True Crime All The Time - Charles Albright

Episode Date: September 5, 2022

Charles Albright was adopted at an early age by a husband and wife in Dallas, Texas. His adoptive mother, Delle Albright, was thought by some to be odd, and she was extremely controlling. She also enrolled Charles in a mail-order taxidermy course at a young age. It was during his years honing his taxidermy skills that he displayed a fascination with eyes.Join Mike and Gibby as they talk about "The Eyeball Killer" Charles Albright. He is thought to have killed at least four women. Charles was known to visit sex workers frequently, and when three of them turned up dead in the early 1990s, police knew they had a serial killer on their hands. This serial killer had a very unique signature in that he removed the eyeballs of his victims from their sockets. The police finally zeroed in on Charles Albright, but the evidence against him was mostly circumstantial.You can help support the show at patreon.com/truecrimeallthetimeVisit the show's website at truecrimeallthetime.com for contact, merchandise, and donation informationAn Emash Digital productionSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Hello everyone and welcome to episode 29 of the True Crime All the Time podcast. I'm Mike Ferguson and with me as always is my partner in true crime. Mike Gibson, how are you? Hey man, I'm doing good. Well, it's good to see you. Yeah, same here. I haven't seen you in a week.

It's been a long time. It has been a long time. 299. I know. Next week's the big one. It's a huge one. Or a big one. Yeah.

And I'll tell you, there's a lot of people that have been guessing. Nobody so far has guessed wrecked. I think there's even a voice. mail that we'll hear later with a guess. But, you know, I did want to make an announcement before we get in. This is something that you and I should have done a long time ago. But we decided to start a YouTube channel for true crime all the time. We're putting some older episodes out there really to try to find new people. Yeah. I think there's two point whatever billion YouTube users. Okay. Hey, if we can get some.

people to find us and then, you know, jump on the podcast bandwagon, that would be awesome. We would love it. So if anybody wants to help us out, obviously it doesn't cost you anything. Go find our site. At least subscribe. That'll help us in some way. Like and subscribe. Yeah. Like subscribe. I don't expect people to listen to anything because it's episodes they've already heard, but you could at least subscribe to it and maybe like a couple videos or something like that. Be awesome. All right. Let's go ahead and get into our. our Patreon shoutouts. We had Paula Motzni. Hey, Paula. She jumped up higher than our highest level. She's been with this for a while. That's awesome. Donna Russell. Hey, Donna. Rosie Abbott. What's going on,

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Well, thanks, Sue. Or mortashed. Or did that sound any different? No, it sounds the same. Okay. Jessica. Hey, Jessica. George Faulkner.

Well, hey, thank you there. Faulkner. Candy. Oh, candy. With an eye. Rinaframaran. I think it's from Ireland. Okay, I like that.

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Yeah, so appreciate all that support. We had two very generous donations this week on PayPal. One from Alan Holm. Hey, Alan. And the other one from Julie Young. Hey, appreciate that, Julie. So, yeah, we appreciate that very much. much probably came from the fact that the other week we said we had no PayPal.

Oh. Donations for like the first time in five years. Yeah, it was a long time. Yeah, it was a long time. But we very much appreciate it. All right. Let's talk about what's out on Unsolved this week. We are headed to Jamaica to talk about the unsolved murder of Ananda Dean.

So like you say, we're headed to Jamaica. We have a kidnapping turned murder and it's got a lot of twist in turns. in this one. Yeah, it's, it's interesting. I think people will find some of the, the particulars very fascinating. So it's out right now. Make sure you check that out. All right, Gibbs, are you ready to get into this episode of True Crime all the time? I'm ready. We're talking about a man named Charles Albright. And you know, we talk a lot about nicknames given to killers by the press. And this guy has a couple that are pretty interesting. He was called the Dallas Ripper, the Dallas Slasher, but probably the one that he's best known for

is the eyeball killer. Yeah, that sounds a little gross. Well, it's that one that will probably give some people the Willys. Albright got that nickname because he surgically removed the eyes of his victims. And I know a lot of people are very squeamish about their eyes. So, you know, we'll see where this one goes. This is also a case where Albright's conviction was based on circumstantial evidence, which has led some to question, I think, number one, just how many women he actually murdered. And two, did he murder at all? So kind of a strange case, a lot of really interesting facet.

Yeah. So let's get right into it. Charles Frederick Albright was born on August 10th, 1933 in Amarillo, Texas. When he was just a few weeks old, Charles was adopted by a couple named Fred and Della Albright. Fred was a grocer in Dallas. And Della, I've seen her listed as all kinds of different things. A teacher. Some sources said she was in real estate. Others said she was a stay-at-home wife. in the grand scheme of things, I don't know that it matters all that much. No.

According to an article in Texas monthly, the Albright's lived in the all-white middle-class neighborhood of Oak Cliff, which back during that time was a beautiful residential area across the river from downtown Dallas. Della told Charles that his birth mother was an exceptional law student, just 16 years old, who had secretly married a. another student and had become pregnant. This is all according to Texas Monthly. And apparently she said when the girl's father found out,

he demanded that she annulled the marriage and give up the baby for adoption. And if she didn't comply, he would cut her off from the family. They did that a lot back then, you know? Well, I think it did happen quite a bit. But this is also what she's telling Charles. I never actually saw in the reporting. where whether it was verified or not, Della Albright went out of her way

to make sure that Charles knew that she would never abandon him. All the sources, Gibbs said that Della doted on Charles, but she also exhibited some behaviors that some saw as odd. She kept goats in the backyard and apparently only allowed Charles to drink the goat's milk. Which is good for you. Sure.

You know, as far as milk, I suppose. Well, she told him that it was much better than cow's milk. And maybe it is, I don't know. I'm not an expert on milk. I've never claimed to be. I actually don't drink a lot of milk. It's not my favorite. But when Charles was a small child, she put him in girls' dresses and gave him dolls to play with. Some people might find that odd. Some may not. Maybe she had hoped for a girl. I don't really know. But there is no doubt. You know, this. woman doted on Charles to, you know, an extreme degree, but she was also very protective to the point of being extremely controlling.

That can have a negative impact on a child. Well, let's face it, there's a lot of things, right? That can have a negative impact on a child. I think there's a lot of things that could affect one person. And the exact same thing would not affect another person negatively. But I think where things got a little extreme is with Della's attitude towards germs and how that influenced her interactions with Charles. Texas Monthly reported that two or three times a day. She would change his clothes to keep dirt off him.

She was afraid, you know, that he was going to touch dog poop. She was also very afraid that he was going to get polio. Now, that was a real fear back then. Well, sure it was. But she took it as far as taking him to Parkland Hospital to see the polio patients locked in, you know, those huge iron lungs that they used back then. Yeah. And she basically told him, hey, if you get it, you'll spend the rest of your life here.

That Parkland Hospital was a famous hospital. Well, yeah, I was going to say, if anybody wonders why they recognize the name, that's where, that's where President Kennedy died. Yeah. It's where he was taken after he was shot. When he was less than a year old, Della put him in a dark room as punishment for chewing on her tape measure. When he wouldn't take a nap, she would tie him to his bet. When he wouldn't drink his milk, she would spank him. Well, that's what a lot of people did back then. Yeah, I don't think there's any doubt that a lot more spankings occurred, you know, back in the day. I mean, that far back. But even when you and I were kids, we've talked about it before, how often we got spanked. frequently. Spanking is one thing. And you don't know to what degree the spanking was tying a little kid down to the bed because they won't take a nap. Okay. You're getting extreme. Putting a kid in a very dark room as punishment. Okay, you're getting fairly extreme there. Yeah, for sure. And then I think

you have to look at all of these things as a whole, right? What do these things do or what could they do to a small child's psyche. You know, this kind of germ thing. Could it turn someone into a germaphobe? Yeah, I think it could. You have to be careful with that kind of stuff. Sure. I think you have to be careful about, you know, being too controlling about any one aspect or focusing on any one aspect. It's really one of the things I worry about with, you know, what we went through during the pandemic. You know, I think we already know there are going to be tremendous mental health repercussions as a result of that time period. But I'm wondering what that period of time did to small children, you know, as it relates to kind of fear of germs or a fear of catching something. I've read a ton of articles about toddlers who

spend essentially a couple of years, most of their life or a lot of their life, wearing a mask, and that had to form something. You hear about, you know, about, kids who after the mask mandates went away were scared to death of taking their masks off because they'd gotten used to them. They'd been told you have to wear them. It was almost like trying to take away a kid's security blanket. Yeah, it definitely gave them comfort. Made him feel safe, like you said. But it also removes their people skills. Oh, well, there's no, there's no doubt that you know, a lot of kids were harmed by either not being in school, you know, being separated, not learning some of those people skills, as you put it,

or just how to interact with people on a kind of an in-person basis. I already think we're struggling with some of that just because of all the technology. Yeah, without COVID, we were still headed in that direction, right? Right. Just kind of kicked it in a different gear. My youngest was talking on her cell phone the other day, and I was shocked because I never hear her do it. Yeah. It's all text and whatever, whatever app.

kids are using these days. So much of the reporting that I saw said there were several things that Della was extremely focused on when it came to young Charles. Number one was his education. She wanted him to excel in his education and she went to great lengths to make this happen. She made him practice to piano every day. She worked with him constantly on his academics to the point where he was able to skip a few grades early on. So a lot like you. Yeah. But I did have that one problem with second grade. Yeah, that took you two or three times. But once you got second grade, it was like, man, let's just fly this kid through. Absolutely. You know, well, when you have a, it's a score of 177, you know, it's going to happen. That's probably not even a real

thing. He probably just gave yourself away right there. It's true, man. Genius score. Now, the second thing I've already mentioned, that was cleanliness and making sure that Charles didn't catch any diseases. The third thing was how he treated women. And there was a lot in the reporting about how she openly talked to her young son about how aggressive her husband Fred was with her regarding the subject of sex. So apparently she wasn't about to let her son be the same way with women. Now, I'm not exactly sure how that conversation goes with the child. Hey, your father is always pawing at me every chance he gets.

I don't want you to be that way. Seems like a strange conversation to have with a small child. Very strange. As he started getting older, you know, going on dates, his mother would drive him on the dates. And she would even call the girl's parents ahead of time. Just to let them know that her boy would never be anything other than a gentleman. Okay.

Seems a little strange to me. I wouldn't want my mom to call my girl. friends, you know, parents saying, hey, don't worry, he's going to treat her good. Yeah. Don't worry. He's not going to try to put the moves on your daughter. Now, is it a bad thing to want your child to be respectful towards women? Absolutely not.

No. Yeah. You know, it's like a lot of things we talk about. To what degree do you go to, though? Can you take things too far? Yeah, of course you can. And obviously you can. So Charles was described as a bright kid.

I already mentioned that he skipped a few grades. He did well in school, and he was also a Boy Scout. So again, a lot in common with one Michael Gibson. Well, like you said, he's a very smart guy. Yeah, he is. Yeah. Or he was. Now, I think one of the big moments in Charles's life came before his teen years.

And that's when his mother introduced him to the art of taxiderm. We've had a couple killers on the podcast. Uh, familiar with taxidermy. Yeah. And this one's going to be real specific to what is going to come later. There, there was a lot of conflicting information about, you know, how this happened. She caught him killing small animals and birds. Some reports said that he was given a gun and he started shooting small animals and birds. Some just said that she caught him killing, you know, however it happened. He was into this. Well, and he got real into taxidermy.

So, you know, either way it happened, she chose to enroll him in a mail order taxidermy class. Not only that, but it was said that she was there by his side, helping him through the whole thing, sharpen his craft. And he apparently got very good at it to the point where his mom would proudly display his projects in the house. Wow. And then like when people would come over, she would take them over to like a cabinet or something and say, hey,

look what Charles did. And it was like birds, animals. People were like, okay, you know, I mean, whatever floats your boat?

Yeah. I think some people would say, okay, it's a little creepy. Everybody has to judge that for themselves. But I am picturing this woman saying, Charlotte, you got to come over.

You got to see what little Charlie did in, in stuffing this bird, it's just amazing. But I think where the taxidermy thing really plays in is with the eyes. You know, one thing that Charles definitely learned how to do was to remove the eyes of these birds without causing damage to the area around it. Now, we already said this guy's called the eyeball killer. Right. So obviously you can figure out that this is going to play in.

Here's his fascination. Yeah, he was, it was reported. that he was fascinated with the eyes. He would go down to like the local taxidermy shop and just be in there for hours looking over their selection of eyes. Now, myself, I've never been in a taxidermy shop. I'm trying to picture just a bunch of different eyes of different animals that you can choose from.

It's like these different glass eyes or something. Yeah. Yeah. They're not real, but they're made to look like the eyes of whatever animal. I guess you are doing the taxidermy on. Yeah. But his mom always said they were too expensive. So she made him use buttons from her sewing kit instead.

And you think there might be a little foreshadowing here. This kid's fascinated with eyes. His mother won't let him have them. So he spends all this time, you know, working on these birds to get them just right. but in the end they have no eyes. So a couple buttons that had to look weird. And I think it had to have been very dissatisfying to him.

You're going to spend all this time, but not get the eyes right. Right. So the whole thing doesn't turn out the way that you want it to turn out. So I think for the most part growing up, Charles Albright was a pretty good kid. It was really around the age of 13 when he started. getting into trouble. He was convicted of aggravated assault. It was also reported that he had his first sexual experience when he visited a sex worker

at the age of 15. And it resulted in him getting crabs. So just one more thing that you have in common with Charles Albright. I don't. I don't think so. But seriously, do you think that's something that he's going to remember later on when deciding on his victims. Well, absolutely he will.

First of all, who goes to see a sex worker at the age of 15? Yeah. Besides you and Charles Albright. And then secondly, it must have been an extremely traumatic experience. It's your first sexual experience. It doesn't go well because you end up, you know, extremely itchy. Yeah. Or so I've been told.

So as you know, not as you've been told. But no, I mean, I think that would cause some trauma to him. But it's definitely something for us to look back on, right? As we move forward into the heart of this case, after graduating high school at the age of 15, he enrolled at North Texas State College, but he was arrested his freshman year for theft. At 17, he served six months of a two-year sentence for theft and receiving stolen property after he got out of that, he enrolled at the Arkansas State Teachers College. But this guy was a thief.

He was constantly breaking into places, stealing stuff. Sometimes he would get caught. But I think more often than not, he got away with it. A number of articles wrote about a troubling incident at the second college where Charles cut out a girl's eyes from some photographs. Foreshadowing? A little bit, yeah. He put.

some of them on pictures of another girl that he then placed around campus. He also apparently just pasted some of the eyes around. And I think it was either the ex-girlfriend of one of his friends. I don't know. There was a little bit of confusion about who this girl was. Getting a little freaky. Yeah. I mean, it's freaky knowing what he's going to be accused of doing.

I think at the time people kind of laughed it off. They're like, oh, you know, that's just Charles. He was a pretty well-liked guy everywhere he went. This wasn't the type of, you know, person that we normally talk about who's withdrawn. And everybody kind of looks at him as though, oh, you better not tick him off because, you know, he's just kind of a ticking time bomb. He got along well with people. He was popular. So I think a lot of people just thought, you know, it's just Charlie being Charlie.

Yeah. But I think it's official, right? this guy had a thing for eyes. And it wasn't in kind of like that, oh, the first thing I notice about a person is their eyes kind of way. Because some people are like that. Right. They look at a person's eyes before they look at anything else, maybe.

He eventually got kicked out of this second college for theft. So he was smart. But he couldn't stay in school because he was just constantly stealing stuff, constantly getting caught. it's been reported that after he got kicked out of college, he just forged documents. He changed transcripts to show that he obtained not only his bachelor's degree, but a master's as well. At one point, I think his transcript even said he was working on a PhD. Wow. Just like that.

Well, I'm assuming it was a lot easier to do back in, back during that time frame. I mean, we all remember, I'm sure you did it too, where you take that F and turn it into be. I didn't need to. Now, what I did do is turn the three in my birth year into a zero to make myself 21 when I got to college. I'm going to tell on myself there because it was so easy back then. You know, it was just a little lamination. You just peel that up a little bit. Use a pencil. The next thing you know, you're 21. Just like that. I'm sure the statute of limitations has passed on on that. I think you're okay. Charles Albright married a woman named Betty Nestor when he was 20 years old. The couple were married for over 30 years. Now, I don't know what kind of husband Charles Albright was,

but either he had trouble holding down a job or he just wasn't really into working. I kind of think it was the latter. There were some reports that said, you know, most of his jobs lasted no longer than about three months. You know, we've talked about other criminals that just weren't into work. Well, what did we have a guy last week? We're 13 days in his entire life. Yeah, and his whole life. Or was that last week or the week before?

I don't remember. But, you know, if you're a thief, a burglar, and that's kind of your life, right? You spend a lot of time on that. Maybe you don't really value the nine to five. Yeah. because you're trying to make your money a little differently. But there was definitely a theme in this guy's life. You know, his wife, Betty, was a high school teacher.

And it seemed as though he was more than happy to live off his wife. Later we'll talk about him living off his girlfriend. But he did have a bunch of different jobs I saw listed. At one point, he made his own baseball baths. He like bought a lathe and just tried to create his own baseball bat. Just turn them right there in his garage. I guess so. He worked as a hair stylist in a salon.

I can do that. I'm sure you could. Yeah. I think you'd be good at it. He even dabbled as a high school teacher and a football coach. Now, obviously, he had to fake his transcripts and even fake his teacher's license and all that. But, you know, he's got a little bit of catch me if you can in here as well. Yeah.

Yeah. He's definitely flirting with the, uh, the process. He also worked as a, as a carpenter. At one point, they did catch. to the fact that he wasn't a real teacher. But also during this time, he was just on and off with his life of crime. He got caught forging checks. He got caught stealing a bunch of times.

But as with so many other criminals from back in the day, it seems as though every time he got caught, he just always got off with a slap on the wrist. He mostly got probation. And if he ever did serve time, it was not for very long at all. Yeah, and that's frustrating. I always wondered what would have happened if these guys would have spent more time in jail for the crimes they committed. Maybe they would have turned out differently. Yeah, I don't know.

It's hard to tell. But I do think, you know, you used the word frustrating. It is frustrating to look back at some of these cases and think, okay, you did this, you did that. And that's all you got. It's going to be even more frustrating as we go along because his crimes are going to get worse and worse. Charles's mother died in 1981 when he was 48 years old this same year, according to a Radford University timeline. Charles was accused of molesting a nine-year-old girl and he ended up accepting a guilty plea.

Then in 1985 at the age of 51, he pleaded guilty to engaging in deviant sexual intercourse with a girl under the age of 14. For this crime, he received a sentence of 10 years probation. 10 years probation. Yeah. For that crime. On top of the other crime that he just pled guilty to a few years before. That, that's a crime itself right there. So it's like get in trouble, get probation. That was this guy's life. So, you know, as we've talked about before, where is the deterrent? Right. Or what is the deterrent when you're committing what we all view as extremely serious crime? And you're just out free.

Now, you're on probation. I get it. But you're not spending any time behind bars. No. Man, if I'm the family of that girl, I am furious. Absolutely. You have to be. And he wouldn't even finish out the probation before he started killing.

Now, the next year in 86, his father died and left him about $100,000. Okay. Quite a bit of money in 1986. Sure. for sure it was. Yeah, what do you think that would be today? You know, it's going to be-bo, beepo, beep, bo, people, beep. $800,000.

Oh, I think that's way high. Do you? Yeah, I think that's way high. But you settle in somewhere in that $450 range? Yeah. I would feel better about that. Yeah. 800 seems very, very high.

It's not 1930. It's 1986. But maybe I had it envisioned it was invested with Microsoft. Maybe, maybe. When you do these, are you also factoring in the clap of 2008, the kind of tough times we're having right now. Yeah, I figure we pulled the money out and just some loan sharking on the side. Oh, so you got, yeah, you got other things that you would do. Jump that up a little bit. I got you. I got you. He also met and started a relationship with a woman

named Dixie Austin, but even though he inherited this money, it was reported that he was more than happy to let Dixie support him, just like he had done with his wife. Well, if it works, it works, right? And apparently it did work for him. It was like this guy just loafed around and he kind of skated through life. He seemed to have some type of spingali like effect on people. You know, was he that charismatic that he was just able to get, you know, these people, especially these women, just to support him while he sat around in his boxers, eating fruit loops. And what a dream. That is living the dream, I guess. And boxers and eating fruit loops. To some people. or for me that's Monday. That's just my normal Monday. He and Betty divorced the next year. I think it's pretty tough to stay married,

Givie, when your husband is already living with another woman. Yeah, I think you just have to say enough is enough time to move on. Well, and man, did she shed a bunch of dead weight? She was carrying this guy for what it sounds like 30 years or so.

All right, now he's somebody else's problem. can pay all his bills. You can buy his fruit loops. Yeah, I'm sure it could be relieving to some, you know, no longer you're financially responsible for somebody. Yeah, I mean, divorce is tough, right? Obviously, we all know that. On the morning of December 13th, 1990, Dallas police were called out and they found the body of 33-year-old sex worker Mary Lou Pratt. She had been dumped in a field. Her t-shirt and bra had been pushed up above her breasts. She'd been beaten and shot in the back of the head with what was later determined to be a 44 caliber pistol.

Texas Monthly wrote that the resident who discovered the body was so horrified by the scene because he was the first one to find the body. He ran back inside his house and brought back out a flowered bed sheet to cover the body. And I think that it would be kind of a first initial response. bonds for a lot of people. Okay, I found this. I'm going to call the police, but how can I leave this woman who's half naked? Right.

I know she's dead, but she's lying on the side of the road. You have to do the right thing and cover her up or something. What he believed to be the right thing. Now, forensically, is it the right thing? No. No, we know it's not. Right. But people don't always think about that.

No, it's all emotional, you know? I mean, you're thinking Poor girl needs to be covered up, not to be laying out there like that. People can just drive by, walk by and see. Gawk. You know, people are going to gawk as they go by in their car. I need to give this woman back her dignity, at least cover her up. And I get that. The New York Daily News reported that the Dallas pathologist who performed the autopsy on

Mary was shocked when she opened her eyelids. Mary Pratt's eyeballs were gone, removed with such precision, this is the way it was written, that it appeared when the lids were shut as if they were still in the victim's head. So imagine that as a pathologist, you get in someone to examine. Their eyes are closed. You're assuming there's eyeballs inside there. Absolutely. Would not think anything other than the fact that they have eyeballs.

Now, from everything I read, this would not have been something easily accomplished. There are a bunch of different muscles that would have to be cut to release the eyeball. And to do all of it without damaging any of the skin around the eye, it was as though this was someone with some real skill and know-how. I even read one article that said, you know, that's not even something that they would teach you in medical school. how to do. This is what would lead the press to call the perpetrator the eyeball killer. But that came later, though, because police didn't disclose this fact to the press at first. And because of this, the murderer actually didn't receive a lot of attention in the press early on. Yeah. And I could see where this would happen. It doesn't make it right, but you have a sex worker found dead.

And we know from the number of cases that we've done, the murders of sex workers don't get the same type of attention in the press as the murders of other individuals. It's sad, but it's true. Now, if that fact had been known that the woman's eyeballs had been removed with the type of precision that they were, that would have been a much bigger story. Yeah, because it's more interesting when you talk about something like that. It's going to grab the attention. Sick, but it's going to grab the public's attention. And it would sell newspapers. Exactly.

And that's what the newspaper people want. Exactly. That's what they care about. Almost two months later on the morning of February 10th, 1991, the body of 27-year-old sex worker Susan Peterson was found on the same road as Mary Pratt. She was found mostly nude and had been shot in the head, chest, and stomach. just like Mary Pratt, her eyes were closed. The Daily News reported that another Dallas pathologist examined Susan Peterson,

but experienced the same startling thing of finding empty space where this woman's eyeballs should have been. Now, both bodies were found in plain sight, leading the authorities to speculate that whoever had killed these two women wanted people to see exactly what he had done. Police still didn't release all of the details of the murders, but news started to spread, right? That there was some type of killer on the loose. Press dubbed this person, the Dallas Ripper,

the Dallas Slasher. Those were two of the names that were used. They got all kind of monikers going around. They do. What they don't have yet is the eyeball killer because that fact has not been released. Yeah. Then on March 19th, 1991, The body of 45-year-old sex worker Shirley Williams was found in plain sight on the road out in front of an elementary school.

This guy just doesn't care where he leaves the bodies. No, and I think even more so than that that he doesn't care, he really wants them to be found. He wants them to be out in the open, but in an area where they're going to be seen. Maybe he likes that shock and all. definitely he's not trying to make any attempt to hide the bodies. If anything, he's doing the exact opposite. Shirley had been shot in the head, but the condition of her eyes was much different than the two previous victims. The eyeballs had been removed, but not with the same type of precision.

It appeared to investigators as though the killer may have been interrupted. There were numerous cuts visible around the eyes. and the tip of an exacto blade was found embedded near Shirley's right eye. Just thinking about that makes my eyes want to water. Right. Because people don't like anything near their eyes or they don't want to think about anything getting near their eyes. No. And we're going to talk about the similarities and the differences of these cases because it's definitely going to come up.

But I think three women whose eyeballs have been removed, pretty tough. not to think they're linked. Now, you have this third victim where the precision is not there. It seems to be a little bit different. But I think they chalked that up to, okay, he didn't have as much time maybe as he needed or as he wanted. The tip that police needed came from a sex worker named Veronica Rodriguez. And she had actually given the police the information they needed a few months earlier. just after Mary Pratt was murdered. She told two officers that she had been picked up by a man who then tried to kill her, but she got away. She said it was a white middle-aged man with salt and pepper hair who had attacked her in South Dallas very close to the Mary Pratt crime scene.

But she was able to flee to the house of a man later identified as Axton Schindler. But here's the problem. The officers didn't believe her. because she was known to police and she was known to have lied about a number of things in the past. So that whole cry wolf kind of thing. Yep. Cry wolf or cry wolf, however you want to say it. I think the bottom line is she didn't have credibility with the police because she had a number of run-ins with them and had lied a bunch.

And Texas Monthly did report that Veronica. told a number of different stories to various people, including the police. First, she said she witnessed Mary Pratt being shot. Then she said a man had bragged to her about shooting Mary. Then she said she didn't know anything about it at all. She also changed the description of the man who attacked her from white to Hispanic to black. So she's all over the place.

You know, I didn't want to get too much into Veronica, but a lot of the articles that I were very unflattering to her. A lot of them talked about how the police believed that she, you know, was under the influence of so many drugs and had been for such a long time that they just thought that, that her brain wasn't working correctly. But this name, Axton Schindler, right, hit police radar. They weren't really sure how he fit into all of this. But when they checked him out, they learned that he rented a house from,

the deceased Fred Albright, a house which by this point was owned by 57-year-old Charles Albright. They also learned that Charles owned several properties around Dallas and two were very close to where bodies had been dumped. They're starting to close in. Sure. They're getting some good information. A deputy also recalled hearing Albright's name on a tip line from someone who said that her friend, victim Mary Pratt, had briefly dated a man named Charles Albright, who this woman said was a very nice man, but who was also obsessed with eyes

and had a large collection of Xacto blades in his attic. If someone says you're obsessed with eyes and you have this large collection of Xacto Blades, probably somebody you need to talk to. Yeah, I agree with you. I mean, at the very least, you might want to have a little convo with this person. According to Texas Monthly,

police also learned that a few months before Mary Pratt was murdered. Charles Albright had taken a job delivering newspapers in the middle of the night for the Dallas Times Herald. So I think, you know, by their way of thinking, this would have given him the perfect cover to begin killing. Especially if you find out that this is a guy who doesn't like to work, hasn't really had to work much over the past 30 plus years. He just all of a sudden decides he's going to take a job delivering newspapers at night.

Strange. According to the Daily News, 37-year-old sex worker Brenda White told police that one of her clients had tried to kill her and that she only got away by macing him in the face. She described her attacker the exact same way as Veronica. Rodriguez had, a white middle-aged man with salt and pepper hair. And both white and Rodriguez picked Albright's picture out of a photo lineup. The police have to feel good about this, right? You would think they would. Yeah, I would think so. I mean, these are two different women describing the same man, picking the same man out of a photo lineup, a man who has to be

on your radar because of all the things that have been said about him. So police arrested Charles Albright on March 22nd, 1991. It turned out he was a known customer to many sex workers in the Dallas area, but under interrogation, Charles Albright never confessed. He said he didn't know and had never met any of the sex workers the police were talking about. According to Texas Monthly, during a search of his properties, police found a stash of exacto knives, a copy of Gray's Anatomy, a bunch of guns, and at least a dozen books on true crime and serial killers. This guy's really doing his homework. Yeah, half of that I have,

so that worries me a little bit. Worse me a lot. I've got a lot of books on true crime and serial killers. But guess what? They didn't find any eyeballs, and none of the guns they found were linked as the murder weapon. But that didn't stop police with charging him with the murder of Shirley Williams. Police believed, though, that he was responsible

for the murder of Mary Pratt and Susan Peterson, as well as the 1988 murder of a woman named Rhonda Bowie. So they thought this guy was a serial killer. Sure, they did. Four murders under his belt, but they only charged him for one.

Even though there was a lot of conflicting information and articles on that, as well. Some said that they charged him with all four, later dropped three of them, but most of the things I looked at said that he was only ever charged with the one, the murder of Shirley Williams. I know that's all he went on trial for. So he's been arrested, he's been charged. Obviously, it hits all the papers. And papers listed Albright is a carpenter and part-time newspaper carrier. And as all right, as all right, as all always happens, Gibbs, after someone is arrested for, you know, some brutal murders.

The press, they go out and they talk to the person's neighbors. The Associated Press reported that some neighbors described Charles Albright as the gentlest man they'd ever met. A woman who lived next door to him called him a sweet person, who often cooked in his backyard and tended to his flower garden. She added that he was always pleasant and often gave candy to her three-year-old granddaughter. This was the same time that police were telling papers that he was a ruthless killer, who picked up sex workers, killed them, and then dumped their bodies on residential streets. Well, and the papers are telling the public.

So I always find it kind of fascinating that I get it as a neighbor. You know a person as X, right? however you know them. And these people were saying, this guy was great. All he did was cooking his backyard and tend to his flower garden. He even gave my granddaughter candy.

Okay. Yeah. So my question is, can you be both? Can a person be both? I think a person can be, and that's pretty scary. Yeah.

I think we've seen time and time again that at the very least, they can appear to be both. Right. They're doing all these bad things under the cover of darkness or whatever, but they're putting out something completely different to those around them. A Jekyll Hyde thing, you know. Yeah, either that or are they the bad person all the time, but they're smart enough to be able to mask it.

Yeah. To these people that they have to interact with day in and day out. That could be the case as well. And don't forget, you know, he was married. He's got a girlfriend at the time that these murders occurred. So I'm assuming he wasn't showing the monster to his girlfriend. So I think she was pretty shocked. Yeah. To find out that police thought he was murdering, you know, these women. Allbright's trial began in late November 1991. And, you know, really what the prosecution had was mostly circumstantial evidence. They brought a number of.

sex workers to the stand who had experiences with Albright. They testified that Charles Albright was a violent man. The prosecution also showed the jury autopsy photos of the women. And they really focused on the eyes and where the eyelids had been pried open to show nothing but empty eye sockets. Kind of makes me cringe when you say that word. But was it going to do to a jury? So it's making you cringe. You're sitting here in the comfort of the studio. Sure. Now put yourself in the place of a juror, right?

You're listening to all this kind of brutal testimony. You can see this guy. He's about 15 feet away from you. You know all the things that the prosecution is saying about him. And now you're forced to look at these pictures of these women who had their eyeballs cut out of their sockets. It's going to be a tough lunch after that. Yeah, no doubt. The AP reported that the prosecution also called an FBI expert on serial killers who testified that the Dallas slings were unique and noted that they ended when Albright was arrested in March. So again, we don't have everything

that was in the trial. We never do. You know, I look at what we do know. And I say, okay, all of this is good. But does it? prove that Charles Albright murdered anyone. And I think, you know, that's the question that we have to keep asking ourselves, the thing that we'll be discussing at the end of this case as well. The prosecution did introduce hair evidence, hairs from the victim's body that they said were forensically similar to hairs obtained from Charles Albright. According to Texas Monthly, the experts also testified that hairs found in the bed of Albright's pickup truck were similar to hairs found on the bodies of the first two victims, Mary Pratt, and Susan Peterson.

And they testified that hairs found in his vacuum cleaner, matched the hair from Shirley Williams. Experts said they were also able to match hairs from Albright to a blanket and a yellow raincoat found out in a field. A sex worker testified that on the night Shirley Williams was killed. She was wearing a yellow raincoat in that Charles Albright had taken this woman to this exact field before for sex. Really not looking good for him. It's really not.

But here's what I want to talk about, the hair evidence. When you start using the words similar. Yeah. Or forensically. similar or microscopically similar. You know, I think we've seen now how really kind of vague that term was back in the day. Now, to a jury, you've got a bunch of experts who are saying, this match is this, this matches that.

It doesn't look good for this guy. Yeah, but as a defense attorney, you have to really point out that what does similar really mean in this case and try to put a big gap in that. Yeah, for me, it's one of the biggest words in this case, similar. Yeah. Well, you and I are similar in a lot of ways. Sure, but different in a lot of ways, too. But we're not the same.

We're not the same. We don't match. No. And so, you know, it's that word that I think a lot of people latch on to when they take a look at this case. Albright didn't take the stand. And his attorney told the jury that the evidence against him was very thin and completely circumstantial. They also tried to put the blame on Axton Schindler for the murders and said police still didn't know what role this guy played, if any, in the whole thing. And this was kind of really true.

Police still didn't know whether or not Schindler played any type of role. You know, I think they looked at him. They thought, okay, could he have committed the murders? Could he have aided Charles Albrighton committing the murders. They couldn't find anything. It was reported that police showed Schindler's photo to many different sex workers, and not one of them said that they had ever seen him before. Well, I mean, the defense attorney has to try to put the blame on someone else. Yeah, and in this case, it happened to be this guy,

Axton Schindler. Again, I still don't know what, if any role he had in any, of this. But, you know, I do think if you have a person who's out killing sex workers and you bring a whole bunch of sex workers in, they say, no, I never seen that guy. Okay. Does it mean he couldn't have been? No. But does it make him look like he most likely probably wasn't involved? I think it does to some degree. It's hard to argue the other way. Yeah. I mean, you know, at least with Charles Albright, everyone seemed to know him. He visited a number of. of these sex workers.

You know, he knew them. He knew the area. The jury deliberated for about five hours before bringing back a guilty verdict against Charles Albright for the murder of Shirley Williams. The Associated Press reported that Albright appeared emotionless throughout most of the trial, slumped forward slightly, and that he stared at the floor as the verdict was read. He was sentenced to life in prison, which was the maximum. he could receive at that point.

And I think that's because the prosecution, they didn't go after the death penalty. I think they could have. They chose not to. So the maximum he could get was life. He was also fined $10,000. Good luck getting that money. Yeah, I don't know how they're going to.

He did have some assets, though, so. Maybe they could. Maybe they could get it. He wasn't destitute. It was said in papers at the time that he would be eligible for parole in 15. years. Albright's attorney Brad Luller told the press after the verdict, it's always a miscarriage of justice when an innocent man is convicted. You think defense attorneys think all of their clients are

innocent or do they just have to say that after they lose? I think they just have to say that after they lose. Now, I'm sure there are some who truly believe that they're defending an innocent person. Yeah. I mean, what he said is true. Oh, yeah, there's no doubt. just doesn't apply to this guy. Or does it? Well, that's what we'll have to figure out and what everybody listening will have to figure out. Exactly.

The Dallas Morning News reported that a source told the paper, no one believes this guy just woke up one morning and started killing sex workers and cutting their eyes out. Maybe now that he has been convicted, he'll talk. So I took from that that, you know, they're saying, you know, how many more people has this guy killed? other than the four we believe he's responsible for. We only got him for one of the murders.

But as far as I could tell, Charles Albright never did talk. He was housed at the John Montford psychiatric unit where he died at the age of 87 in 2020. There really was very little about him. Yeah. You know, there was some articles written about him

in the last, you know, four to ten years, but there wasn't anything new. It was all kind of a recap of the case and what had happened. So as we wrap up this case, you know, I found it to be pretty fascinating for a number of different reasons. You know, you have this guy who was in and out of trouble for most of his life. There's no doubt in my mind. He had a very strange fascination with eyes. He visited sex workers in the area where these women were killed, but did he kill them? And maybe a more apt question is, did the state have enough evidence to prove that he killed Shirley Williams? You know, like I've said throughout, there was a lot of conflicting reporting.

Some outlets said he was charged with all four murders. Some said just one. I think when you added all up, I can see where a jury came to the conclusion that they did. The question I have is, could you convict someone on that same evidence today in 2022? Just don't know if you could. I don't think you could either. I don't know with everything that has come out about hair analysis and things like that. At the very least, I think it would be much tougher. I think it's been proven that a lot of people were convicted, you know, based on hair analysis where one expert said, this is microscopically similar to the other. I think you and I have even talked about it before. I remember one case where, you know, that was said by an expert. And then later on, they figured out

that it wasn't even a human hair that they were comparing. Yeah. To it was like a fiber or a dog's hair or, you know, something like that. Well, how can it be microscopically similar? And just exactly what does that mean? Right. Because they didn't have the technology, I guess, to say, this matches that. Now, that's not to say that I believe Charles Albright is not a killer. It's more of a question of did they have the evidence to conclusively say that he killed, at the very least, Shirley Williams. It's a question. It's, It's hard for me not to think that at least the three women that we talked about the most were not killed by the same person. I mean, the cutting out of eyeballs is a pretty specific thing. Kind of reminds me of those sisters we talked about back in the day.

Poppin? Yes. Poppin? Yeah. I forget exactly how you say their names. Yeah, that it also reminded me a little bit of that movie Red Dragon, where Ralph, is it Ralph Fines, is that his name? He was the bad guy, right?

And he would go in. He would cut open the eyelids so that the people were looking at him, I think. Oh, yeah. Yeah. It was kind of freaky. Yeah, it was really freaky. Yeah, I don't know. I just found it a fascinating case overall, you know, given his history, given, you know,

this strange fascination with eyes, it's kind of hard to believe that he was not involved in these murders. And I hate the second guess a jury. I don't like to do that because we weren't there and we didn't get to hear everything they heard. Sure. I guess for me it's more of a referendum on some of the hair analysis that was used 30, 40 years ago. And we now know that some of that was not correct. And they never did figure out what happened to the eyeballs. Yeah. This is a freaky thing, man. I think when you think of eyeballs, because you can actually relate to it, you know, when you think about... Why?

Because you have eyeballs? Because you have eyeballs. And because, you know, how much something can hurt, you know, your eyes. I mean, you could scratch my arm. I'd be like, okay, you scratch my eye, you know, it's a different type of pain. So I think about, you know, what that would have felt like, you know, even if, you know, and what it must have taken to take the eyeballs out too. Just how gruesome is that to go into somebody's eye and pull that out and remove it.

Yeah, the other thing that I wondered was where did the perpetrator or Albright do this at? Yeah. Did he really try to do it at the scene where he left the bodies? Because we talked about how public they were. Or did he do it somewhere, you know, behind. and close doors and then transport the bodies. That seems like a more logical conclusion. But as a killer, to take the eyes,

that's one way to get the attention of police, the public, right? More so than just killing someone. Well, and if we think about trophies, let's assume that the eyeballs were trophies. Yeah. It's kind of, you know, one of the most macabre type of trophies that, you know,

you can think of because I could, picture this guy putting these eyeballs on a shelf. Yeah. And he's literally looking into the eyes of his victims. How scary is that? Very scary. That's it for our case on Charles Albright. We got some voicemails Gibbs.

You want to check those out? Yeah, let's hear those. To say about how we've been to do coming out of prison, they don't offer programs for people in prison. They say they do. They do not. Once you've been in prison, it is very hard to come back for it. It is a lifestyle.

It's not a place that you're put in. into it becomes a lifestyle for these people. So being there longer than he has it, he has a huge uphill battle. And I feel like people don't always give to a lot of been in prison enough credit for what they have facing them when they leave. They just think that everyone that went to prison is a terrible person and they deserve to be there and that can't be further from the truth. So I hope that this has another light on it.

And thank you. I love listening to your podcast. Bye, guys. Yeah, I've actually heard that before, Gibbs, from some people who have been in prison. Now, does it depend on what you were in prison for? People make mistakes. And, you know, my thought has always been if you're sentenced and you do your time, you come out with a clean slate. The problem is, I don't think a lot of people look at it like that, kind of along the lines of what she's saying. Sure. It's harder to get a job. It's harder to do that. It's hard to do everything because, of

of the stigma of having been in prison. Hey, gentlemen. This is Al from Calgary, a long-time listener, but first-time supporter. I decided to stop being a freeloader. Anyway, I love you guys. I fall in age-wise somewhere between you two, so sometimes your pop culture references is cracking me up. I do have one suggestion.

I know you guys got a lot of friends up here in Calgary and a lot of friends in Canada, but I don't know if you've ever heard of the story of Nick Raspberry. and the stuff that went down between him and his neighbor a couple of doors down. You know, these guys were getting along with their wives. The wives go to bed. One guy winds up dead. Kind of a cool story. So please look into it.

Other than that, you guys are awesome. And, you know, keep your own time taking. Cheers. Cool. That's, you know, at first that sounded like a Wednesday night for you, Gibby, until somebody turned up dead. but no, I've never heard of that story. So we'll check that out. And we do have some amazing friends in Calgary.

We do. My guess for the Big 300 is Albert Fish. If not, I really, really hope so. Thanks, guys. You're going to take you back. So I think I mentioned it on Patreon or maybe it was on Patreon. A lot of people guessing what is episode 300. Yeah.

Nobody's got it yet. And I will say it's not Albert Fish. So he's going to be disappointed. We will do Albert Fish. He's been on the list for probably since 2016. We just haven't done him yet for some reason. But you're close. You're close.

Yeah. You're in the ballpark. Obviously, we know it's a bigger type killer. Yeah. And so people, I think, are just going to be surprised by who it is. Don't give up, man. Yeah. Keep trying.

Don't give up. Don't stop believing. We did have one thing in the mailbag. Kim Federico sent us in some really cool tie-died shirts that we're actually wearing right now. Yeah. Because we've worn them for the Patreon video. Good quality shirts.

They are. They're very nice. And she sent them from her company, Sun and Moon Creation. So we appreciate Kim. She's a Patreon supporter. And that was nice to send some stuff in for us. I look very...

Masculine. Yeah. Was the word that came to mind for me. Was that what it was? Yeah. Okay. It looked very... You look very rugged, masculine, Jason Bournish, if that's even a word.

All the, I'm just pumping your ego up because these are all the things that you like. I feel like I'm ready to go to Yellow Springs is what I was going to say. Well, that too. We'll go see Dave Chappelle and I'm sure he's over there in Yellow Springs. Oh yeah. Yeah, he lives over there. That's where he lives. Yeah.

All right, everyone. That is it for another episode of True Crime all the time. So for Mike and Gibby. Stay safe and keep your own time ticking.