True Crime All The Time - John List

Episode Date: January 24, 2022

In 1971, John List murdered his entire family. Beforehand, he took a number of measured steps to help ensure that they would not be discovered too quickly. This allowed him to flee and assume a new identity. List spent the next 18 years living under this new identity and even remarried. It took the help of the America's Most Wanted television show to finally bring him to justice. Join Mike and Gibby as they discuss family annihilator John List. The details of what List did to his family are difficult to comprehend. But, the reasons he gave for the massacre are equally tough to believe. John List thought he was smarter than everyone else and he always wanted to portray the air of a wealthy man. But, when he couldn't keep that going, he decided to murder his entire family to keep them from having to go through the pending financial hardship.You can 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 267 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, give you what's going on, man? Hey man, I'm doing good. How about you? I'm doing great. Yeah. My family is home from like a little visit to Chicago. Yeah, a little Chicago windy city. Yep. Yeah. Girls weekend. They had a good time. But they're back. So I like that. I like, you know me. I like when everybody's together. You do. I've started my new. fitness regimen for 2022. Yeah. Riding my bike, lifting a little.

So I'm feeling pretty good about that. Okay. My goal is to lose, you know, some weight before Las Vegas. All right. And so I got to keep with it, man. So you're making the right steps towards that. Yeah. I just need you to help keep me on track.

Well, quit buying all that good food you buy when I come here to pre-record. One night a week. One night a week. Yeah. Let's do our Patreon shoutouts. We had Corey Keypins. Hey, Keypins. Candice Mill House jumped out

to our highest level. Thank you, Candice. Brett Bruce. Hey, what's going on, Brett? Jillian Turner. Hey, Julian. Grant Everhart jumped out to our highest level. How are you doing, Grant?

Cheryl Vincent jumped out at higher than our highest level. Wow, thank you, Cheryl. We had Sue Hanson. Well, thank you, Sue. Brooke Shaw. What's going on, Brooke? Mary Ann Hall jumped out to our highest level. Hey, Marianne.

Tanya Castillo. Marilyn Hines. Hey, what's going on, Heinz? Manningai Campbell. What's going on, Manchi? And then last but not least, Wendy Burke jumped out of our highest level. It's windy. We were. We just talking about the Windy City, too.

We were. And then if we go into the Vault Gibbs, this week we selected Barrett Nilsson. Well, thank you, Barrett. So Barrett's a huge fan of the show. We appreciate all the Patreon support that we get. We had some great PayPal donations. Michaela Hall gave a sizable donation. Wow, thank you, Michaela.

We had Katie McCormick. What's going on, McCormick? Natalie Ryling. Well, at an ass, it's reasoning. I just wanted to point that out. And Omar Romero Baza. Well, thank you, Bazan. So we appreciate all the support.

Gibbs right now on True Crime All the Time Unsolved. We have an episode out on the 2006 murder of 17-year-old Candice Hilds. So we're headed to Colorado. Yeah, it's a good case. Jump over there and take a listen. Candice was a very intelligent young woman and had a great future ahead of her. unfortunately some tragic events happened and we're dive into those yeah so make sure you check that out all right buddy are you ready to get into this episode of true crime all the time i am ready

we are talking about the infamous family annihilator john list that's a big case it is a big case you know we kind of go back and forth right we do some of the lesser known which i know people really like but i think they also like it when we do some of the more well known from time to time you know, from the outside, the list seemed like a perfectly normal family living in the city of Westfield, New Jersey. There's that Westfield, New Jersey. Yep. The watcher of Westfield. And really, you know, the list case came up in that episode, but it's come up in a number of cases. Sure has. That have occurred in New Jersey. John List was an accountant. His wife, Helen, stayed at home. The children attended the local school and they were active in sports in the theater.

They went to church. And I think, you know, their neighbors and all their friends viewed them as good people, religious people. But in reality, a storm was brewing within the family. And it all came to a breaking point on November 9th, 1971, when John did the unthinkable. He murdered his entire family and then he fled town. John was on the run for 18 years before reality TV. finally brought him to justice. So there's a lot, right? In this case that we're going to cover,

number one, just the idea of a man murdering his entire family. That's hard to grapple with. And then, you know, for him to be able to evade the law for 18 years. Yeah. Kind of amazing, really, if you think about it. Sure. And then to be caught by the publicity that was generated by a television show. This case has a lot of different facets. Yeah, it really does. And I think a lot of people will recall some of those. Oh, yeah.

I mean, this was something that definitely played out in the media, especially at the end when he was captured. John Emile List was born in Bay City, Michigan, to parents John and Alma List. His father was 61 and his mother was 38 when he was born. John was raised in the Missouri synod section of Lutheranism, a group of German heritage. So, okay, his mom and dad had a pretty big age disparity. Yeah.

I've heard of men having children in their 60s. It happens. It can happen for sure. I'm not going to be one of those men. And your wife's not going to be one of those women. No, no, absolutely not. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with it at all. No.

What I'm saying is for me. Right. I can't imagine being 80 years old at the time that my son or daughter graduates from high school. I feel like that would be so strange. And the second thing is I just don't have the energy at my age now, let alone 61 to go back to getting up, changing diapers, running around after. a toddler who's getting into everything. I just couldn't do it. Well, this, just be honest, you wouldn't be changing the diapers anyway. I changed a lot of diapers. Yeah. Well, this time around, you wouldn't be changing any of diapers. No diapers. No diapers.

Growing up, John was a loner. You know, he played by himself. He really didn't talk to anyone outside his family or the church. His parents discouraged him from participating in worldly activities like dancing. What is this footloose? And we've got a footloose situation. Yeah, it's a Footloose 1 or Footloose 2? I don't know. I never actually saw the remake. I don't think it was called Footloose 2 though. No, it wasn't.

I think it was just called Footloose. It was just a remake. I never actually saw that one. But John said that he was resentful of his parents for how strict they were. He said that his father was cold and distant. His mother was doting, but he said that she was smothering. He had one parent that was at one extreme. and his mom was the other.

Yeah, I mean, you could see how somebody might be resentful, right? I'm not allowed to dance. I can't participate in, you know, certain types of activities. And then I'm not getting any attention from my father and I'm getting too much attention from my mother. Right. Yeah. It is basically what he was saying.

John served in World War II as a private. He also served in the Korean War as a reservist. he left the army with the rank of first lieutenant and he earned a bronze star in world war two he was also held as a po w while fighting in germany so kind of impressive he had a pretty good uh war record you'd have to give him that john met his wife helen taylor in 1951 she was a widow and a single mother from virginia that's where john was stationed as an officer during the korean war Helen announced that she was pregnant just one month into their courtship. And then as soon as they finalized their wedding plans, she confessed to John that she wasn't

actually pregnant. Uh-oh. I'm not sure how well that went over. I'm thinking maybe not as well as you would think it. Well, they got married. Yeah. So it couldn't have wrecked that part at least. There was another bombshell that Helen didn't disclose until after they were married.

and that was the fact that she had syphilis. See, that would be a pretty important part of the pre-marriage discussion. Honey, not only am I not pregnant, but I have syphilis. Well, apparently she got it from her first husband, never got treatment for it. And the reporting Gibbs, it said it was latent and no longer contagious, which that would be a big deal. Sure would. Helen suffered from severe lethargy. which progressed to brain atrophy as the years past.

She occasionally suffered from out hallucinations. Oh, because of the syphilis. I'm sure that had a lot to do with it. It didn't specifically say that in the reporting that I saw, but you've heard that before from people who contracted syphilis and ended up affecting their brain. After getting out of the military, John earned a bachelor's and a master's degree. and business administration from the University of Michigan,

or as we would say, that school up north. Yeah, exactly. Although they did beat us this year, so we can't really rub it in at all. Did they really beat us? They did. Yeah. The family settled in Michigan with Helen's daughter, Brenda.

Brenda got pregnant at age 16 and was sent to a home for unmarried mothers. That was pretty big back then. It really was, and that still surprises me that they actually did that back then. Yeah, they just, saw it as such a, what's the word I'm looking for? Such a bad thing. A negative. Negative thing that they didn't even want to be associated with their own daughter.

They didn't want their daughter in their home. So they, yeah, they would send them off to, you know, someplace until they had the baby. And it kind of stinks, really, when you think about it. Sure. That young girls were treated that way, kind of as a pariah. Yeah. John began a successful career as an accountant, but there was a pattern, Gibbs that would soon emerge in his life. John felt spiritually superior. He had problems getting along with others. He really couldn't hold

on to a job for more than just a few years. And he went into debt trying to live a wealthy lifestyle. Okay. He wouldn't be the first person to have that happen. Yeah, I think many people have been down that road. Well, a lot of people live above their means. It happens. They get into trouble financially doing it. You know, John had a high IQ, but it was also said that he was a perfectionist. But he also had trouble managing people, which is a problem if you're going to be in the business world.

Well, and he also couldn't make compromises. So, you know, those two facts are going to affect your career negatively. Now, I wonder how much of that comes from being a perfectionist, thinking that you're the smartest guy in the room. Okay. Do you then have trouble relating to the people that work for you so you have a hard time managing them? Is it hard for you to compromise when you're a perfectionist and you think you're always right? Yeah, it's a problem for sure. Yeah, a person that believes they're always right, they don't need to make compromises because they know they're right.

Just do it my way. No compromise needed. And those are people that are not fun to work for. They're really not. In 1961, John got his first taste of a wealthy lifestyle when he landed a managerial job with Xerox. Okay. Really good company back in the day. Sure was.

He went on company trips to Europe and he could then afford luxuries like Waterford Crystal. But John was fired in 1965 because he just. couldn't keep up. He just couldn't do the job. Well, when you're a perfectionist, it's hard to keep up sometimes, right? Because you're always worried that things have to be done a certain way and you won't move past that until you get exactly the way you want it. Yeah, I mean, think back about the job that we had, you and I and our time working together. There's a lot of deadlines, right? Things needed to be done by a certain time. If you have that perfectionist type of

mentality. Does it make it very tough for you to juggle all of these deadlines? Because you can't let this one thing go because you don't think it's quite yet perfect. And so you could sometimes maybe spend the whole day on one task that another person could do adequately in 45 minutes. Kind of goes to that. Who's got my monkey? You know, you're going to pass that around. Okay. Is that a real saying or is that just something you made up because I don't believe I've ever heard that. It's a real saying. Okay. We will go with that. So John got fired, but he landed an even better job. He was hired as vice president of the first national bank of Jersey City. Man, there you go. And this is when the lists moved to Westfield, New Jersey,

1965. At this time, John worked for the bank. He made a good salary. They purchased an old Victorian mansion called Breeze Knowles. And they paid $100,000 for the home. Wow, back in 65, that's a lot. That is a good chunk of money. What do you think that would be today? Be-bo-be-bo-po-po-poop. It's like a 1.2.

Okay. Yeah. I like that. I like that. You've been off lately with some of your calculations. I'm not going to poo-poo that one. Yeah, I wouldn't poo it. Okay.

Well, I won't do. Now, it was more than they could afford, even though he was making a good salary. but they wanted to live kind of a wealthy lifestyle. And I don't know if it was all of them or more so John, John and Helen. They put down $50,000 in the house. They borrowed $10,000 from John's mother, Alma. John remodeled the third floor of the house as an apartment for his mother. So if we just take a step back, right, things are going well.

Yeah, good job. family, nice new home in a very good neighborhood. We've talked about Westfield a number of times in different episodes. And actually kind of a prestigious job back in that time, right, to be a VP of a local bank. So you're saying it wasn't a prestigious job like three or four years ago? I'm just saying sometimes they pass out VPs, like, you know. Like just giving them out like candy? Yeah.

All right. I agree. So they had this neighbor Harry Devlin and his son Dave. They went over to say hello to the new family. Harry had painted a mural inside the mansion for the previous owners. Dave saw that the neighbors had sons his age. And so he was hoping, you know, he was going to make some new friends, right?

Some playmates. According to NJ.com, John List opened the door, accepted the pie that they brought over and told them, Thank you very much, but we like to keep to ourselves over here. Well, but he kept the pie. He kept the pie, but basically said, thanks but no thanks. Right.

We're not going to socialize with you. And this is the exact reason why I don't try to get to know my neighbors all that much. I don't want for someone to take my pie and then basically say, thanks, but no thanks, and shut the door in my face. My ego can't take that. No, but you would take the pie if someone brought it to you. And say pretty much what John lists. Exactly.

We do like to keep to ourselves. So needless to say, Gibbs, John was not a friendly neighbor. You know, this was the type of guy who chased kids who would cut across his lawn. He one time apparently threw gravel at Dave Devlin while he was playing at a construction site next door. He also threw rocks at Dave's pet donkey. Okay. I think we need to stop for a minute. Because you just said pet donkey.

So which part is throwing you? The rock throwing or the pet donkey? The pet donkey has got me thrown. Yeah. I didn't know anyone growing up who had a pet donkey. John was also known around town for mowing the lawn in a suit and tie. That's class, man. It's like eating your snickers with a fork and knife.

Good Seinfeld reference. But imagine driving through the neighborhood. And you see a guy outside. all dressed up looking like an executive. Yeah. And he's pushing the mower back and forth across the lawn. I don't even like to do it in shorts and a t-shirt. I can't imagine sweating through a nice suit.

It just doesn't make any sense. It's not needed, you know? But is he trying to give off the air that, you know, we're so rich, we're so fancy that I cut the grass in a suit and tie? Yeah. Maybe. I think he was. Now, it was said that Helen was pleasant, but she almost never left the house.

In 1966, John was fired from the bank. So that lasted maybe a year. Maybe it was all the grass stains on his suit pants. Or so, yeah. And really, he never kept a regular job after this. But he did go to the train station every morning, dressed in his suit, and he would sit at the train station just reading. He pretended to work for about six months. and he refused to file for an employment.

Instead, he took out a second mortgage on the house. It's kind of strange, that type of pride, right? You're too proud to take unemployment, but you're going to sit there and borrow money to go more in debt just to, what, save face? Well, and, you know, let's face it, obviously he's not telling his wife, right? if he's going to all the trouble to act as though he's going to work every day.

You know, was he humiliated? We said it, right? This guy had trouble keeping a job. Yeah. We listed out some of the reasons why. So maybe to file for unemployment would be an admission that, you know, he wasn't the guy that he thought he was. Sure.

Yeah. I believe that. John eventually got an accounting job in New York City. But he was fired in 1969. when the company relocated to Long Island. He started selling life insurance, but he really just could not make enough money to pay the bills. I mean, let's not forget,

he had had some jobs where he was making quite a bit of money. And even then, he bought a house that was beyond his means. Right, yeah. Yeah, he overstretched them. So when he started not being able to, you know, land these jobs where he was making all this money, it's going to make it real tough financially.

Yeah, adding some stress to the relationship for sure. And that's what happened, right? All was not well in the list household. We've talked about it. John had trouble maintaining a job. He owed a bunch of money on his mortgage. And he started stealing money from his mother's $200,000 savings account. It got to the point Gibbs where he was on the brink of foreclosure.

I saw in one of the articles where it said John only made about $7,400 in 1971. That's not horrible money, but it's nowhere near, I'm sure, what, you know, he was used to making. I also think, you know, it's tough to buy a $100,000 home when you're now earning like $7,000 a year. Yeah, it's not good. Or make the payments on it. Right. Anyway. And he had the second mortgage and then he ended up taking out a third mortgage on the house.

Well, because he can't make ends meet. Right. So what does a guy like John List do? I'm getting the picture of him as someone who cannot admit the situation he's in. So what does he do? He's trying to figure out a way to cover it all up. And this time he does it by taking out the third mortgage. I can't think of a story where that ever.

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Thrivemarket.com slash teacat. By 1971, John was 46. Helen was 46. And their children, Patricia, John and Frederick were 16, 15, and 13. John and Helen had been married almost 20 years. And we talked about John's childhood, right, and the fact that he resented the very strict upbringing. So I thought it was a little strange that he carried on the same tradition. He demanded that his children have perfect manners.

They had to attend church every week. If his wife Helen skipped church, he got very upset. He disapproved of her behavior. Helen drank. She wasn't afraid to speak her mom. mind, especially when she wasn't happy about what was going on in their marriage. He just really wasn't happy that she wasn't acting like a very good religious wife. Yeah. So it sounds like to me, he had a picture in his mind, right, of how the kids should behave.

He had a picture of how his wife should act at all times. And when they didn't live up to that, he got upset. Yeah. And it sounded like, his wife was getting upset because he wasn't doing everything that she thought he should be doing. Yeah. Well, you know, he was a perfectionist, right? So he had this image of what the perfect family life should be. Yeah, I think you're exactly right. And when he realized it wasn't perfect, I think that's when he starts to have a meltdown.

He gets upset. Yeah. Now, people said that Helen felt like Breesnell was a prison. She was bedridden most of the time. she developed trouble with her brain. It was said that, you know, years of tranquilizers and barbiturates added to it. Helen's medication cost about $100 a week, which was a lot of money back then. And I think John viewed it as a financial burden.

Sure. If you're only making $7,000, $8,000 a year at that point, it was a huge burden. Well, and he's already upside down. Yeah. To the point where he had to take out a second and third mortgage. and still money from his mom. And still money from his mom. So the relationship with Helen was rocky. His relationship with his children was rocky. He forbade Patty from hanging out with her friends because he thought they were bad influences. He also hated her boyfriend. This guy named Chris

Day. Chris was 20 years old, Catholic, and he wasn't in college. Patty started smoking cigarettes with her friends. She began skipping school. Sometimes she went home to talk with her mother. Helen was okay with it, but John was outraged. Well, again,

remember he has this image of the perfect family, perfect kids, and when they are outside of that mold, it throws them off. Yeah, I almost think of it as the Norman Rockwell painting. And when somebody moves outside of the pose, that they're supposed to be in from this painting,

it's as if his world begins to crumble. He can't handle it. John even got upset when Patty joined the theater. Now, he was okay with it when he thought it was a hobby. But then Patty started talking about wanting to be an actress and he wasn't happy with that. He just didn't think that was an acceptable career for a good, you know, religious girl. And this religious thing, right, keeps coming back up. Everything with him kind of goes back to his childhood, his religious upbringing, you know, the way that his parents treated him. He also once caught Patty

with a Ouija board. Well, for somebody that's really religious, that's probably going to be a problem. It can be. Now, she was also telling her friends that she was a witch. And I think that that really drove him over the edge. Patty was afraid of her father. She told a friend in the fall of 1971 that her dad wanted them all dead. So this is kind of a premonition because obviously we know what's going to happen. Apparently one time she confessed to her drama coach that her dad told the children he was going to kill them. He asked if they wanted to be buried or cremated. It was reported that one night John asked his family what they wanted to do with their bodies after they die.

So that's a little freaky, you know, as a child sitting there and hearing your dad say this kind of stuff, you're probably like, what in the world's going on? Well, the kids were afraid of him. Sure. I think that much is obvious. He was very strict, you know, kind of my way or the highway. If you're not walking the line, then you're going to get it. But I think a lot of parents over the years have been very strict.

I don't know how many parents have gone to their children and said, what do you want me to do with your bodies after you die? Yeah. I'd be scared to death, like you said, as a child. And it wasn't just Patty. Helen and Alma suspected that John wanted to kill them too.

How frightful is that to think that, uh, the person that should be in love with you, somebody that should protect you wants to hurt you, kill you. Yeah. His wife, his mother. his daughter. Now, he got along with his sons pretty well, as long as they behaved.

And it's been printed that John Jr. was his favorite. Now, if they didn't follow the rules, he shouted at them, he criticized them. And then all of a sudden, in October of 1971, John began to act a little more relaxed than what he normally did. He started to be nicer to his children. He stopped enforcing some of the strict rules as much as he had done before. He even let Patty host a Halloween party, which was very out of character for him. And he helped Patty and her boyfriend clean up the party afterwards. Okay. You would think something strange, right, based on all of the things that we've talked about. Right. His personality, the way that he acted, okay, what's going on? Dad has changed big time. On October, October.

14th of that year, John applied for a gun permit. Now, he already owned two guns. He had a nine millimeter pistol from his time in World War II and a 22 caliber target pistol. He started going to the shooting range for practice. I think a lot of people who were in World War II brought home nine millimeter lugers. You hear people from that era talk about it. Right. Yeah. It was kind of a trophy if you could get your hands on one and bring it home. Then you, you know, you talk about Gibbs, him starting to go to the gun range. And I think for most people, you would think, okay, you applied for a gun permit, you've got some guns, you want to learn how to shoot them. I'm not thinking much about it. No, or you know how to shoot, but you just want to get better. Get better. Practice. Or you just

want to keep your skills up. But with John List and everything that's going on, if you're in that family, I think you got to take a second to think about it. Members already thought that he wanted them dead. Now all of a sudden he's going to the shooting range. I'm a little concerned. And basically Gibbs, what came out was that John blamed his family for all of his problems. Well, of course, it's not going to be him. No, no, because he's perfect.

Right. He's a perfectionist. I don't know what it's like to be a perfectionist. I think you more so than anybody knows that I'm not, but I can see how a perfectionist might have a hard time seeing their own flaws or admitting to those flaws. Yeah, I think they admitting parts a big problem. He later said that it was Helen and Alma, who were the ones who wanted Brees Noles. It wasn't him.

He also felt like his mother was a burden, despite the fact that she had helped him out financial. quite a bit over the years, both knowingly and unknowingly. Yeah. You know, she had given him money, but he had also taken quite a bit without her knowledge. And then the other thing was that he really worried that his kids were going down a bad path. John later said that he set on his recliner every night prank, thinking about what to do with his family. He didn't finalize the decision to kill them until November 9th of 1971. one. And it was on that day between 8.30 a.m. and 4 p.m. that John List killed his entire family.

So, and I just want to back up for a minute. You know, he is later talking about sitting in the recliner, what do I do? Things are going bad. Obviously, he's thinking about killing his family. You have to start the thought. Right. Before you can finalize it at a certain point. How does the thought even enter your mind? I don't know. And how do you have those type of thoughts and how do you plan that out in your head? You know, this is what I need to do. Or that this is the right thing to do. It's the thing that's going to solve all my problem. It's hard for everyone to imagine just even having the fleeting thought of it, let alone coming to the decision that it's the best course of action.

November 9th started off as a normal Tuesday morning. The family got up, the children ate their breakfast, and then they went to school. After sending the kids to school, John List loaded his guns in his car. He went into the house determined to complete his mission. According to ABC, John later said, it's just like D-Day. You go in. There's no stopping after you start. So right there, he is comparing.

The mission to kill his entire family to D-Day. Yeah. That's scary. It's really scary. John shot Helen in the kitchen while she was drinking her coffee. He then went upstairs to find his mother, who was waiting in her kitchen for her toast to come out of the toaster. She gave her son a kiss on the cheek and she asked him about the loud noise that she just heard. John told her he didn't know what it was and then he shot his mom in the face near her left eye

and he just left her there lying on her back her knees were bent there was blood everywhere son of the year husband of the year in the span of a matter of minutes you've killed your wife of you know 20 years or so you've killed the woman who gave life to you right doted on you you. Okay, maybe she was a little smothering. I get that, but she doted on you. She loved you. John then went back downstairs. He dragged Helen's body into the ballroom and he scrubbed the blood in the kitchen. There was so much blood that he said it took a number of rounds of mopping to clean it all. John announced to his acquaintances that he was going on a long family trip because Helen's mother in North Carolina was very sick.

So this was part of his plan, right? He's thinking ahead. Right. Planning it out. So he paused his newspaper, the mail, milk deliveries. He took a shower, drove into town, and he withdrew his mother's entire savings. And we mentioned it. She had quite a chunk in there.

Yeah, $1.200,000. John then called Westfield High School to tell the administration that he, He was taking his children on an extended vacation. Now, we said early on Gibbs that John List was intelligent. So it doesn't surprise me that, you know, he thought of some of these things. You know, how do I get away with what I'm going to do? Okay. Maybe he even made a checklist.

I need to make sure I cancel all these things. I don't want anybody coming to the house. I don't want anyone to realize that something's wrong, that the kids haven't gone to school. So the ruse is going to be that we're going to go visit my wife's sick mother. Yeah, he really did plan all this out with great detail. But so far, he's shot his wife and mother. Then John ate his lunch at the same table where his wife had been sitting just a few hours before. According to ABC, when he was asked,

how he could eat after murdering his wife and mother, he responded, I was hungry. That's just the way it was. Got to eat, got to eat. Kind of hard to get much colder than that. Well, he's definitely cold. And he's going to continue to be a heartless son of a bitch. Yeah, I think that's a very apt description. So in the afternoon, he picked up his children from school, took them home.

He shot Patricia in the head as soon as they got inside. and then he ambushed his sons when they ran inside. He killed his son Freddie with one shot, but his other son, John fought back. John later told ABC, John got hurt more because he seemed to struggle longer. I don't know whether it was only because he was still jerking, that I wanted to make sure that he didn't suffer, or that it was sort of a way of relieving tension. After having completed, what I felt was my assignment for the day. My assignment for the day. This is a man devoid of emotion.

Right. You know, we said cold. And I get that, but, you know, really emotionless. He's acting like murdering his family or a bunch of tasks. Yeah, I mean, you know,

the first thing that left into my mind was, I've got a to-do list. Kill my wife. Kill my mother. kill Patricia, kill Freddie, kill John. And he's checking them off. Yeah, check, check, check. In between there, it's, you know, call the mail or, you know, stop the mail, stop the milk

deliveries. He's just checking all of these things off one by one, call the school. John ripped his face out of every family photo he could find because he felt as though it would make the police harder for them to get his description. Now, you know, that's that's some thought that went into that. You know, a lot of times we talk about murders. Sometimes they can be very spur of the moment. Nothing is spur of the moment about what John List did. He'd been thinking about it. He'd been going back and forth on how to solve his problems. Now he's completed his assignment in his words, horrible words. And then he has the thought,

that, okay, the police are going to come after me. So I'm going to make sure there's no photos lying around of my face. Again, very smart guy. Yeah, no, I believe he was smart. Being smart doesn't mean that you always do the right thing, that you always make good judgments, but he was intelligent. After all this, he spent the night at the house. And then the next morning he turned the heat down to 50 degrees. You would think maybe to preserve his family's bodies. That wasn't the reason. It ultimately turned out that he did so just to keep the pipes from bursting in his home. You don't want to turn the heat completely off because then you could have a freeze, a pipe burst, and attention is drawn then to the home. So he really has this planned out. I mean, he's thought

this all the way through. It was also said that he didn't want to cause problems for the bank. Of course. He's going to be more concerned about the bank than his loved ones. But that's not a surprise, right? He just murdered him. Yeah. So he can't pay back his mortgage.

He's on the verge of foreclosure, but yet he doesn't want a pipe to burst in the house to get damaged so that the bank will be out money. Yeah. Thanks. Oh, gee. thank you for not letting those pipes burst, but we're so glad that you, what, decided to murder your family in this house?

He then played classical music over the intercom, and then he got into his car and drove to the airport. John left his car at the airport and got on a flight. It's assumed Gibbs that he used a fake name because there's no record of John List ever taking a flight. Now, let's face it, much easier in the seven, to kind of walk on a plane or give a name or, you know, something like that. It would never happen today or at the very least it would be much harder today.

Yeah, but back then you just had a write down your name, pay some cash. You were sitting in a seat. And then really after this, weeks went by. You know, we talked about it. The list didn't get out all that much. Really no one noticed that anything was wrong. The school thought that they were, you know, traveling. the kids were on a trip he actually did a pretty good job if you think about it lining everything up so

that it would take quite a while for people to discover what he had done he gave himself a really good amount of lead time yeah and i and i think that was his intention in december 1971 neighbor bill cunuch wondered why the lights at breeze knolls were going out one by one it had been weak since he'd seen anyone entering or leaving the home. Now, he didn't think a whole lot about it for quite some time because the lights were on. But as soon as they started going out and he noticed that no one was replacing them, he started to wonder if people were actually home. Bill's wife had also noticed an unfamiliar white car loitering outside.

The driver was a man named Ed Ileano, who was Patty's drama. coach. He was concerned because Patty hadn't shown up to school in such a long time. John had called the other drama coach, a woman named Barbara Sheridan, to tell her they were going on vacation. Ed didn't believe it. So he went to police, but they assured him that everything was fine. Then on December 7th, he convinced Barbara to go with him to the house to check things out. An officer also spoke to Bill Cunuch on the afternoon of the seventh. Bill told the officer he was worried about the family too. When he saw the white car in the driveway that evening, he went over to investigate.

His wife called the police. Two officers, Ed and Barbara, stood outside the house at 10 p.m. And it was that evening of the seventh that police officers entered the home for the first time. They immediately noticed soft organ music playing over the internet. intercom system. As they stepped further into the house, they found five bodies, almost the entire list family. They found Helen, Patricia, John Jr., Frederick, and Alma. They had all been shot. So everybody but John. And I always think about police officers who, you know, have to encounter these types of scenes. They go out on probably what they think is a very routine call. And then all of a sudden,

Gibbs, it turns into probably the most disturbing call that they ever, you know, would take in their entire career. Helen and the children were put in the ballroom, laid out on bloody sleeping bags underneath the skylight. Alma was upstairs in her attic apartment, stuffed into a storage area. The girls and Freddie were shot once in the head. John Jr. had been shot at least 10 times. and all of the bodies had been there for almost a month. Not a good scene to walk into. No, no, not at all. Police entered the office and they found notes taped to the desk with instructions.

Inside a filing cabinet drawer was a manila folder with letters. One was a note about repaying a $500 loan. Others were apologies to John's relatives. They also found a 32 caliber revolver and a 9mm pistol pistol in a desk. drawer. Most disturbingly, they found a five-page note from John to Reverend Eugene Ray Winkle, who was the pastor of Redeemer Lutheran Church. John wrote about the evil in this world. He claimed to have murdered his family to save their souls. The letter read, Dear Pastor Ray Winkle, I am sorry to add this additional burden to your work. I know that what

has been done is wrong from all that I've been taught and that any reason that any reason that I might give will not make it right. But you are the one person that I know that while not condoning this will at least possibly understand why I felt that I had to do this. Knowing the type of location that one would have to live in, plus the environment for the children, plus the effect on them, knowing they were on welfare, was just more than I thought they could and should endure. With Pat being so determined to get into acting, I was also fearful. I was also fearful. as to what this might do to her continuing to be a Christian. I'm sure it wouldn't have helped.

At last, I'm certain that all have gone to heaven now. If things had gone on, who knows if that would be the case. P.S. Mother is in the hallway in the attic, third floor. She was too heavy to move. Okay. Wow. Yeah. I mean, I'm struggling for words to even break this thing down.

You know, I think the first thing that jumped out at me was him thinking that this pastor would be in any way able to understand what he did. He says, I know you won't condone it, but you'll understand it. Yeah, you're kidding. You know why. Right. No, I'm not going to know why, John. Nobody's going to know. Nobody's going to understand.

And then, you know, him talking about that. his family shouldn't have to endure being poor. He'd rather have his family dead than have to have them go through being poor and on welfare. And the part about his daughter acting as though she would no longer be able to be a Christian. I mean, you know, you just, what is going on in this guy's head? He was really warped. Extremely warped. Yeah.

But I want to zero in on the, the welfare, not one. wanting his family to have to endure being poor. To me, Gibbs, that's him. Not being able to live with the fact that he's unable to provide for his family the way that he believes he should. And I think he's trying to justify it by saying it that way. Yeah. That's what I got from it.

Yeah, I agree with you. John also wrote that he prayed for his victims after the murders because it was the least I could do. Yeah, it's the very least. that you could do. You could have not murdered them. He went on to say that Helen and the children all agreed they wanted to be cremated and that he wanted his books to be donated because that's important in a situation like this. Yeah, I think so. What's going to happen to his books? Got to have a good home for my books. According to NJ.com, John also wrote that he planned to kill

his family on November 1st, All Saints Day, but travel arrangements were delayed. So he wasn't able to carry out the family annihilation when he wanted because things just didn't work out. Detectives found John's car parked at JFK International Airport on December 9 with a parking voucher dated November 10th. And they found that John had locked his keys inside the car. So they knew that he had taken. taken a flight. So the FBI launched a nationwide and international surge.

They had dozens of agents working the case, but they couldn't find any signs of his location. And the community was devastated. Westfield hadn't had a murder case in eight years. So, you know, Gibbs children were scared. They were asking their dads if they were going to come home one day and kill them too. That's sad. It is sad. This whole thing is. This whole thing is really sad. And I'm sure the community was devastating. I mean, if they haven't had a murder case in eight years, now you have an entire family murdered, wiped out in one fell swoop. People who knew John List were worried that he would sneak into their house and kill them too. And why wouldn't they be? If this guy was capable of doing what he did, he's capable of anything. Sure. Yeah. So maybe he's got

some vendettas. Maybe there are some people that he knew that he didn't like. I think I'd be a little worried too. Yeah. A year after the murders, Breeze Noel burned down in an arson. The case was never solved, but the police suspected teen vandals, I think many people in the community were glad to see, you know, basically this symbol of where these heinous murders occurred gone. And I think I'd be in that camp too.

If something like that had happened in my neighborhood, you know, seeing it every day, driving by it every day, kind of really. living in your head what had happened, you'd kind of just pray that it would be leveled. Yeah, it's a big negative energy on the whole community. Sure. Now, for a while, people suspected that John List was the infamous D.B. Cooper. We covered Cooper in an episode of Unsolved. We did.

Cooper hijacked a plane in November 1971 around the time that John was on the run. But John dismissed that theory later on. after he was captured, John List managed to murder his family, escape, and build a new life for himself. It took 18 years, but it was a true crime TV show that led to his capture. In 1989, Union County prosecutors asked the producers of America's Most Wanted to do an episode on the John List case. They had also asked Unsolved Mysteries, but they rejected the case because they said it was too old and there were no leads. And this is a very well-known America's Most Wanted episode.

A lot of people will probably remember it. They worked with a guy named Frank Bender, who was a forensic sculptor. Bender analyzed photos to predict how John List may look 18 years later. Forensic psychologist Richard Walter predicted that John would continue wearing his horn-rimmed glasses to appear intelligent. And I can see how he would come up with that. Let's go back to everything we said about John List. He was intelligent, but would it surprise you if giving off the air of intelligence was extremely important to him? It wouldn't surprise me at all. No, because that's who he wanted to be. Yes. And that's who he wanted people to see. Yeah. He wanted to portray.

that and wanted them to believe it. Just like he wanted to kind of portray this very wealthy, affluent lifestyle. Right. Now, ultimately, he couldn't live up to it. No. But he didn't stop him from trying and really wanting it to be that way. Yeah, he tried hard. I mean, you're out there cutting your grass in a suit, you know, at some effort.

You're fancy. Age progression photos were pretty new technology at the time. The FBI had created photos of John. using some new software, and America's most wanted used the photos to help make the bust. Fox aired the show on May 21st, 1989, and they displayed the bust of an aged John list. And this is what people will probably remember the most. I can still see it in my head. Gibbs about 22 million people saw the episode.

The Westfield Police Department received 300 calls after the episode premiered. A woman in New Orleans even turned in her own husband thinking that he was John List. Right. Yeah. She was so convinced that he was John List that she got the FBI to fly down to interview him. Now, he did have the same biographical details as John, but his fingerprints didn't match. Okay. How does the marriage progress from that point?

Yeah, I really don't know at that point because, you know, it's all about trust. Trust. Trust. Honey, I told you I wasn't John List. Right. You still called the police on me. And you called me some really bad names until you found out, well, I was not him. I think they call that irreconcilable differences. Yeah. A woman from Denver, Colorado, thought the bus looked like her former neighbor, Robert P. Clark. Robert went to church. He worked as an accountant. And he also wore horn-rimmed glasses. The clerks had recently moved to Virginia. and the FBI took this one seriously as well.

They went to Clark's house and they confronted his shocked wife. She explained that she met her husband at a church social. They lived in Denver until just a few years before that. She was willing to cooperate and gave over information and photographs. And the man in her wedding picture looked exactly like the bust. On June 1st, 1989, FBI agents arrested John List, to his accounting office. The New York Times said that John was, quote,

very calm and self-contained during the arrest. He denied his true identity, but fingerprints confirmed he was John List. Again, none of that surprises me. This is a man who, I'm assuming, thought he was better than everyone else. So with that comes what, Gibbs. Okay, I'll stay calm.

Right. I'm going to deny, deny, deny. Somehow I'm going to worm my way out of this. But obviously with fingerprints, that's pretty hard to do. And what I thought was extremely interesting is that Robert P. Clark lived basically the exact same life as John List. He worked as an accountant, but he had trouble keeping a job. He worried about money. He went to church. He continued to wear the same horn-rimmed glasses. It was like he didn't change anything. Well, remember, he thinks he's the smartest person in the room. So I don't need to change anything because I'm so smart they'll never be able to catch me,

right? Exactly. But they know who he is now. They have his fingerprints. And so John finally agreed to tell the truth. He said that after killing his family, he went to the social security office in New Jersey. He told the clerk he lost his card. and he needed a replacement.

Now this was back before they required proof of identity to get a replacement card. So John got a brand new card with a fake name on it, Robert P. Clark. He said he then went home and burned his passport and pictures on the grill. Then he took a flight. He rode trains and buses and really kind of took a non-direct route to Denver. He arrived there on November 20th. When he first got to Denver, he worked as a hotel fry cook, and he purchased a trailer with Alma's money. He grew out his mustache and he got a new wardrobe. And he said that he really didn't ever

see all that much news coverage on the case. He could only recall seeing one newspaper article with his photo. But even so, he stopped going to church. He made sure to avoid even getting a parking ticket. And really Gibbs, you'd have to say his plan worked. He'd be, he'd built a completely new life. The problem was he couldn't resist going back to what he knew, what was familiar to him. So in 1975, John rejoined a church and he got a job as an accountant. John met Dolores Miller, his future wife in 1977 at a church social. And he said Dolores was exactly what he wanted in a wife. She was reserved, quiet. and devoted to the church.

Reserved and quiet. Obedient is maybe another word he wanted to use. Yeah, I think you're absolutely 100% correct. I believe that John List wanted everyone in his life to stay in line. And that included his wife. And, you know, we talked about it. She wasn't exactly doing everything that he wanted her to do, right? she drank a little. She spoke her mind. She probably got on him when things upset her,

especially as the years went forward. Well, and doesn't that kind of just happen naturally in a marriage, right? When you first meet someone, when you're dating, do you really let it all kind of come out? No, nobody does. But, you know, 10, 15, 20 years into the marriage. Okay, you stop closing the door when you go to the bathroom. Bodily functions in front of each other aren't all that important as they were before. You did that on day five. I do that to you. I know on day five.

Without a care in the world. It's just kind of a natural progression as people get more and more familiar with each other. John told Dolores his first wife died of lung cancer and that he had no children. He and Dolores got married in 1985 and moved into a condo that she purchased. Not surprisingly, John lost his job in 1986. And he pretty much burned through Dolores' savings. She told a friend that John was constantly buying things, that they just couldn't afford. And that if he didn't get a job, she was going to leave him.

Okay. again, the real John List can't be contained. This is a guy who wants to project a certain image. So he needs to buy certain things to project that image, whether he has a job, whether he has the money for it or not, or whether he has to deplete his new wife's entire savings account. He's going to do it.

And he did it. And he did it. The Clark's neighbor Wanda Flannery picked up a copy of the Weekly World News. They did a story about the murders on the 15th anniversary. She ran to Dolores's house and told her that the man in the story looked just like Robert. And Dolores reportedly told her, well, it does look like Bob, but it's not him. And she never even mentioned the story to her husband. She just didn't believe it could have been him.

No. and what person would want to believe that, right? That's kind of a tough ask. It is because what's that going to say about you? That your picker was off. Yeah. For one thing. In 1988, the Clarks moved to Midlothian, Virginia,

suburb of Richmond. There, John got a new accounting job. And things were pretty normal, Gibbs until the episode of America's Most Wanted premiered. John later admitted that he actually watched. the end of America's Most Wanted when they presented the bust. He told ABC, I was perspiring like anything.

But Dolores didn't notice the similarities. What would that be like to sit with your new wife as they tell your story about how a terrible person you are? And you're probably just hoping, hoping that she doesn't clue in. Well, I imagine it would be very nerve wrack. you're thinking at any minute she's going to examine this bus that they're showing and she's going

to turn to me and say man that looks a lot like you but on the flip side how happy are you that you let her watch that show and at the end of the show she doesn't say anything yeah you got to feel like you're you're out of the woods right at that point wanda flannery her daughter eva and her son-in-law randy mitchell watched the episode together. She noticed that John List looked just like her old neighbor. Randy also recognized him. And it was Randy who made the call that changed everything. So let's think about it.

If America's Most Wanted never did that case, he could still be sitting in his chair in his living room watching TV right now. Yeah, it's very possible. You know, go back to the fact that Unsolved Mysteries turned it down. They didn't think there was enough there to present. And that's kind of, you know, producers and everybody involved. They have to make that decision. Sure.

Yeah. You and I make that decision on a weekly basis as we're reviewing cases, researching. Is there enough here for an entire episode? Right. Unsolved mysteries obviously thought there wasn't. There's no new leads. What are we even going to talk about? It's very possible that America's most wanted could have made the same

decision and the outcome would have been very different probably. But I can't help but think about how he was able to be out there for 18 years, undetected. Well, go back to the fact that it was as easy as to just walk into the social security administration and say, I need a new card. And my name is Richard P. Clark. And this is my social security number. Okay, well, a little bit easier to get away with things if there are no controls in place at the time. Dolores visited John in jail on June 3rd, and he explained to her why he killed his family.

According to NJ.com, with tears in his eyes, he told her, I was always such a kind gentleman, except for that one act. He encouraged Dolores to sell her story to the tabloids to make money, but she refused. And she has never, Gibbs, made a public comment about the case. Does a lot about her character. It does because this was a huge deal. And she could have made a ton of money, right, by selling her story. No doubt about that. But let's go back to that one comment.

I was such a kind, gentle man, except for that one act. That one act being pretty much the worst possible thing you could have possibly done. Yeah, horrific. Or what's that guy in the Armageddon when they're around the big table? They're talking about how this is going to be the worst event ever. What's the guy? Owen Wilson. He says pretty much the worst possible thing imaginable.

You could have just said that. Yeah, exactly. Pretty much the worst possible thing imaginable. something along those lines. Right. All right. That's a good reference. I actually got that one.

John went to trial on April 2nd, 1990. The prosecution psychiatrist testified that John had been suffering from a midlife crisis. I think it's a little bit more than a midlife crisis. Yeah, I found that comment to be a little underwhelming. I think a lot of us suffer from midlife crises. You know, we go out and buy a Harley. We buy a sports car in our 40s or 50s. 50s or whatever it is, what we don't do is murder our entire family.

That's not a midlife crisis. No, that's a different type of crisis. But the psychiatrist went on to say that John enjoyed the new life he created after murdering his family. Dr. Stephen Simring, a forensic psychiatrist, told ABC that he believed John's neatness was the result of a compulsive personality. He said, he showed no evidence. of anything that approached genuine remorse, he's a cold, cold man.

Now, that I understand. I do too. And I think you even alluded to that fact of just how cold this guy was. Well, I mean, if you think about how he associated murdering his family as if they were a to-do list, you know, that checklist, check, check, check. That's cold. It is cold. And I think the lack of any type of genuine remorse.

that really says a lot about someone. Simering diagnosed John with obsessive, compulsive personality disorder, characterized by a strong need for order, and strict adherence to how things should be. And that makes a lot of sense based on everything that we talked about. Yeah, it really does. Simmering said he is so focused on little details that he misses the large picture. He's not good at picking up emotions and other people.

He's not empathetic. Not that he's cruel, but he lacks empathy. Doesn't really get what other people are about. Doesn't really read other people, which I think continually got him into trouble. Well, if you lack empathy, it's a problem. It is. I mean, it's something that is quite often said about serial killers. We've talked about it for many, many years.

Now, I think there are a lot of people that share these same traits that never hurt anyone. They just have no empathy towards people. They don't care what other people are going through. I actually know a couple of people that are like that. Yeah. I don't see them as ever going on a serial killing spree. They just don't pick up on the emotions that others are experiencing

and or they just don't care, you know, about them. Well, I think there's a lot of that going on. Yeah. Yeah. I really think there is. John's defense tried to prove diminished mental capacity, but all of their evidence was refuted by John's extensive planning and preparation, as well as his actions after the murders.

And that makes sense, right? Gibbs, we talked about, you know, all of the things that he laid out, the things that he did to kind of cover his tracks or at the very least give him this kind of big lead time to get away before anyone would know what happened. So kind of hard to argue, diminished mental capacity when the prosecution is just going to throw back in the defense's face. Well, did he have a diminished mental capacity when he called the school? Right.

When he thought of this elaborate plan, when he canceled the mail and the milk and all of that when he lowered the temperature down to 50 degrees just so that the pipes wouldn't burst in the house. Sounds like he knew what he was doing. Sounds like he had the mental capacity to pull all of that off. On April 13th, 1990, John List was found guilty of five counts of first degree murder. He received five life sentences on May 1st, 1990. So my thought, Gibbs, is that the defense team went into that one thinking, we got a real uphill battle here. And my assumption is John had to think that too. He got away with it for 18 years. Right. But he had to have known that if he was ever caught, he was going away. He was going to be convicted. And never get out again. John set down with Connie

Chung from ABC in 2002. By that time, he was 76 years old. And this was the first time that he ever spoke out publicly about the case. He said that he worried that financial hardships would split his family up and turn them away from God. He felt like a failure because he couldn't provide for his family. He said, I grew up with the idea that you should provide for your family. And to do that, you had to be a success in the job that you had or you're a failure. And that was not a good thing to be. Well, we know he was obsessed about looking successful. Yeah, I think he was. And then he talked about how with the foreclosure looming, he had to make a decision.

He said, I finally decided the only way to save them from that was to kill them. You know, kind of pretty much what he put in the note to the pastor. John said, I didn't really think I would get away with it for more than a week or two. I decided to stay free as long as I could. I might have had it in my mind to turn myself in. but I never gave it serious consideration. I was afraid of the consequences. I was afraid I would go to jail for a long time.

And then Connie Chung asked a question that many people had asked over the years. And it was that if John hated his life so much, why didn't he take his own life? Yeah. Why take everybody else's? He told her that he didn't take his own life because he wanted to get into heaven. And he hoped to be reunited with his. family one day. Okay, how is that reunion going to go? I can't imagine that it's going to go well.

He said it was my belief that if you kill yourself, you won't go to heaven. So eventually I got to the point where I felt that I could kill them. Hopefully they will go to heaven and then maybe I will have a chance to later confess my sins to God and get forgiveness. So that was his rationale. He said, I feel like when we get to heaven, we won't worry about these earthly things. They'll either have forgiven me or won't realize, you know, what happened. I'm sure that if we recognize each other, that we'll like each other's company, just as we did here, when times were better, that is the most backwards thinking I've ever heard. Well, that's what he wants to believe, right?

He's trying to justify what he did. So he keeps telling himself that, I guess, to help justify it. Yeah, you're probably right. John Emile List died on March 21st, 2008 at the age of 82. He died of pneumonia related complications at St. Francis Medical Center four days after he was admitted. So Gibbs, you know, as we wrap up this case, no doubt, it was, it was a shocking case. It still is. I mean, it still shocks people to this day family violence i know it haunts westfield to this day and i think it's you know kind of left people wondering for many many years how john list could murder his mother his wife and his three innocent children how could a man hate his family so much that he felt like killing them was the only way out

yeah i don't know he was just so cold and calculated he was that but to to me on top of it, his view of things was so skewed that his way of thinking, you know, to me just doesn't make any sense at all. And he was very selfish. Yeah, he was a very selfish person. He was vain. You know, he was all of those things. Yeah.

And I think he said some of this himself, but it was, you know, it was basically like, you know, if I can't have the life that I want or that. I believe I should have. And I can't give my wife and children the life that I think they should have. They're better off dead. And that's just so bizarre how someone could build that up in their mind and actually believe it's true. To most people, it's nonsensical. It just doesn't make any sense. And then you have the whole thing where he leads his other life for 18 years. How do you go on for 18 years? Knowing what you did? Yeah.

I think you do it because you didn't feel bad about what you did. You didn't have any remorse. You really thought, and I know this is going to come out sounding bad, but it's almost as if he thought he did his family a favor. Yeah. You thought he did the right thing. He thought he did the right thing. Or at least that's what he has said.

You know, in my way of thinking, I kind of. of lean towards maybe he thought, I just want to start a new life. I'm messing this one up. I'm jacking this one up. So the easiest way for me to start a new life is to rid myself of this current one, assume a new identity and try to start over. Now, whether that's true or not, I don't know. But that seems much more believable to me. Sure. Then a person thinking that their family is better off dead than having to go on welfare or struggling through some hard financial times. I think if his family had a say in this, they would have chose something different. Yeah, they would have chosen life and maybe a struggle through some hard financial times. Maybe it would

have been brief. Right. Who knows? But he didn't give them that choice. He chose for them in my way of thinking, based on what was best for him. Yeah. Now, he has always spun it as though this was what was best for them. I don't believe him. I think he did what he thought was best for him. Yeah, for sure. But that's it for our episode on John List. We've got some voicemails Gibbs.

You want to check those out? Let's hear him. Hi, Mike and Gibby. This is Kristen Hoppe. I'm calling from San Diego, and I'm sorry I am laughing so hard because I'm listening to Edwin. Amos, Lowe, Espin Amos, and it's a gibby to start talking about the rabbit. And I'm sorry, I love it.

I love you guys. I listen to you all day at work. So I've been dinging for months, and I'm now at that episode. So anyway, I keep listening to every single one. And I guess that's it. You guys crack me up every day. Love it. Keep doing what you do.

Keep your own time ticking. Bye. So that one genuinely made me laugh because you know that was real. She was laughing so hard. Yeah. She struggled to get it back to where she could finish the voicemail. And it really cracked me up. We've been there before.

Oh, we've laughed so hard that we've had to take a break. You've had to change your pants. I've had to change my pants before. Thanks for pointing that up. Hey, guys. I am from Chicago, Illinois. And I started listening to your podcast. About a year ago when I started driving along for work on a pot executive.

And I listened through the george of them, and I decided to switch it up and found my Jandah. I is old to new, and I'm listening to the very first podcast you started, and I tell you, it's not the same without your partner. I am enjoying it, and I want to thank you guys for everything you're doing. I'm now more allowed when I go out, even more aware of my surroundings, when I'm out and about, or even when I'm by myself on a daily basis. So keep your own time ticking, and I think you're going to be very good.

great. Thank you. All right. So I think the phone went in and out a little bit there, but I got what she was saying, right? So I think most people know you did the very first episode. I did. And then I did the second one by myself. And I knew right away that it just wasn't the same. It wasn't going to work. And so we made the decision that we would do them all together from there on out. And I'm glad we did. It's very hard to do an episode by yourself. And you're and have no one to bounce off of or there's no back and forth. It's really tough. I know. All the talking I do, I'm glad that at least you're there to, you know. As a sounding board. Exactly. I know you need a sounding board.

I do. That's why it works. Exactly. What's up, guys? This is Matt from Cocoa, Florida. I love the podcast. I've never listened to a podcast before until I actually heard about your guys. It's not binge listening to it at work.

I work 60 hours a week. So it gets me through the week. One suggestion that I wanted to make was I've heard a couple times in your episodes about women marrying convicted felons and making poor decisions. That's not necessarily true. Unfortunately, I'm a convicted felon from when I was 18 years old. You know, I'm 32 now, but on paper, I'm still a convicted felon. And I've made some mistakes in my life, but those mistakes that made me the man that I am today. And on paper, people might look and say, oh, he's a convicted felon, but they don't know.

me as the person that I am. Like I've had a wonderful girlfriend, never been in trouble a day in her life. She accepts my past because that's not who I am anymore. Just wanted to throw that out there. Enjoy, like I said, I love the podcast. You know, guys keep doing what you're doing. You guys do great work. So stay safe and keep your own time ticking.

So Gibbs, I get exactly what he's saying. What I would say to that is I think when you and I talk about it, we're talking about women who fall in love with some of the really big time killers. Yeah. Who are never getting out of prison. Never. Ever. And they've killed multiple people.

Yeah. And so I do think there's a difference there. Oh, big time. I don't think we're ever talking about a woman who decides to date a convicted felon for, you know, whatever they were convicted of. Sure. Yeah. the woman that wants to marry Richard Ramirez. Yeah.

Okay. Why do you want to do that, knowing what he did to so many women or, you know, whoever it is, Ted Bundy or whoever. But I get what he's saying. Yeah. Glad you're listening, man. Yeah. 60 hours a week, man.

That's a lot. That is. That is. Thank you very much. We had some mail bag gives. Julie Maple sent in a buttercake and some Harley chips. And she listens with her sister, Terry Barbado, and her mom, Lori Mollinger. who has a birthday in February. Well, happy birthday, Mom. Yeah, happy birthday, Mom, Lori. Love you all.

Thank you very much. So Gibbs, that's it for another episode of True Crime all the time. So for Mike and Gabby, stay safe and keep your own time ticking.