Yeah, because a lot of these people aren't, they don't work. They're retired. Oh, and they're retired making great retiree money. Yeah, so it's a different scale when you look at it, because the cost of living, if 100 is average, here it is 135. Oh, yeah, that's expensive. Housing is the big one here. Median home cost here.

There's limited space, you know what I mean? Yeah, it's an island. $795,700. That's the median home cost. For anything affordable, there's a million dollar home. That's incredible. That's wild. And it makes sense because it takes, think about what million dollar home. That's incredible. That's wild. And it makes sense because it takes, think about what it takes to build a house there.

Yeah, you got to reinforce the ground. There's a water table that's right goddamn there. Not only that, just to bring the materials over there. Right. It's so much more expensive. Eye beams and shit. Yeah, you have to float them over there on a ferry. It's hard.

It's hard going. You gotta get them to carry them. Yeah, he doesn't want to. So if we've convinced you, you have the wallet and you have the mindset and you're ready. We have for you the Lopez Island, Washington real estate report. OK, average two bedroom rental here is over double the national average. $2,500? $2,560. Wow.

Yup. Here is a three bedroom, two bath, 17, or I'm sorry, 1,272 square foot house. So not a giant house. It's a manufactured home, obviously. It was trucked here or floated over here. Looks like shit on the outside It needs a paint job something fierce. It looks like it's abandoned, but then inside Like the really nice hardwood floors and it looks much better on the inside could use some updating, but it's still nice

They they really brag about these out buildings that look like Ed game murder sheds That's all really where yeah where somebody would dismember a body and play with murder sheds. That's all it looks like. Where, yeah, where somebody would dismember a body and play with its sexual organs. That's, they look terrifying. So that's weird. It says in the listing, quote, nice three bedroom, two bath home on 0.5013 acres. That's very specific.

Just say half an acre. I've never seen acreage broken down to the fourth decimal. Have you? To the fucking foot. Fort spot over. That's wild, man. That's that's an island. Yeah. Holy shit. That's four hundred sixty nine thousand bucks for that. Wow. It's pricey, but you're on an island. My God. Yeah. Here's a two bedroombedroom two-bath

2164 square feet on point seven four acres. They didn't go all the way to the fourth decimal It's nice it's a lot of wood but it is It looks like kind of like a bed and breakfast this place. I would say like a small bed and breakfast. It's right on the water Yeah, fucking beautiful. The views are amazing. It's on the water 1,000,000 250 thousand dollars. Yeah, it's a million and a quarter You're getting almost an acre of land to on an island on the water. So privacy Here's a five-bedroom eight bath tee ball for each and every beehole and some neighbors 4404 square foot shit on 24 and a half acres Is this 10 million dollars? It's it look this looks like where people in romantic comedies go to get married. It's fucking ridiculous

It's like it's like fantasy island silly like there and there's all like beautiful stuff in the like that They've built for like outdoor stuff really like in the woods. There's like nice. It's gorgeous 6 million seven hundred,000 bucks for it. Which is less than like dollars. I mean it may as well be 10. If it's six, it's 10. If it's six, it might as well be 50, who cares? It's six million dollars.

Who the fuck would afford that? That's crazy. That's crazy. That's a lot. So things to do here. Okay, we have the Lopez Island Home Tours. Okay. A lot going on here is what I'm telling you. What is that?

You go around and look at people's houses? That's just... Yep, more than 100 homeowners have opened their homes for the Lopez Island Tour. And... Oh, they're allowed, they want you to. Yeah, you go in, you walk down streets and you just walk in and look around in their houses

and pocket their prescription pills out of their medicine cabinet and leave, I think. Grab a chain right here, right there. Grandpa's got some oxys, here we go. We're gonna pocket those bad boys. So one person here that opened their home said, we said yes right away. This is just one day of our lives

with the important fundraiser for the community center. This is what this does. And yeah, so that's what they do. You go around any longer. How much do they raise? You know what I mean? Like if every home just donates 20 bucks and says don't come in my house.

Yeah, get the fuck away. I would definitely donate more for you to stay out of my fucking house. Yeah. That would be great. Bet you raise more money for that fucking community center. Yeah, just put a sign on my lawn and said gave $1,000 and move on. Stay out. Yeah, just put a sign on my lawn and said, gave $1,000 and move on.

Stay out. Yeah, so apparently there's just, some of the houses are cool. There's one house, Asha Leela is the name of the person who owns it on Shark Reef Road, was built entirely from timbers that they cut down on the five acre of land place. So this is no like outside stuff.

It's all local wood and shit. So that's pretty cool. They had five acres of woods. They cut down the woods and built a house out of the woods. Out of the woods, yeah. That's kind of cool, right? I mean, at least that's like pioneering. That's like old school.

It's an old house. As long as it's not just wood, as long as you throw up some drywall out of those stuff. I'd hope. There's some stucco maybe, some concrete in the foundation, I would say, things like that. A little bit of mud on these walls.

Something, yeah, slap it up there. There's that and then there's the Up Up Crane Circus. That's what it's called. Up Up Up, I'm sorry, three ups. Oh, so what is that? Crane rides? The Up Up Up Traveling Circus Ensemble tours the Salish Sea for its fourth annual tour. The crane circus, the crane truck circus will perform a one hour all ages outdoor circus

show at the Lopez community center. This is what we're raising money for with these houses on Lopez Island with a crane truck for shenanigans. What kind of shenanigans and a baby grand piano for live music. The show features aerialist musicians, acrobats, clowns, and illusionists. This is a food truck circus basically. Oh, and they show up.

Some trapeze up there. Yeah, they do like a pop-up in the parking lot for an hour and they take off. Walk and taco and watch some people flip around. No tent, tentless circus. Crime rate in this town, well we're interested in here, property crime is about a quarter underneath the national average, so about 25% under.

Little low, yeah. Violent crime, murder, rape, robbery, and of course assault, the Mount Rushmore of crime is more than 50% under the average, so. Very safe. It's a very safe place, I mean, what are you gonna, you're not gonna get away. Nobody's blowing very safe place. I mean, yeah, what are you gonna, where you're not going to get away? Who's nobody's blowing through town. It's a fucking Island.

It's a 45 minute flight on a fairies back. You got to want to be there. You know? So, uh, that said, let's talk about some murder here. And you're like, wow, it's a little early. Yes, it is. Cause this is a lot of murder and it's a lot of crazy Let's talk about a man first. Okay, and this is a man man. This is a this is a dude This guy would call us total pussies in two seconds. Well, his name is Rolf nestland Nesl und Rolf with an O So he's born. We don't know when he's born. He's a, he's a man of mystery. Oh yeah.

We think he's either born and when I give you this date, you're going to shit your pants. It's a, this didn't happen in like the twenties. Don't worry. It's a, it's a modern tale, but I have to tell you about this guy. July 7th, 1897. He's born Ralph or, or July 7th, 1900, either one. It doesn't matter. We don't know. It's a very old man. It's a very old, we're gonna go with 1897 for now.

He's from Kongsberg, Kongsberg commune in Buskerfjord, Busker Rude Filk, Norway. Yeah. Yeah. That's a lot of shit there. He's from a commune or is that is it the town of that? It might mean that might mean town in Norwegian too. I don't know. Because the commune is K K O M M U N E is how they spell it. So I don't know if that's like a root word for how they came up with commune. We have no idea. And Busker Rudd Filky is the other place, Norway.

It's a seaport where he's from, Kongsberg. Or Kongsberg, I'm not sure. His grandfather was a prominent, like a boat captain, and owner of sailing ships. Hell yeah. Okay, so, but he didn't have much money coming up. His grandfather was like out on the seas. Yeah, that's fascinating. A captain can either be like a super rich guy Okay, so, but he didn't have much money coming up. His grandfather was like out on the seas. This is.

Yeah, that's fascinating. A captain can either be like a super rich guy or a fucking, you know what I mean, destined to be rarely in between. Yeah, who needs a job so he has a place to live for a while. Yeah, that kind of shit. He needs to stay on this boat. Yeah, so he was four years old

when his father was a barber, Rolfe. So he was four years old when his father was a barber, Ralph. So he was four years old when his father put him to work, which he was the latherer for shaving. He would lather people's faces for the shaving. That was his job at four. He had to stand on a wooden box to do it and get up there. So he soon decided as a child that I don't want to do this forever. Yeah, this sucks. My grandfather was a barber. It is fucking 12 hours a day on your feet,

six days a week, brutal. Yeah, but rubbing a whiskery old man is no fun either. That's no fun, especially back then. They all smelled. Every one of these guys stunk, I'm sure. Yeah, just rubbin' shit on their fucking neck. Probably stabbin' his little fingers with their fucking pointy bristles.

Yeah. A four year old's fingers. That man may as well just be a pumice stone. He's exfoliating the shit out of that child. Oh my God, so exfoliate this child please. In 1909 when he's 12 years old, or nine, we're not sure. I think it's 12. He decided at 12, I don't want to do this anymore. I don't want to be here. I don't want to, you know, barber. I don't want to do any of this. I'm going to run away from home.

So he ran, he left at nine to 12, somewhere in there. So he ran. Now this isn't, I'm going to run away to the next town, I have like an aunt, I'm gonna go stay at her house and ask her to not tell my mom where I am. He got on a Scandinavian American steam line ship and went to New York. Wow. At 12. That's a trip around the block, innit?

That's some shit, that's some balls right there. Yeah. Glad you're being a 12 year old. As a kid, you'd be like, I'm gonna go around the block in it. That's some shit. That's some walls right there Yeah, I'll be back that's a long ride that's a long fucking block right there so he stowed away aboard a Danish passenger ship to the United States a steamer and He try had to avoid the workers on the ship How do you because he's a stowaway? He quote, I slept in the toilets and ate with the passengers. Oh. And just pretended. So just go up and eat, yeah.

Yeah, he said they made it ashore in Hoboken without being discovered as a stowaway. So all the way across the ocean. That's over like a week across the ocean he's there. He tried to hop a ferry across the Hudson River to New York, and that's where he got fucked with. He tried to skip the fare on it. And if it's anything like the subway now,

they really take that shit seriously. So he had no money, not American money anyway, and the ferry cost three cents, and he didn't have three cents. Oh no. So a Norwegian man recognized him and said, I know that guy, I know that kid. They're from the same town.

He used to get his hair cut by his father. Imagine that. Imagine the coincidence. He said, it's a Norwegian boy. He just lathered me a week ago. This is crazy. I exfoliated his palms with my netting. Look at his palms. They're gonna be like red and is crazy. I exfoliated his palms with my neck.

Look at his palms, they're gonna be like red and scrappy. I bet they're still red, it's been three weeks. That's crazy, so he didn't have fair-y fair. And there he goes, so he is incarcerated for seven days at a holding pen for immigrants. Uh-huh, okay, because now he's an illegal, yeah. Yeah, just picture little Vito Corleone and the Godfather two staring out the window

at the Statue of Liberty singing. That's what we got going here. Demigrating illegally, wow. Yep, so he's locked up. Then he was deported on the same ship going back to Norway. Who in the ship left? They just stuck him back on it and held him the fuck up. Give him another free ride.

Yep, he was trying to get to his aunt's, he had an aunt on Long Island and he planned to sign on to a ship sailing from New York to anywhere and lie about his age. That was his plan when he got there. Wow. But the aunt ended up visiting him while he was there before he took off. But I guess at the time she wasn't married and they wouldn't release him to an unmarried person or some shit, they had to get to be like a married couple.

Boy, oh boy. It was weird, yeah. So it was. You look fascinating. It was 1909, women couldn't vote yet for Christ's sake. Yeah. It was a different time. Anybody who's taking on the responsibility

of taking care of this child, fucking have at it. You want a stowaway Norwegian boy? Like sure, here you go, You're related to him, great. Yeah, I imagine there was sex trafficking back then too, but not near as prevalent as it is today, I'm sure. Well, I'm sure it wasn't as big of a, then they would actually sell you a child. Now it's like a lot of, I'm sure,

they sell you, they rent you a child. Yeah, an online shitter. I don't know what the fuck they're doing, but it's gotta be weird. It's nefarious and shit. But I mean, as a government entity, you don't want to be fuck they're doing, but it's gotta be weird. It's nefarious and shit. As a government entity, you don't wanna be just pushing kids onto people. No, no, no.

Yeah, take it home with you. There you go. There's some happens to that kid. Now it's the government's fault for giving them, sending them home with that person. No shit. What the fuck was that movie with Diane Keaton in the 80s where somebody like a cousin

she hadn't seen in 30 years willed her a baby? What? They died and she gets a call from a lawyer saying she inherited something. So she shows up at the airport to pick it up and she's like, signs, where, what did I get? Signs the paper and they're like this and they hand her a baby. And now she's got a baby. And she literally says, I can't have a baby.

I have a 1230 lunch meeting. I'm a business. It's so fucking ridiculous. Very late 80s, early 90s. Very late 80s, yeah. So, Ralph, oh Ralph here, he had to go home to Norway. He said, quote, when he got home, quote, my ma gave me a good beatin'.

Yeah, I bet she did. I bet she did, so he turned into a little Italian boy somehow, my ma gave me a good beatin' when I got home. I desired it. I desired it, She kicked my ass. He turned into a thirties Brooklyn kid. He said, but they were kind of glad to see me, I think. I would hope so that they were glad to see. I can't believe you made it across the world. Twice back and forth. So they figured that now that he got that out of his system,

he'd be better. But instead a year, he ran away again. Did it again. Hopped on another steamer down for New York. This time, he got across from Hoboken and across the Hudson on the ferry. So he managed to then get her... Well, he didn't have any money, but he hitched a ride with a guy who had a car who was driving that on the ferry. So the guy let him sit in his car. If you're listening to this podcast, then chances are good, you are a fan of the Strange, Dark and Mysterious. And if that's the case, then I've got some good news. We just launched a brand new Strange, Dark and Mysterious podcast called Mr. Bolland's Medical Mysteries. And as the name suggests, it's a show about medical mysteries, a genre that many fans have been

asking us to dive into for years. And we finally decided to take the plunge and the show is awesome. In this free weekly show, we explore bizarre, unheard of diseases, strange medical mishaps, unexplainable deaths, and everything in between. Each story is totally true and totally terrifying. Go follow Mr. Bolland's Medical Mysteries wherever you get your podcasts, and if you're a Prime member, you can listen early and ad-free on Amazon Music. If you're listening to this podcast, then chances are good you are a fan of the Strange, Dark and Mysterious.

And if that's the case, then I've got some good news. We just launched a brand new Strange, Dark and Mysterious podcast called Mr. Bolland's Medical Mysteries. And as the name suggests, it's a show about medical mysteries, a genre that many fans have been asking us to dive into for years, and we finally decided to take the plunge and the show is awesome. In this free weekly show, we explore bizarre, unheard of diseases, strange medical mishaps, unexplainable deaths and everything in between. Each story is totally true and totally terrifying. Go follow Mr. Bolland's Medical Mysteries wherever you get your podcasts, and if you're

a Prime member, you can listen early and ad-free on Amazon Music. That's how it worked. So he passed himself off as a worker on the ship. That's how he got there. He said, yeah, I worked on the ship and that's what he told everybody. He found his way to the aunt's house as well. He found his aunt. He said, I was the cause of her getting married.

The aunt married her fiancee earlier than planned so Ralph could stay with them. How about that? And so they did it. So he, after a few months, he ends up running away from his aunt's home and ships out as a mess boy aboard the British freighter that was bound for France.

He wants to just he wants to work on ships he liked the ship thing. Yeah. So yeah the ship was the Ganges and it sailed off on Christmas Eve and on Christmas Day they got a huge snowstorm so he got he got some experience pretty quickly here. He said that he never forgot that day because of the steamers chief engineer. He said that green water shipped through a hatch that Rolfe was wrongfully blamed for leaving open. Green water? What is that water? The ocean water I guess. I don't know it says green water. Maybe it's in sewage. Maybe, that's possible.

Though that would be brown water, I would think, right? They call it black water on like an RV. Yeah, that's what I mean. The gray water is the toothpaste and sink water. Green is probably good water. You think, maybe. Or maybe, I don't know. But the water just rolled through the engineer's mess

just as the chief emerged from his cabin, which had been flooded. So Rolf said the chief had the sharpest pointed shoes I've ever seen, and they reached me no matter where I was. He was a mean, mean man. He's kicking him? Kicking him right in the ass. It's like 1911.

You could fucking drown this kid if he fucks up. It's probably legal, you know what I mean? And nobody even knows where he is. He's some 14 year old. So yeah, seven years later he's going to enter World War I here. Really? Yeah, one of the assignments he had was aboard a British freighter bound from Baltimore to Europe. He said we were 10 days at sea on salt, meat and beans.

Wow. Yeesh. Salt meat? Like one word? Salt meat. It's salted meat. That's so it won't go bad. Like canned ham or some shit. Yeah.

Yeah. Like that's what they used to just salt beef before refrigeration. They'd salt the meat and salting would keep it like cod, like salty cod. They did that too. Also, he said, we never even had potatoes. Really? So, yeah, he was old enough to convince immigration officers that when he got to America, by the way, he told them that, no, no, I can work and I'm older. He faked his age and said that, you know, I don't need to be dependent on anybody.

I'm older. I'll be fine. So, interesting. Another job he had in New York for a while, I guess in between ships. He was so young, but nobody wanted to do this job. He was hired as a painter to work on the beams of the buildings being built on 42nd Street and Madison Avenue in New York City.

Holy. So building the big buildings, and he's the guy up there. Painting the beam before they clad it with whatever they clad it with. Walking on beams hundreds of feet above the ground. And back then there's no safety equipment, you just walked on the beam,

and if you fell they fucking found somebody else, that was it, done. So everybody up there too, these were all Italian immigrants that were working. So it was him and a million Italian immigrants and the Norwegian kid. So he must have fell out of place, not only in a million Italian immigrants and the Norwegian kid. So he must have felt out of place, not only in a million different ways.

So then he gets on these ships for the Lucanbach Line. Yeah, yeah. And he boarded a ship called the Harry Lucanbach. And it was the New York based Lucanbach Line that he ends up being a captain for later on as we'll get to. One night here, after a couple of voyages on the Harry-Luchenbach, which was the flagship here, he was a quartermaster by now and I guess

shortly after midnight a French freighter ahead in an eight ship convoy was torpedoed. So Rolfe said she was afire from fore to aft. He said she lit up everything. Oh god damn boat. A fire in the night at sea is the brightest thing in the world because it's so fucking dark out there. It's so bright. So a few minutes later, the ship sank off the off the coast there. So he was like, shit what happens now cuz this is you know, World War one times and He said she was gone in eight to ten minutes Which is crazy. She went down by the head. So like the Titanic but then the Titanic broke He said he remembers the stern lifting into the air before the ship dove to the bottom

Just goes that's what it goes. Right down like a missile. And eight people died on the ship. Went down with the ship. Eight people died. He's seen so many people die, right? Eight people, yeah. He said he almost died too. He said he owed his life to the second mate on the ship.

Rolfe was abandoning the bridge when he nearly fell into a coal bunker hatch dislodged by the torpedo strike. That would have been everything. It would have fell 30 feet he said. He said the second mate grabbed me by the nape of the neck and saved him from falling 30 feet down and then drowning. Like a cat.

Yeah. So even if he fell down he would have had no chance of climbing up before it went down. He would have just drowned. That would have been that. So survivors were picked up by a yacht that was serving as a convoy escort so uh yep he just hops right back on the next ship doesn't care oh my god dude's got balls man I'm telling you so following World War one he became a second mate he because he was a quartermaster he never had to serve as a third mate, he went right to second mate.

By 38 years old, he's going to be master, ship master. That's what he's gonna earn here. By the time, 1928, he becomes a U.S. citizen in the 20s as well. He remained a Luxembourg's captain for 17 years before later on he will become a World War II person, as we'll talk about here. He, I guess, well, we'll talk about this. He continued progressing up the ship ladder here,

and in 1926 was his first command. He became master of the Robin Goodfellow, and captain's a hard job to be the master here. You're in charge of everything. You know everything about master here. You're in charge of everything. You know everything about this boat. You're in charge of everything. You have to know everybody's job, what they're doing, make sure they're doing it well.

You have to know, anything that goes wrong by any of these people, fuck up. It's your fault and you gotta go down with the ship. That's a lot, it really is. Some asshole could open a hatch and we'd taken on ship. That's a lot. It really is. Yeah, some asshole could open a hatch and we'd take it on water and it's my fault. And I gotta die now. Yeah.

I gotta fucking die now. I gotta die. Great. This is fucked up, man. Yep. So this is when he first started going into Puget Sound as well and found this area. Now he's a kind of a good looking guy.

And he's a sea captain, so he's got a certain, there's a certain ruggedness to him. Swagger, yeah. You know, it's almost like being a cowboy in the 1800s. Like he's a sea captain. It's the yellow slicker, James. He comes in with his frozen fish patties and he's like, I brought these for you. People are like, oh, look at that, breaded mutt, just how I like it.

Yeah, it's either that guy, Captain Hook, or Captain Ron. Those are the three. Captain Ron's my favorite of the three, obviously. Those are the three captains. That's all the captains right there. So he likes women, obviously. He's into women, he likes doing that, but he's not married yet, even in his 30s.

Back then, guys got married early. He's in his 30s, he's not married yet yeah he's in his 30s he's not married yet that's a question he's been with a lot of women though and he's always any port he goes into he finds the place to go he likes him that port dripping yep uh he will marry a woman in 1934 her name is i'm gonna spell it a l fL-F-H-I-L-D. That's her first name. Alfalfa. Alfalfa, Elfield.

Middle name is Margrethe, but I think it's probably Margret and Margo they call her. M-A-R-G-R-E-T-H-E is her middle name. So she marries him. Now he's 34 and she's around the same age, which is good. But she's from Norway also, hence the weird name. So she, and that's where he met, every once in a while he stops in Norway,

he feels the most at home there and he likes it there. She's a native, so it's pretty cool. Now in 1935, he meets her, she's got a younger sister, much younger sister named Eleanor. E-L-L-I-N-O-R, Eleanor. Yeah. She was only 11 at the time they met, and he was 35, so they met there.

We'll find, that'll come into play later, don't worry. Rolf, obviously old enough to be her dad, but he's going out with her older sister, who's less than 10 years younger than him. So he's on a ship called the Andrea-Luchenbach during World War II. March 10th, 1943. He is the master of the company flagship, Andrea-Luchenbach,

loaded with 14 tons of army cargo for the North African invasion. They're gonna go, he's gonna bring this over here so these people can go fight Rommel. Like no shit, like that's what we're talking about here. So this was, Andrea was near the tail end of 115 ship convoy that was crossing from Atlantic, or from New York to Liverpool,

and then was gonna go down He called it. Rolf said quote. We were at suicide corner, which is not the place you want to hang out really Yeah, either the front or the back. Those are bad places cuz that's I mean, it's right by murder alley You don't want to you want to avoid that place They're coming if they come from the back with like yeah gun gun planes. You're getting it first Well, I guess it's where they were to is where the Germans had a real line in the ocean to where they could come and get you Yeah, so he said we were carrying six thousand tons of ammunition We're a bomb ships with ammunition were put in the last section and the Germans knew that oh So that's what they went after the German subs picked off three ships at the end of the convoy.

The third one was the Andrea, the one he's on. So it took two torpedo hits near the stern. This is getting attacked by a U-boat. Wow. How many people have we talked about that survived a U-boat attack? Right. He's been torpedoed by the Germans twice. Yeah. 30 years apart.

That's fucking crazy. And he took it in the stern where the goddamn where everything's at. That's the motor. That's everything. So that's where most of the ammo was stowed, unfortunately. And that the hold for sure. He said the whole aft end went. The end blew right off. The plates on the side went through the air he said and landed on a British escort steamer nearby oh boy so this thing was gone in eight minutes it was sunk to the bottom of the ocean 21 crewmen died on the ship oh no 63 survived so about a quarter survived the captain ruined they're fucked. They're fucked, yeah. They're ruined men.

And they're gonna get right back on another ship. That's the crazy part. I wouldn't even take a bath after that. No, fucking done. I don't want any water. Showers only, I don't swim. This is. Do you swim?

Not if I can help it. Not unless you hit me with a German torpedo. I don't. I don't stay on this motherfucker. Not at all. He said, Rolf said, when I dove off the main deck, the rail was only four feet off the water. What the shit.

The fucking deck was four feet from the water, which on a big ship that they're, you know. It was 30 feet in the air. Yeah, it's 40 feet in the air. He had to swim through fuel oil several inches thick to reach a lifeboat. Oh, God. It's thick on top with oil,

so they had to wash them off with Dawn, like a fucking bird in a commercial. Like a sea bird. So he said he remembered seeing the bow of the ship disappearing into the sea and shimmering shortly after sunset. He said it took a lot of heart out of me. I'll bet, yeah.

He said a ship is like a human being. You can get awfully mad at her, especially when you're docking, but you have a lot of feeling for her. That's what the Mormons always say. You can get mad at her, especially when you're docking. And then, which you still have a lot of feeling for,

you know what I mean? So. That is, wow, that is a, you get mad at the ship when you're docking, but when she goes down, because she took a fucking torpedo, your heart's broken. It was sunk by U-221.

That was the U-boat that sunk it. They even know which one sunk it. Yep, that's fucking wild. Five minutes after, immediately after a lookout spotted the periscope, they spotted the U-boats, and five minutes later they were firing the torpedoes. Wow. Which is fucking wild.

The second torpedo hit just forward of the first, and the majority of the nine officers, 46 men, 28 armed guards here, had to abandon ship in the lifeboats. That was it. So others jumped overboard, swam to the boats like him. That's wild, man. The armed guard officer gave his life jacket to a seaman who didn't have one, but the officer couldn't swim and then died.

Why did you give up your life jacket, man? Before you give it up, go, can you swim? Yeah? Okay, I'm going to hang on to this then, because I can't. I'll just sink to the fucking bottom. I'd love to save you, man, but if I save you, I die. I'm totally gonna die. I hope you can chance it. So in just over an hour the British fleet oiler Orange Leaf rescued 17 armed guards, nine officers, 37 men and put them in Scotland. Anybody on the sea at that time is lucky to be alive.

Those, they didn't, they weren't discerning from anything. They were just sinking everything. They were sinking, and the Germans specifically knew, though, in these convoys, they kept the ammo shit in the back, and that's what they wanted to destroy, was the ammo, because that's shooting at them. That's how you win, yeah. That's how you win, so that makes sense here.

Yeah, I guess he was the captain of the, I'm sorry, one of the guys on the ship, the second mate I believe, he broke his leg and shit like that so a lot of them were injured in this little melee here but he was the captain and he was rescued. It was a 6565 ton steam Wow. That is fucking wild, man. Is there any shame in that, of like, jumping overboard when you're hit? It was torpedoed. Yeah, 21 men die though.

Yeah, they went down, he went, he stayed on the ship till it was in the water. That's what you have to do. You can't jump off early, you have to basically make sure you're the last guy on the ship. As soon as it's hit, be like, all right guys, I'll see you around. Shit, jump! And he fucking takes off and jumps into the water. Save her if you want, but I'm leaving.

Hope you guys can swim. As he takes off, got down four feet. So at that point, you don't have to commit suicide. You can jump in after that. This boat doesn't need a captain, it's over. It had, for you, longitude, latitude dorks here. It was 51 degrees, 20 north, 29, 29, I don't even know how to read these, nevermind. Okay. I tried to do it like I don't even know.

Are you longitude and latitude, but I'm definitely not. No idea how that even works. I know the latitude of the east to west because it's like a ladder, latitude, ladder. That's all I remember. That's from like fourth grade though. Long, yeah. It's long, that's from like fourth grade.

Longitude, right. That's what I remember. So 1945, he is one of the, Rolf's one of the first members of the Puget Sound Pilots Association. Oh, of like airplanes? No, no, no, pilots meaning ship captains. Oh, okay. They're called pilots too.

Like these Seattle Pilots baseball team in 1969, they were the pilots, they were ship captains. They had like on their hat, they had the braids and all that shit. So. Had nothing to do with Boeing. Nothing to do with, no, not at all. So as a pilot, he helped captains guide their ships through the narrow straits of the sound. So that's how it would work.

He was like a help guy. So now his marriage to Marg, to Marg-Ether or whatever her name, we'll call her Margo. Margo and Rolf never had any children. First of all, he wasn't around enough to knock her up. You know, he'd come in the port for three days and if she's not ovulating, it's not happening.

So he, yeah, because he decided that he wanted to be on the open sea. He didn't want to be an independent pilot doing boat to boat. He wanted to be out there. So it was a lot going on out there. There's submarines, there's still, there's shit happening in the ocean that's dangerous here,

but he didn't give a shit because he's been fucking on two sunken Torpedoed ship so if he survived that he's really pretty yeah He's he's got a lot of friends too. He sends out every year at Christmas. He sends out over 550 Christmas cards How do you know 500 it's amazing cuz he I guess he makes friends all over the world How do you know 550 people? It's amazing because I guess he makes friends all over the world. Different crews he's had.

I couldn't- You get their address. And keep that. And then just to pay for the postage of all of that. Oh, God. All the cards. It's so much. That's a lot.

He would do it all himself, too. He'd address them and all that and always send everybody birthday cards every year. Everybody liked him. Now 1956 comes around. Remember Eleanor, the little 11 year old girl? She's not a little 11 year old girl now, she's 32 now. Now she's hot. Yeah, she's now a single mother of two young girls. And she's ready to, looking for a husband,

but Rolf's married to a sister, of course, or her sister, so obviously, they're not gonna get together. But she thought he was like a heroic, of course, or her sister. So obviously, they're not gonna get together. But she thought he was like a heroic, cool guy, even though he's 30 years older than her, 25 years older. Yeah, she thought he was like, she's always had a crush on him since she was 11, apparently. So his wife Margot becomes very ill all the time,

chronically ill. So Rolf persuades Eleanor to move in with them in their home north of Seattle. Yeah. Okay. Margot needed someone to care for her and her own sister. Who better than her sister? Who better than her sister, who by the way is now a very pretty blonde woman. Right.

So Rolf doesn't like the fact that not only he's out at sea, but then he comes home and his wife's sick and there's no sexual action going on here. So Jesus Christ, Ralph thinks Eleanor's pretty hot. Tell you that much here. So they end up hooking up. Yeah. Yeah. We don't think that Margot was aware of this in the beginning.

Jerry, Jerry. Yeah. Well, it gets, don't hold the Jerrys. Because it's about to get like, yeah, Jerry, Jerry. And the chair is going to fly across the screen because not only did they not think she was aware of the affair, she became aware of it because Eleanor got pregnant.

Yep. Can't ignore that. Hold them back, Steve. She's not going out with guys. She's just hanging out around the house. Jesus Christ. There's one jizz source in this entire house. And it's this asshole.

So when Margot figures this out, that they're having an affair, and they're continuing it right under her fucking nose, and her sister's knocked up, she's like, well, this isn't great, not wonderful at all. So they decide they're gonna get a divorce, the Margo and Rolf here. That poor thing. Now, everyone's also gossiping,

because he lives in this house, it's the also gossiping because he lives in this house, it's the 50s, and he lives in this house with these two sisters, and one of them's knocked up, and nobody in town's been going out with her, so. Right. Yeah. She and Rolf were married in Finland that year, Eleanor and Rolf. Yeah.

In 1958. And then she gave birth to their son, and they named it Rolf Jr., of course. If you're a crime and sports listener, you know that's just par for the course here. Not good. Two years later, she's pregnant with a second son named Eric, so they get that. Now he's 60 years old and the father of two babies.

And she had two before, so there's now four in the house, yes? Now four, yeah, yeah, exactly. I think hers are grown now, is the thing. So's now four in the house, yes? Now four, yeah. Yeah. Exactly. I think hers are grown now is the thing. Okay. So they're out of the house or whatever. So Eleanor was temporarily living in Norway and Ralf was working as ships, pilots, from

all these different ports and everything. So the problem is Eleanor doesn't know this, but Ralf did. She and Ralf aren't legally married. Really? At the time of their Finnish wedding ceremony, they got married in Finland, Ralph's divorce from Margo wasn't final yet. Uh oh.

She didn't know that? She didn't know that. Apparently he did. Yeah. Then, so Ralph decides here, he's living in Vancouver, and he sends for Eleanor and the kids. Come on guys, come with me again. This is before Eric was born, so she was pregnant, so it's one kid and little Eric.

So Rolf bought plane tickets to bring Eleanor pregnant as shit and the little boy to Vancouver, and everybody's very happy here. Now they wanted to go to America, but they first went to Canada because it's easier to get into America that way. Sure, sure. That's what they're doing. So Eleanor was pretty surprised when Ralph admitted that

we're not really married by the way. Yeah. Just to let you know, so you know that. But he said, now I'm divorced though, so now we can get married legally because of divorce with the... So, no worries. Let's do it again.

We'll fix this. He said, I even got a Canadian marriage license for us. So we'll be totally fucking cool, absolutely fine. Everything's going to be great. Problem is, while Eleanor was in Norway and he was here, he met somebody else in Seattle. Somebody else named Nettie Ruth Myers. Ruth is what she goes by. She's born in 1920, so she's about four years older than Eleanor, but younger than him by

a long shot, obviously. By a lot. She's from Beardstown, Illinois. Yeah. We've been talking about Finland and Norway and all these exotic things and then we're like Beardstown, Illinois. It's an hour outside of Springfield. Didn't even know it existed until just now. Either did I. Beardstown. I'm surprised they don't have the biggest beard festival or some

shinery. I'm sure they do. They do. So her parents are the Reverend Asa Myers and Maude Myers. Her name is Ruth Myers. So never easy for her. Ruth came from a rough background. She came from a family of 10 children, which is always hard back then if you're not hugely wealthy.

Some of them were born in Ohio, some in Illinois. Her siblings, Mamie Mary, Robert Walter, Asa, Paula, Carl, Enoch, Paul, and then finally her. She's the youngest of the 10 children as well. Remember, by the way, Paul very much and Robert. You want to remember those two. Okay. Now, uh, some of them remained in Ohio and, and you know, places like that, Illinois, but some of them moved all over the country from LA to Biloxi, Mississippi, all over the place. There's 10 of them. Um, one of the kids died in childhood too. I don't know which one. Oh, Enoch,

Enoch by long for this world. He had the worst name. So they just fucking let him go. We can't afford to feed all 10 kids. Which one do we let go? And they're like, that poor Enoch has never got, he's not nothing going for him. Run over by a plow or some shit. Nothing's gonna happen there. He died at one year old.

Oh God. Another brother disappeared. Oh, he died you mean? Just disappeared. Oh, he died. You mean just disappeared. And then some Carl Meyers also just took off during World War One. OK. Ruth said he just left home and never came back. He just went missing. OK, they sent his truck back and all of his trunk back and all of his possessions.

That was 1919. We don't know whether he's dead. I think he's dead. He's dead, yeah. He's missing during the war, dead. And you have all of his shit? Yeah. He'd probably want some of it back if he was alive. Might need it.

She said that, by the way, in like 1981. We've had his trunk for 30 years. 60. It's been 62 years we've been waiting, so we think he might be dead by. I think he's dead! If not, he's 80, so he's probably pushing it anyway. Jesus Christ. Ruth and Paul were the youngest of the children.

She's the youngest girl, he's the youngest boy, and that made them very close because they're in age. They hung out together a lot here. Ruth ended up moving to Louisiana to move in with a man named Morris Daniels. When she was in her, she was about 15, she moved to Louisiana with him. She had her first child a year later,

Morris Daniels Jr., of course. And then she had another kid as well, another boy. She raised the boys at some point in here before she met him, because that was like 1935. So by the time she met him, they were out of the house and gone. So she ends up going to Seattle. And they don't know, by the way,

what she did with her kids. They don't know if she raised them or not. If she just gave them to the father, nobody knows. Fascinating. But Ruth ends gave them to the father, nobody knows. Fascinating. But Ruth ends up meeting Rolf here, and the problem is, we'll talk about how they met, but when they met, there's a lot of rumors swirling around Ruth.

Oh. Apparently, her mother died in the last couple years before they met, and a lot of the people in the family think Ruth is responsible for her mother's death. Not good. Her mother lived in Illinois and was very elderly but Ruth had managed to write a life insurance policy on her through the Seattle company that she worked for. Because she worked there she managed to get around a couple of things and get some life insurance on her.

So not too long after she became very ill the mother and Ruth learned that her mother had been hospitalized in her home state so Ruth went to the hospital and Ruth managed to convince the doctors that she could take better care of her mother at home. Problem is she didn't and her mother died very quickly once she was released into her care. Some of her sisters said that she deliberately and her mother died very quickly once she was released into her care. Some of her sisters said that she deliberately fed their mother the very foods that the doctors had put on her forbidden list. Really? And it ended up killing her, and the woman died shortly after.

So she may have murdered her with french fries, so it didn't poison her or anything. Some shellfish? Yeah, something like that. They said Ruth was the beneficiary of our mother's insurance. She collected her money, and when anyone said anything to her about it, about how she gave into mom's cravings for sugar and all, Ruth just said, well, she was going to die anyway.

Oh. She was an old sick lady. Gave a diabetic whole bunch of sugar. Just give her whatever she wants. It's like we used to do with my grandmother when she was like 93. Yeah. She'd start drinking like whiskey at night.

We're like, let her do it. Who cares? She's 93. At some point you gotta live, man. She's dying, like before our eyes. Let her drink what she wants. Let her live while she's dying, geez. Yeah, so we didn't try to kill her.

We just want her to be happy as she went out, so. It was the biggest scandal in pop music. The stars of Milli Vanilli, the Grammy-winning, multi-platinum R&B phenomenon, were exposed as frauds. But none of this was their idea. So whose idea was it? Enter German music producer Frank Farian. He saw the success of acts like Michael Jackson and Prince, and he wanted in, no matter the cost. So he devised the perfect pop heist. Two once-in-a-lifetime talents who were charismatic,

full of sex appeal, and phenomenal dancers. The only problem? They couldn't sing. But Frank knew just how to fix that. Wondery's new podcast, Blame It on the Fame, dives into one of pop music's greatest controversies and takes a never-before-heard look at the exploitation of two young Black artists.

Milli Vanilli set the world on fire, but when the truth came out, Rob and Fab were the only ones who got burned. Looking back now, it's hard not to wonder, why did everyone blame them and not the man pulling the strings? Follow Blame It On The Fame, Millie Vanilli on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can binge all episodes of Blame It On The Fame early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus.

Nancy's love story could have been ripped right out of the pages of one of her own novels. She was a romance mystery writer who happens to be married to a chef. But this story didn't end with a happily ever after. When I stepped into the kitchen, I could see that Chef Brophy was on the ground and I heard somebody say, call 911. As writers, we'd written our share of murder mysteries. So when suspicion turned to Dan's wife, Nancy, we weren't that surprised. The first person they look at would be the spouse. We understand that's usually the way they do it.

But we began to wonder, had Nancy gotten so wrapped up in her own novels... There are murders in all of the her own novels that she was playing them out in real life? You can listen to Happily Never After, Dan and Nancy early and ad free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple podcasts. Her mother's insurance wasn't a huge amount of money, but Ruth is good at investing money as well. She does better financially than most of her siblings to begin with.

She's very good at investing in things. She paid $5,000 for a little house in Everett, Washington. A new house was cheap back then. You get a new house for 10 grand in Washington, they said. And Everett was out there for a ways from Seattle. Now it's, fuck, now it's part of it, Jesus. Yeah, now it's suburbs. So after she met Rolf, she sold this bungalow for a profit.

She also owned a vacant lot as well, and all that sort of thing. So there's good investments here, because Washington real estate will spike huge in the next 15 years. So yeah, everybody calls her Ruth, like I said. She's got a very strong personality, everybody said. I'm gonna give you some quotes from Anne Rule here.

You don't know who Anne Rule is. She's written like a thousand true crime books. Her claim to fame is she's the lady who sat next to Ted Bundy at the suicide prevention hotline and got her start writing about Ted Bundy because she knew him. She had a QB next to him. Yep, that's how it works there. They ate Taco Bell together a couple of times for lunch. So she said that quote, Ruth had a very strong personality and a native cunning that made her

much more talented in getting what she wanted than Eleanor was. And what Ruth wanted was Rolf. Oh. Yes. Then she goes on to say, Ruth could probably have made a fortune teaching a course on how to enchant a man. Nettie Ruth Myers was not a great beauty, but she had a pleasantly curving figure and she was a lot of fun. She had a full face with a sharp chin and a somewhat bulbous nose and her tightly permed hair and

she wore glasses with lenses so wide that her eyes sometimes looked like an owlish cast. She's not sounding that hot the way she describes it. No, she's describing the mom from The Help. Yeah, she's describing the fucking Where's the Beef lady from the Wendy's fucking commercials from the 80s. I don't know what she's... Bulbous nose and sharp chin, not great. She said not a great beauty, but she said even though she was no Lana Turner, Ruth had something more important than sheer physical beauty.

She knew how to interest a man. Okay, so their meeting was in the late 1950s. Ruth worked for the insurance company, like we said. She planned to have lunch with a man whose offices were in the tower she worked in, but her lunch date got canceled. So she went in the elevator just as Rolf was in the elevator. She had to do something else. So she said she was instantly attracted to him.

She said he had a full head of gray hair, nice strong jaw line, and carried himself like a much younger man as well. Hell yeah. Yeah, Rolf's a worldly son of a bitch. You know what I mean? Yeah, he's sailed the ocean. Yeah. Ralph's a worldly son of a bitch. You know what I mean? Yeah. He's sailed the ocean.

Yeah. He's been all over the world. He's seen it all. Right. So Ruth makes sure that she knew his name and she gave him his name and how to get in touch with her. I work up here, give me a call and all that kind of shit. So then she asked him out to lunch.

Right. Which back then women didn't ask men out very often. So he was like, whoa, this broad's fucking. Look at this. Look at her, oh boy. This forward ass, yeah. She's swinging. He's like, sorry, I've been listening

to a lot of Sinatra lately, it's the 50s, you know, sorry. Very enchanting. Enchanting. Somebody said later, she saw Rolf and she decided she wanted to have him. So, okay, now Eleanor suspects from the beginning that something's going on. Really? Okay. Ruth is always around. He just brings the woman he's having an affair with around. When Rolf introduced Ruth to Eleanor, he explained that she was a close business associate

of his. Is she fucking Gilligan now? Is she a sailor? What the fuck, you're a ship captain. What business associate is this broad? What are you talking about? First mate is not good when you're married. No, probably not. So Eleanor wondered what kind of business that could be because Ralph only gives a shit about ships and he doesn't really, he's not interested in business.

So it's not like he's got five side businesses and she's doing something. And she's feeling unattractive she's like seven months pregnant when this is going on Eleanor and She's suspicious. She learns that Rolf said he hired Ruth to be a kind of housekeeper That would help Eleanor around the house until after their baby was born. This is his MO He loves getting getting another one in the house until after their baby was born. This is his MO. He loves getting another one in the house.

Yeah. That way you just move the other one out and this one's there now. It's fucking... The start has begun. Wow. And Eleanor's... she's seen this movie before. You know what I mean? She's starred in one like this.

Hey, this sounds familiar. What the fuck? Hey, I've done this. Yeah, she didn't want Ruth around She said she didn't need her but sure enough Ralph moved her in and Ruth moved into the Vancouver house and Fucking made herself at home. How's that? Wow, so Eleanor was worried obviously She said that this is how you know this this came around she was telling her friends This is how I met the guy and got hooked up with him. So what the fuck?

How could I make sure he's not gonna do this to me now? So it's a little weird here. Ruth, by the way, also, they don't even get along, Eleanor and Ruth, even on a personal level. No, Ruth wasn't friendly. And Eleanor told friends that she seemed to be, have more power over Rolf than even Eleanor did,

who was his wife. At least she thinks that they're married. Rolf then, it's weird. Also Ruth didn't do any housekeeping. Like, shoot, that was the whole point of her moving in, but she didn't do anything. And she didn't like take care of Eleanor. She wasn't like, oh no, you have bed rest,

I'll bring your soup to you. None of that shit either. So it's very, very strange thing here. So Ruth became even more entrenched after Eleanor gives birth to Eric. She's supposed to leave them, but she doesn't. They said that she gave her opinion on their own private matters at times. Eleanor told somebody, quote, once Ruth suggested that I return to Norway and have the children adopted out.

What? Go get rid of your kids? Why don't you abandon your children and just go back to Norway? What the fuck? You don't need any of this, do you? She said it was a very miserable situation for me, Eleanor said. She said, obviously I wouldn't think of giving up my children and why would Rolf want me to adopt out

his sons, that's crazy. This is fucking weird, but Ruth kept doing it, kept talking shit and Rolf never asked her to move out. So in 1961, Rolf obtained another Canadian wedding license and told Eleanor that he is gonna marry her, finally. Two kids into this. It seemed that Eleanor's like, okay, so maybe everything's okay.

Maybe he's not fucking Ruth. Maybe it's all a figment of my imagination. You know what I mean? So then, Rolf ends up confessing to her, they're making a plan when they're gonna get married. Oh, maybe the 12th. Okay, that sounds good. And then finally he said,

before you hire a caterer, there's something you should know. What's that dear? Well? I've been married to Ruth for a few months now Too late I Used my wedding license to marry Ruth instead Okay, so what the fuck? That is crazy So Eleanor said I was so suspicious of their relationship all along,

when I found out they were married, I knew I didn't wanna marry him again. Now it's, I don't wanna do it. That was when? That's when. When he decided to marry someone else, I decided I didn't want him anymore. So Ralph assured Eleanor, he said,

I had no choice but to marry Ruth. I don't love her. This isn't like, I had no choice but to marry Ruth. I don't love her. This isn't like I love you obviously, but she threatened to expose me as what I don't know and told him that Eleanor would too. I don't know even know what that means. He wanted to stay in America, but Ruth lied and said that Eleanor was threatening to turn him over to immigration authorities for fraud because now they're in Seattle. So she said I had to marry her so she didn't turn us in. What is happening? So he marries her April 24th 1961.

His why is his life in such turmoil? How is somebody able to just ruin your whole day like this? Aye. The man likes waves and changes in season. That's why he likes he he likes Monday's sunny, next day it's stormy and choppy, he likes that. You know what I mean? What's gonna happen at this port? Welcoming women with tiny bikinis

or people trying to murder us, who knows? We'll find out. Jesus. So, Rolf and Ruth move back to Washington State and they're married together and she didn't want him to have anything to do with Eleanor or his two kids. Really? Fuck that.

Yeah, she kept tabs on him to be sure he wasn't giving Eleanor any money even though he abandoned her with his two kids. Right. I mean, those are my children. There's child support. He was secretly giving them money because Ruth wouldn't let him. Yeah. She discovered from time to time that he was helping her out and she'd get super pissed.

Once she found a greeting card that he planned to send to Eleanor and it had $500 in it and she fucking lost her mind. What year is this? 74? The 60s. The 64. We're talking 65, 66. Jesus Christ. So, yeah, they're doing well financially, We're talking 65, 66. Jesus Christ. So yeah, they're doing well financially, Ruth and Rolf, though, apparently. He's making good money at sea,

and then she does very well investing it and doing things like that. So apparently, yeah, all he got from his family, his mother, down from the shipping business, his mother left her estate to him and three siblings and he got about nine thousand dollars from it okay so there was that so Ralph wanted Ruth to keep doing the books and look around for properties to buy she also called herself a horse trader so she dealt with horses actual horses horses, not just like, you know, not a euphemism.

So they end up moving, they look at a property on Lopez Island and they're like, yeah, this is the shit right here. They move into Lopez Island. It's gorgeous. Ruth eventually lets Rolf see his kids, by the way. Wasn't, you know, easy, but got it. Yeah, people were shocked because here would come the two kids to Lopez Island during the summer. I guess they were allowed to come in the summer. Public records show that she had been forced to deal with this because

Eleanor filed a paternity suit in Vancouver claiming Rolfe was her son's father and that he should be supporting them. So Rololf was ordered by the court to support the kids and did that, so yeah. Then in 1970, they became beneficiaries of his social security dependence benefits. Right. So yeah, it's wild. So they, she hated,

because she kept track of the money and hated to see money, when Rolf was giving Eleanor money. Yeah, hated it Ralph and Ruth also like to fight Oh with each other. Okay, they fucking rumble. They like to drink and drink and drink Yeah, the cocktail hour starts about noon. Oh boy and continues until somebody is bleeding and sleeping That is the thing about southern Illinois and Indiana people they drink like they drink a lot. Yeah Yeah, and he's a literally a European sailor he drinks quite a bit and she holds her own with them Yeah, so they would have huge arguments big huge blowout fights when people over and all things like that.

They'd be sniping at each other, talking shit back and forth. And then eventually it would come to physical fucking altercations. They would hit each other, scratch. They even bit each other. Sometimes they're nuts. The cops would have to come out. Yeah. Once Ruth claimed to the sheriff's deputies that Rolff forced her head into the stove's oven Put her head in the oven. I will fucking cook you Okay, I don't know They don't know they said turning out turning on the gas wouldn't work

And she was I guess at this point too heavy to push her completely in the oven So we don't know what his plan was I don't know if this was a symbolic gesture or what slam her head in there Just a symbolic gesture. I would like you to be cooked in an oven can't physically do it, but this is what I'm looking for Man Ruth told the sheriff that she had been She had been seen to a roasting chicken in the oven when Rolf leaned on her shoulders and pushed her arms against the hot grill she held her arms up and hot grill. She held her arms up and showed him the burn marks and the cop said he wasn't sure if she was really burned or if the oven racks were dirty and left grease marks on her

lower arms because it didn't that's what it kind of looked like. They said very drunk they were just they would drink so much that they couldn't even remember the details of their fights to tell the cops the next day. They would wake up in the morning surprised by themselves. They said, Rolf, a lot of times in the morning would have dried blood on his face, scratches, a black eye, bite marks, chunks of hair have been pulled out of his head and all sorts of shit like that. Yeah.

It's a fun morning. That's great stuff. Sometimes then that was what Ruth was attacking him. Then sometimes he was attacking her. Ruth would run away from Rolf and lock herself in the little bunkhouse behind their home while Rolf quote, slept it off, she said. Good Lord.

It is fucking wild. One couple that lived on Lopez Island said, they went out to dinner one night, or they went to the Nezland house for dinner, and Ruth was a great dinner party person. She had decorations and centerpiece and the whole deal, good food. And the people said everything was wonderful.

The food was lovely, the place settings were great. And then everybody started drinking after dinner. And they said, Ruth and Rolf, one of them took offense to something the other said and Soon they were fucking battling each other arguing flying Plates are flying across the room literally breaking and the guests were like I think they're looking at their watches I think it's about yeah I was gonna have dessert at home anyway, and they just kind tiptoed out. Rolf and Ruth were so into fighting,

they didn't even notice everybody leave. That's fuckin' wild. They were. Men are so dumb, how do we do this? Soon. They're bleeding with like broken fuckin' plates everywhere and they're like, where'd everybody go? She's wrong, right, Jeff? Jeff, where'd you go?

Jeff, shit. You know what? I'm going to call Jeff up and make sure. So the wife of the one couple said, Ruth called me the next day and apologized. She said, I could tell she felt so bad. She apologized over and over for the way her dinner had ended. I could tell she was terribly disappointed and humiliated, too She asked us to give her another chance swearing it would never happen again come over again. No

If I see domestic violence, I'm not coming to your house anymore. Yeah, I got a really nice rib roast But I have a crown roast recipe you're gonna die over seriously. It's so good come over never again You're gonna die over seriously. It's so good. I'm over never again so 1978 Ruth claims to everybody that she was trying to get Rolf to retire He's still captaining ships What he's a yeah, he's 80. He's talent captain in ships still If I got on a plane and the fucking pilot was 80, I'd turn right back around and get off because he could just drop dead in midair and then we're fucked.

He may have a really terrible diagnosis that none of us know about. That's the other thing. And he's ready to take this whole fucker down. I want my pilot to look like he can at least outlive the flight time, you know what I mean? I need the pilot to look like he can at least outlive the flight time. You know what I mean? I need the pilot to look like he has something to live for. Please. Yeah. I want him to be showing pictures of his kids as he get on.

I got to be at little Frankie's little league game on Saturday. Wouldn't miss it for the world. I need those kids to have events and milestones coming up. Let's be safe here. So Ruth said she was worried about his competence toward the end of his career. She said, Rolf's hearing and memory were deteriorating and so was his attention span.

I was worried and I begged and begged him to retire. She said she even wrote him a song. I called it, Please Come Home to Lopez, she said. My own Downeaster Alexa. I wish I had the lyrics to this song, but I don't. I have lyrics to ones for later, which are great. Lopez, she said. But it didn't work. My own Downeaster Alexa. Yeah. I wish I had the lyrics to this song, but I don't. I have lyrics to ones for later, which are great. Ralph thought that if he retired, he would kick the bucket, is what Ruth said, quote

unquote. For Ralph to retire, for him it would have been weak. It's weakness. Oh. Then the world intervenes for him. Yeah. June 11th, 1978. He is on the freighter Antonio Chavez,

which he's captaining, and they ram into the West Spokane Street Bridge and fucking collapse it. Oh no. He collapses a car bridge. They don't have a bridge for the next six years. This is my nightmare. This is, he took this shit down.

All that Baltimore shit, you see? He did this. He did it before that. Just picture that with like afros and big pubic hair and then you got what's going on here, 1978. See a firebird running off into the water. This with like fucking, how do you like it, how do you like it,

playing in the background. That's what this is right now. Donna Summer and this. So, the current West Seattle bridge opened in 1984 and it's still standing. To replace this? That is what replaced the West Spokane Street Bridge. Holy shit.

The incident occurred in the west fork of the Duwamish Waterway as the Chavez hit the West Spokane Street Bridge, which had been raised to allow the ship to pass through. He missed it, he missed. Sounds like he had a couple of cocktails before he went out there. Whoop, a little too far to the left.

I'm gonna straighten it out. He's singing to the bridges, god damn it. Oh man, so, holy shit. That's fucking funny. No one was hurt in the collision, but it resulted in the bridge being stuck open. Oh no. He fucked it all up so they had to replace it. He was carrying 20,000 tons of gypsum. Gypsum is what did this. Gypsum is what did this. Yeah, that is fucking amazing. I have to say They said that he's the boat pilot This is from the newspaper

Rolf Nesland is the boat pilot who guided the freighter Chavez on its ill-fated course in the dawn hours of June 11th 1978 That's fucking funny. The Coast Guard investigation of the incident found evidence of negligence on Rolf's part, leading to him having to retire. Damn it. Yep. He then took a motor home tour of the United States with Ruth, and then he said he's settling down in Lopez Island, it's all over.

Tired of fighting with you in this Winnebago. See, imagine the fucking grumble. People are like, man, that bad winnie's shaking, boy, those people are having some fun in there. They're just strangling each other up against a counter. So April 1, 1979, he's in retirement. And the newspaper does a big fluff piece on his retirement. Really?

Which is weird, because he just fucked the whole bridge up. You won't have a bridge for six years. And they're like, isn't he great? He's retiring in shame you guys. Yeah, buddy is I mean he was Torpedoed by a U-boat so you know that's some hero shit so here we go They say quote it was this it was in this inauspicious manner that ralph launched a seagoing career that lasted an unusually long 69 years Fuck now 81 launched a seagoing career that lasted an unusually long 69 years. Fuck! Now 81 but more spry than most men 20 years his junior, Captain Ralph Nezlin recently retired from piloting ships.

Ralph has left the sea but the sea is still at his doorstep. The affable mild-mannered master, mild-mannered, and his wife are fucking... Until he's around Ruth. and his wife Ruth reside in pleasant quarters they constructed here on Lopez Island in the San Juans from the front room Rolf can view oil tankers entering and leaving Rosario straight pilots aboard those tankers sometimes sound the ship's whistle in tribute to Lopez Island's old man of the sea is right? They know he can see them so they fucking... They're whistling to him.

He's got respect. Rolf and Ruth befittingly have named their 10-acre Alec Bay compound Shangri-La. The pastoral setting contains cows, sheep, and a horse called Lopez Slew. How about it? This is the, they have it all. This is a 10 acre, where their view is the fucking ocean, this is crazy. Where passing tankers honk to them.

Yeah, that's so amazing, man. Like a trucker down the freeway, when you throw that shoulder at them, they just doing it just because. He doesn't even have to crank on the horn at them, they're just doing it. Standing on the shore't even have to crank on the horn at them. They're just doing it. Yeah, standing on the shore, they're like, oh, let's beep to Rolfe here.

So he said it's 69 years on the water, and they said, you know, what do you have to say about that? And he said, it was better than barbering. Really? Okay, yeah. That's what he said, better than being a barber. So in a barber, you wouldn't be retired there, I'll tell you that much. So winter of 1979 here, he's talking to Eleanor,

because he still talks about the kids and stuff, and Eleanor is telling, he tells Eleanor that he's fearful. And she knew that Ruth was weird. She said that from her personal experience, Ruth did some real disturbing shit. She said, quote, sometime in the winter of 1979 she called our phone and asked to speak to my son Eric. I told her that he wasn't home and she told me to give him a message. Okay, she said quote, she said tell him his father's dead and then

hung up. He wasn't dead. What the fuck? She might have just been drunk and being a jerk. I don't know. So in the fall of 1979, one night, she locked herself in the bunkhouse and called her niece Donna Smith and told her that if Rolf came back there, she would shoot him because she's so mad at him. When the deputy sheriff Gregory Das responds to a call there in June of 1980, the table cloth and dishes were on the dining room floor. Which means the table is set there eating, somebody got up and said, ah, just pulled

the tablecloth off with everything. What kind of fight is that? It was not a drunken watch this magic trick. It was just, fuck your dinner. Fuck your dinner. Rolf was disheveled and had a bright red scratch along the side of his face and Ruth was also disheveled with a puppy face. She was in the bedroom and said she said she was safe there and if Rolf came in she'd just shoot him. So at one point Ruth's face was black and blue in

July of 1980 and Ralph said that he had quote, decked her one. I guess so. I bet it was more than one. Then he told, this is fucking, then Ruth told the cop that yeah, don't worry, he'll never do it again and she pointed to the rifle in the corner. Oh boy. Said he does it again, I'm gonna shoot him.

So, June 1980, Brooks Bouillon Jr., that's a great name. That's a kid? Brooks Bouillon Jr. Someone named their child Brooks. He's an adult now, but at some point he was a kid. Brooks Bouillon Jr. is the guy who worked on their pool. Okay, he's the pool boy. He's their pool guy.

But he also goes out to dinner with them. Okay, so close. Close with the pool guy. So they said they went out to dinner with them. Okay, that's close. Close with the pool guy. So they said they went out to dinner one night and Rolf and Ruth had exhibited signs of a physical argument. Rolf had a scratch on his face, dried blood all over him, and Ruth had a bruise under her eye. Later on that night, he saw Rolf again and said he had new cuts and bruises, including

a deep ear cut and a cut on his lip after that. Fresh blood. Fresh blood. So this is a lot. They have just stormy marriage, lots of heavy drinking, all sorts of shit like that. There's a woman named Kay Sheffler. She lived in Seattle and she was an old friend of Rolf's,

platonic actually. All time, Ralph. Ann Rule describes her as quote, a large rumpled looking woman. Very nice. Okay. Kay, this woman Kay said that Ralph came to Seattle on July 29th, 1980 and told her he needed some cash. He hadn't asked Ruth for any that day and so he had gone to one

of their banks to cash a $75 check and they wouldn't cash it for him. No? The bank told him he had insufficient funds. So he's like, that's ridiculous. So he stopped in to Kay and just said, will you loan me $30 so I can get back home and see what the hell's going on here? And then Rolf asked her about the mortgage he and Ruth held on the house that she had bought from them. Kay said, he asked me when I'd be paying it off and I told him, Rolf, I paid off that loan in 1975, five years ago, I paid Ruth.

She said he was shocked, he didn't know. Rolf had told her that Ruth said the loan hadn't been paid off, like they talked about it specifically and she lied. He said he had no idea how much money he had because Ruth was in charge of that. She was the one who collected his retirement pension and any other money due them. She did all the banking. He said he gave Ruth power of attorney to do all that. Oh no.

So looks like in the middle of 1979, Ruth just transferred most of their funds, which were held as joint assets, into accounts with just her name on it. Bank records show that the Rolfe's $78,049.50 retirement funds were used to purchase a joint $50,000 money market certificate on May 1st, 1979, the balance into a savings account. The money market certificate and savings account were in the names of both Rolf and Ruth, but on June 25th, 1979,

she redeemed the $50,000 money market certificate early and had a new $50,000 money market certificate issued in her name only. So she cashed that out, bought another one just for her. In the same day, on the same day, the entire $50,157.95 balance in the joint savings account was withdrawn and the amount deposited in a savings account under her name only. Yeah. Yes. Testimony later will be that she had power of attorney and complete control over

his $1,800 monthly pension checks as well, which wasn't bad money in 1980. Yeah, but it's not great that he only has $80,000 and two grand a month. That's not bad if you're 80. It's frightening. In 19, no, not in 1980. That's... Yeah, I guess you're right. In 1980, that's like having 250 in the bank and getting like five grand a month when you're 80. That's... Yeah, I guess you're right, in 80 it's not so bad. In 1980, that's like having 250 in the bank

and getting like five grand a month when you're 80. That's okay, you'll be fine. This is fine, yeah. That's a little, that smaller number, that 80 and two grand scares the shit out of me. Yeah, now, because in 2024, that would be a lot different scenario, yeah. Yeah, so what if something goes wrong?

In 1979, a little bit different. I mean, a house in 1979 was like 30 grand 35 grand or some shit for like a you know regular house, so Ruth Basically took all this money and locked him out of the accounts He's got nothing. He's got nothing and so my god this he told this woman this woman ended up Asking him trying to get a hold of him to get her $30 back and couldn't get ahold of him. So she's like, now I guess this guy's ducking me for $30, this is crazy. Like, so some time goes by.

How much? A couple of months. And then in September, on September 10th to be specific, Ruth starts telling everyone Rolf left, he's gone. Took off, never returned. Yep, she called September 10th to be specific, Ruth starts telling everyone Rolf left. He's gone. Took off, never returned. Yep. She called September 10th and said he took off August 14th. She called his friend Harold and said he left on August 14th, never came back. Harold said she told me that there was no need for us to come visit.

Harold's his brother from Norway and he he was gonna come over for his birthday, for Rolf's birthday. He said, don't bother, she said Rolf's not here. She said he drew $25,000 from the bank and was going to Europe. So we canceled our plans, he said. So I guess his true birthday is November 3rd, by the way. He lied about that too.

So his sister phoned to wish him happy birthday and he wasn't there and neither was Ruth. And a stranger answered the phone for his sister and said, Ralph wasn't there and Ruth had gone to visit her relatives. We'll find out who the stranger is. It's her brother Robert, Ruth's brother Robert. Eugenie didn't know, oh this one's different. This is the house sitter Winnie. Winnie K. Stafford, one of Ruth's friends. We'll talk about her.

Very devoted friend as we find out. She and her daughter agreed to watch the house while Ruth went back east. So Winnie and her daughter moved into the house and they said that they were telling everybody Ruth and Rolf went to Massachusetts and were staying for two weeks. She said she didn't see them leave, but that's it. And whenever she talked to Ruth, Ruth kept saying, you know, us and we are going here and we, we, we. So Winnie said

she received many phone calls while she was staying at Ruth's and advised the callers that they were going to Massachusetts and that's that. So now December 1980 to February 81, Ruth's brother Paul moves in. The youngest boy. Moves in. Moves into the house. Yeah. Okay.

Robert also lived there for a while. Yeah. Robert's an older brother as they all are cause she's the youngest but older than Paul. He was visiting during the summer of 1980 and she said that Rolf had asked Robert to look after her as after Rolf left, as Rolf was going to leave. Robert had been very ill in 1980 with failing kidneys and prostate trouble.

His pisses must be horrifying to take. Just a mess. But he had slowly regained his strength after having surgery And he wanted to spend some months with Ruth Ruth and Rolf in a relaxing environment and heal and get better and they were fucking island yeah, Ralph He said that Rolf was happy about it, too And then when Rolf left he said well you you know make sure Ruth's okay, basically so January 18 1981 Gunnar Olsberg, okay, he's a retired pilot friend of Ralph's. He contacts the sheriff's department. Oh?

He hasn't heard from Ralph in four months, and this is not like him, and he never got a Christmas card from Ralph, and Ralph sends out Christmas cards every fucking year. How about that? Those fucking Christmas cards made red flags go up. Why do you think I told you about them? Yeah, poor bastard.

Otherwise it wouldn't have mattered in this story. I would have left it out. So yeah, he also placed advertisements in the local newspapers offering $25,000 reward for information on his whereabouts. That's a lot of money in 1980. He's literally employing other people to stalk this man for it. He's in Europe, this guy.

Yeah, he's not even a missing person. Nope, so in February, 81, Rolf's friends call the police and ask to please check up on his welfare. We haven't heard from him in months. He's an old man, he stays in contact regularly, and he's fucking gone. We wasn't around for his birthday,

never got a Christmas card. So they go to Ruth to see what's up. So they show up and it's a beautiful view. The cops are like, wow, this place is fucking amazing. When they showed up, it was sprawling house set close to the water. She invited them in. They said she was matronly looking, you know, short dyed hair, tightly curled perm, you know, old lady style.

In the 70s. Yeah. So all of that, they said she also had bright red lipstick on and all that. They said she didn't appear nervous. She was pleasant, neatly decorated house. The two deputies said they just wanted to check on her husband, see how he's doing. She said, oh, he's not missing. She said, he's not missing she said he's not missing he's gone oh difference big difference she said he took off he's not fucking missing I know where he is he's not here yeah I don't

know where he is but it's not missing so she told them she knew perfectly well where she was where he was but there's so you don't have to be concerned so they were like okay that's a little weird. They ended up, the advisor of her Miranda writes here, they read her her rights just to do the questioning because they get a little weird feeling. And they said, so you're willing to talk to us? She said, of course I am, yeah, what are you talking about?

She said, yeah, he left my home on Monday, August 11th, 1980, a little bit more than six months ago. And she said, oh wait, no, you know what, it might have been the Thursday after that, the 14th, she said. She said, I can't really remember which. Can't remember the last day you saw your husband. He said, I recall he took his clothes and he wanted some of the furniture,

but he never came back to get it. She said, and also, this is how I also know he's gone. I came across his favorite car, which is his Lincoln Continental. It was in the employee's parking lot of the ferry dock over the by the ferry run there. So, you know, she said, but that I saw that like two weeks after he walked out on me. So I mean, that was months here. She had arranged to have the car towed back to their residence. So now it's that's why it's in the driveway. She said, I found it down there though.

She said, you know, and they were like, so you just, he just took off and you're kinda, you don't know real details. And she was like, yeah, you know, it happens. Like it was the, somebody said, I'm gonna go out for a pack of smokes and never came back. You know what I mean? It's one of those.

He's a man of the sea. He's flighty, he'll be back. Yeah, that's what it is. Sometimes flights of fancy. He's probably hopped a man of the sea. He's flighty. He'll be back. Yeah, that's what it is. Sometimes flights of fancy. He's probably hopped a steamer somewhere. You never know. How do you think he got here?

Yeah. Ruth told them that she was pretty sure she knew why he took off. She said, I always suspected he was sneaking around with this woman named Eleanor behind my back. You know, the woman I stole him from. Who she thinks is his ex-wife. Yes, and it's been 20 years. She said that, you know, she never,

she believed that Rolf was currently with Eleanor and the two of them were off in Europe together. That's what she thought. She said, Rolf's gone to Norway with Eleanor. I did my best. I followed him all the way to Norway. I took flight 726 on Scandinavian airways and went looking for him and they said well when was that she said I think it was October 10th I spent two days in Norway looking for him, but I didn't find them

She said she hadn't contacted any of his friend or family members in Norway because she didn't think they'd know where he was Because she he's off with this Strumpet, obviously. Getting all this trim out there. So he said, the cop looks back at her and he said, oh yeah, that's fine, we can check on that and you'll be on the list of passengers, so no problem. He said as he glanced up, he saw that Ruth's face was just.

A ghost one. What? Yeah. She said she was really startled, her face just dropped in her mouth hung open She hadn't expected anyone to follow up on what she told us she figured we just go away and be satisfied with her version of where the Yeah checks out and they said a man in his 50s even his 60s

Might be expected to leave a wife in a comfortable home in some sort of crisis to go be with some other woman, but 80? Man in his 80s? That's pushing it maybe. You know, who's got this beautiful setup too, it's everything he's always wanted and it seems a little bit odd. That's weird. He's getting horn honks from the tankers. He's not leaving.

Life is fucking fine for him, man. So Ruth, I guess, was asking, she was more, they're doing kind of good cop and kind of cop that's not bad, but just asking her more pointed questions. So she starts just turning all of her attention toward good cop here, just in there. Warren is accusing here. She didn't like the other guy. Ray Clever is his name. And we'll find out too. He's from San Diego, by the way. Put that in your bank because she's gonna make a big deal out of that later. They said that when they left,

the cops looked at each other and said, I don't know whether she killed him or not, but she definitely did something to him and she's lying to us. There's something going on here. So they went back the next day just to see if maybe they could get her to tell the same story two days in a row. Make that woman sweat. Yup. So they read her her rights again. She said she'll talk. She they said that they were deliberately giving the impression that they believed her that

Ralph might have might have left on his own accord, but that he might have subsequently had an accident or even died of a stroke or a heart attack and we got to find out what happened to him, which is a clever thing. So speaking of clever, Detective Clever asked Ruth if she had a current photograph of her husband and she said she looked toward pointed toward several photos on the end of the table, mostly family pictures showing them together and all that kind of thing. They said it looked as though Ruth might have been feeling sentimental because there was a projector

set up when they came over, a projector to show slides. And there was slides of them on vacations and shit in there, like she was looking at slides of them doing things. They said she picked two pictures of Rolf and handed them to Ray Clever, and she said, this looks like him now, what he looks like now. Because there was ones all over the years

of different stages of whatever. So I'm sure he had like sideburns and like, you know, from like 1971, here he is with big sideburns and like bell bottoms, and here he is looking like this. So they said that she rambled and rambled and all these suspicions of where he might be. She had a lot of ideas about where she could be. And at one point, clever detective clever interrupted her and said, Can you give me

any information about where your husband is that would help us identify him, even if he should not be alive now. And he said she stared at him as if it had never occurred to her that Ralph might be dead. And she said after that, well, he has some tattoos, old tattoos on his right forearm. He has a heart with an arrow through it. Does it get more old school sailor than that? He has seen some shit. That's the oldest like, oh man, like that in an anchor. You know what I mean?

And it says Muriel above it. That was some girlfriend he had a long time ago. She's dead now. Muriel. Muriel. That Muriel's some piece of ass. Let me tell you something. He's got Muriel on his arm.

She said on his left forearm, he's got something that looks like a Coast Guard insignia or maybe it's an American flag. It's a military thing of some sort. And on the middle finger of his right hand there's an arrow tattooed around that finger. She remembered a lot of details. They said that when they would ask her if there was any dental x-rays available, she took her head. She shook her head and said, his teeth are false, both uppers and

lowers. Dr. Sam Anderson made them. His office is on Northwest 85th in Seattle. He also had prescription glasses from this doctor, all that kind of shit. So according to Ruth, it's also quite possible that Ralph had two broken fingers. She said, I think Eleanor broke them once in her lawyer's office in Canada. He never got them treated as far as I know. So that might be something to look at too, if they had broken fingers. She then started talking about Eleanor again and going into details about all the legal problems she had endured because of Eleanor and her attorneys. They're looking for a missing person.

They don't care about your relationship gossip bitching about Yeah, they said that you know, she kept bringing it up even when they would change the subject So Ray clever detective said have you had any letters or calls from Eleanor or her attorneys recently? And she said no, of course not. That's ridiculous because I have nothing to do with her they said anything else about Rolf that makes him stand out and she said that he was bowlegged She said too many years of riding decks on the ocean He also had a split diaphragm an injury that he sustained when he was a young man lifting a heavy log I don't know. She also listed all of his clothing sizes

Jacket size inseam 35 waist 29 inseam, jacket size, inseam, 35 waist, 29 inseam, 41 jacket size, 15 and a half neck, 9 and a half shoe. 35, 29, poor bastard, that's a tiny short pant. That's a short pant and a wide waist and a 6 and 7 8s hat, which is small, a small hat. She suggested that they check Eleanor's house again to see if maybe his clothes were there. She recalled that Ralph had a particular set of cufflinks that he always wore with his French cuff shirts. She said they were Viking ships. He had other cufflinks too, but I never saw him without the Viking ship ones. They asked if they might look at his jewelry box and see if he had left anything behind,

but she just steamrolled right over it and kept talking, didn't ignore him. After he'd asked several more times, she finally agreed to show them the box. When the detective glanced in, he saw the Viking ship cufflinks right there. There they are. There they are, yep. And also, there was a very expensive men's watch with a broken wristband as well. That's not a good sign. Also there was a very expensive men's watch with a broken wristband as well. Yeah.

That's not a good sign. They found out the cuff links she'd insisted he never went without were there. They said she became very nervous and her hand shook and she started to talk about all the histories of the cuff links and the watch and she wanted to show that she and Rolfe had been very close and she'd been a huge part of his life and blah blah blah. They said, could you tell us a little more about the day your husband left? What did he say to you? And she said, well, he said, I'm not coming back.

Or he might've said, I'll be back for the first of the year, if ever. One of those, you know, I'm leaving and I ain't coming back. They said- At least six, eight months away. They said the more she talked, the more suspicious she sounded. She was very odd. She said she was well aware that a man who lived on Lopez Island was spreading rumors that Rolfe was dead. I've heard people have been spreading bad rumors. She said, I made him apologize to me once for gossiping about someone I was supposed

to be married to before Rolf. So yeah, but Ruth hadn't confronted the man for saying Rolf was dead. But for talking shit. Yeah. They said, well, you know, anything else she said, quote, Rolf drinks like a European, you know. Yeah, that's a lot. She said that means beer in the morning almost every day, sherry in the afternoon and several

high balls before dinner and then wine and other booze after dinner. Oh boy. He's just drinking the whole day. Between that, the salt air, the sun and the wind. Imagine what this man's skin is like. It's leather. And the salt meat. Leather, leather, leather. She explained that all the drinking only made his diabetes worse

though. So in addition to making his diabetes worse, she said, quote, and it made his blood toxic too. Oh, so we went septic? The fuck does that mean? How does drinking make your blood toxic? I've never heard of that before. If it makes your, if it hurts your internals, like your, you know what I mean? If it hurts your, I don't guess. I guess that toxic blood would be a side effect

of a way worse disease. Yeah, that's what I mean. She said, that's why I tried to make excuses for him when he started hitting on me. He never remembered later about even fighting with me. Diabetes took over. So then after these cops leave, these two cops leave, you know, she answers all their questions. She gets mad and calls up the undersheriff, who she knows to complain about these cops

coming to the house to bother her. Yeah. Can you tell the cops to stay out? They said she phoned our under sheriff Rod Tiverty TV RDY Tiverty, I guess yeah She admitted to him that she might have you know said some of the things she told us were Were more fluffy than they actually were but that she said she said that because she didn't like that quote California detectives questions old San Diego man. So she's made some things up, she said, because she just didn't want to talk to him.

Yeah. He's lived here for 20 years, this guy, by the way. He's not like, he didn't come in like, what's up, brah, with a surfboard under his arm. She just admitted to the undersheriff that she just lied to cops. Yes, because they were over here, and they shouldn't have been over here.

She then said, now, talking to you, I remember more about the arguments that we've had you know just prior to when he before he left. I didn't tell those cops about it because I didn't like him and she said they had been about Eleanor. They said he definitely wanted to give money to her $15,000. He was putting pressure on me to let me let me give let him give that woman $15,000 of our money. It was my money too. So she didn't want to do it. By the way, the pilots and their wives have had a bunch of parties since August and the last one was in January of this year, which of course, Rolf didn't

attend but Ruth showed up by herself. They said she had quite a bit to drink. And one couple recalled she made an odd remark. She said quote, Ralph won't be coming home again. Ralph's in heaven. Uh oh. Uh oh. Ralph, she's just in heaven. This is okay. So they asked her about it now and she shook her head.

The cop asked her, didn't you say this at a party? And she said, no, no, that's not what I said. I said Ralph would be in seventh heaven if only he could be here. This party's heaven, you know? He said, what do you think Ralph is using for money? And she said he told me when he left that he'd be taken care of by the Elkinsons, which is Eleanor's family. Later though, Ruth seemed to have an answer for everything. But she did admit that she lied to Detective Clever about them going to Norway in October. She said she had left the island two months

after Rolf walked out, but she hadn't flown to Norway. Instead, she just went to Louisiana to visit her son and relatives who live there. Because they checked up and they're like, we cannot find any record of you going to Norway. No, not the airline, not immigration, not customs, nothing. Yeah customs doesn't have a record of you. Then she said that she'd been so mortified knowing Rolf was with Eleanor that she hadn't told her good friends

and relatives the real story because she was embarrassed. She told one friend that she was going to Norway and another that she was going to Louisiana. She said you see I read a letter I read a letter that was addressed to Rolf and sent it to the Pilots Association. It was from Eleanor. Rolf always told me that he didn't want a divorce from me, but Eleanor sued us for $75,000 to support her two sons. She was going to cause trouble for Rolf by telling

that he lied about his age back in 1917 So he could get first-pate mate papers. I don't think they care about that in 1980 We are 60 years removed from this ma'am two world wars later. We're good. I feel like the statute of limitations has Vastly expired. Yeah, I don't think anyone go. Let's take away everything.'s done then. He's been doing that a job for 69 years. She said, before Rolf left me, he told my brother Robert that Robert had to stay here with me. He told my brother, she's going to need you,

and I realized that Rolf was going to be gone a long, long time. So they're searching for Rolf. They don't know what happened to him. So they searched for him, they checked with relatives in Norway, they checked with Norwegian what happened to him. So they searched for him. They checked with relatives in Norway. They check with Norwegian police, the US embassy in Norway, Interpol, immigration, customs, everything you can imagine to see if he went to there.

They checked with the FBI. They checked with the departments of motor vehicles in all 50 states to see if he applied for a driver's license somewhere. They contacted friends and relatives in America. Nothing, no one's seen him, no one's heard shit from him, nothing. What the fuck? The person we really need to talk to is Eleanor.

Yeah, yeah. And they do. They found Eleanor very easily, the cops. Ralph one with her. No? She's in Norway, chilling. Has she seen him? No.

She had traveled to Norway, but she did it with her new husband. She's got a new husband she traveled there with. That's seen him? No. She had traveled to Norway but she did it with her new husband. She's got a new husband she traveled there with. That's why she's there. She said they learned that she said they you know she and Ralph have been friends throughout the years. He's been nice to her and when they talk to her they're like this isn't the woman that seems because Ruth is like she's been trying to lure him away from me for years. They're like, that's not what this seems like. She seems happy with her new husband. What's going on here? So then they start having, Eleanor says that he was an unhappy man who

wanted to come back to Norway, but was afraid that Ruth would track him down. That's what Eleanor said. Eleanor said that they, if I come and I leave there they meaning her and her brother Ruth and her brother would find me and He also said he was afraid of being poisoned and said if I die make sure there's an autopsy Performed on me because I think she's gonna poison me So yeah, she said he was an unhappy man He wanted to start over in Norway. And she said that at one point he said, I want you and the boys to have everything I have left,

money-wise. Ruth has something to say though. She then comes out to the cops and goes, you know, thinking about it, I think he killed himself. I think he's suicide, he's dead somewhere. She said, now that I think about it, after the bridge thing and all that, he was very sad. She said, now that I think about it after the bridge thing and all that he was very sad. She said his mind was kind of going he was hallucinating some and drinking a lot. Hallucinating any is bad. She said ever

since the ship hit the bridge he brooded a lot he would sit for three or four hours at a time only getting up to fix himself a highball. Really? Yup. So then newspapers, because she talks to newspapers, so then they start putting out articles saying that he was very depressed before he left and all this type of shit. Brought on by the bridge collision, which everyone said, oh, that makes sense. But the cops aren't that, they don't believe that shit. No, they don't believe the shame, did it?

They don't buy it based on everyone else they talked to they said he loved his life And he just couldn't stand Ruth basically so They start looking into Ruth and they start looking into credit card purchases phone calls tax filings bank deposits withdrawals Medical care all this type of shit, and they said that Rolf had a bank account in Norway where he kept a few thousand dollars That was the money that his mother left him. He's had that there for years and years and years. He hadn't withdrawn any of the money from there, nor had he tried to access any of the bank accounts

he shared with Ruth. Not after August 8th, 1980 is like the last, that's the last record of him doing anything with money. Really? After, and all the checks were written and signed by Ruth. Then Ruth had a lot of paper trails. She continued her life after he disappeared. On August 14th, which is the day she said he left,

Ruth put an ad in the Friday Harbor Journal paying $9.10 to offer shit up for sale. It was a classified ad. Commercial meat grinder, $550. Antique sewing machine $50. Potbelly stove $100. Office furniture sofa and chair $125. Record a call $350. It's like an answering machine I think. Steel desk $100 and a 1968 nine-passenger station station wagon $500 a 1964 Ford Fairlane 500 sick

450 bucks and A 65 I guess it's got to be 65 and a half because that's her there were 64 and a half So 65 Mustang fastback pony seats two thousand dollars And that's by the way his Mustang was his prized thing. So the day he left, she put his car up for sale is what she's saying. So April 13th, 1981, they show up at the house to do a little look around. They go, we just want to make sure. And this is a limited search.

They can only poke around the outside and look for some shit. They can't go do anything. they can't dig anything up. They located several green plastic garbage bins behind the house. They were filled with burned and partially burned debris. When it was spread out on a screen and examined, they found a single spent 22 caliber cartridge and bagged it for evidence. The burned and partially burned material in the cans wasn't unusual.

It was insulation, beer cans, blackened metal, glass jars, some carpet. Nearby, they saw a blue metal burn barrel containing some still burning coals. So they said without, there's no garbage pickup on the island, so they all burn their garbage, everybody. They said that this one was new though, the burn barrel, which is weird because everybody has old ones. They've been doing it forever. Its paint had barely been singed. It was far too new to hold the remains of somebody who disappeared eight

months before. So they're like, it's not in here, but where's her other burn barrel that she had before this? Right. They said this is very fucking weird. Weird. So they spread out over the yard, looked into the pasture land behind, and they're looking all around. They're looking for signs of disturbance on the ground or somebody would have been buried. No suspicious dips, humps, patches of grass that are growing extra, none of that shit. So they moved into the residence and searched it, but the search warrant listed specific evidence they were allowed to look for.

Bullet holes in the wall and or blood stains. That's it. That's it. Couldn't pull up carpets, they couldn't do any of that shit. So they tested a number of stains to see if they were blood and they weren't. At one point, one of the cops sat with Ruth in her living room.

He noted a book on her coffee table, a Reader's Digest condensed edition of quote, to catch a killer, how to get away with murder. Reader's Digest? He said, I looked down at it and looked back at her. We both looked at the thing at the same time and made eye contact with each other and we're like, oh boy. We both smiled. They spent two days searching, but in the end

there was nothing at all that they could construct as physical evidence, just a single bullet. And that didn't mean shit because people out here shoot. She has 10 acres and they said she shoots all the time. She's known to be very skilled with guns. And a lot of times people in this area have guns to fire off when dogs are harassing their sheep. It scares the dogs away. So, yes, they said, we have a suspect, we have a motive, we don't

have a body, and we think there was one here once, is what the cop told his other cop buddy here. So she was pissed though. She told everyone they came here and searched and they didn't find anything. This is ridiculous. So, yeah, April 21st, 1981, this is right after the search, she goes to the newspaper to talk about how sad she is he's gone. Oh! She's trying to get public sentiment on her side. This is April 21st, 1981. This is from the article, quote, a stack of magazines is sprawled on Ruth Neslin's coffee table. The covers are smudged with inky fingerprints.

The corners turned up and tattered. National Geographic, Time, Newsweek, McCalls. Ruth Neslin does a lot of reading these days. But on one corner of the table stands a shorter stack, arranged in perfect formation and unread. Ruth Neslin doesn't touch the copies of Marine Digest. She's saving them for her husband, Rolf. Oh, she's keeping them?

Yeah. You've missed these. Yeah, Rolf Neslin hasn't been home in eight months, but Ruth Neslin believes he will return soon to read his magazines, play with his grandchildren, spend his afternoons pouring over the memorabilia he collected in his 69 years as a merchant sailor. He seemed to be adjusting to retirement, Ruth Neslin said,

until last August 13th when he disappeared. The San Juan County Sheriff's Department's searching for any clues to Rolf's whereabouts, but so far Sheriff Ray Sheffer said that we've reached a dead end. Not at all. That's just what they told the press. Meanwhile, Ruth Neslin tries to keep busy. Reading, talking on the phone, searching for clues. I miss him a lot, she said. He was the captain and I was his crew. Ruth, wow.

Ruth Neslin doesn't want to think about her husband's disappearance. She says the possibility that the adverse publicity surrounding the bridge crash and Rolf Neslin's involvement in it may have compelled him to suicide didn't occur to her until recently. Before reading the articles, Ruth Neslin said she believed her husband had left Lopez Island to travel to his native Norway with another woman with whom he'd previously been involved. Scheffer said that he checked with American and Norwegian immigration officials and they have no record of him either leaving the US or arriving in Norway.

The woman Ruth Nesland suspected of traveling with Ruth is living in Seattle and claims to know nothing of Ruth Nesland's whereabouts since he left home. She says her husband showed no evidence of wanting to die, but in the last few weeks she has remembered something else. Quote, he told me that if he ever had a bad accident he'd seek the briny deep. He'd just walk into the ocean and let it take him. The briny deep. The briny deep. She said those words to a man writing words down. She didn't have a Davy Jones locker reference? Come on. Nope, she was going back and forth.

Briny deep, JV, you know what, let's go with briny deep. It sounds more, you know, it's more, more fucking formal. Timely, yeah. I never really thought about that remark until recently. And still, she believes he's alive. She said, I have to believe that. I'm that kind of person. Yeah

Right after that by the way Roots niece Joy stroke writes a letter to the sheriff's department up here. Oh She said she wants to by the way Joy is one of her sister Mamie's daughters Joy wrote she wanted to talk with someone in authority about her aunt Ruth. She said Ruth had evidently called her many times between November 79 and July 80.

Most of the time she'd been drinking and said crazy things like, I'm watching Rolf out the window. I could shoot him from right here. Sometimes she spoke of quote wasting Rolf or quote burning him. Joy's sister Donna lived in the Seattle area. She was the girl who had been like a daughter to Ruth when she was younger.

But Donna remembered the time that Ruth locked herself in the bunkhouse to keep Rolf away. Ruth called her saying, if he comes back here, I'm going to shoot him. That was in the fall of 79 and Ruth had threatened violence toward her husband in numerous phone calls since. They said there were so many phone calls that she was drunk and saying this shit that Joy had just dismissed it as drunken ravings, rantings. So in conversations though between these she kept talking about wasting him and burning him. Then in July 1980 in the presence of her niece Donna Smith, she said that I won't have to put up with him much more or I'm going to do away with

him and then said I won't have the problem of Ralph much longer. July 80. So these two here, Joy and Donna here, those are sisters, they're like, whoa, this is fucking crazy. They say they both received phone calls from Aunt Nettie Ruth on August 8th, 1980. Joy told the detective, Ray Clever, that she was at work estimating that it was about noon in Ohio, about 3 p.m. in Washington, when her aunt called her. They had a brief conversation, about three minutes. She said it was crazy. She said, quote, they said this was the secret that had this been going on.

She said this was the information that she was waiting for. According to Joy, Aunt Ruth contacted her there and told her that she shot Rolf and burned his body. Yes. That day? Yeah, she was like, that's, no, probably not. That probably didn't happen. She said, I was very busy at work and just told her I'd call her later.

She said, she's probably just drunk. She said, I didn't want to believe what she's saying. I thought she'd been drinking again. Two days went by and Ruth called again. And she was like, oh yeah, I think she was just drunk. She thought that Ruth was spouting nonsense and all of that, but then on August 10th, she told her the same thing.

Killed him, burned him. She said, then as time passed, Joy, even though she didn't want to believe it, she said, well, why didn't Rolf take his clothes with him when he left? Because Ruth offered to send his clothes for me and my husband, because they were about the same size.

Oh my god. So she's like, why would you do that? Later Joy mentioned to Ruth that her daughter was having trouble with a boyfriend who was too persistent and Joy talked of a plan to get the guy to leave her alone. Ruth said, I know a better way to get rid of him. I'm good at this. Jesus fucking Christ, man. I'm in a Dixie Chicks

song. I know what I'm doing. So that's fucking insane. Then here she goes into detail too. She says Robert held Rolfe while she shot him, then helped her drag the bloody body to the bathroom. There they chopped him up with a broad axe and a butcher knife, burned his remains in a trash barrel after they ground down some of them in the meat grinder. Meat grinded him. Meat grinded him and then sold the fucking meat grinder to people who make meat. Yes, sold it to somebody else with raw fall over it. Yup, then Paul, the other brother, he told authorities that on several occasions Ruth

told him that she shot her husband. She also reportedly told him that her husband fell over a couch when he was shot, spraying blood and brain matter in the living room. His body was cut up in the bathroom. Pretty similar story. Ruth told Joy that, she and Ralph had a fight and that Ruth's brother Robert held him and that Ruth shot him and killed him. So they also find out that this was a fight over the finances because that's

what she said. She talked about the $50,000. Then Robert Myers, who was the other brother, told Paul Myers that when Rolf Neslin told Ruth to come up with the money or else, that Ruth gave him or else. That's what she said. Wow. So that is fucking interesting. So now they head to Illinois to talk to her brother Robert.

According to him, that's exactly what happened. Ruth shut, now Robert is sick as fuck on dialysis. Oh. Not doing well. So they. He's willing to just fucking spill it. He doesn't care. Yeah.

Yeah, he doesn't give a shit, he's dying. So they said, yep, we had a broad axe and a hacksaw and a butcher knife and we cut it up, burned him in the backyard, put some in a meat grinder and then Robert said he pulverized the remaining bones. Then what was left of him from the meat grinder and the pulverized bones was mixed with manure and used as fertilizer for her flower garden. She turned her husband into a fucking flower garden.

She raised daisies. She made him push daisies for real. Push the little daisies and make them come up as we once said. Wow. After all of this, Ruth commented, quote, first time the old bastard ever smelled sweet. Oh, what a bitch. She is rough. And that's her brother who said that, not somebody else.

So they visited Robert and they said he is, he's also half senile half the time and he's all sick and there's no way they're gonna bring him back to Seattle and put him in jail. He's in a convalescent home so they just leave him there. The niece's info and his info leads to a new search warrant that is very invasive, rip the fucking house apart and find what you need. Underneath some new carpet, they found a trail

indicating the presence of blood on the concrete floor of the residence. And a spot of high velocity blood mist was found on the ceiling of the house as well, spatter. The blood spot on the ceiling was a type, they said that it only happens caused by gunshot wounds. It's a very fine, it doesn't happen from anything else. So they test the blood, it's a type A blood,

but now they have to find what fucking blood type Rolfe was. They also find a gun. They find a lot of guns we'll talk about, but one particular gun had blood on it, on the gun, indicating that it had been used to shoot either a human or an animal from a range of three feet or less. Close feet, yeah. Turns out it's type a human blood. What's Ralph?

That's, let's do that shit. So to find that out because they had no way of figuring out what Ralph's blood type was, they didn't have anything on file. He never donated blood, nothing like that. They used the same technology They used for ancient Egyptian mummies They have this new thing basically that where they can figure this out So this new technology they use to type the blood of mummies they use For Ralph and they found out Ralph Ralph is type a that's not good same thing. Yeah

January 1982 this is still going on, Paul is pissed at Ruth because Ruth is scamming her own brother. He wrote a letter to her saying, Dear Sis, I've called you several times and have finally come to the conclusion you have made a mistake. Love and affection that I have for you and the blind addiction to your needs, I believe believe have given you the impression that I am to be treated like a dumb sucker I'm not going to call you anymore or write you anymore You get the money together that is mine and get it to me or send me the Something if they can't read it and I'll come get the car if you don't I'm going to Seattle and I'll show you who's a sucker

Your bro Paul. Your bro. Your bro. So apparently he showed up in February 82 to claim the vehicle that Ruth had promised to him, but when she got there, he got there, she told him, car's gone, sorry. I already sold it. Yup, he was convinced that Ruth and her neighbor Winnie, the friend Winnie K Stafford, had colluded to hide it from him.

It's in Winnie's house somewhere. Despite the fact that she was 15 years younger than Ruth, they were really close, her and Winnie. So at this point, she decides she's going to turn her house into a bed and breakfast, a high-end bed and breakfast. Yeah, you know, with blood stains all over it. She's a good cook. She specialized in baked goods and homemade sausage.

She's entertaining. She knows how to put on a good cook, she's specialized in baked goods and homemade sausage, she's entertaining, she knows how to put on a good dinner party, there'd be virtually no start-up costs and she could get $150 to $200 a night for each room. So Paul heard about this and said, well you owe me a share of this shit because you stole my money. He didn't have a house or a job or money in the bank and she burned him on the car deal and so he know she he said he was going to convince her that she needed a man around the place to help with

chores and for protection so he'd go into partnership with her. Okay now the second search warrant after Paul gets pissed off at all this when she tells him no he tells the cops everything the invasive one a little bit more that they find we'll go to the whole deal here. What they find here, by the way, Winnie K Stafford is there and Ruth is there. 1102 AM, the two women sat there, they said just upset. They left two and a half hours into it.

They just took off. Ruth came back the next day to pick up her blood pressure cuff and a hot water bottle, complaining to everyone with an earshot that it was terrible that an ill woman should be treated so badly forced out of her home, our own home, while cops pawed through her belongings. She told Detective Clever, quote, there's about 50 people who would like to come in here and squeeze your head. 50?

50. Yeah. A few minutes later she called the house again and demanded that they turn off her outside lights even though she's the one who left them on. It's my light bill. Yeah. Her attorneys called the search preposterous. They said neither they nor their client had seen any affidavit listing what the searchers

were looking for. They said we think there's no basis for it. We have no problem with them taking a look at what's there, because maybe that will shut them up once and for all. They're going to just look around, then they're going to go along on their merry way. Ruth said she was taking the search very hard. Quote, it not only creates a physical hardship by her being displaced from her home, but serious emotional trauma as well.

So the carpet, when they found under the carpet, it's because a patch of the carpet looked newer than the rest of it, although the pattern was exactly the same. She had a chunk cut out, huh? Yep, they found out she went to Willett's Carpet on August 16th, 1980, and bought eight square yards of carpeting and seam tape. That was eight days after the eighth

when they think he disappeared. She seam taped it. Yep. Then on March 23rd, 1981, after they first talked to her in late February, she went back to the same store to purchase new carpeting and tape again. This carpeting, which they said matched the present rug in the master bedroom. They said if it wasn't, it wasn't, if she had, she didn't like completely redo her home, it's just certain sections had been patched or replaced so that the rooms would look casual, looked like they were, you know, normally in fine and all that kind of thing. Ruth said in a tone, quote, that she wanted to keep our home just the way it was so he'll

see it when he comes back to me. The two investigators said let's let's look at that carpet. They found deep red stains. They also said Ruth's bedroom was a small armory. Loaded handguns and rifles up against the wall, under the bed, in the closets, in the drawers. She's like fucking Rambo. This is fucking crazy. The search warrant listed any weapons she might possess. According to those who knew her, she was quite familiar with guns. They'd seen her shoot deer from her front door. They've seen her shoot at cats to scare them away from quail on her property. She could shoot rifles, shotguns, handguns, everything. The Smith & Wesson 38 caliber revolver, it was at the bottom of a dresser

drawer, that's the one that they found blood spatter on as well. They said, one neighbor said Ruth was one hell of a shot. They also found a Colt Python in a pouch along with six rounds, a Winchester 22 Magnum rifle with a scope which had 11 live rounds in the chamber, also a Marlin with a scope and eight live rounds, an Ithaca 20 gauge shotgun, a.30-06 shotgun, and at least 2 dozen boxes of bullets ranging from.22s to the shotgun. Shit. So, wow. Numerous knives of every size and a chopper, as well as hatchets, hacksaws, machetes, and

axes. This is inside the house, not outside the house. They said, but this was of course the home of people who lived in the country and you do your own chores and you know this could seem normal, but the fact that her husband's missing is a little weird. This many knives and this many guns, she is petrified. How many bad people does she know? It's weird. They found a homemade voodoo doll with a nail driven through its chest. Oh If that was odd They searched her bedroom and they said there was little to find they said it reminded me of my own

Grandfather's bedroom the cop said very spare with few items in it beyond a bed and a dresser It was like a simple hotel room They took the jewelry box with the Viking cufflinks and his Medic Alert Rit badge tag, which he didn't take with him either. You didn't even take that? Nope, during, it's fucking insane. This is a 10 day search, by the way, that they do. So they said that it'd become habit

to keep their eyes focused on what might be in plain sight that they may have missed. So one cop's laying on the carpet, looking up at the ceiling. As he looks back, he said he's stretching out because his back hurt. He said he saw the faintest mist of something dark brown against the ceiling tiles. So the faint dots weren't all over the ceiling. In fact, it looked like most of the ceiling had been resurfaced with a textured paint

product, but one section had been missed. It was stained with what looked like blood spatter, fine spray, high velocity spatter. He said it was right over where Rolf's easy boy chair was. He was always, he always sat right there. I can remember Ruth sitting on her bed and telling me about how Rolf had hit her even though she never had a mark on her and Rolf sitting in that chair with scratches and cuts all over his face because that's a cop that had been out there before. The two deputies grabbed a saw and cut that section out to be tested.

Then they looked down. They saw the concrete floor slab in the shadow area behind the couch. They said it was porous enough that it too had absorbed some liquid. They discovered that another concrete slab leading to the master bedroom was also stained. They were both marked with some fluid deposited there. They tested positive for a chemical designed to clean concrete called Crete-New. Oh. Yes. But it didn't work 100% of the way because they said they still found shit. They said we tented off the area to keep concrete dust from

floating around the living room, trying to keep the rooms as clean as we could. But it was like a dust storm in there because they had to cut out a chunk of floor. So they took turns with a jack hammer until they were able to lift and remove a number of concrete slabs for testing. Despite the Crete knew the lab would be able to tell blood. They said, that's the first time I ever had to use a jackhammer in a crime scene. And we couldn't use a wet saw to cut through the concrete because it might have diluted any blood in there. There was so much concrete dust we vacuumed several times, but Ruth Naslin was still furious afterward because of the dust. Wow. They said that they put luminol down and shit popped like crazy. They said it popped on the frame of the sliding glass doors of the tub in the master bathroom. They

found similar stains on the walls of both the master bedroom and bathroom, even a faint patch of droplets between the master bedroom and a bathroom on the other end of the hallway. A large stain resembling the imprint of a hand appeared on a carpet pad in the living room along that path. The handles of a wheelbarrow also reacted to the luminol. Further testing, all stains proved to be type A human blood. In certain areas like the slabs, there was so much blood that the person who had bled there would have had to have suffered a major, probably fatal wound. Pools of blood. So much blood the person's probably dead. Yes now they said A positive A is very common type

it's the most common type and Ruth also had A blood and no one knew what type of blood Ralph had at the time we'll find out later it's fucking A but they said these stains spatters and mists they found proved to be human blood and they said, okay This is this is this is pretty fucking crazy here. Yeah So they found out it was type a they couldn't be more specific as DNA isn't around obviously they said they're collecting all this evidence and Then at the end when they were all done. The last thing they bagged was readers digest to catch a killer He's the cop said this time we took it. It seemed pertinent. Yeah, it's a pretty good book.

It's fucking insane. So this is, this is wild. They also found out that in 81 people had refinished the ceilings. They found the people who had refinished it and the ceiling was apparently resurfaced after the blood was deposited and the blood was found only in the non resurfaced area. She didn't realize it. Also they found out that she replaced the living room couch and they said a trunk which was behind the couch had type A human blood and bloody gray head hair on the lid. He has gray hair by the way. So not good let's just say here. Master bathroom. So basically exactly what Robert said,

shot him in the living room, dragged him to the bathroom, cut him up, brought him outside. Exactly what the evidence shows. So the.38 caliber revolver, they said also, has type A blood on it. Right, and shot with something powerful enough to blow head hair off and a mist into the fucking ceiling. High velocity, which is a 38 would be there.

So Ruth is arrested, obviously. Yeah. The town freaks out because rumors start flying about, you know, she cut him up and then put him in a meat grinder. So they found Jean Plummer, a Lopez butcher who lived on Port Stanley Road, turned over the items that she bought from Ruth a meat grinder a grinding auger and four grinding and cutting attachments

The plumbers this that never used the meat grinder Because of the rumors they felt after they got it. They heard the rumors are like we really get through it. So When they ran tests on it, they found no stains of any kind of anything. This thing had been cleaned Very well, like no not even like a little piece of turkey nothing like it was boiled on it they found no stains of any kind of anything. This thing had been cleaned very well. Like no, not even like a little piece of turkey, nothing. It was boiled. Yes, exactly. So they said, okay, that's something, but the meat grinder rumors get really big here. Then a guy named John Saul, who's a Lopez Island thriller author, he started writing

limericks about this shit. A thriller author he started writing limericks about this shit. The thriller author? Yeah, he writes like crime books. He wrote he said quote one night at the Alec Bay Innie a Drunk shot Ralph Neslin the nini While dear brother bub chopped him up in the tub Ruth served a drink to friend Winnie Next door there was once a lady named Ruth whose problems was telling the truth. She shot up her hubby, cut him up in the tubby, and now needs a pardon from Booth. There was a Lopezian named Ruth who tippled a little vermouth. She shot her man

dead and cut off his head. The judge said that Ruth was uncouth. Not bad. Some said the old lady was kinder than one who would use a meat grinder. Some said she stole money but Ruth said that's funny. Yes, guilty is how they will find her. So he's clever, that's fine. Yeah, it's not bad. They're not going to arrest Robert. They find out he is probably, one of the cops said he's probably in his last days

He's on a kidney dialysis machine in bed 24-7. Yeah, he's gonna die next week He's more worried about bed sores than convictions at this point. So will they be able to convict her or is it once again? No, buddy. No crime. They've got nobody is Marley singing it deep for us Nobody no crime. They got nobody is Marley singing it deep for us No body and no crime one more again. Yeah more again. They said if no one can find the body This is by the way the Spokane County prosecutor Donald Brockett said if no one could find the body chances are you can get away with a murder That's not good. He said that in the newspaper, right? Don't print that if you get rid of it, we can't get you.

Don't write that part down. I was just telling you that. He said, how many thousands of missing persons are there and how many of those are the result of murders where someone really sat down and plotted it out and with just a little bit of luck got away with it? Shitloads is the answer. They said you'd have to dispose of the body in a way no one can find it because if you can do that, who's to say that there's a murder?

He said if you can do that, who's to say there's a murder? That's real reassuring, bro. Thanks. Here's how you kill someone and get away with it from the county attorney. I am locking myself in a bedroom forever. He's like, I'm really tired of prosecuting shit. I'm going to tell you guys how to get away with this. So she has

been arrested. Like I said, they let her out on bail. And so for three years she runs a bed and breakfast out of her house that she killed her husband in, allegedly at this point without going to trial. His body still isn't located. This, by the way, if convicted, she will be the first person in the state of Washington to be convicted on a murder without a body. It's fascinating. First, no body, no crime. Jury selection was interrupted for more than a week when she was hospitalized for a severe

nosebleed. By the way, that's her excuses about the blood in the house is it's from me, I had a bad nosebleed. I get my blood, my nosebleeds are so bad, it's a mist. Plus you think it's a corpse has been dismembered here, that's how bad they are. Yeah, tip your head back and it just sprays everywhere. They have a jury of 12 men and three women

and they'll pick numbers to see who's gonna be the 12 from there out of that. It took two and a half weeks to fucking get this jury. It was the longest jury selection process in the judge's 35 years as a lawyer and judge, he said. So there we go. The judge said they must prove him dead by criminal means in order to prove their case against Ruth.

That's what the jury's told in the beginning. So that's what we have to figure out. So the Superior Court judge here, Robert Bibb, Bobby Bibb, told the prosecutors that they are allowed to interweave their circumstantial evidence with statements made by others about the crime. They said when the state's case ends in about two weeks, the judge will decide whether prosecutors

have in fact shown that he's dead, and if not, he'll dismiss it. They said, we don't even know he's dead. Okay. So the prosecutor in his opening said Ruth Neslin siphoned $100,000 from joint accounts into her own name then shot and killed her elderly ship pilot husband Ralph when he tried to regain his fortune. That's what he said.

This is a case about a woman who couldn't get along with her husband after he retired. This is a case about a woman who intentionally killed her husband when he confronted her about the missing funds and disposed of her husband's body in the hopes the crime would not be discovered. The defense attorney, Fred Whedon, reserved his opening statements till later. He said, I'll do it at the conclusion. I'll just do closings. I don't need this shit. till later. He said, I'll do it at the conclusion. I'll just do closings. I don't need this shit. That's fucking funny. Also, the judge ruled that Robert Myers earlier testimony before an inquiry court is admissible here because he's too sick to make it here. They're going to just put his testimony into the record and the jurors are going to be able to read it in that. In that testimony, he denied that anyone killed Rolf. That's when they talked to him before he went back to Illinois and was sick and admitted it all.

So the defense is like, we're going to use this and say this is the truth. But Paul testifies and he testifies he overheard his brother and Ruth describe the slaying while he was present in the house. Like she said, he said, I was sitting there, there were five feet away just talking about it. Like, remember when we cut his arm off? Remember, we didn't know what to do with his head? Like, shit like that. Uh-oh.

November 21st of 85, after several trial delays and interruptions caused by Ruth's ongoing health problems and her excessive use of alcohol, she'd be like, I can't make it today, I'm hungover. I am fucking hammered. The judge orders her. We do this murder trial another day. Can we hear this?

The judge orders her to stay in the Island's Convalescent Center each night except Friday and Saturday night, the remainder of the trial. The turn up nights. That'll get her to there on time. The defense case here, witnesses talked about several incidents that could explain the presence of blood stains found on the floor. Not that much. You can't explain that. Unless it's we dismembered something that

was once alive. Two friends of Ruth Estelle Strong and Wanda Post testified that she suffered serious nosebleeds. We're talking real civ. Like she needs transfusions because it's just pouring out by the court. You know what a civ is. It's really like a civ. It's just pouring. Jim Johnson, a resident who worked on the Nestle and Home during its construction said

he was injured twice during that work and left blood in the house each time. So it might be his. Oh. Never know. Here's another guy who says he saw Ralph after he's supposedly dead. He said, I saw him on August 10th of 1980. This is John Norman.

He said he remembered the day clearly because he was going to a McDonald's restaurant, which everyone knows when they go to McDonald's, you keep that in your brain, to celebrate a friend's birthday was the friend's six. Because if they're not, your friend is a piss poor fucking celebrator of birthdays. Why are you hanging out with babies, man?

Nuggets for everyone. They said, you're certain it was Mr. Neslin, and he said, absolutely. But on cross-examination, he acknowledged that he and his friend frequently traveled where they went to McDonald's, and it might have been another time. It might not have been August 10th, even though that was a day that they were there. So Ruth testifies, because she has to.

She testifies, and they think that she's going to come across as a nice-looking senior citizen. No way, right? Yeah, she bakes cookies. You've stated her B&B. Yeah. So during this she told about her marriage during direct Direct examination her health or alcoholism and her version of the period leading up to the disappearance And he just took off and it's so sad and she wiped a tear and then the prosecutor came in Oh, yeah, and established that this relationship was increasingly violent. Throughout questioning, she either denied or claimed she couldn't recall certain events

and incriminating conversations she had with her relatives. I don't recall that. So they attacked her versions of events using sworn testimony she made during a special inquiry in the 8182 year there, as well as a statement to investigators. They just kept finding all of her discrepancies in her statements. And bringing it up, They just kept finding all of her discrepancies in her statements.

And bringing it up, yeah. At the end of her testimony, the guy said, okay, no more questions. She shouted out, I did not kill my husband. She knows. She's like, ah, that went so bad. And a lack of a contraction there too. I did not, so it was bad.

Then the prosecution, just when they think it's all over and it's gonna be you know who a little shaky and who knows the Prosecution hits them with a surprise witness that just comes forward who's this Winnie Kay Stafford? Oh the next-door neighbor and best friend. She's got a conscience She'd well, let's find out a man who who knew both of them, who was friends with them, said, quote, Winnie Kay can be as crazy as a hoot owl sometimes. She just got sucked in by Ruth and Ruth's money. So here it is. She comes up and she had said in the inquiry hearing that nothing happened. She feels terrible for Ruth.'s awful now she says that no Ruth confessed to me I know exactly what happened I've been in the house from time to time when they're cutting him up and I know exactly what happened I know

everything she told me everything yeah and they said well why are you recanting your former test now she said I felt what had been what had been done had been done and I was protecting Ruth. What's done is done. You can't bring him back to life by getting Ruth in trouble. She said that after being granted immunity from prosecution from perjury, she decided to come forward.

You know, the testimony here, the prosecutor called it the stereotypical surprise witness. It's like a TV show. So she said she admitted the day that the murder happened, Ruth had admitted to her that this happened. She said Ruth began to cry as she confessed and explained to her that her brother was at the moment chopping Rolf's body up in the bathtub of their home. And then she told them Ruth's brother later burned the body.

They smashed up the thing, the meat grinder, the whole deal. So in closing, the prosecutor says the marriage was really a case of who was going to kill whom first. He said Rolf apparently discovered his wife had placed his assets from him, he went home and demanded the money or else and he got or else. He used her own fucking statement against her. The defense said nobody's been found. Nobody, no crime. They brought in a guy with steel drums and shit and just started playing a full reggae

version of it. And there's nothing that said he's met a violent end. This is ridiculous. He thinks that, you know, Ruth says that he went to Norway or committed suicide and we don't have any evidence to the contrary. They said that a lot of witnesses said Rolf came depressed sometimes and drank heavily after the accident that forced his retirement, so who knows what happened. It is 33 hours of deliberation over four days.

And this is a sequester jury too, so they've been holed up for weeks these people here and they come in with a verdict of guilty of first degree murder. Wow. Absolutely. Yeah, guilty. First one. First one. Yep, they said because they had like five people that were like, yeah she told me this and then this one helped. It's all the same. It's all the same. I mean, it all matches the physical evidence perfectly. Where he was shot, where he was dismembered, and the new burn barrel, everything. So the prosecutor says she was a woman who after her husband retired just couldn't get along with him. She systematically moved money from their accounts into her own, killed him when he confronted her about it and tried to erase the evidence. Okay, Ruth during sentencing, she cobbles in with a cane by the way. Oh man, they said, do you have anything to say for yourself? And she

said, I didn't kill my husband. I wouldn't and I couldn't. Which is exactly what O.J. said about Nicole, which is funny. The judge says, well, you, ma'am, may fuck off life in prison with parole. With parole. He said he would recommend to the State Board of Prison Terms and Parole that she should serve a minimum of 20 years behind bars. Under state law, she could be released after 15 years. But he said, I'm going to recommend you serve at least 20. She said that the length of the sentence doesn't matter

because I won't last that long. That was her response. They also grant a defense motion to release her pending appeal. Until her appeal is done, she can stay out. It's either $100,000 cash bond or $150,000 property bond. So she does that and she's out running her fucking B&B during a murder while she's convicted

of murder. While an appeal is going on. Let's rent a room from that lady who was just convicted of murdering her husband. I'm sure she'll make a lovely breakfast in the morning. Yeah. I hear she makes a great brunch. I hear there's a great brunch. I hear there's a type A all over this place.

Wow, so members of the jury that convicted her also cried as they read the verdict. One juror said it was not a decision we wanted to come to at all, but the evidence was too much. They said it was very difficult for all of us. So she's appealing the conviction, like we said. She said it was very difficult for all of us. So she's appealing the conviction, like we said. She said, I don't have any future. They took my future

away from me right here in this stinking little county. This stinking little county. A few days later, after the conviction, a juror says he was duped. What do you mean? A juror said that he erroneously thought that she placed an advertisement to sell their home shortly after he disappeared. And it turns out she listed something for somebody else with her number on it, but it wasn't her house. But she's good at selling houses,

so she said she would do it. She sold his car though, doggy. And all the other shit. But this was the thing, that he said the ad was actually for a home owned by a friend of Ruth's and he said you betcha I would have held out if I knew that. Why? Why is that the piece of evidence? Whether or not she sold the house doesn't matter. How about she sold the meat grinder her brother said they ground him up in? How about that? Sold all of his shit. Sold his fair lane and his Mustang.

She said, I just feel totally miserable. There's a whole bunch of reasonable doubts in my mind until I saw that she was trying to sell that house I thought was her house. He said that his second thoughts were cited by a defense lawyer as a potential grounds for a move to overturn the verdict. So yeah, they said in my mind, there's a big, the prosecutor said in my mind, there's a big difference between being innocent and not guilty. That's what the jurors said. But still, Root's lawyer says, yeah, they said,

if I determine that that's the basis for a mistrial or a new trial, it's gonna come, yeah, let's do it. Another juror disagrees with that first juror. The one juror said, quote, this guy's name, by the way, is Richard Saylor, S-A-Y-L-O-R. So Dick Saylor, he's on board. Dick Saylor. He said, if Rolf Nelson walked into Friday Harbor the day after tomorrow, we could say we didn't make a mistake under the circumstances.

I respect that juror for the fact that he didn't cave in but I'm disappointed that he's saying now that he has second thoughts because it accomplishes nothing. He shouldn't feel badly we did a good job. This guy's saying even if we did fuck up it's not on us because the evidence was there. We took what we took. We saw a snapshot of something and this is what we agree. The next day in the long view daily news. There's an editorial. That's fucking hilarious It's said it's called liquor was an accomplice Had John Barley corn been on trial with her John Barley corn meaning booze Ruth Nelson might have gotten off lightly as an accessory in the murder of her husband

But Ruth Nelson was on trial alone, and the jury this week pronounced the Lopez Island resident guilty of first degree murder. Three factors distinguished the case. Prosecutors produced no body. A startling number of witnesses testified that Nezlin had told them that she killed her husband, but most astonishing at all was the role

of booze in these events. Why is that astonishing? Shocking. Oh my God, it goes on to say prosecutors also described them as a hard drinking couple. Given these drinking habits, it's no wonder that the actors in this drama had difficulty remembering what actually happened. And one can only speculate on how drinking aggravated the tensions that led to his death. Ruth's conviction underscores a cautionary tale. Drinking doesn't excuse murder. She was still responsible for her actions. But a monster

was loose in this family, and Rolf Nelson was not the only victim. In January 1987, Ruth Nelson agrees to an out-of-court settlement with the San Juan County Sheriff's Department to resolve the lawsuit she filed, claiming they violated her civil rights and damaged her property So they gave her six grand to fix her concrete She's still out mind you July 17th 1987. She hits two bicyclists with her 1975 Dodge van while shit-faced driving Wow Leaving them in critical condition. Oh my god. She

ran them over. Yes. So she testified she unknowingly drank orange juice laced with vodka that some of her friends said inadvertently, and unknowing and inadvertent, placed in the refrigerator without telling her. She said the drink and her poor eyesight, she's Mr. Magoo now, contributed to this accident. You can't taste the difference between regular orange juice and vodka and a screwdriver? Even Chong went, it's vodka, man. He was stoned and on 18 different kinds of pills. He was stuffing them in his face. I thought that orange juice was bad.

The judge said, you know what you're going to do now after you've been, you've got convicted over two years ago. You're actually going to go to jail now. Center to jail in his decision. He wrote, it's uncomfortable for me to contemplate Ms. Nuzlin spending some substantial period of her last years in prison or even expiring there only to have her conviction subsequently reversed. You're the judge. Do you think it's gonna get reversed? Do you think you did everything right? So she's finally sent to jail. She's held in Island County jail until transported by plane to Washington Correctional Center for Women at Gig Harbor. So yeah, February 8th or February

1988 she puts up an appeal, basically saying that her brother's testimony recounting conversations he heard between them shouldn't have counted because that's hearsay. So that's what they say. But they say that a party opponent is not hearsay if it's offered against a party and is a statement of which he has manifested his adoption or belief in its truth. So it's fine. It's not hearsay if he's there to say it. And he heard it coming out of her mouth.

Right. It'd be one thing if Robert told me Ruth said this, that's hearsay. This is, I heard this bitch say it. It's different. She said it to me. Yeah. Well, to somebody else when I was there. There's hearsay and there's heard this bitch say it. Those are two very different things. Yeah. So it is denied, by the way.

Really? With good behavior, her earliest date of release from custody would be August 2007. Oh my God. Because she went in in 87. She could have had five years of time served already, but she doesn't. So fall of 1992, she is diagnosed with lung cancer

and told she has only months to live. Wow! More than 100 Lopez Island residents signed petitions asking Governor Booth Gardner for an early release on account of her failing health. Mercy. February 17, 1993, at the Purdy Correctional Facility, she dies in prison. How about that? No mercy.

Nope. Medical examiner determined her death was caused by a blood clot in the lung which was a result of poor health and inactivity By the way, the governor's board of clemency had had scheduled a hearing for March 12th consider releasing her for humanitarian reasons Just missed it Yep, she is buried at the gig in Gig Harbor, Washington here, there, and he is on find a grave for Ralph. It says burial cremated, comma other. He's all over the place. Burned and put in a flower garden.

Quickly June 2023. There is a state save our statue thing. This is a statue of Ralph thatph that's been in town forever Oh, look at that check it out. It's a dope statue with a plaque These said the smiling mug of neslin with that smiling Jesus. Yeah, that's smiling. He's looks like he's frowning Yeah, fucking sailors. What do you that's scowling not smiling? Oh, okay? It's a sailor smile right there not smiling. Oh, okay.

It says scowling. That's a sailor smile right there. It sits atop a four foot pedestal and a local resident said, I like it because clearly Ralph led a rough life. It kind of exudes a rough life. A little tattered, a little torn down. They said sometimes people put a hat on it.

Hell yeah. Shit like that. But then a local Feliciano is the guy's last name. They said the statue had toppled over. The wooden pedestal it was on had been eaten by termites. So this guy raised money and got a stone base for it and had it put up again. So it's yeah. He said that yeah, it's nice here.

They also say there's a town legend here, quote, it's said that on moonless nights on the now quiet structurally unsound high bridge, a drunken voice can be heard singing Norwegian sea shanties down to the ancient river spirits who laugh and seem to understand the cosmic joke. Amazing. This was, Anne Rule's book is called No Regrets and Other True Crime Cases. It's got a bunch of different stories in it. It was also an A&E Citi-Confidential, remember those? Citi-Confidential on Lopez Island, foul play on the friendly aisle. And that everybody is Lopez Island, Washington, and one of the fucking weirdest things we've ever done, right? Is that crazy?

Or is it just me? I love the local legend lore of a seed that he's being sung to the Norwegian sea shanties Song amongst where the fucking fallen bridge of that drunkenly singing down Un-fucking-believable. So there you go. If you like the show tell the world about it get on whatever app you're listening on Doesn't matter give us five stars that helps tremendously. I'm telling you I don't know why but it drives you up the charts to do that follow on social media We are at small town murder on Instagram small town pot on Facebook at murder small on Twitter Definitely also head over to shut up and give me murder calm..com. Get your tickets, live shows everybody.

Let's go, May the first, I'm sorry, May 31st. May 31st, yeah. We're way past the first. May 31st, Durham, North Carolina at the Carolina Theater, Triangle area, get your tickets, we're almost sold out. So get your last minute tickets, Nashville's sold out the next night.

Also, Minneapolis, you'll be our biggest show ever. Sell that bad boy, come on, let's do it. Also, Kansas City, we added more tickets. We added a whole, we opened up another tier for you guys. A whole floor. So we said, fuck it. That's it, hire some people and bring them in. So get them in there.

New York, Boston, Kansas City, like we said, Oklahoma City, get your goddamn tickets right now. We're going to have so much fun. Shut up and give me murder.com. Definitely listen to our other two shows crime in sports you don't have to like sports you have to like funny shows with us making fun of someone if you like that you'll love it and you should also listen to your stupid opinions which we talked about people's dumb reviews of everything you

can imagine and it's the funniest hour there is. People are such assholes. So check that out as well. Patreon.com slash crime in sports. All of your bonus material, tons of shit, new stuff every other week. You get hundreds of back episodes right away. Anybody $5 a month or above, come on. Patreon.com slash crime in sports. This week what you get, you're gonna get one crime in sports,

one small town murder, and you get it all. For crime in sports, we're gonna talk and you get it all for crime and sports. We're going to talk about the OJ trial. Yeah. What happened there? How do you have DNA and not a conviction when they convicted this lady on type A blood pure incompetence is how you fuck it up. You got two bodies. They had none. Two of the worst lawyers I've ever seen and a bunch of the worst cops I've ever seen is how that happens. And we'll explain it all and then for Small-town murder

Inside Ed Gaines house. What's in there? What's in Ed Gaines house? What's a day in the life of Ed Gein in that house? It's fucking weird. We'll talk all about that and more patreon.com Slash crime and sports and you get a shout out. Yeah, which is right fucking now Jimmy hit me with the list of the most wonderful goddamn people who've ever existed on this shitty goddamn blue marble called Earth. This week's executive producer is Whitney Green. Thank you so much, Whitney,

for everything you do for us here on Angel. Other producers this week are Liz Vasquez, Peyton Meadows, Heath Mauger, Lori Simmons, Janice Hill, Scarlett Horbeast III in a Joey Pepitone rug, Steph Feller, Jessica Anderson, Krista Gonzalez, Sean Heller, Christiana Robbins, Thomas Lombard, Tariq Ortadeck, Amy Hartsfield, Opie with no last name, Jessica with no last name, Travis Moser, Tina Ribeiro, Dakota Bracken will Roberson LG Suzanne Antonelli Richard McClendon Amy would know last name angel H Katie Potts Joanne Jonathan not Joanne

Jonathan Stratton Zachary Hudson Nicholas Deckert Gail Berge Hades daughter Kevin Fouts Prya Ramnath I think Alan, Alan Corey, Megan Tuttle, Eden Metz, Tammy, no, that's just Tam Hi, Tam Hee, I think it's Tam Hi, I think it's an Asian name. Tam Hi. Tam, last name Hi. Maybe Hee, how do they say H-I?

Is it Hi? Or is it like, Raising Arizona, is it Tam H-I? Hi, Hi, I think it might be Hee. Hello, Hi. Do I like Hi? I like Hi better. I think it's Hi.. Do I like ha? I like ha better. I think it's ha. Yeah, ha.

That's how we're saying it. Jackie Chastain, Ken Todd, Natalie Cocagno? Cocogno, it's Cocaino, right? Cocono. Cocono? Cocano? C-O-C-O, no, C-O-C-C. A-G-N-O, that's Italian, Cocano, right?

Or yeah, oraccino might be. Hey listen, good for you, Natalie, thank you so much. Stone Toad, Samantha Barnes, Wooper God, Icky would know last name, Don would know last name, Gloria Haley, what is it, say it again? Woods, obviously, for Icky. For sure, it has to be. It might just be Ick.

Shill34, Wendy Middleton, Carrie Cormack, Alicia Conezzo, Tom Kowalski, Chris would know last name, Kimberly Pratt, Carter Lee, Veronica Barth, Samantha Smith, Melissa Urbonik, Bobby Goldsmith, Young would know last name, Sterny would know last name, Haley would know last name, Amanda Johnson, Megan would know last name, Seb Casablanca's, Madison Gordy, Flower Moon Bagels, Wayne McKinley, Abby Testa, Travis Payne, Rebecca Patterson, Abby Braun, Laurie Espe, Denise Frese, Sampson Nelson, Sarah Maloon, Matt Barnes, Kimberly with no last name, Casey James, Petruchio Atzant. Ashley Hancock.

Cindy Wolf, Jenny, Jeannie, Jeannie Hammers. Yes, she does. Kayla Davenroy. Rat Baby. Dana Doll. Courtney Ward. Susan Brown. Zoe Ford.

William Chandler. James Lancaster. Leanna would know last name. Rose Brammer. Andrew Hadding Radio. Andrew Hadding from the radio, I don't know. Troy Miner, John Murphy, Michael Nuding, Susan with no last name, Brittany Jones,

Jasmine Caldwell, Raphael Mosey, Jesse Coshall, Tanya MacPherson, Rick Schmitz, Rebecca, just one, not two. No, it is two, it's not just one. Oh yeah, yeah, that's what it is. Rebecca Baggett, Baggett, Trey Adler, Alder, Trey Alder. Thomas with no last name, Michelle Nazarino, Eric Widerholt, Kelly Dooned, Dunned, Heather Mama Miller, JB, Charlie Coker, Coacher,

Sam with no last name, Estelle with no last name, Zachary Thompson, Kenny with no last name, Margaret McCormick, Trish Tawne, J, the letter J, also Jen, Scott Richardson, Adam with no last name, Brittany Cox, Flutie Flakes, Levi Stiles, Zach Chalky, Fizel Isbay, Isbay, Isbay, Fizel Isbay, Kerry with no last name, oh, maybe not, all right, J.L. Pfeiffer.

You had a fucking epiphany there. Sure did, Ethan M. Schaaf. Lisa Milbrot, Michelle Curtin, Jen, no, that's Jed Frederick, Kathy Kathleen Jefferson, Martha Mayer, Jason Sabine Sabini, Aaron Howard Kai would know last name, John Weaver, John Erickson, Jill Rini, Jolene Black, Rock Trotter, Gene Mensinger, Ricky would know last name, John Weaver, John Erickson, Jill Rini, Jolene Black, Rock Trotter,

Jean Mensinger, Ricky would know last name, Daniel The Manual, and Jenny Pithicus. Nicole Garcia loves us, James, in case you didn't know. Oh, well, we love you back. She would like us to know that. Cody Argue, L. Sperry, Lucas Schultz, Lee Rutledge, Ashley would know last name, JB would know last name, Jason Molasse, Desiree Kern,

Mike Elliott, Christopher Kilburn, Jackie would know last name, Samantha Binkley, Aaron Hoskins, Frackle Rock, Matthew Golden, Riley Moran, Ryan would know last name, Hope Eggers, Noah would know last name, Dana Bengals' sister, Gavin Long, I mean, we all know Dana. I like to know, well yeah, we all gotta know. Gotta know who the brother is.

Who they're related to, obviously. No other way. Gavin Long, Matthew Cutting, and all of our patrons, you're amazing. Thank you, everybody, so much. You wonderful, magnificent, beautiful, fantastic bastards. We fucking love you. You wanna follow us on social media.

Shut up and givememurder.com, drop down menu, hit that shit up, follow us, hang out with us, social media shut up and give me murder.com drop down menu hit that shit up Follow us hang out with us keep coming back and then we'll be back and until next week everybody. It's been our pleasure If you like Small Town Murder, you can listen early and ad free now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple podcasts. Prime members can listen early and ad free on Amazon Music. Before you go, tell us about yourself by filling out a short survey at Wondery.com slash survey.