True Crime All The Time - Louis Hastings

Episode Date: September 11, 2023

On March 1st, 1983, Louis Hastings killed almost one-third of the residents of a tiny community in the Alaska Wilderness. It is believed that he killed his neighbors in an elaborate plot to destroy the Trans-Alaska oil pipeline and end his own life. Join Mike and Gibby as they discuss the murderous actions committed by Louis Hastings. At the time of the shootings, 22 people lived in and around the McCarthy, Alaska area. McCarthy had no running water, no electric grid, and very little contact with the outside world. Hastings' marriage and business were failing when he moved out to McCarthy full-time. Before he left his main home in Anchorage, he wrote down a "hit list" that included approximately 200 names. 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 349 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, I'm doing good about yourself. I'm doing very well. Good. The new version of my favorite game, NBA 2K comes out later this week.

I'm super pumped. Can't wait. Don't know what that's about. No, but I love it every year. Yeah. Let's go ahead and give our Patreon shoutouts. We had Christine Craig. Hey, Christine.

Rocky. What's going on? Rocky. Billy. Hey, Billy. Tina Kay. Hey, what's up? Kay. Terrius Kane. Hey, Kane. Jimmy Burley. What's on, Jimmy. Rhonda Gunnell. Hey, Rhonda. Ashley. Hey, Rhonda. Ashley. There's Lynn Feather. There's Lynn. Stephen Ashley. Oh, good old Stephen. Alicia Haywood. What's up, Alicia? Maria Bairam. Hey, Maria. Lexi New listens. Lexi no. Kumasi. What's up, Kumasi? Lole Berman. Hey, Berman. Debbie Peck.

Hey, Peck. Riley. What's going on, Riley? And last but not least, Brad Schaffin. That sounds like a country singer. Yeah. Brad. Cool name.

Yeah. So we appreciate all that new support. And then if we go back into the vault, this week, we selected Lisa Sabo. Okay, Lisa, there you are. Yeah. Appreciate all that continued Patreon support. We had a couple of donations on PayPal from Brian Coffee. Hey, Brian.

And Kaylee Straw. Oh, you guys are awesome. Thanks, Kelly. Thank you to everyone. one. Gives, I need to make the announcement about our CrimeCon meetup. It's going to be Saturday night at 9 p.m. in the main Marriott lounge where the crime con event is being held. I'll try not to get lost. Yeah. So it's a joint criminology, T-Cat, morphs paying for everything. It is what I heard. That's what I heard too. Yeah. So three bikes in one spot. I don't know if he's

aware of that. If he acts strange when you go up to him, that's just how. Yeah. Just keep asking. He likes to play stuff off. Yeah. Just telling him where, just asking where your free drink is. Exactly. Gives, right now we have an episode out on True Crime All the Time Unsolved. We're headed to Canada to discuss the disappearance of Ryan Stuka. Yeah, this is either a skiing trip that went bad because of an accident or it's a skiing trip that went bad for other reasons. Relating to some type of foul play. Exactly. Yeah. We get into all that. and make sure you check it out. All right, buddy, are you ready to get into this episode of true crime all the time? I am ready. We're talking about Lewis Hastings on March 1st, 1983. Lewis Hastings killed almost a third of the residents of a tiny community in the Alaska wilderness.

It's believed that he killed his neighbors in an elaborate plot to destroy the trans-alaska oil pipeline and end his own life. Now, we have limited information. on Lewis's early life. At the time of his arrest, he was 39 years old. His mother was Maude Marie Gunn. And he had a sister named Madeline. She later wrote that there were three children.

But the third sibling is not identified in any of the sources that we saw. Lewis's father, whose name is not given, was psychologically abusive to his children. As a teen, Lewis received counseling for depression. Well, that all has an impact on somebody, you know, as you grow up, it's definitely going to mold who you end up being. Yeah. I mean, you know, how many people have we talked about who have, you know, ended up killing who have had either a mother or father, sometimes both, who were, you know, verbally abusive, psychologically abusive, physically abusive. And you have to ask that question. okay what does that do to a young child to a teen as they're growing up as their you know brain is developing

and everything and their character is is taking shape it has to be impactful no there's no doubt and not in a good way right how can it ever really be good now people deal with it people make get through it and they turn out to be quote unquote fine. Maybe they go through counseling or whatever it is. Not everybody who has this situation turns out to be a killer. We know that. Louis served in the Air Force for three and a half years. And according to the Daily Sitka Sentinel had top security clearance. So he was kind of, you know, up there with you. I know you have double secret probation top security. Well, the probation finally was dropped. Oh, gotcha. So yeah, what do you want to know? I want to know all the area 51 secrets. Well, I'll tell you. Okay. Lewis was married to a woman named

Madeline Stoval. He worked as a computer programmer at Stanford University in the late 70s. He and his wife moved from Palo Alto, California to Anchorage, Alaska, around 1980. They lived in a duplex in the city. Lewis operated a computer services company out of their home. That's a big change, environment change. Oh, Palo Alto to Anchorage, Alaska. Yeah, I want to talk about, you know, this guy, obviously he must have been pretty intelligent. You think about Stanford University, very prestigious. He's working as a computer programmer in the late 70s. Big machines. early, right, early days. And then he starts a computer services company, you know, out of his home later in Alaska. A neighbor from Anchorage said Lewis was very polite,

a very good neighbor and very good to my children, according to the UPI. And I think, Gibbs, I'm at the point now where, you know, I'm not really shocked by any quotes from neighbors because they they run the gamut from you know this guy was a saint he you know was the salt of the earth to I knew something was wrong with him right you know they they just they're all over the the map it does seem to me though more often than not people talk about some of these individuals who end up doing horrible things in very glowing terms they knew them as a good person for me, those are the more scary ones because they could be like that. And then all of a sudden not.

You know, the ones that you said, I always knew something was wrong with that person. Yeah. I could tell one day this was going to happen. Well, you expected it. And you would probably not associate yourself with that person. Right. You'd keep your distance. I think you're absolutely right.

It's the people, you know, think of Ted Bundy. You know, how many people did he fool? Oh, of course. Yeah, lots. Basically everyone in his life. And women found him attractive. He was disarming. You know, people who knew him said that he was just a great guy. Meanwhile, he's killing people all over the place. Yeah. In the summer of 1982, Lewis and Madeline purchased a vacation home close to the remote community of McCarthy, Alaska. McCarthy is an old mining community in the Wrangell Mountains, located about 22,000. miles east of Anchorage. The nearest large town was Glen Allen, which was a hundred miles away. Well, that was definitely a remote vacation home.

Yeah. I at first thought it was a little strange that you bought a vacation home in Alaska. Yeah. But I guess if you're living in Anchorage, which is a big city in terms of Alaska, then you want to get out away from everyone. you're not going to get too much farther away than the next big town being 100 miles from your vacation home. That's pretty out there. Maybe they just wanted to have that mountain vacation home, you know? Maybe they just wanted to be by themselves. And there are a lot of people like that.

You know, I watched some of those wilderness shows where, you know, and I think I've mentioned it before, one of the guys flies from somewhere in Alaska to like a very remote place where he traps and things like that. And he'll live there for like months at a time while his family's back home. There's a certain appeal to it. I mean, it quickly dies for me because, you know, there's no TV.

There's no Xbox. No internet. There's no internet. Nothing like that. But for a split second, there's a little bit of a appeal in being completely surrounded by nature on your own.

And then there's a bear. And then I'm like, like, yeah, no, that's not for me. I'm out. In the 1980s, McCarthy was inaccessible by road during the winters. At that time, McCarthy had no running water, phone service, and no power beyond the electricity provided by privately owned generators. Oh, okay. Now we're really getting into the nitty-gritty. You got nothing. I mean, this is really remote. Really remote. Got to get your snow and melt it down drink it. And you're going to have to go to the bathroom in a homemade outhouse type something,

something. McCarthy did have two air strips, which was how residents traveled. And they did receive mail and other supply. So, but you know, it almost sounds like in a way, the wow, while west or a, you know, a town from the 1800s. Yeah. No electricity. The Pony Express comes through and delivers mail. There's like a little general store that has limited supplies. Otherwise, you're grabbing your fishing string and going out to the iced over river. Well, one thing you're not doing is running to the corner to grab a Big Mac. No, that's not happening. You're eating what you can catch, what you can shoot, trap, fish, whatever it is.

Now, I think to a lot of people, there's, again, some appeal to that. a simpler way of life. Oh, I know a few people that would love just to be by themselves in some cabin and some remote area and fend for themselves. Yeah, you know who else like that? Ted Kaczynski. Yeah, he did. The heuna bomber.

Yeah, he liked his little shack. Yeah. Now, would I like to experience it for a day? Absolutely. Yeah. Would I like to vacation there on a regular basis? No, probably not. McCarthy in the surrounding area had 22 residents at the time of the 1983 shooting.

Lewis Hastings killed six people. Again, I said it up front, right? It was almost a third of the community's population. Well, that's a pretty small town, 22 people, but. That's not even a town, dude. You can't call 22 people a town. But it's also 22 people that love to have no running water, no electricity. and like to be cold.

I don't know if they like to be cold. What I would say is most likely, they like to be left alone. Yeah. I think if you're choosing to live in this type of area, it's because you don't want to be in the rat race of a bigger city and you don't want people on top of you. And definitely if you've got only 22 people,

you're not going to be living side by side like most of us do in a plat or a subdivision. No. Because even though you would call these people neighbors, I mean, most of them lived miles and miles apart from each other. The Daily Sitka Sentinel described McCarthy as a ramshackle collection of weathered building. Ramshackle. That's pretty rough. That word is not used as much anymore, I don't think. but it does kind of paint a picture.

It does. Right? This is not Palm Springs that we're talking about here. This is remote Alaska. People are cobbling together, probably buildings, very limited supplies, that type of thing. Use what you find. The Washington Post reported barely two dozen people live within a 50 mile radius of McCarthy, which is connected to the 20th century.

by a slender steel cable across the foaming Kennecott River. Until last summer, a rickety handcar built of wooden planks, carried residents across the river to cars parked at the head of a 60-mile gravel road. Okay, now we're getting more of the picture. It definitely sounds like an old mining town. Yeah, yeah. I mean, when you think about a hand car is needed to cross the river from where you have to leave your car to get to wherever.

I'm assuming there was maybe a lot of snowmobiles used and things like that. Now, it was said that McCarthy was once home to a thousand people. That's a big difference. A thousand down to 22. But that was because gold was found at the turn of the 20th century, as well as one of the largest copper deposits ever discovered. according to the Daily Sitka Sentinel. The Kinnokot Copper Company operated a mine near McCarthy until 1938.

Kinnikot also constructed a town for the miner. So at one point it was a little hotbed, you know, for people to come in, make some quick money. But when the gold and copper ran out, they fled. And maybe this is why it reminds me so much of, you know, some of the old, West back in the day. Because if you think about it, that's kind of what happened there too. Oh, yeah. Right?

These towns popped up. People flocked there because there was gold or silver or whatever. But once it ran out, everybody left and they essentially became ghost towns. Lewis lived in the cabin intermittently for about a year. Investigators would later learn that his business and marriage were failing in the months leading up to the murders. Well, I'm kind of thinking that a computer programmer in the 1970s in Anchorage, Alaska, probably wasn't a huge need of a business.

Now, see, I was maybe thinking the other way around. I was thinking maybe they weren't that many computer experts there at the time and that he would have been a little bit in demand. Now, what throws me is that if you're going to start staying more and more at this cabin, how are you running this business? Because you don't even have power. Yeah, well, how do you even know that someone needs your services? But as we find out, the marriage is falling apart by the winter of 1982. Lewis moved into the cabin full time while his wife stayed in Anchorage. He later told a magistrate that he had been living in the house for eight months. So, you know, maybe the marriage and the business

kind of went hand in hand. You know, everything was just falling apart at the same time. And so he ended up moving out to the cabin. Lewis's home was located about six miles outside McCarthy at the old Kinnacott mine. His closest neighbor was 29-year-old Christopher Richards, who also lived in the mining complex. Chris told the Washington Post, I didn't really like the guy personally, but I was trying to get along with him because I figured I was stuck with him. him as a neighbor.

Well, that makes sense, right? Make do with what you have. Well, I think probably we've all been there. Whether you move in or somebody else moves in, there's going to be a neighbor that you don't really care for. Right. But what are your options? You're going to just up and sell your house because you don't like this person or

they're not your favorite? No, you just don't talk to them or whatever. You find a way to either make it work or find a way to, like you do here, avoid your neighbors. Yeah. Well, it's like the story I used to tell about my neighbors that used to live next door, they don't anymore. You know, every time I'd see him, I'd say, I'd throw up my hand and I'd say, hey, what's going on? Not even a look in my direction. Yeah.

I would have rather just had the finger. Yeah. Because then at least I would have known that you heard me. You're acknowledging me, not in a great way. but they just kept walking. And I thought, okay, I don't know what I've done. We never got in a fight or anything. They just were so unfriendly.

There's people like that in this world. Now, other locals described Lewis as a loner, but according to the Daily Sitka Sentinel said, you know, a decent enough human being. You can dissect that and take it a couple of different ways. Decent enough. That doesn't sound like, you know, humanitarian of the year.

type stuff. But they're saying, you know, he wasn't torturing animals or, you know, doing horrible things. Resident Rick Kenyon told the paper, it would have never crossed anyone's mind that this kind of thing could happen here. I'm sure he didn't even know some of these people. Judy Miller told the Washington Post, my very first impression of Lou was a walking computer, such an emotionless person. Okay, that's interesting description. Very different. I don't think I've ever heard, we've heard emotionalists a lot.

I don't think I've ever heard one person describe another as a walking computer. Well, and think about the computers back then. They had no personality. Less emotion. Are you saying computers now have a lot of personality? Some of them have like, you know, you know what I'm saying. I never do. No.

You think I do, but I never do. They have Panash. Panash. No, they don't. No, I get what you're saying. I mean, they're programmed to be that way, but they're much more interactive than you think of the 1980s computer. Yeah. Just like green text and war games, man.

Yeah, war games type stuff. Would you like to play a game? No, I don't want to play that game at all. resident Loy Green recalled that he and another resident named Gary Green, same name unrelated, were standing on a path when Lewis approached. Loy said that Lewis was kind of strange. Green responded, well, so are you. We all are.

So what? And I got a little chuckle out of that because, you know, I'm kind of thinking about this town. Right? there's 22 people live there, 50 mile radius. Wouldn't all of the 22 people have to be in some small way, a little bit strange to kind of want to live in that type of environment? Yeah, I'd say unique. Yeah, maybe strange is not the right word, but Lloyd later said everyone here is a little strange in their own way. So, okay, here's just another strange guy. And he's not really doing anything. He's antisocial, but we're not tremendously social anyway. And so we really don't

pay too much attention. So lose strange. So what? Yeah, I don't know with 22 people how social you could be. And I don't know if they would want you to be social. Because let's go back to one of my theories, the reason why I think a lot of people would want to live in this scenario is because they don't want to be that social. It might have a friend or two that they see on a regular basis, but you can't, you're not walking out of your house and throwing up your hand because your neighbor's miles and miles away. Yeah, you're not seeing them. So you, you really have to go out of your way to be social. Probably the most social you're going to be is when you go pick up your supplies for the week or month. According to an article by Kevin Coughlin from the University of Oregon, both Lloyd Green and resident

Jim Miller said they suspected other individuals of the shooting before Lewis was identified, but they didn't elaborate. So we're going to get into the specifics, right, of what happened. But obviously they felt that Lewis was not the strangest of the crew. There must have been some other people that they suspected before him. So the night before the shootings, Lewis visited Christopher Richards to play a board game during the game. Chris mentioned that several people were away on a ski trip. Lewis seemed disappointed. Now, that wouldn't mean anything at the time.

It would definitely mean something after the details of what happened came out. Because why would you be disappointed? Why do you think he was disappointed? Well, I think, as we're going to see, he was already planning this mass shooting. And I'm thinking he wanted as many people around. as possible. So to know that the population's small anyway and that some people were away on a ski trip, I guess that disappointed him. So it sounds like maybe his thoughts were if I could knock out the whole town, that would be my best scenario. The shootings took place on Tuesday,

March 1st, 1983. And it was said that Tuesday was mail day in McCarthy. And mail day was always an important day and most of the community came to the airstrip to wait for the plane and socialized with each other. Rick Kenyon recalled that Lewis came every mail day, but he never really talked much. But I can see that when you're in a remote area, even when you want to be remote and not really have a lot of interaction. I can see that one day a week. It's your little bit of excitement coming in, going to get the mail, who wrote me, and, you know, catch up on a little gossip. while you're waiting for the Well, you're not, you're not being social just for the sake of being social.

You're coming to get the mail. But everybody else is there. So why not, you know, chit chat a little bit or whatever? Everyone met at the home of Lassen Flo Hegeland, an older married couple who lived about 50 yards from the airstrip. They received mail for the community and stored grocery deliveries for everyone on their porch. So I'm starting to think there was. wasn't even a country store. Doesn't it sound like it sounds like it was a country porch.

It sounds like you had to order your groceries from some place. Yeah. And pay for them somehow. And they were flown in and they, these folks just stored it on their porch. The Hegelons also made daily weather observations and radioed the information to the FAA flight service station in Cordova. They had the only radio powerful enough to contact the.

outside world. I mean, it's really such a picture. Yeah. Of this community. Very isolated. No, very isolated. Everything is coming through this, essentially, you know, this older married couple. Now, I would imagine be much different today with the forms of communication. Sure. You know, satellite phones and, and different things a person could have. I'm just thinking when you went to pick up your items for this week, you had to know what you're wanting. it for next week. So you can tell them to radio in my order for next week. Because how else is it going to get there if nobody else can contact the outside world? But you know, I want to talk about this kind of weather observation, radioing into the FAA's flight service station. I know from watching

those shows where they fly those little bush type planes that the weather is a very big deal. and it can turn on a dime up there. And in a small plane like that, it can get dangerous in a hurry. So I would think that would be a very important duty. Their home was described as the hub of what social life there was, according to the Daily Sitka Sentinel. The weekly meeting spot. Sounds like it.

Chris Richard saw Lewis outside his cabin around 8.30 a.m. on March 1st. He invited him in for a cup of coffee. Chris noticed that Lewis took. a deep breath before he went inside. Chris said Lewis shot him completely out of the blue. He said as he reached for a cup, he felt something hit his cheek. When he ducked, he felt something hit the top of his head. He spun around and saw Lewis approaching him. He screamed at Lewis to stop, but Lewis told him, look, you're already dead. If you'll just quit fighting, I'll make it easy for you. So here you have Chris trying to be a nice guy inviting Lewis in for coffee. And the next thing

he knows is Lewis is essentially saying, look, you're already dead. Just stop fighting. Let me kill you. Yeah. Can you imagine? There's only 22 people in this place. So I get it. Maybe they're loners. But he must have thought enough of Lewis to invite him in for coffee. He couldn't have imagined that this guy was going to turn on him or kind of snap in the way that he did. And I think what really hit me was that, you know, he basically said, just let me finish you off. What are you doing? Stop fighting me.

Well, who really wants to do that? I don't know who's going to just lay down. And Chris didn't. He grabbed a knife. He stabbed Lewis in the upper chest and the right leg. He ran outside without shoes or proper. clothing for the weather, which, you know, if we were talking about a lot of places in, in the U.S., you could get away with that.

A little rougher in Alaska? A little rougher in Alaska to just run outside without proper clothing. But when someone's trying to kill you, you don't have a lot of choices. Yeah, you can say, hold on one minute. I got to get a parker. I got to get my boots. No, you got to just get up and get out. Chris ran three quarters of a mile to a neighbor's abandoned cabin.

Lewis fired at him as he ran and a bullet nicked his right on. He took boots, a parka and snowshoots. So he didn't have time to get them from his own place, but he was able to get them from this abandoned cabin. Chris ran to a nearby cabin owned by Tim and Amy Nash. He told them what had just happened. The Nash's had seen Lewis.

heading towards McCarthy. They decided to arm themselves and go to the airstrip with their snowmobile taking Chris with them. Now, here's my other thought. When you're living in an area that is remote as this one is, my assumption is that everyone in this place is armed with something. I would think. Because you've got wildlife, bears, I don't know, animals that you have to defend yourself from. I'm thinking some of them are venturing out to find their food. Yeah, and some of them just are using weapons to hunt.

So at the airstrip, they found Gary Green, who was working on his plane. Gary agreed to fly Chris to Glen Island so he could receive treatment and report the shooting to the police. So again, you just can't whip out your cell phone and call 911. No. Gary had also seen Lewis heading towards the Hegelons house. Tim Nash decided to go check on the Hegelons as Gary Green was taxiing to the end of the runway. Tim Nash ran down the airship. He told the group he had just gone to the Hegelen house and saw blood everywhere.

He spotted Lewis on the back porch while he stood in the kitchen. He fired at Lewis, but the bullet hit a door jam. And Lewis shot back hitting Tim in the right leg. A little shootout. Again, going back to giving me like Old West vibes. So what they decided was that the Nash's should stay to warn others while Gary transported Chris to Glennell. On the way over, Gary contacted the mail plane and told the pilot not to land, and then he radioed the police. News outlets reported that Lewis barricaded himself inside the

Hedlin's cabin. He killed both Les and Flo, Hegeland, and resident Maxine Edwards, who was arriving at the airstrip to get her mail. Maxine and her husband, Jim, lived on a homestead. They established in the early 50s. Maxine went out by herself on foot, pulling a sled behind her. She stopped at the home of Rick and Bonnie Kenyon, who lived close to the landing strip. Rick said he was going to get the mail, but Maxine offered to pick it up for him. Oh, that's always rough after the fact.

Yeah, I mean, again, we just have people doing nice things here. and it's going to turn out that it ends up badly for them. But I think what you're alluding to is, you know, what happens to the survivors when they learn all the facts and realize that it could have or most likely would have been them had a person not volunteered to do something for them? That's going to be tough to live with. Lewis killed the victims after he fled,

Chris's home and put their bodies into a bedroom inside the cabin. Around the time Gary Green departed from the airstrip. Lewis backtracked towards the airstrip using a dog sled trail. He crawled on top of a mound of snow and fired at least 10 rounds at the nashes from 250 yards away. He walked within 50 feet of their bodies and shot at them again. He then approached and fired two close range shots at their heads. He dragged their bodies to another snowbank to hide them.

So it's a little unclear from the reporting, but it sounds like he must have, at the very least, wounded them from 250 yards away. Yeah. And that's a pretty good shot, long shot. Yeah. Anybody who is shot at distance knows that that's a pretty long shot. Because if he's able to walk up within 50 feet of them,

it has to mean they were wounded. they would have ran off. And then obviously he ended their lives with shots to the head. So that makes five victims. Yeah, five victims to this point. Soon after residents Harley King and Donna Byron arrived at the airstrip, Harley lived 15 miles away in Long Lake, but came to McCarthy to pick up his mail.

Donna Byram lived between the communities and Harley picked her up to take her to the air strip, Harley was driving a snowmobile and Donna was riding on a sled. She had plans to get on a plane to Glen Al. When they arrived in McCarthy, Donna saw Lewis walking on the airstrip and then saw blood in the snow. She thought someone had been butchering animals. When they got close to the Nash's bodies, Lewis shot at them. Donna was shot in the arm.

So again, you have all these people, right, coming to the airs. trip to get their mail. It's not a coincidence that Lewis Hastings planned this for a Tuesday. He knew this was the day when a lot of people were going to be in the same place. I wonder what 15 miles on a snowmobile or riding in a sled behind a snowmobile is like. Cold. Yeah. Cold.

Maybe a little bumpy. Probably. I mean, it's not like, you know, driving your escalade down a, uh, uh, a well paved road. Let's put it that way. Probably not going to be able to sleep on the trip then. But also, doesn't it tell you something about this place where you see a bunch of blood and you just say, you know, that's somebody butchering an animal because that that probably happened routinely out there. The last thing you're thinking is that someone shot another person. Well, if my wife and I take a stroll down the neighborhood sidewalk and I see pools of blood,

I'm not thinking someone is butchering an animal. We're living in two very different types of environment. For sure. But you mentioned that he waited for this day, for the mail day. And clearly it seems like he's pretty good with his rifle. He probably felt confident enough that he could at least try to shoot people from a distance. Well, I think any time you're dependent on your shooting ability to survive, right, to find food, things like that. You get pretty proficient with it, I would think. So now he's shooting at

Harley and Donna. Donna shot in the arm. Harley King tried to speed away, but lost control of the snowmobile and crashed into a snowbank. His leg was injured by one of the gunshots. Donna tried to load him back onto the snowmobile. But Lewis was approaching from about 100 yards away. Harley told her to run. So she ran towards the Hegelons house. Donna heard two gunshots as she ran. I mean, this is straight out of a horror movie. It really is. Now, this is not, you know, in the middle of the night.

Like it would probably be in a horror movie, but you can picture that scene where you have someone who falls down, they're injured, and you see the killer walking towards them. Yeah, and you're screaming, get up, get up, get up. and that person saying, leave me, save yourself, right? This is, it's kind of something so very similar. Harley King was shot several times in the face at point blank range.

Donna was too scared to enter the house. So she hit outside a greenhouse. She heard Lewis looking for her. He approached the house and called out one not dead, one not dead. Strange thing to say. Strange thing to say, but. also if you're done, how scary would that be? I think it's strange for us. For her, it must have been one of the most frightening things she had ever heard in her life. Now,

he eventually stopped looking for her and fled using the Nash's snowmobile. Probably one of the best sounds she heard. Him leaving. Yeah. Chris Richards and Gary Green arrived in Glen Allen around 11 a.m. Alaska state troopers flew to McCarthy to search for Lewis. He was was found about 20 miles outside McCarthy on a snowmobile. He was wounded and was armed with a semi-automatic rifle and hundreds of rounds of ammo. And what does that tell you, Gibbs? Well, you're planning on killing a lot of people and putting up a big fight. Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, if you're going out hunting, most people don't take hundreds of rounds of ammo, you're not going to need that. You might take a few shots. You might only take one shot. I don't know. I'm not a hunter. I just have a feeling you don't need hundreds of rounds of ammo.

No, I don't think so. Lewis told the troopers, he was trying to leave the area to warn other people. According to the Daily Sitka Sentinel, he told them his name was Christopher Richards and actually said, Lewis Hastings has gone berserk and is shooting up McCarthy. Okay. Kind of a interesting ploy.

Yeah, it's a good attempt. These people obviously couldn't, couldn't know who he was, right? They don't, they're coming in from some other place. I'll try to do the old, you know, I'm someone else. But hey, that Lewis Hastings, he's, he's gone crazy. You better go get him. That's right. He went that way.

The problem is, for Hastings at least, was that police had his description. And they knew that the real Chris Richards was at the hospital. eventually Lewis admitted I'm your man so it was a good try didn't work the police found 63 year old les heggland 59 year old florence haggland and 52 year old maxine edwards inside the cabin and the daily sitka sentinel reported that they were stacked in a bedroom like cord wood it seems like he saw their bodies as objects yeah instead of people i mean if anybody you know can visualize cordwood stacked up, why would you need to stack bodies up like that?

Yeah. Because you were planning on bringing more bodies in to stack, possibly. The Sentinel also reported that the interior of the home had been sprayed with bullet. 61-year-old Harley King was found at the end of a trail of blood on the runway next to the trail leading to the Hegelons house. his snowmobile and Donna Slet were found nearby.

Tim and Amy Nash were found in the snowbank on the airstrip. So Lewis Hastings was charged with six counts of first degree murder and two counts of attempted murder. On March 3rd, a judge ordered Lewis to undergo a psychiatric exam. That's not surprising, right? Something happened with this guy and the authorities need to figure out what it was. Yeah, I think a psychiatric exam. The pediatric exam seems like it would have been in order. New evidence was made public on March 8th.

Assistant DA Stephen Branchflower asked a judge to order Lewis to copy words from a list of weapons and supplies to see if his handwriting matched. And this list was found in his home in Anchorage, indicating he planned the shooting spree. Some of the items on the list were found in the duffel bag Lewis had with him when he was arrested, such as a silencer, a Ruger mini 14 rifle and ammo. Other items on the list included clothes, a flashlight, and fliers. And this really stood out to me because, you know, we said that he had been living out in McCarthy for some time. What was it? Eight months? Yeah, eight months. I believe. So does that mean that he had been planning this for a very long time? If he wrote,

wrote that if he had not been back to Anchorage, then it has to mean that. Now, I don't know that for certain. I mean, his list was everything he needed to make sure that he could take out as many people as he could in that community. I mean, he really wanted all 21 people dead. Now, I'm going to play defense attorney for a minute and say that the list could also be what I need to take to McCarthy with me when I go, right? I think you can make the argument both way.

You could. Now, it's a little harder to make that argument after you've shot six people and tried to kill two others. On March 10th, 1983, Lewis Hastings was indicted on six counts of first degree murder and two counts of attempted murder. Investigators were still trying to understand his motive. Christopher Richards told state troopers, as quoted by the Daily Sitka Sentinel, I can't give you no idea. I could only say he went stark raving insane over the night, and he must have premeditated it because he got this little gun, new, which I never knew he had, and bingo, without any warning, splat right in the head. State troopers said Lewis gathered hundreds of rounds of ammo,

a police radio, and other equipment before the shooting. Troopers found weapons that had been modified to add a silencer, a shortened rifle. and a pistol that had been modified so it could be concealed inside a sleeve and fired using a string. Wow, there's something out on the movies. Yeah, like a gadget where the gun kind of comes out of someone's sleeve into their hand. But this is like it fires right out by pulling a string or something maybe. Just lift your arm up and pull the string on your belt and somehow it fires the gun. I don't know.

now whether he used that, whether it would have worked or whatever, I think at the very least, this shows a lot of planning, right, from the handwritten note to, you know, everything that, that they gathered. This wasn't a person who woke up in the morning and said, you know what, I'm going to go shoot some people. Yeah. This was something that had been mulled over, had been planned, contemplated in his anchor home, the police found coded, computerized lists with the names of over 200 people, including

police officers and state legislators. Some of the names were marked with an era, according to the Daily Sitka Sentinel. So it sounds like this was potentially going to be something much bigger than just the folks around McCarthy. Yeah, there's only 22 people there, including him. He was also carrying three letters to be mailed out. One. of which was addressed to his wife, Madeline. And we did kind of say this right in the very begin, right? He killed almost a third of the town's people, but it seemed as though his plan was to to end his own life. And maybe more than anything, it comes from these letters, right? Why do you need to mail out letters to various people, including your wife? Unless you don't plan on being

around later to explain to explain or tell them what you want to tell them so it was either he planned on ending his life or he thought he would be killed maybe but then how are the letters going to be mailed it to me it was almost like okay i'm going to i'm going to commit to shootings right i'm going to mail the letters and then i planned on taking taking my life in june public defender John Salimmy told a judge that he made base Lewis's defense on a new state law. The state law went into effect in October 1982. It was passed after 14s were shot in Anchorage's Russian Jack Springs Park in May 1982. The shooter was sentenced to four 99-year terms after a failed insanity defense. So this new law stated that if a defendant understands he,

is killing another person. Even if they have a mental illness at the time of the murder, they could be found guilty. The law also allowed for a verdict of guilty but mentally ill and not guilty by reason of insanity. So that's pretty interesting. Defendants who are found guilty but mentally ill could be incarcerated in a prison psychiatric hospital and transferred to a regular prison if they are cured. So it sounds like this new law. gives the public defender more options for Lewis's defense.

Yeah, it sounds like maybe there was more outcomes possible and more outcomes that would be, I guess, more beneficial to Lewis than, you know, many, many 99 year terms. Yeah. I guess is what the guy was thinking. After the murders, the survivors spent the summer building a new tramway. Sally Gilbert, a McCarthy resident. told the Washington Post for a while everybody just sat around and talked about the murders until somebody would say, we've got to talk about something else. And then we talk about it

some more. But the tram project was right there to slip into. The state provided $90,000 for the project. Residents cut logs and salvaged cables from the mine. Well, that's good. You know, they needed to get their minds off of all the murders. Obviously, they needed the tram. So let's dive into that and see if we can forget for a little bit. Well, and staying busy. Well, that helps. And working towards a goal is, I think, helpful in doing some of that. Now, Lewis was invited to join the planning for the project over the winter, but he refused.

Lloyd Green told the post, idiosyncrasies are welcome here. But Lou couldn't see that. He didn't fit in. He felt that. But it was his own projection he was seeing, not ours. after two delays, Lewis's trial was supposed to begin in December 1983, but then on December 5th, Lewis pleaded no contest to six murders and two counts of attempted murder. John Salimmy asked that the state's psychiatric defense law be declared unconstitutional.

The judge denied the motion, and Salimmy said Lewis would plead no contest. ADA Stephen Branchflower portrayed Lewis as a man beset with personal problems and depressed by the environmental degradation of Alaska. According to the Daily Sitka Sentinel, Lewis was described as a serious environmentalist, who apparently moved to Anchorage to escape the taint of the big city. He became depressed by how the oil industry had changed Alaska. Branch Flower said, as quoted by the daily Sitka Sentinel,

the trans-alaska oil pipeline became a focus for the defendant. an embodiment of a particular evil. So let's go back to that list with 200 names. We don't know all the names on there, but it said state legislators, and maybe they were involved in passing some of these laws that allowed for the pipeline.

I wouldn't be surprised if maybe there were people involved with the companies that were running this pipeline. And maybe that is why he wanted the guns with the silencers. And maybe that's why he wanted the gun that he could hide and pull on a string to make it shoot. So it would be undetected. Branch Flower told the court that Lewis's business and marriage were failing and he was in poor

help. He decided to end his life over the winter, but also decided to kill his neighbors. And this is the part that I didn't understand. You know, if you're saying that this guy is an environmentalist, he's upset over this pipeline, what big oil is doing to Alaska. Okay, I get that. But what does that have to do with killing his neighbors around McCarthy? Yeah.

They're not building the pipeline, I don't think. They're not the ones who are financing it or going to benefit from it. They're just living their lives. Yeah. As far as we know. I mean, there's there was nothing in the reporting that any of them had big time dealings with this pipeline. And why would they? Branch Flower told the court previously unknown details, like the fact.

the fact that all the victims died of multiple gunshot wounds and all were shot at least once in the back of the head at close range. Maybe that was his way of making sure that they didn't suffer after the initial shots. Maybe. Or maybe it was his way of ensuring that they were dead. Well, you can look at that, you know, a couple of different ways. But it also came out that Lewis made efforts to clean up the Hegelons cabin so that people that would be arriving would not see the bodies back to stacking them up in you know one of the rooms treating them like objects but why do that now that this has come out in court it's because more people are going to be coming they're probably going to go to the

hegelons got to clean it up so that they're not scared scared away and i have a chance to kill them too you know it was said in court that probably the most disturbing thing was that Lewis's plan was to kill as many people as possible in McCarthy, according to the daily Sitka Sentinel. When Branch Flower tried to elaborate on potential motives, the defense objected, it was decided that theories on motives would be presented at a post-conviction insanity hearing. It took months for Lewis to be sentenced. While awaiting the hearing, his family members wrote to a judge in hopes that he would be

allowed to serve his sentence at a psychiatric hospital. Parts of their letters were published in the Daily Sidka Sentinel. Maude Marie Gunn, Lewis's mother wrote, with all my heart, I believe Lewis's sanity completely left him on that horrible day. She wrote that Lewis never showed any threatening or violent tendencies toward anyone. And I'm assuming she meant before that day. According to Mod, Lewis received counseling for two years as a teen. depression, he started having trouble keeping himself organized, especially to do school.

Lewis's sister, Madeline Hastings, blamed her father. For Lewis's problems, she wrote, his constant belittling, criticisms, and patronizing attitude left all three of his children with a poor self-image, shy and unable to relate to other people easily. I knew Lou to be a good, kind man, not a criminal. I think it's evident that he never. could have committed these crimes had he been sane at the time. Yeah, I don't know.

As a family member, I'm sure it's devastating to hear this news about what your brother did and your son. And I'm sure you do want to defend them because you know them as this one person. But then you find out that he did all these terrible things. And how do you justify that? Well, yeah, and I think you're racking your brain trying to figure out what it could be. And that's where you get into, okay, how did the treatment by the father affect him? How did the earlier depression affect him?

He must have been mentally ill because he never would have done this. I mean, they're saying all these different things. Lewis's sentencing hearing opened on July 25, 1984. The purpose of the hearing was to give the defense a chance to prove that Lewis was guilty, but mentally ill, which would affect his sentence. sentencing. So he pleaded no context, but they're still moving forward with trying to establish the fact that he was mentally ill at the time of the shootings. The following quotes come from the Daily Sitka Sentinel. Dr. Joseph Satin, a psychiatrist from San Francisco, testified that Lewis

planned to blow up the trans-alaska oil pipeline in an effort to make his death meaningful and spare his family the pain of knowing what he'd done. So now we know how he was going to end his life. He said Lewis had a longstanding personality disorder that made him incapable of appreciating the wrongfulness of his conduct. Lewis told Dr. Satin and other psychiatrists that he planned to kill everyone in McCarthy and load their bodies onto the mail plane,

then dump the bodies as he flew to Glen Island. Once he got to Glenn Allen, he planned to land on the highway and hijacking oil tanker, which he planned to crash into a pump station on the oil pipeline, which would start a massive fire. He thought that this would disrupt oil flow for years and he would die in the fire so his family would not know what he had done. Assuming that they never found any of the bodies that he was going to throw out of the plane. Yeah, that part was a little confusing to me. And maybe the area was just so remote that the chances of finding the bodies would have been not great. Yeah.

Especially with falling snow and all that. Satin said Lewis had experienced middle problems since he was a boy living in Kansas. He seemed to improve with treatment, but he was still a shy and lonely child. He was a rebellious loner and experienced chronic depression and thoughts of suicide. And it was said that his mental health declined. After he moved to Alaska, his marriage was failing, as was his business, and he was concerned about his health. Lewis moved to the cabin to be alone.

Satin said, it became a place where he could think about things. He began to brood in a morbid way about various things. He began to develop the idea that he would like to make his suicide meaningful and somewhat. He wanted to target the oil pipeline because it was the reason more people were moving to Alaska. Well, I'm sure people were looking for jobs. Yeah. Opportunities. I think a lot of people got jobs, right? And back then relating to the pipeline. But I thought it was because he was an environmentalist and big oil was messing up the state. So it sounds like there was a little bit of conflicting information or conflicting stories told. At the hearing, Lewis's attorney, John Salimmy,

called the plan a crazy irrational scheme that had no chance of succeeding. He noted that Lewis had no criminal record and no history of violent behavior. The shootings, according to Salimmy, were totally inconsistent with the way he lived his previous life and the way he would live the rest of it. And I think that's an important way to say it. You know, he's fine before the incident, right? The incident occurs. He would have been fine after it. But it's just this one blip where his mental state was so bad that he did this.

Two state psychiatrists agree that Lewis suffered from chronic depression and emotional disorders, but thought he had the capacity to understand that what he did was really. wrong. So here again, right? Just like we always have, conflicting information from experts. experts on the side of the state and experts on the side of the defense. The judge rejected the defense's argument that Lewis was guilty, but mentally ill. And on July 27th, 1984, Lewis Hastings was sentenced to 634 years in prison. He received 99 years for six counts of of first degree murder and 20 years for each count of attempted murder to be served consecutively.

That's a lot of years. 634 years, you are not outliving that. And the judge described Lewis as an environmental terrorist. Accurate. Outside court, one resident said that some of the victims were conservationists and some favored further development in Alaska. One resident said, the only thing. they all had in common was that they had all helped him Hastings at one time or another.

So I think that's important, right? These are not all people who were even in favor of the further development in Alaska. Some of these people were conservationists. So how does it fit into the narrative that they had in any way a connection with the pipeline, what he deemed to be messengers? up Alaska. And then it comes out that they'd all helped him in some way. It makes it even more strange. And the fact that he said he was going to dump their bodies out. So,

and then blow himself up so nobody would know what he did. So it's not like he's killing them to make a statement. No. It's almost like he wants the whole town to just disappear off the map. In October, 1984, Chris Richard sued Lewis for $3 million. In physical and punitive damage,

Chris suffered from double. vision, glaucoma, and still had bullet fragments in his skull. In early 1985, Lewis filed an appeal requesting to withdraw his plea and have a new trial so a jury could hear his argument that he was poisoned by copper residue, which caused psychosis. He claimed he was exposed to copper in the summer of 1982 when applying log oil containing a copper preservative to the logs on his. cabin. That's a new one. That is a new one. You and I have covered a lot of motions, appeals for new trials and things

like that. Copper poisoning causing psychosis is not one that we've heard of. Well, maybe he's just trying to stretch something here, try to make something out of nothing. Maybe the judge will side with him. Yeah, I feel like that's every defendant in every case we've ever talked about. Right. I mean, how many defendants just go away quietly? Uh, I don't think any. Very few. Yeah. Most of them are going to try to come up with something. And, you know, oftentimes what you see is it's this. Okay, but on my next appeal, it's this. And then it's something else. I'm going to keep trying until I find something that someone will listen to and maybe believe. Yeah, I mean, why not? They got nothing but time.

They got nothing to lose, right? This guy's got nothing to lose. And we said he's a smart individual. I think he was. I think he was intelligent. He wrote in an affidavit, my review of a large body of medical research indicates that exposure to the intoxicants involved can cause psychiatric effects sufficient to explain my bizarre thinking during 1982 and 1983. agree. Lewis also argued that his former attorney failed to pursue a copper toxicity defense and that John Salimmy mistakenly believed his name was on one of Lewis's hit lists. So he was unable to defend him wholeheartedly according to the Daily Sitka Sentinel. Well, I'm on that list. So I'm not going to

give you my best defense. Now, maybe he was on the list. Maybe he wasn't on the list. I don't know because to me it sounded like the list was made well in advance. Right. So either he was on another list that was made later later, or this is just bull. Don't ever want to be on somebody's list. No, I don't want to be on any list, to be honest with you. Lewis argued that lab tests conducted after the murders found high levels of copper in his body in addition to the fumes from the preservative.

He inhaled dust while scraping paint off his windows. ADA Stephen Branchflower argued that the doctor who found toxins in Lewis's body concluded it could be a sign of low sugar levels, but it was not sufficient to cause psychosis. So in March 1985, a judge rejected the appeal. At the hearing, Lewis and his new attorney, David Graschen, refused to participate because they were trying to have the judge removed from the case. John Salimi spoke at the hearing and said that two hired psychiatrists found that Lewis was not insane. There was evidence he planned the murders and exhibited rational behavior during and after the shootings. Salimmy said they had trouble coming up with the defense and even considered a defense based on overindulgence in chocolate and an absence of light. According to the Daily Sitka Sentinel.

Well, if you don't get your fair share of sunlight and you're eating nothing but chocolate, could be a problem, right? Well, we know sometimes, right? There is an absence of light in Alaska. There are many days where there is no light. I'm okay with overindulgence of chocolate, though. Well, I know you are. My wife is too.

Now, if something goes horribly wrong and she comes after me, would she then later be able to blame it on an overindulgence in chocolate? You can always try something. You can always try. And we have heard some pretty far-reaching things. These are near the top of the list, though. It's too much chocolate. The chocolate did it.

A lot of people eat a lot of chocolate. And I just don't know if ingesting a lot of chocolate has ever caused anyone to do anything like what Lewis Hastings did. But it's interesting that his former attorney, right? is now coming out and saying that we couldn't even figure out what defense to mount because of some of the psychiatrists saying that, you know, he was not insane. Yeah. The level of pre-planning that he did, those were all obstacles to a defense for sure. He also tried to establish the copper toxicity defense, but there was evidence showing that

Hastings planned the murders before he was even exposed. to copper residue in the month. Well, that ruins that. It does. I mean, and it kind of goes back to, you know, I feel like this list was made way before he even moved out there full time. Yeah, I mean, I guess you could say, look, I made the list. I'm not going to deny that.

I made the list. I wasn't happy with what was going on with the environment and all this and blah, blah, blah, right? But I would have never followed through on it. through until I got this copper toxicity. Easy for you to say. In May 1987, the Alaska Court of Appeals upheld Lewis's sentence, but they did find that the 20-year sentences for attempted murder were excessive.

The court recommended a seven-year sentence instead. I don't know if the people that were being shot at. Almost killed. Almost killed would agree with that. Yeah. My other thought is, if you're Lewis Hastings, is this a win when, you know, you had 600 and some years anyway? 20 down to seven, it's not really going to make that much of a difference. But to the victims, it might.

Yeah. Maybe for him, he's like, all right, we got that win. Now let's go for the big one. We're going to keep trying. Lewis was transferred to a prison in Kansas, but in 1987, he requested to be transported back to Alaska to work on. his appeal with his lawyer. By August 1988, dozens of Alaska inmates were returned

back to the state, including Lewis Hastings. In 1996, Hastings filed an application for post-conviction relief, seeking to withdraw his plea, but the application was dismissed. He appealed, but the court affirmed the dismissal.

So he didn't give up. I mean, it was like, he just kept trying throughout the years. Why wouldn't he? And like we said, nothing to lose, right? Lewis was finally resentenced on the attempted murder counts in 2004. He argued that the counts should be dismissed because of delayed sentencing. But in February 2007, the Court of Appeals of Alaska affirmed the decision of the

Superior Court judge. That did take a very long time. If you think about it, they made that ruling in 1987. It took 20 years to finally, you know, sentence him. Alaska does not have an online inmate search feature like a lot of other states do. If Lewis Hastings is still a lot, he would be 79 or 80 years old. A lot of times we can find out current information on people, but apparently not in Alaska. 40 years of past since the McCarthy shootings, but the case is still very well known among Alaska residents.

Lewis Hastings decided to kill everyone in the small community. his original plan was unsuccessful, but his actions completely devastated the community and left a lasting impact. And, you know, when you look at the number of people he killed, six, that's a lot. But as a percentage of the people in McCarthy, it's a whole lot. It is. You're talking about roughly 33%. You know, extrapolate that out to just a city, let's say. say of 10,000. So, you know, he killed 3,000 plus people. And we've said it before that these

murders impact more than just the victims. It reaches out to the families, the communities. So I'm not surprised that. It's something that people in Alaska still talk about. And does it hit even harder because of the smaller amount of people? So at some point, that community had to pick up the pieces. The Hegelands were gone. who was going to hold on to the mail the groceries for everybody the groceries i mean it completely changed their way of life it would have had to have in in a lot of aspects but you know this was a really strange one for me yeah i get it he had some bad things in his childhood but he was 39 years old when he committed these murders right and had no criminal record and i'm i'm struggling

so much for a motive here. Why did he want to kill these people? Now, he said a bunch of different things. He wanted to blow up the or disrupt the flow of the pipeline. Okay, I understand that. He was an environmentalist. If he thought that's something he needed to do, how did that involve killing people in his community? Yeah. He could have done that and not killed anyone but himself. Just go do that and be done. That part didn't make any. sense to me. And then when it came out that a lot of these or all these people had helped him at some point in time, you know, what did he have against them? So I guess for me, I was left really kind of wondering, what is the real truth? Because I don't know that it came out as to why he wanted to kill

these people. Now, as far as did he have a plan to go further? I think he did to kill more people. Maybe to mess with the pipeline, you know, kind of evidence by the fact that he was going to mail out these letters. And we never did find out what the letter said or anything like that. But I don't know. It's, it's a head scratcher of a solved case. I'll definitely say that for sure. It's got some facets to it that just have never been fully explained, I don't think. And maybe that's just because he said so many different things and has never really said why he really came out and killed these people. Yeah, it didn't seem like he was skittish about it either. No.

In some respects, the descriptions were like he was tracking. He was hunting these people. But that's it for our episode on Lewis Hastings. We've got some voicemails. You want to check those out? Let's hear him. Hey, Mike and Gibby. This is Jared Colin from Shepherdsville, Kentucky.

Go Cats, by the way. I have been binge listening to your podcast for like the past month now, and I am obsessed with it. Keep up the good word, guys. I have a case suggestion, by the way. I was looking for y'all's episodes, and I noticed that y'all had not done an episode on the murder of Jessica Dysian. It's a hometown case that happened back in like the 80s or something like that. It was a very sad case, and I was hoping if you guys have not had that on your list of cases to do yet,

hoping maybe you could cover that and put some more information about it, because it's a really sad case and very interesting at the same time. But anyways, guys, I'm team true crumb all the time. I love both of you guys. Keep up the amazing work. You remind me so much of a podcast that I also listen to called Crum Junkie. And just like they say, be weird, be rude, stay alive. I will do my best to always keep my own time ticking.

Thanks, guys. All right. Appreciate the voicemail very much. I have not heard of that case, but we will make sure and get it down on the list. Mike and Gibby. This is Brian from Boston again. I recently left you a voicemail probably about a week ago. I just donated some money on PayPal for you guys.

I know 10 bucks isn't a lot. It's the best I can do right now. I just need to tell you guys, you get me through my day of groundskeeping at Phoenix Country Club. So easily, it's amazing. And I just listened to the episode today. I think it was 125 or 124. You guys were talking about the Cecil Hotel, and it's Kismet, because the night before I watched Netflix.

documentary about that girl from Vancouver on the Cecil Hotel. So I really hope you guys do get a chance to do that. I know I'm really far behind in the episodes. And I hope you guys keep your own time ticking because you're the best thing I've ever heard in a podcast ever. Have a great day, guys. And God bless. Hi, praise indeed.

Appreciate it very much. We haven't done a full episode. I don't think on that case. We did talk about the Cecil Hotel. Strange occurrences or something. And that part came up. But as far as a full-blown episode, we have not. All right, buddy, we had no mailbag this week.

So that's it for another episode of True Crime All the Time for Mike. And Gibby. Stay safe and keep your own time ticking.