Small Town Murder - The Sweater Letter Murder - Ontonagon, Michigan

Episode Date: October 16, 2026

This week, in Ontonagon, Michigan, an unlikely couple seems to be making it work, until a strange series of events make it seem like something is out to get the wife. A large cinderblock falls on her, from the roof of their home. There's a suspicious fire, when only she is home. And she finally ends up dead, during a family gathering, with her own mother finding her, on a wooded trail. Finally, a letter, found in the sleeve of a sweater makes the whole wild tale make sense!!   Along the way, we find out that you don't want to end up in the "Busking Barn", that one attempt on your life could be an accident, but many are a pattern, and that you should never give evidence of your murder to someone that you have a crush on!!   New episodes, every Wednesday & Friday nights!! Check us out on VIDEO Wednesday and Friday evenings on Netflix! www.netflix.com/smalltownmurder Donate at patreon.com/crimeinsports or at paypal.com and use our email: [e-mail] Go to shutupandgivememurder.com for all things Small Town Murder, Crime In Sports & Your Stupid Opinions!   Follow us on... instagram.com/smalltownmurder facebook.com/smalltownpod   Also, check out James & Jimmie's other shows, Crime In Sports & Your Stupid Opinions on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts!!

Hello, everybody, and welcome back to Small Town Murder Express. Yay! Choo! Oh, yay, indeed, Jimmy. Yay, indeed. My name is James Petro Gallo. I'm here with my co-host. I'm Jimmy Wiseman.

Thank you, folks, so much for joining us today on another crazy Small Town Murder Express episode, all aboard the murder train. Pulling away from the station, we have some crazy stuff today. 10 pounds of murder and a two-pound bag, as usual. We're going to stuff it in there, though. So let's do it. And before we start, though, head over to shut up and give me murder.com. Oh, yeah.

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All of it. This week is no different this week for crime and sports, and this was a banger too. This was a fun one. It was small plane crashes at sporting events. This one guy was a lunatic, just an absolute lunatic who was trying to land a plane on the football. field during a playoff game. And luckily, it's a long story, but we'll get into it. Then for Small Town Murder, we talked about scary movies, horror movies, Halloween type of

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Patreon.com slash crime in sports, just like the name of that other show you should listen to. That said, I think it's time to sit back, everybody. I think it's time. What do you say here? There we go. Clear the lungs. Arms to the sky.

Let's all shout. Shut up. Give me murder. Let's do this, everybody. Okay. Let's go on a trip, shall we? Where to? Pags pack.

over there. Yeah. Behind your chair and see them. All right. Well, there they go. It's just a fanny pack. It's just a tell you're taking for the road. Just a toothbrush and a prayer.

Not even. I'll get the paste when we get there. That's right. I just bring the brush. That's, I know I'll need this. So let's get on a trip. We're going to Michigan this week. Okay.

On Tonagon, Michigan. Yeah. That's a tough one. It is way up. It's as UP as it gets as up the UP as you can get here. Right up in your UP. Right up your UP. O-N-T-O-N-A-G-O-N.

Very native. I looked it up to try to get the pronunciation. It's, like I said, far northwestern UP. Like, as far away from everything as possible. It's five hours and 15 minutes to Minneapolis. That's kind of the closest city. Eight hours and 50 minutes to Gross Point Park, which was our last Michigan episode. Episode 703.

puppet master killer. That was crazy. So get overtime driving that. Good God. Oh, absolutely. It's nine hours. That's wild. Antenagan County, it's in. Area Code 906, population here, very small. I mean, it's a summertime kind of outdoorsy community. 1322 is the population.

Tiny, and it's in the middle of nowhere. Median household income here, pretty low, much lower than the national average. Really? $42,500. It's got to be fixed income. There's some of that. There's some of that. And people who work in the area to keep it up for the summer.

And then the median home costs, though, also very low. And that's because it's a lot of cabins and things like that. $92,900. So you can actually afford it if you make $42.5. That's median, yeah. Nickname here is Harbor Town because it's right on the water up there in the middle of nowhere. A little bit of history. the village is located within

Antanagan Township apparently at the mouth of the Antenagan River on Lake Superior. It's got to be so fucking cold. In the summer it's actually pretty hot there and humid. Is it? Yeah, it's actually pretty warm but in the winter it's going to be cold.

Oh my God. But frigging gorgeous too up there. I believe that. It's pretty. The name is an Indian name of the Chippewa dialect that means my bowl is gone. rumor has it some

A lot of stoners up here My boss and I said My bowl's gone dude So as a young girl apparently Legend has it A young girl went to get like some Water out of the river with a bowl Or something and the bowl flew away

And she said my bowl is gone And they named it And I said yeah If the kids coming back with their bowl is gone I'm going to be very suspicious Of what ball is gone exactly Was it kicked at least Or was it half full

It's a problem So it was a lot of copper mining up here? apparently. Oh, really? Yeah, I don't know how you even find the copper up here, but they found it. And so there's still like old abandoned mines you can find up there and shit that's kind of cool. In 1874, a plank road was built between these two different mining establishments, but they built a 14-mile plank road.

Wow. That's a long goddamn road. It was called Miners Road. And the industry, it was a lot of industry here for a while. they had the Smurf it stone container, which I think we've talked about before. Smurf it? Smurf it.

Like, that sounds like a smurf who's had it. Oh, smurf it, man. I've had enough. That's it. I'll smurf this, man. Smurf this whole place. Smurf everything, man. I don't give a shit anymore.

I'm tired. Smurf. Tired. I think it's easy being blue, man. Smurf you. Smurf it all the fucking hell, dude. My shoes are always dirty. They're fucking white.

White whole thing. What choice was this? White souls. Everything's white. Whose idea was that? Walking around in a fucking diaper and a goddamn stupid hat. That's my outfit. With my blue chest out.

Always with the blue chest. A diaper and a beanie cap? That's what you guys thought was a good outfit for me. Smurf this shit, man. Like I'm in a rap video in 2005. Is this what I'm doing? So that place closed in 2010, though. Here's some reviews.

There's only three reviews of the whole town. Really? So I'll give you all of them. Here's five stars. I enjoy living in this small, friendly town. The scenery is beautiful, and it's a wonderful area to raise a family in a safe and caring community. Oh. They could just never leave because they'd be shocked by the outside world, probably.

Oh, they wouldn't be able to believe this shit. Here's four stars. I love living in Antenagan. I moved here only three years ago, but everyone has been so friendly. I've never been treated like an outsider. Everything in town is in walking distance, and with a car, the outdoor activities are endless. Oh, boy. Many forests, hiking trails, waterfalls, skiing, snow-shoeing.

I feel perfectly safe here. Yeah. They love the outdoors. Oh, yeah. Oh, it's pretty up there. It really is. It's gorgeous. Then finally, two stars, not so enthralled.

High drug area and crime rate. I looked it up. It's not a high crime rate. People are not very inviting if you are not born and raised there. I can see that. Very little to do. There are some jobs, but you have. to know someone to get hired.

Yeah, nepotism of the 1,300 population town. That'll happen. It sounds like the four-star one is probably a lady who's reasonably attractive. Everyone's been so nice to me since I moved here. It's weird. I've never felt like an outsider. I've never pulled a chair out ever since I got it. Whereas the next one's a guy with a receding hairline who's like, everybody treats me like shit here.

I can't even get a fucking job. What the fuck? Smurf this. They make me back my own grocery. Yeah. This is crazy. Things to do here. Well, number one, go to the lake.

I mean, it's right there. Knock yourself out. But also, the Porcupine Mountains music festival is coming here. Oh, boy. Now, you can imagine how fun it would be to try to book bands to come all the way the hell out here. It's got to be brutal. Bands like Danny Frank and the Smoky Gold. And the Smokey Gold.

Oh, yeah. T-A-E and the neighborly. T-E? Yeah, but all caps. Like, it means something. The Blue Moon Marquis will be there. Blair Crimmons and the Hookers. Oh, that's fun.

Blair Crimmons. They'll bring people from all around. The hookers are coming. Blair Crimmons. The steel wheels will be there. What was the guys, the Crimmons that was in Boston, the comedian? Oh, yeah. No?

God damn it. No exactly you're talking about. Ah, is it Bob Crimmons? Oh, it's going to drive me crazy. I can't remember. It'll come up for there. He was from one with stand-up stood out. the fucking salty guy.

Yeah, he was funny. Yeah. He's badass. Damn it. Amazing. Just died. Boss mama and the Jebberhooch will be there. The Jebber who?

Jebber Hooch. Jebber Hooch. Jebber Hooch. Okay. Jeber Hooch. Boss Mama and the Jebrerhuch. The Abby Posner trio. Cousin Curtis will be there.

Oh, thank God. Jesus. Cousin'Curt. The fretliners will be there. Okay. Charlie Parr. Northern Days The Benson and

Sibbs Benson and Benson with an E.N. at the end. The Congo boys have two sets. So watch out for that. Oh, because they get the crowd involved. Yeah, it's hot shit. They go from three all the way to five. They're pushing on through.

Then from 6 to 630, P.K. Mayo. Don't look at me, man. McCauley, Hurricane, and Hool. Okay. You'd think that this would be local music, but there's no fucking way 1,300 people have this many

musicians living amongst them. God, no, they wouldn't have this kind of just equipment laying around. Right. Then there's a busking barn as well. What the fuck is that? Well, the busking barn is an all-acoustic stage offering amateurs and professionals.

By the way, it's literally in a fucking, like a log cabin barn. That's what's going on there. An opportunity to play in intimate and nurturing setting. Okay. And scheduled performers receive a complimentary two-day pass. So if you perform here, you get to come to the festival for free.

Well, that explains why there's so many musicians. Nobody said they're good at this. No. They just want free admission. Such luminaries as Iron Mule. Yeah. Christopher Hick-Erickson, aka the Riverman. Oh, boy. Del Hopper, Todd Swanson, Andrea Statter, bad melon Morgan Field. Bad melon. Got a bad melon. He just points at his head. Fucking weirdo. Bet, bette, bett, two separate words,

and the Rayman. Right. Oh, Betty, or Betty. Betty and the Rayman. Them too will be there. Them too. The boondoggle cats. This is all people that just wanted free of mission.

That's it. You can't convince me others. They made up these names as they applied for this. Maple Moon, um, E-L-O spirits. I think it's just electric light orchestra. All of their fucking hits.

The, muddy boots, hippie Steve and the beve. Fucking A. And finally, the wailing loons will be there. And don't forget about Thomas Jackman either. He gets all his jacket done. I think they're all whaling loons, to be honest. Everybody.

That said, it's murder time, everybody. Let's talk about some murder. What a festival. What a lineup. Yeah, this is something that they got going on here. That's the deepest lineup we've ever had. For a town of 1,300 people? There's so many. That's a crazy, that's all day. Every day.

Two days. Yeah, just nonstop. I don't think they get a lot of time. They get 20 minutes, the open the acoustic barn people. There's set times such as 415 to 435. It's very regimented. Yeah, and we're not done. We'll pull the plot.

Oh, you're coming off stage. No, it's like an award show. They start playing other music and it's drown you out and your mic goes down. Playing Oscars music over your fucking. You're like, what's the, what's the swell? instrumental. What's happening right now? All right. Let's talk about Robert Bruce Moylanin.

M-O-I-L-A-N-E-N. All right. Bruce. Bruce Moilin. He's born March 29, 1954. His dad's name is William. And he's a six-foot-tall kind of a guy. He's Finnish, as we know. Apparently a lot of the people in the UP are Finnish. I didn't know that.

Oh, finish. I thought you said thin. No, no, he's thinish. I'm thinish. If you looked at my legs, you'd be like, oh, it's probably a skinny guy. I'd see my arm. It's probably a skinny guy. Then you see my belly and you're like, hmm. What happened there? What happened?

We know he had an appendectomy in 1959. That's tough. He was confirmed in the Lutheran church in 1969, which is at 15 years old, which I guess confirmation. If it's like Catholicism, you got your, you know, communion first, then confirmation. it takes a while. Say he did that in the Lutheran. When?

How old was he? Fifteen. Ten years earlier, he had an appendectomy? Yeah. When he was five? Yeah. I'm shocked they found that. Found is that as appendix tiny?

Yeah, found that it was like sick. Well, I mean, you got to communicate how, well, I guess a five-year-old can tell you, motherfucker this hurts. Sit here, fever. Yeah, there's symptoms. Yeah, there's that too. I would hope doctors would know even. in the 50s. I had a friend that was

in their 30s that they almost missed it and they almost died. It happens. It's happened before. They sent them home to eat soup, James. Well, there you go. That seems stupid. So he had a couple, no real legal problems, two speeding tickets, a citation for improper overtaking

on the road, shit like that. It was in the early 70s, too. It was probably shit-faced also. They didn't care. We did it in a school zone. Yeah, well, they were like, I mean, I'd like to let you off. You are shit-faced, so I mean, obviously, Your judgment's going to be impaired, but I mean, they don't want to give him one because he's drunk. They're like, I feel bad, you know, you're being drunk and all.

This one's on you, though. You know, but I still got to give you one. He ran on the track and field team at the high school around here. He was in two car accidents by the time he was 23. 74, he was a passenger. Minor injuries, 76. Again, he lost control of his car, minor injuries. Newspaper had him printed, so we'll give you a kind of.

of his background here. Is it up in this area where all this happened? That's where he was, I believe. Yeah. Yeah, but there's also, he's going to live in a different area than this exact area, but still in the UP. As an adult, he worked at General Hospital in Marquette, which is up there in the UP. As support staff, we'll talk about, I think he drives, as we'll talk about.

he one of later on a woman that will know him that worked at the same hospital as him said he was kind of crude

he pretty much said what was on his mind it was kind of what he was like he's outgoing but he doesn't have a lot of friends which is interesting it's odd to be outgoing and lonely

that's odd that just means you're kind of a douche that no one wants to be around at that point that feels desperate and sad it's sad

Well, if you're trying and no one's interested, normally it's like, well, you've got to put yourself out there. And if you put yourself out there, you'll meet people. It's like, well, he puts himself out there. No one's interested in hanging out with him. That is, that's a flaw. That's on him. Yeah. And the reason why is he thinks he's the smartest person in the world.

He's really, really thinks he's smarter than everybody and anybody. Very much so. Very confident, as he puts it. But it's mainly fucking arrogance. Now, somewhere between 74 and 76 between those two car accidents, there. He meets a girl. It is disputed, whether it was 74 or 76 or 75 even, somewhere in there. Mid-70s, he meets a girl. Judy Diane Blake is her name. She's born October 16, 1957, so about three years younger. She's from Hancock, Michigan. Her parents are Dale and Marianne. Dale ran a business called, very creatively, Dale's service.

Oh, okay. There you go. Really, really. It's really creative there. Their family's big in the church and the Redeemer Free Lutheran Church. The Redeemer. The Redeemer. It's all I can think of immediately. Redeemer. He said Redeemer and all I see is that monster.

You just fire fly through the air. Come on, Jesse. So she has two brothers, Jerry and David. And she is very much into, here's a quote from a book. I'll give you the title of the book and everything later because the author does. a good job. Judy's family, her parents, her brothers, these people are like rocks of the community. They're very religious and very private. Upper Midwestern Stoics. I mean, that's pretty common shit here. Judy is the quietest of the quiet in her family. She's pretty

quiet. Really into the outdoors. That's what she's like, which I mean Christ almighty. If you grow up in northern Michigan, that's what's out there, man. So she's got a lot of woods around her house and they're always in the woods and always doing things and she's very organized. She trains Springer Spaniel dogs. Oh, very cool. That's what she's good at here. She also works in the hospital system in Marquette at Marquette General. That's where they meet these two.

So she was, we don't understand exactly what she is, whether she's a nurse or something else because it's disputed. But either way. But he's a driver. So they're delivering something. So she's in contact with that? Well, I mean, they're all in the hospital, apparently. Oh, he's in, okay. I mean, wherever they work, they'd end up at the hospital at some point.

So he'd run into people. Now, their relationship is strange, everybody says, because Bruce is loud and brash, kind of confident, and she is very, Judy's very reserved. Reserved. Not even meek, just not a... Mild. Mild, yeah, very Midwestern.

But it makes, somehow it makes sense. a friend of hers who worked with them said, I think he was something different than she was used to. Bruce was someone who came across as being very sure of himself. One of the things that he saw in her was a close family relationship, and it was a group that he could kind of feel like he was a part of a family. Bruce's family isn't that close to each other. Nobody's really tight.

He doesn't really stay tight with his family. There's a lot of psychological shit going on here, but that's interesting. Exactly. Exactly. So, I mean, it's, and you can throw in opposites attract and all that. shit too and whatever it is. Compensating for what she doesn't have. Same thing.

Yeah. Now, later on, a detective will kind of summarize Bruce thusly. Nobody cared for Bruce. Nobody had anything good to say about him. And on the other hand, everybody that knew Judy loved her. That's the couple we have here. He's a dick and she's a nice lady. That's what everybody says.

If you're that guy, you might see how she behaves and how that. No. attracts people and then you just kind of adapt to be a better person. He might almost see it as a buffer to the world as far as, you know, maybe she can, people will like me more if they like her type of thing. Not sure what their psychology is. That could be viewed as psychopathic also if you see somebody else and learn from their behavior and try to adapt to be like everyone else.

Either really healthy or really unhealthy. Or just cunning. Yeah, one or the other. Well, it depends on if you understand. emotions and also depending on how you utilize that for your personal gain

whether it be friendship or robbing and raping and that's the thing yeah well we'll find out what happens here so 1978 they get married the family

a friend of Judy said her family thought about it like this I don't think they cared for Bruce I think he was wild and he was also obnoxious so and he's also like 23 years old. And there's a lot

of people I know who were cocksure at 23. Pretty crazy at 23 and then you meet them at 43 and they're a completely different human being. The world is humbled. The world is and just, you realize that's not the way to be after a while. It's got you nowhere. You bang your head against the wall enough and see other people.

Unless it's just a fucking delusional person that's a comedian that can't leave their fucking town. We've seen that plenty. There's so many of those in every town and I know seven off the top of my head in Arizona. I'm saying I think of a lot more than that probably.

So bad. Sat down with a pen and paper. Just delusional in their 40s that they're so fucking important. 50s. 50s some of these people. Yeah. Out of their mind. We didn't even want to do this on camera.

No. How unsure are we? No. Yeah. Our first thing they came to us to like Netflix watch and we were like, no, that's okay. And they were like, what? That can't possible.

Yeah. People that work with us are like, no, no, no, no. You have to do this. Like this is a big deal. We were like, no, no. You don't have a choice. We're good. No, we're okay because we didn't want to be on camera.

We didn't want to do it. So. Well, here we are. They're like, not much. Yeah. Okay. Well, sounds wonderful then. Yeah.

But no, no, no. They're fine. Netflix is very fair. We're not being, I'm not pitching about that. So 1980, both Judy and Bruce are working at the general hospital in Marquette. This Leanne woman works there as well because she, we get a lot of quotes from her. She knows both of them. Now, coworkers describe Bruce as spending most.

of his shift at work flirting with female employees. That's what he does. Not her? No, the same, he's married to her. He doesn't need to flirt with her at work. So he should be, but he's like, he's like, but this is Bruce. He's like, I don't need to fucking flirt with her. He already got her. He already got her. I need to fucking bang this brought in the broom closet. I got to flirt with it. So to, to flirt with women at a place that you and your wife both work is, balls. Wow, huge balls. What the fuck. Then Judy's co-workers never knew whether she knew or not. Nobody wanted to start anything. And it's the Midwest, too. So they're all like, I don't want to get involved. It's very much, you know. Then June 16th, 1989. It's about, you know,

10 years goes by. They have a daughter named Elise that's born here. Now, by then, the blakes have accepted Bruce as he's not going anywhere. It's been a decade. It's been 15 years since they've met each other. He's still here. Now they have a baby. It's, this is it. So they just accept them after a while. He's ours. Yeah, so, you know, they have a house in Marquette. They have Springer Spaniels that she trains. They have their, her family lives in Antigon, Antanagan. So that's where they are.

I guess they're retired there or what, but they live in Marquette and they're both working at a hospital. They have a toddler. And that's their life. Now, 1991, Bruce is up on the roof of their home working on the chimney. Uh-oh. Which you should leave that to a professional, by the way. You don't know what you're doing. call somebody.

Please call somebody. This is like plumbing. Like, please don't try to get down there with a wrench. I don't know how that works. It's not going to work. I don't get it. No. It's just a hole in the roof and a hole in the house.

And it somehow keeps smoke out. The same way that the little thing in the toilet keeps shit from coming back. That's amazing. It's incredible. Amazing. So he put a couple of concrete chimney blocks up there. Judy was on the ground below on the patio cutting some flashing. So she's in this.

She's helping. Their daughter's about two and was like crawling around in the yard, basically. One of the blocks went over the edge. Uh-oh. It weighs between 80 and 86 pounds. Oh, dear God, that is moving. So if someone drops that from six inches above your head, you're fucked. If someone drops it from the roof, you're in a lot of trouble.

So it hit Judy in the head. Not a direct blow. That would have been a cartoon thing that would have pushed her a foot into the ground probably. Right. Not that, but... Clipped her. But yeah, glancing blow. Which, by the way, didn't matter because it gave her a severe concussion where she had to spend days in the hospital.

Wow. It's a lot. Later on, a friend said Bruce was working on the roof. She was on the ground. An 86-pound cinder block fell off the roof and hit her. She had some significant injuries and she had to be hospitalized. Now, Bruce, because they were like, how the hell did that happen? Yeah.

He said, fuck, this first thing. he said was I must have accidentally nudged the block with my foot while I was moving around up there and it was closer to the edge and I thought now to move an 80 pound block you don't accidentally nudge that that doesn't get bumped like a glass of water. No, you got to shove

that thing to do it. So yeah then he said he told another person that the scaffolding collapsed which is interesting and then around the side of the house yeah then later on like a couple years later he had a third version where Judy was on the roof and she fell off the roof.

And that's how she got hurt. What? So it's wild. So that's what she told. He'll like years later tell police that. Meanwhile, at this point, it's not like that at all. At this point, they look at all the records and they said Bruce made the statement that Judy was on the roof and fell off the roof and hurt herself.

And of course, we got all the reports. So Bruce gave an account that was fictitious because at the time, he didn't. didn't say anything about Judy being on the roof. She was never on the roof. And then the years later, all of a sudden, she was on the roof. So it's a lot. Now, he files an insurance claim, not for Judy, but for the patio, because the block had damaged the patio on the way down. So he took up close-up photographs of the spot where it smashed it.

So those will come in handy later. Judy thinks about leaving around this point, by the way. Maybe it's because he dropped a fucking cinder block on her head. That's possible. Not a real capable man if he's on the roof dropping 80 pound blocks. Yeah, he's doing cartoon shit to me. He had a piano up there, dangling. I'm worried.

An Anvil was next. There's other things that he think he's going to do here. So she tells her friends, she's thinking about leaving Bruce. One of her friends, this Leanne lady, said, I think she was afraid. I think she knew something was happening and she had to get out, but she couldn't quite get there. They said, if she didn't have a daughter in the mix, chances are, Judy would have taken the step and maybe initiated a divorce. And that's the thing.

If you have a toddler, society and the world and everybody tells you try to make it work. You have a kid. You got to try to make it work. You got to try to make it. It's very common. She's from a home that's stable. And she knows what stability helps with. Yes.

And they're church people and everybody at church is going to tell you. You got to make it work. And, you know, that's the child and this you raise them and everybody has problems. Yeah. I get from broken home after broken home, so I didn't, I had no fucking qualms about divorce. No, I didn't even think about it. Fuck this. I'm not doing this.

Never thought twice about it. Went through quite a bit of unstable fucking situations. Don't care. So she, though, she talked about it. She talked about it to Bruce, apparently. And so, you know, she talked about maybe we should break up. And he, I guess, talked her into staying, trying to work it out. Now, around this time, there's another woman.

Sort of. Sort of. Bruce wants there to be another woman, but this other woman isn't so interested, which is hilarious for a married guy. He's trying to get a thruple? No, he's trying to fuck another chick on the side. Oh. And she's not interested because he picks some other married chick from the hospital who has no interest. Very much like another.

Yeah, this is Gail Lampinen, who he picks. Now, Bruce was driving the Marquette General Hospital. cat scan mobile unit. He was the driver for that. They do mobile cat scans? I guess so. They did in Upper Michigan then, which makes sense in a rural area

that you would... I'll bet it's a deliverer to the CAT scan machine from these small towns. I have no idea. It's really irrelevant here. So he knew Gail for about two years because she worked at the Portage View Hospital

in Hancock, so he knew this woman. Now she, Now, she is fucking happily married. She's met Judy. She didn't want this. No, she's met Judy. And she considers later on her quote is that Bruce is a quote pest, which is the worst insult you could get from a woman. A pest.

I think so. Yeah. A little dick pest would be worse probably. But outside of that. The only reason I know is because he showed it. And I didn't touch it. I didn't ask for it. Yeah.

So Bruce made regular unannounced visits to Gail's office. He'd bring flowers. He'd bring cards. He'd tell her that he understood and he knew that her marriage was about to end. And she'd be like, what are you talking about? I'm not ending my marriage. She's like, no, no, no. I know you are.

It's weird. He talked about the fact, well, I'm getting a divorce. So you should end your marriage and we'll be together. Here's some flowers. One of the ladies from the hospital said Bruce had kind of this fixation and he would give her flowers and cards. He seemed to like her a lot and put of a lot of attention. toward her. Yeah.

Now, she just ignored him, basically. Her goal at the time, because this was, we're talking 1991, this isn't go right to HR and they'll take care of it type of thing like they would now because they'd be worried about a lawsuit, obviously. But back then, this was, if someone's picking on you, you just kind of, you know, you just ignore them, just, you know. Have they touched you? Then get back to work.

Then get back to work, exactly. And they, you don't want to be, people didn't want to be the subject. of that because you didn't want to whatever. So she said one person said it's like how do you tell somebody you don't want to be friends with them? We just didn't know how to say it so we kept ignoring him

and hoped he'd go away. That's kind of a quote from all the women here. Now sometime a few months after the chimney incident Bruce and Judy's house caught on fire. Oh. Yeah. I mean didn't start working. I guess the chimney's fucked up. That's why you hire a professional.

Yeah, he fucked it up worse. Judy and their daughter were home alone asleep and Bruce was not there. Oh boy. So later on they said the fire started because Bruce had piled wood stove ashes next to the firewood pile in the basement. Oh my. Okay. Anybody that has a, I have wood stoves in my house and I have. You got to make sure that shit's out.

It's never out. It's like if you have a fire overnight and then five o'clock in the afternoon the next day, there's still. coals in there. There's still things. And so you put them in a separate container. Yeah. And then that container stays separate until your time to take it out. You put it with the other ashes, but you don't just throw it near wood because it's fucking coals. It's a spark and fuel. That's crazy. It's a lot. Yeah. So the house catches on fire. Judy and Elise get out unharmed. The house doesn't, you know, doesn't completely burn the place to the ground or anything. So that's nice.

This is a quote from a cop later. There was suspicion by a number of people that perhaps this fire and the chimney block incident were not an accident. Now it started to be like, Jesus, this is a, this lady. Hopefully a lot of accidents. Yeah, this lady is really accident prone for shit that has nothing to do with her. This is less than a year, two near fatal household accidents. So they're like, that's weird. Then early to mid-92, there's some financial trouble with the couple.

I guess they were having all sorts of problems all caused by Bruce. Oh, he's doing too much. He's doing something with his money. Later on, it's described in a book, quote, he was borrowing money from one place to pay money to another place. Oh, he is so bad at this. He's not good. He was totally irresponsible financially, whereas Judy,

everything was always in line with her. Uh-huh. Now, Judy doesn't tell anybody about this. About him fucking up. she's embarrassed. She doesn't tell her parents. She doesn't tell anybody. Again, this is a, I think there's a lot of this comes from embarrassment and people not wanting to be embarrassed because you get Judy a few different things that if she was less embarrassed and more vocal might have helped her here. Shame is just. It's tough. And it's ingrained in people from an early age and it's just kind of how some people are. It's not a negative thing. So she told a handful of people that her marriage was in trouble. and a couple people that she was thinking about divorce, but mainly friends, people from work.

One of the, later on, one of the cops said, these financial problems that built up were mostly Bruce is doing, if not all Bruce is doing, but she kept very quiet. She didn't want her family to know about their financial problems because I think she was embarrassed. There were just very few people that she told that there were marital problems and was even thinking of divorcing him.

Summer 1992, Bruce won't leave Gail alone. he keeps fucking coming at it. Still a past. It's been months of her having no interest whatsoever. You know, there's something to the psychology of financially enslaving his wife while at the same time pursuing other things elsewhere. He's putting himself into a position where she can't leave and he can do whatever the fuck he wants. Well, she can leave because she has a family. So her family, you know what I mean?

I just think this is basically he's trying to have, he's, he's, he's, he's, he's, Deem Judy is weak. Okay. In my mind, he's deemed Judy is weak. He can fuck around with the money. He can drop a cinder block on her head. He can try to bang other chicks from work. And she's not going to say shit about it.

I think he's thought of her as he's going to play her for a fucking sucker and do whatever he feels like. And she's just going to sit at home with this toddler and take it. I think that's how he thinks it is. But Judy isn't quite there. Isn't quite as weak as he thinks. Yeah. So he kept at her. He kept showing up at her office, this gale with flowers and cards, and she would ignore him, and it just kept going on. Then Thursday, November 26, 1992, it's Thanksgiving. Bruce, Judy, and Elise, who's now three years old, drive to Antenoggin to spend the long weekend with Judy's parents, Dale and Marianne. Judy's brothers are around.

They have all the dogs there. And it's also the last week of Michigan's deer season for guns. I think you can use bows later. But for shooting deer season, this is the last day. Or it's the last week. It runs from 15th to November 30th, this particular thing. So in Michigan, by the way, in Minnesota, Michigan, Wisconsin, this is a bigger holiday than Thanksgiving. Oh, this is such a big deal.

It's a huge deal there. So the woods are full of fucking people on the last week because they want to use their tag before it's expired. Got to make sure you get your meat. Yeah. So Sunday, November 29th, 1992, still this weekend in the morning. It's the last Sunday of deer season. Huge deal. All the men go out in a large hunting party with all the brothers, Bruce, the fathers, everybody goes out here.

Friends, Bruce went with them. So Judy stays back with her mom and a little Elise. Okay. She's not big into hunting. She likes to walk her dogs instead. Fair. Yeah. So early afternoon, Judy takes the dogs out.

I think it's four dogs for a walk on the trails behind her house. Together. She's got her own Springer Spaniels and she's got her parents' dog streak as well. So I think there's four dogs, but we're not sure. Now, she's not wearing orange, which is. If you go near a tree in Michigan In hunting season You head to fucking toe hunter orange

You have to It's just what you do Get Tennessee volunteers clothing And just outfit yourself Head to toe Look like a giant Peyton Manning fan Longhorns, whatever Just orange it up

Orange So Syracuse You're big Syracuse fans Let's go I'm a huge Minutemen fan Oh man So Approximately 4th

Are they the Minutemen now? Aren't they? They were always the orange men. Why wouldn't they be the orange men still? Oh, orange men. You're right. St. John's red men changed.

Okay. Yes. Because I'm like, how is orange offensive? What fucking, who was orange? I never heard of that before. I've heard of lots of colors,

but not orange. Is that somebody orange? I just mixed juice with people. Yeah. Men have made and men. Yeah. To New York. Yes,

you did. You connected those like flippers of dolphin. Yeah. Like an average. Absolute morrow. I love it. So, 4.30 p.m., two and a half hours had passed since Judy left, and she wasn't back yet. Apparently, there are different accounts of what happened, but we know at least streak, the parent's dog comes back home without her.

Shows up at the house. So they're like, oh, Jesus. Now they thought, oh, fuck, we should go tell Judy's probably searching for streak. For the dog, yeah. The dog probably got away, and she's out looking through the woods for the house. this dog and the dog's at the house, so we should go out and tell her that the dog's home and you're good here. So that's all we know. So Marianne goes looking, mom here. It's getting dark now. It's in 430 and way up in the fucking UP in late November. So it's getting dark. They go out looking.

And Marianne and there's a family friend also follows this path here, the one they know that she usually goes on. They find the rest of the dogs in the woods by themselves alone. No Judy. Oh, the other three are there by themselves. Yeah, they just find the other dogs hanging out. So they're like, okay. Then, away from the dogs here, about five or six hundred feet further into the woods, they see Judy. Oh. She's lying on her side across the hiking trail, partly in a puddle of water.

So this is not resting, obviously. You don't rest in a puddle in late November in Michigan. That's cold. That's cold. So she's not moving. They go run over. They roll her on her back and they see blood everywhere on her. Oh.

And they're like, oh, my God, Jesus Christ. So Marianne screamed here and she said, I could see that she was not alive. I could see all the blood and I just panicked and I started going home. She ran, she just ran out of the woods, ran to the closest house that was by the trail and called the police from there. The police are called at 5.12 p.m. So the police arrived. They find that Judy has been shot. A bullet went in the front of her chest,

went through her heart, and went out her left side. All the way through her. All the way through her. That's a powerful round, obviously. Now it entered about an inch to an inch and a half lower than where it exited. Okay.

So there was an upward trajectory. So that's something they got to think about, too, where this shot could have come from. Yeah. Now, they place the time of death between about 2 and 3 p.m. Okay. So, no, she's been out here a while, but we don't know exactly how long because they're terrible at telling time of death ever. And especially outside, it's difficult temperatures and much easier if they're in like a 72-degree house to figure it out.

So that evening, Detective Sergeant Bob Ball, he's the guy who comes out from about 60 miles away. Right. Not a lot of homicide detectives up here in this area. he goes out to the scene. They go out with flashlights. They found a body. He's got a wound. They found a pack of dogs.

And really nothing else. There's no other clues. There's no human footprints near her that aren't from her mother or the family friend. There's no shell casing. No one had called about a shooting. No, the bullet went through and through also. No hunter came forward to say, I fired at a deer and heard something off about it or

I might have hit somebody by accident. A news anchor from up here said that this is hunting season in Upper Michigan. It's an absolute must that you wear orange when going out. One thing they noticed is that she's not wearing orange because she was found in the woods on the last Sunday of deer season. You might suspect that it's a hunting accident. That's what everybody thought. What a terrible accident. It's fucking horrible.

It happens all the time in this area. All the time? These hunting at, remember you didn't see Drop Dead Gorgeous and Drop Dead Gorgeous. Oh, yeah, he's a hunting season. She's like, yeah, you know, and she's at the morgue. Just very common. Very common. People constantly.

Wow. So now this guy said he'd worked accidental shootings before. Again, if you work up here, you've seen, you've worked a few of these if you're a homicide detective or someone who investigates death at all. And he knew that a deer rifle can fuck you up at a distance. And that's probably what this is. Oh, boy. Yeah. He said, I've investigated a number of shootings that have been accidental.

those bullets traveled tremendous ranges. And if indeed someone just shot at a deer and missed the deer, it could hit someone and the shooter wouldn't even know it. Wouldn't have a clue. Wouldn't have a clue. So the investigators fan out with flashlights to go over the area because it's dark. And they said, one said, this is ball. He said, we weren't buying that it was an accident. We weren't buying that it was a murder.

We were out here investigating. That was our job. So we just started out with, we don't know what happened. and let's find out. We're doing our best to figure that out now. We just know a woman's got a through and through. Yeah. And that's how you should investigate something like this is I'm not going to make any assumptions.

I'm going to see where the evidence leads. So now they find one thing that night on a maple tree, 37 feet from where Judy fell, there's a fresh mark in the bark. A blaze mark, they called it. They did a test on it, a sodium, whoa, rhodesinate. test swabbing the spot with a chemical to see if it reacts to lead. Okay. They said a positive reading is if it turns purple, which it did. So that confirmed that this is in fact a bullet strike on a maple tree, approximately 37 feet from where she'd been shot.

So it's like a ricochet, an accident. Yeah, like a bullet grazed it. So now they know where Judy was standing and they know where a bullet hit a tree. So they have that. They drove stakes into the ground where she was found and ran. a string to the blaze mark as well. So they're doing all this type of shit. They walked the line roughly back about 100 feet looking for a shell casing because

that's why they did that to say, okay, if it's here, a shell casing would fly there and they didn't find any shell casing. So then they went and searched for the bullet that should have gone after it hit the tree. So they kind of looked for a ricochet point and all that. But the area kept expanding and it's super dark out. And so they're really, now they're pissing in the wind. They're walking around the deep woods with a flashlight looking for a thing this big in the dark. So good luck.

And something that could be fragmented by now, too. Totally. Could have come apart. Could be stuck in a tree where you couldn't see it go in. There's a million things. So they end up leaving that night. They said, okay, well, this isn't going to work here. Now that night, they go inside, though, away from the woods to talk to the family here.

This bald dude, he goes and talks to the Blake. family and he said the first thing that comes to mind is when you've got somebody shot you want to be able to account for family members number one you want to be able to account for the spouse okay they're all up there family and spouse so that night he sits down with all these people um he said her husband bruce didn't say a whole lot but he was critical of his wife because he had learned she walked the dogs in the woods that day and wasn't wearing orange but i was thinking this guy just lost his wife and now he's critiquing her and I was uncomfortable. So, yeah, that is uncomfortable.

This fucking, I told her. Like, hey, be sad now. Yeah, let's not place blame until we know the whole story, too. Yeah, let's start with sad and we'll fan out from there. So Judy's father told the detective and the family, including Bruce, saying that, you know, we'd all been hunting together at the time. Yeah. And he said, the cop said, Bruce never said anything.

He just let us believe by not saying anything that he was at the hunting camp. Apparently, Bruce had actually wandered off on his own for a while here. They said, one of the things that Bruce volunteered that really sent up a red flag for me was the fact that he told me, he said Judy was not wearing orange that day. So he's being critical of his dead wife. And then also didn't tell me about the wandering away from the hunting camp. So for the moment, it's ruled a hunting accident. It's the fourth in Michigan just that season. So happens.

There's a wire service associated press ran a national roundup of hunting deaths under the headline carelessness and hunters equal a deadly season. And they put... How many times of years that happened? A ton. It's four times just in the season, just in Michigan. Right. I mean, at in Wisconsin, Minnesota, it's a lot. 150 people every year, yeah?

So many. It's a lot. So then they filed Judy into the hunting deaths. They said Judy was walking her dogs last weekend and they have a whole thing. She was the fourth hunting-related fatality in Michigan this season from the Associated Press. So that was the whole, that's how it worked. Even the prosecutor in the area said, you wanted to think this was an accident. Poor Judy.

You know, she was walking the dog and someone took her movement or something and it happens. All the time. December 2nd, 1992, so three days after the shooting, the cop returns to the Blake House to talk to Dale and David specifically. He's because these are guys that were with Bruce. He wanted to know who could account for Bruce for the entire afternoon. He said, we wanted to interview David and Dale Blake, and we wanted at this point, we would be very specific in our questioning and try to determine who could say, determine who it was that could say where Bruce was that entire afternoon. They said that Bruce was with them all morning, but then in the afternoon time, when

Judy would have been shot, neither man could say where he was. He wasn't with them. Disappeared on us. Disappeared. So at this point, though, Judy's parents are completely backing Bruce and think the police are being dicks and keep bothering this poor man who needs to take care of his young daughter. It's very, very rude.

It is. So the family, yeah, Mary Ann said, or one of the cops said, Mary Ann said, quote, I just feel that you folks have made a horrible mess of this investigation. Basically, now you're trying to blame Bruce for. You're really fucking it up, guys. Yeah. And, you know, the cops said they supported Bruce 100% right away. In fact, they weren't real happy with the police because the police were zoning in on him.

So Bruce takes an extended leave from work, which if you have a toddler and a dead wife. You're allowed. Yeah. That's normal. Starts going on ski trips, which is strange. That's not allowed. That's not allowed unless you're teaching your toddler to ski. That's fine.

Bonding. Yeah. He may, I feel like he's just in some lodge somewhere, sipping hot cocoa waiting for the chicks to come in off the fucking slope, though. Yeah. Over tipping the bartender. Yeah. He happens to have great snow bunny tits.

He made frequent visits to his in-laws, hung out with them. Within a few weeks of the funeral, though, he asks out, Judy's childhood friend, who I think works at the hospital too. This is Leanne Jessop. And the cop said Bruce's demeanor was completely out of character for someone that should be a grieving widower. That didn't seem right at all. No, within a few weeks of the funeral, you should not be asking your wife's friends out on dates. That's weird.

Sorry. That's just strange. Especially ones they've known their whole life. That's so weird. Then there's something really weird. Bruce drives, this is days after the funeral, Bruce drives to Gail's house, remember Gail, the woman he was obsessed with,

with boxes of Judy's clothes. Oh? And just leaves them on the porch. He said he showed up here with about five, this is according to Gail, with about five boxes of sweaters and clothes and just put them on my porch. You know, it was at the holiday time

and we were busy and I just never paid attention to him and left him in there. Wow. Apparently, it gives her the clothes. So the boxes sat out on the porch. She just basically ignored them, just like she ignores everything with this guy. Left the boxes sitting out there? Just sitting on the porch.

So then, according to Gail, Bruce started telling Gail that he expected a financial windfall from Judy's death from this life insurance. So he's like trying to up his stock, like, I'm going to have some money pretty soon. You know, might want to get on this train before it leaves that station. So December 11th, 1992, Bruce comes in for a formal interview in the police station. This is the first one that's not like in a living room. And they said Bruce produced the names of close to 30 people that had seen him at different points during the day. But there was a window during the early part of the afternoon that Bruce could never come up with anybody to alibi for him. They said there became a very clear chunk of that day that was in the time period that we believe she died.

that his time was unaccounted for. Then they found a witness who had seen Bruce hunting alone in the area of the shooting as well. Oh. That's not good for old Bruce here. Then December 13, 1992, here comes Marble Dan. Who's that?

Marble Dan is a 42-year-old local copper mine employee when the copper mine was still open before the old Smurfett closed down. I thought it was a character I was supposed to know. I was like, uh-oh. This is old Marble Dan. His name is Dan Cass. but everyone calls him Marble Dan from now on.

He's an amateur metal detecting expert as well. Oh, love those guys. And he's helped police with his metal detector before find shit. So he comes in, goes into the woods alone. He has a slingshot, some marbles, and a metal detector. Okay. It's got a very primitive yet effective ways here. Okay.

So he said, well, it's a big area. It's like finding a needle in a haystack. I knew the bullet was there. It was just a matter of time. and getting it in the right place. Well, yeah, like a needle in a haystack. Right. So he searched three times

the metal detector finds nothing. And he said, once the snow comes in and starts settling, because winter's about here, the bullet's going to be gone until at least spring, if not forever, if it seeps into the ground. So he's out here.

Now he brings everything. And he said, I wanted to find this thing before winter really set in for good. So I devised away with my slingshot. He stood where the shot would have come from and fired marbles at the blaze mark on the maple tree and then watched where they bounced. Okay. He said, after they hit the tree, they all ricocheted into the same general area,

and it gave me more confidence that's approximately where the bullet should have landed also. So he takes his metal detector to where one of the marbles landed and clears away the leaves and everything and gets a hit on something and finds a crumpled fucking bullet. Wow. This fucking marbled hillbilly up here just completely came up with his own science and did it beautifully. That's an amazing experiment too because a bullet goes so much faster than a marble, but somehow energy dissipates from it exactly this age. It's so strange. It's so weird.

So from that day forward, everyone called him Marble Dan. So it goes to the crime lab. It's a flattened 30 caliber bullet. Under the microscope, they saw fibers on its surface. The fibers matched the clothing Judy was wearing when she died. So this thing went through her off the tree and ended up there. And the fibers stayed on. Because they're burned on.

They're singed on. Yeah. So then it dropped to the ground about 80 feet from her body. So they said, you could draw it from the height of where the bullet struck the tree to the height where the bullet went through Judy. We can show that a bullet passed through the body. at an upward angle because the entrance was an inch or inch and a half lower than the exit wound. So they said a long stray bullet from a distant hunter would have been dropping by the time it reached her, not rising.

That's more. Right. So they said based on the trajectory, we determined the shooter had to be in a direct line from the blaze mark across where the body lay straight back in this more dense wooded area right back behind us and probably not any further back than 100 feet. and they said less than 100 feet in the thicker cover on a straight line they said

it was a perfect shot that's what it was a perfect shot people up here know how to shoot rifles they're all hunters they're good at it so they compared the bullet

to the rifles found at Bruce's house nothing matched not of a match so they said we couldn't come up with a gun the right 30 caliber

class gun so that was a big frustration Bruce said he didn't own a 30 caliber gun but then police found a bank loan paperwork in which Bruce had listed under things of collateral, a 30 caliber rifle that he has. So they're like, well, either you committed bank fraud or you

lie to us, which one. You used to have a 30 out six or, yeah, you're going to jail for this. Then it all happens. December 18, 1992. Gail goes to the cops and said she finally opened the boxes and I have something for you. She tells this, the ball guy, the Bob Ball, the detective. And he said, She said, I've got a letter here. I think you might want to take a look at it. The letter is written by Bruce, but as Judy. He's pretending to be his wife writing Gail a letter. In his own handwriting.

But it's Bruce writing. It's amazing. Okay. There's a bunch more to it, but he said, these are for you. Enjoy them if you can use them. After 14 years, we don't see things the same anymore. I guess Judy and Bruce here. At this point, you are the only woman he trusts.

And then this is the best. It really shows Bruce's full character here. P.S. Who do you think the P.S. is? You should probably fuck him now. P.S. He's incredible in the sack. Boom.

Bruce, you fucking idiot. That's an applause of stupidity that we have to give you. That's amazing. What a moron. Oh, my God. P.S. He's great. He's incredible in the sack.

I'm still coming. Still, it happens. It's been weeks, actually. It's still going to. Still just really fucking contracting. So he really is just the most proud person ever. Imagine being that proud of yourself. It's insane.

So basically this letter is purported to be Judy telling her, look, you should just fuck my husband. I don't think I'm done with him, but you should fuck him because he's really great. He's great. It's amazing. So Gail read the letter and said, you know, you read the letter and you just thought, this is crazy, you know. The P.S. on the bottom said he was incredible on the sack and, you know, you just laugh about it. Yeah, you do, as we all did.

And I hope all of you did as well. You don't even give it a chance. No. And Ball, the cop said this was the type of letter that one woman would not write to another woman, especially a woman she didn't know. We figured it right off the bat that Bruce was the author of that letter. That was like an explosion. the letter was critical.

And he said that letter was so freaking weird. And it is. That is weird. She found it in the arm of one of the sweaters. That's where he put it. tucked it in a nice one. Yeah. He said it's not illegal to be creepy,

but this goes toward motive and the underlying reasons for Bruce to get rid of his wife. Now, they do handwriting comparisons, and they know it's definitely not Judy's handwriting. It's inconclusive whether it's Bruce's or not, but it's certainly not Judy. All right.

So there we go. Now, then they find out he has a shitload of insurance policies on Judy. Oh. Reaching $321,000, which is a fuckload of money in 1992 in the middle of nowhere, Michigan. Yeah. Several of the policies carry double indemnity clauses, meaning if Judy died of natural causes, it pays out. But if she died in an accident, you get paid double. Double, yeah.

This is an accident, hunting accident. Super accident, yeah. Then in the winter of 92, going into 93, Bell has, or ball, he has all these, all this evidence, but still he's not sure how he, if he has enough evidence to convict yet. So he asked the women that Bruce was bothering at work to report back to him what he did. So Gail agreed to log every call in conversation and that Leanne woman did too. So Gail said, Bob asked us if he would document phone calls and any interaction with him. Was it going behind his back? Well, if he had nothing to be guilty about, it wouldn't hurt him, you know?

It could be helpful. Leanne said that a few days Bruce took her to dinner and started talking about Judy's death. So she thought, she didn't know it was like a date. She thought it was like, you know, whatever, a friend. She said he picked up a napkin. He took this napkin out and he proceeded to draw a picture how Judy was shot. And I knew from that moment on that he was. was the one that for sure did it and I was scared to death. All I could think of was how the hell

to get out of there. Yeah. So she said she couldn't take the napkin with her because it would have been suspicious and she was afraid. So she described it to Ball and Ball said that the sketch matched the shooting perfectly. Leanne said that quote, I would have this same nightmare, this repeating nightmare. There was Judy and Elise and I running through the same woods trying to run away from Bruce. I would have it. I would wake up in the sheet. I would wake up in the in sweats and cry and be scared to death. You put yourself with the wife and daughter. You're really wanting to, you really think highly of yourself here, don't you?

Now, the Blakes, who had called the investigation a horrible mess, had now started to turn away from that and start to think the proofs was the guy that did it. Early 1993, they're asking him to take a polygraph. Like, just take a polygraph and we'll get you out of here. He said, well, I already took one privately and passed. I did a private polygraph. So I didn't trust myself. So I got a guy to do one for me.

I'm good. Trust me. So the detective said, well, what's his name? And will you sign a release? He said, no problem. So they call the guy, the polygraph guy. And the guy said, no, he didn't pass, number one. It was inconclusive.

He didn't fail either. It was inconclusive. But the examiner said that when he went to get Bruce from the waiting room to do the test, he was passed out in the waiting room. He said he had to kick him in the leg. a few times to wake him up because he believed that Bruce took something before the test so he keeps his heart rate

down. We left him sitting a little too long and he napped on us. People do that all the time with lie detectors. If you take drugs, it fucks them all up. Then April 23rd, 1993, Bruce is back at the police station. He agreed to a state police polygraph

and he does it. Now, the lieutenant who's giving him the polygraph told him that your statements appear untruthful. Then they put the sweater letter on the table. Oh. And explain that, by the way, Gail's been working with us. Just so you know.

We found your sweater letter. They said, we could see it had a tremendous effect on Bruce. Then he realized here she's working with the police, but it just kind of choked him up. Then he started to cry. Then he said he shouldn't say anything more without an attorney. And so the cops told him, you don't have to say shit. You just fucked everything up. so we don't care.

And then he started talking. And he said, I did it. Fine. You're right. He admits it. Really? I used a 30 caliber rifle, he said. He said afterwards, I took it apart and I threw it in the Ford River.

That's why he couldn't find the rifle. It's in pieces in the river. They said, why did you kill your wife? And he said, she threatened to divorce me. I didn't want to give her half. Half of the debt? There's nothing. She was going to take half of a half of a half.

everything, what little he had. Those were the words he used. What little he had. That's what the cop said. His exact words were, she was a tyrant at work and she was a tyrant at home. So he said, I couldn't take it anymore.

Okay. And he also, quote, he said he killed his wife because she was a tyrant at home and a tyrant at work. She was not a good cook. Yeah, that came out too, the cop says. And she cooks like shit. Also, just saying.

Fucking burns everything. And they said this whole thing. That was Bruce's downfall. He was cheap. That's it. He was cheap and her cooking wasn't his favorite. Yep. And he gives an account.

He said the first time I put the scope on her, I couldn't do it. First time. Yep. He said, I put it up again 20 minutes later. He's just stalking her through the woods as she walks and she has no idea. The first time I put it on her, then 20 minutes later I put it on her again. I put it up again and I put it down. I put it up one more time.

I put it on her chest, closed my eyes, and pulled this trigger, is what he said. So he said he couldn't do it. So he stalked her through the woods. Think about that. 20 minutes later, she's in a completely different space. He had to stalk her like an animal. The prosecutor said he knew her habit. He knew she was going to be walking the dogs.

And he waited. She waited. She walked by one time. He just couldn't do it. Then when he said when she came back, I closed my eyes and I just shot and then I ran. He named the caliber, the disposal, the river. He said it was because of a shitty cook. She's a tyrant.

She's going to divorce me. And the book later on describes him as this was a guy who thought he was smarter than all the law enforcement types up here in the Upper Peninsula and that they'd never figure this out. So he's arrested. What the fuck? He's arranged for Elsie or Elise to stay with David and Yvonne Blake, her godparents, members of Judy's family. they go to the river, they search the river, they cannot find the gun. It's nowhere, so they don't know. It's in pieces.

But he is admitted to it. 1993 in July, he tries to recant. He said the confession, the confession was coerced. It was police pressure, exhaustion. He said he would have said anything to make him leave me alone. Then they go back to the roof. They climb the roof of the house with an 86-pound block and try. to make it fall off the way Bruce said that it did.

And so they said, no, even if you jump, the roof moves, the block doesn't move. Right. So they said, that didn't work. They said the first test is going to be with the block position right on the edge of the roof. They jumped on the roof. The roof flexed. The block stayed where it was. They concluded there's no way that the block went over the edge unless somebody pushed it.

He said, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out if I push something off a table. It's going to go out and fall. Right. So they do all that. Then they get another guy, a surveyor. He checks out the angles and distances between the body and the tree. It is not, that's not the common way they do it to get like a land surveyor to do it. But I guess it holds up if you do it right.

That's all you've got up here. That's all you've got. That's it. The prosecutor, by the way, is a 26-year-old woman. And she's on her own on this case. Yeah. This is her first big deal. Her office is in an Indian casino.

Like it's not. Not a lot. She called herself a one-woman show, youngest prosecutor in the state of Michigan by myself. And this was my first big criminal trial. And you should see her at Kino. She's amazing. She's incredible, Jimmy. I have no idea. He's got a seasoned defense attorney, Bruce does. So it's a big trial for the area. The prosecutor said, I felt the evidence was there to convict Bruce of Judy's murder. I felt a jury could easily find him guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. It was a pre- big case for the UP. I was told, oh, people are taking bets at the mill that you're going to lose this case. At the mill. They're down at the mill betting each other. So it starts. Bruce walks into the trial with holding papers over his face, which is pretty funny.

They said that the prosecutor said laid out all the evidence. The defense said it's deer season. He said, this is crazy. He goes, we all live in Michigan. we all know that what happens in the deer season. They said Bruce was arrested and charged with the homicide of his wife during hunting season, and he said it wasn't true. His wife died as a result of a hunting accident.

He said 700,000 armed people in 14 days are in the state of Michigan hunting. That's more than the standing army. Some of them are in the county. That's how many people. 700,000 people are out in the woods shooting? It's fucking crazy. They bring out the block on a dolly to show that, you know, how heavy it was and the fact that this couldn't be an accident.

They have, you know, all this type of thing. They bring the letter in. And they said this too, by the way. Somebody says, later on, one of the jurors says, that P.S. Certainly, I can't think of a woman in the world that would write a comment like that. I mean, at least not the ladies I know. I mean, they exist, but not up in the UP.

They've long... And they aren't writing it during a divorce to set you up. with new strange. It's not happening. And some clothes, too. Yeah. For your new strange. Also, you should fuck my husband and also try on the red cashmere. Yeah, you should check that out. He really likes that one. So while Gail was on the stand, he fell apart. One of the jurors said, I think everyone in the jury

saw that after viewing him for several days with no kind of emotion whatsoever, then this woman takes a stand against him, and he's an instant sobbing mess. It's definitely validated, not just her testimony, but his reaction was concrete. That's the moment he realized he's not going to fuck her. Yeah. And they said that, you know, here we go. The defense comes up and they put on no case. Oh, really?

Yeah. And the prosecutor said, I was ready for Castleman to stand up and start presenting a defense case. And he stood up and said the defense rests. And I was like, what? I mean, that happens a lot, but she doesn't know that probably. So now there's no witnesses, no case. The lawyer said that he told the court his witnesses.

had backed out at the last minute, afraid with the town would think of anyone who testified for Bruce. He said, if you're going to have someone who's hostile testify, and after all, it's not going to help you, your purpose isn't going to make the life of that potential, isn't to make the life of that potential witness miserable in small town USA. Closing arguments, they lay it out. They said that the defense says it's all forced, it's coerced, the confession. There's six detectives, four formal interviews, six informal. There's calls at work at home. Your house is searched twice. Your car is searched.

After a while, pressure gets to a person. Well, that would make me just want to admit to a murder I didn't do. He said, often I just want you off my case. I'm going to say anything that you want to hear in order for you to leave me alone. And he said, those of you who are combat veterans or prisoners of war might understand that. He wasn't held anywhere, though. He's going on ski trips. And in between it, he was inconvenienced with a fucking interviewer or two.

Well, he tried to bang people. No, breaking your ankles over and over again. No, six hours of deliberation. He has found guilty of first-degree premeditated murder and felony firearm use. Right. The jury foreman said, the clincher for me was when he broke down. I saw a shell of a man sitting there, you know, scribbling on a piece of paper. And the fact that the minute Gail opened her mouth, he was a mess.

It just kind of solidified his emotional attachment. to this woman and things just fell together. He never touched her. That's the other thing. She has never given him one iota of encouragement. But there was fantasy. And now it's shot to shit. Now, sentencing comes around.

You, sir, may fuck off two years for the felony firearm charge to be served first. Then, mandatory life without parole. So eat dicks. It's over. The defense attorney said somebody discharged a gun at a time. when it's lawful and everybody and their mother is discharging guns it's the last day the last minute the last hour there's only one more day to hunt 700 000 armed people in 14 days there's more than an army what was uh there what was there that day that nobody knows it's very difficult to prove a negative

so he appeals based on he said his core confession was coerced which it's not the chimney block he tried to say they shouldn't have had a whole you know thing in court about it um The surveyor wasn't properly qualified to testify about distances and angles. Ineffective assistance of counsel. It all comes out. It doesn't matter. So he also tries to fight about Elsie or Elise. God, I keep calling her Elsie.

Elise, who ended up staying with her godparents there and they adopted her when she was five. November 29, 2007, the 15-year anniversary, Mary Ann Blake dies, the mom, died on the same day. Really? At 71. Really? Yep. He's a dick in jail. Bruce and two other inmates have a federal lawsuit about secondhand cigarette smoke in prison.

He kill me faster. Who cares? Life without, motherfucker. He has a big thing. They said they were exposed to high levels of environmental tobacco smoke and that no separate ventilation or barriers are in place to protect their health. He needs a ceiling fan. Yeah. Then he files a thing saying that the.

staff is mean to him because he filed this thing and he wants to be transferred and all this shit. Anyway, 2011, all the claims he brought up are all dismissed. So he is number 235-252 at Lakeland Correctional Facility in Coldwater, Michigan. Still there. The book is called Hunt to Kill by Dave and Lynn Distal. Dave was a writer for his wife is from this area and did like a lot of the interviews of people from around this area. So he, I guess, was a Los Angeles Times sports writer and columnist for a long time. He's the ghostwriter of the book, Michael and Me, which was the book.

It's a famous book about Michael Jordan that talks about that he loves to bet and fucking gamble and all that shit. Michael Jordan. He's a ghostwriter of that. He hates that book. Yeah, that's that book. So that's pretty interesting. It was on Forensic Files in 2004, season 9, episode 2, Hunter or hunted. So there's that.

It was also an American Justice episode. There you go. On tonight in Michigan very quickly here before. It's a crazy fucking story. Through and through. Through and through. Definitely, wherever you are listening to this, give us five stars. It helps a lot.

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