True Crime All The Time - The Cheshire Murders

Episode Date: July 15, 2019

Bill Petit and his wife Jennifer Hawke-Petit had built a wonderful life. They lived in the upscale neighborhood of Cheshire, Connecticut with their two amazing daughters 17-year-old Hayley and 11-year-old Michaela. In 2007, Jennifer and Michaela were at the grocery when they caught the eye of Joshua Komisarjevsky. Joshua followed them home and realized their house was the perfect burglary target for him and his partner. Joshua met fellow career criminal Steven Hayes early in 2007 at a halfway house and the two were looking to continue burglarizing houses. They broke into the Petit house on July 23, 2007, and in a bizarre set of events, burned down the house and murdered three of the four members of the familyJoin Mike and Gibby as they discuss the horrific crimes committed against the Petit family. The paths of both Komisarjevsky and Hayes led them to serve time and then ultimately to meet each other just months before the murders. How did what they've stated was meant to be a home burglary end up in three murders and a husband left to grieve his wife and daughters?You can support the show at patreon.com/truecrimeallthetimeVisit the show's website at truecrimeallthetime.com for merchandise, contact and donation informationCreditsWriting/research - Lana HiottSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

and welcome to episode 139 of the True Crime All the Time podcast. I'm Mike Ferguson. And with me as always is my partner in True Crime, Mike Gibson. How are you? Hey man, we're doing good, man. All right, man. I love to hear it. You got a birthday coming up. Well, it's coming up from the time that we record this, but when this episode is out, you will be another year older. I will, man.

So happy birthday. Thank you. How are you doing, man? I'm doing great. Doing great. just got back from Gallenberg where my daughter was in a big dance competition and they did really well. I was super excited for, but I was so ready to get back. That's how I always am. If I go somewhere, I'm okay for a couple of days, but pretty quickly, I'm ready to come back.

Yeah, the places I've traveled with you, you're pretty antsy by the very next day. Yeah, yeah, no doubt. I mean, we're going to Chicago here soon and you're probably be ready to head out pretty quick. I will. I will. All right, Gibbs, we have some new Patreon supporters, so let's give some shoutouts. We had Pete McCray. Hey, McCray. Tony Steinhardt.

Stinehart. Hildy Linseth Eilertson. Ooh, hello, Haldi. Lisa Cameron. Thanks, Lisa. Kelly McBride. Hey, Kelly. Fine girl Brandy.

She's a fine girl. Yeah. Heather Brennan. What's up, Heather? Jimma Beelby. Hey, Jimma. Brandy W. Brandy.

Kelly Labeds. Chris Tola. Hey, Chris. Heather Chipman. What's up, Heather? Kylie Hall. Hey, Kylie. Lil Shelley Temple.

That's the new drink. Sean Simpson. Hey, Bartch, brother. Tristan, aka Baby Tea. Let's go baby tea. Nick Caches. What's up, Nick? Ashley Pascall.

Alexander Loreale Barry. That's a lot of names here. It is. Mia Lovat. Hey, Mia. And Mitchell McKay jumped out of our highest level. That's amazing, too. Yep.

If we go back into the vault, Gibbs, This week we selected Michelle Jolly. Been with us a long time. Yeah, she's happy. Yeah, she's happy. And she's a longtime Patreon supporter. So we appreciate all the new support, the continued support. We had some great PayPal support.

Bradley Polson made a sizable donation. Thanks, Bradley. We had Patricia Lopez. Awesome. Emily Suspect. It's like a suspect. No T. Oh, okay.

It's K. Gotcha. Caitlin Maddox. Thank you. Karen. Sutherland. Hey, Karen. And James Pulteney.

Pultene. So we appreciate that support as well. We have an episode out right now on True Crime All Time Unsolved. We're talking about Bob Levinson. Yeah. I was really excited about doing this episode. Yeah. You know, Bob was a retired FBI agent who found his way over in Iran.

Doing some private content. contracting investigation work for a client? But this is one of those very mysterious cases. I mean, number one, you have the FBI, the CIA might jump in there at some point. And, you know, the question of what happened to Bob. You know, at one point there's a proof of life video. Yeah.

Yeah, we run through a couple of different administrations because of the time period from the time he goes missing until current day. So, you know, you have to deal with the, uh, all the political, I don't know what you want to call it, what, the political mumble jumbo. Red tape. Red tape. Yeah. On both sides, right?

Not only here, but overseas with, you know, Iran. Sure. Sure. So check that out. That's out right now. All right. Gibbs, are you ready to get into this episode of True Crime all the time? I'm ready, man.

We are talking about the Cheshire murders. And this is one that I've wanted to do for quite a while. It's a case that really. gets me. And I'll go into why that is, you know, as we get, you know, into the episode. I mean, part of it is, I think, because a lot of people's biggest fear is being in your own home at night, in bed, vulnerable, in having someone somehow get inside of your house and attack you. Right. You think back to the Golden State killer. You know, things like that are very scary. Because as you and I have said, when you're in your house, that's your castle. That's your safe place, right? It's supposed to be.

You should never have to worry about when you're at home. Well, I know you don't because you sleep with a K bar under your pillow. At least one. In the area that we're talking about, very upscale, very nice, very low crime rate, I think, you know, that's part of it, right? It's sad to say, but I think there's very few places anymore that you can look at as the Mayberry, right, that we watched on television years ago. I just don't know how many places are like that anymore. Yeah, you know, I was thinking about that the other day. And, you know, one that kind of resembled Mayberry was when we did Bernie. And even there, he still had to deal with what happened. Sure. Yeah. I mean, I think there are bad people, right out there everywhere. Some of them are looking for a way into your house. So we're talking about

murders that took place in a town called Cheshire in central Connecticut. And I mentioned a low crime rate. The town had a violent crime rate of just 1%. This is a place consistently ranked among the best small towns in the U.S. It's called the betting plant capital of Connecticut. I'm not a big gardener myself, but I know you are. The bedding plant, huh? Yeah, you put out a lot of bedding plans. Oh, they got all kind of beddings out. The sad thing about this gives is when you start to research the city of Cheshire,

one of the very first things that comes up are the murders that we're about ready to talk about. It's like the town became infamous for these murders. Yeah, I remember it when it was on the news. Yeah, it was a big deal. It really was. And I think we're going to tell this story a little bit differently. We're going to, instead of starting with the perpetrators, like we do a lot of times in their backgrounds, we're going to start with the family, the victims, the murders, and the events of July 22nd and July 23rd, 2007. And then we'll talk about the two men, Joshua, Komisarjevsky, and Stephen Hayes, that perpetrators. these horrible crimes. The one name being very hard to say. I was getting ready to try to say it.

You should. Well, you will at some point. Yeah. So let's go to July 22nd, 2007. It was a Sunday. And the Pettit family, they were going about their lives. This was what many would consider Gibbs an all-American type family. The dad, 50-year-old William Pettit, who went by Bill.

He was an endocrinologist, as well. well as a diabetes expert, he was a very highly respected doctor. The mom, Jennifer, she was a striking woman, former pediatric nurse who now at 48 years old was co-director of the health center at a private school in Cheshire. So like, you know, this is an upscale place. That's high end. Jennifer was extremely religious. And she taught Sunday school for many years. Jennifer was diagnosed with MS some years before. Then you have the couple's oldest daughter, Haley. She was 17.

She was headed to Dartmouth College in just a few months. Good college. Very good college, very hard to get in. I remember when they tried to get me to go there. They tried to recruit. I think they recruited you pretty hard, didn't they? Yeah, they did. Yeah.

So Haley was not only very smart, but also like you, she was a, gifted athlete. She led her in a number of sports in high school, but also led efforts to raise money for MS, multiple sclerosis that, you know, her mom had. Sure, it's impressive. Just a good kid, man. Yeah, everything about her was extremely impressive. And I think that's how you get into Dartmouth. I wouldn't know because I didn't have the credentials to get in there. I think you got offers from what, Dartmouth or something like that? Dartmouth wanted me. Yeah. The couple had a younger daughter, 11-year-old Michaela. Michaela adored her older sister Haley and she really wanted to follow in her footsteps,

including taking over the reins of her MS money raising efforts. So this was a big deal, right? Haley had raised thousands and thousands of dollars for MS. It was kind of her thing. She was known for it. Yeah. While at the same time, playing a bunch of sports, probably getting straight A's, Michaela was also a, you know, gifted athletically.

She played a number of sports. She was getting ready to attend middle school that fall. So, I mean, this is a very condensed bio on the family, but I think it's extremely easy to see that this family had a lot going for them, right? They had money. Yeah. They lived in a nice house and a nice upscale neighborhood. Things are going well.

Yeah. They've got two great kids. This was a family that was well respected. They were loved by a great number of people in their community. They were active in the community. You know, not like me. They weren't hermits that didn't like to leave their house. Yeah.

You're not very active. No. I'm not active in my community. These people were giving back. They were, you know, know, teaching Sunday school, just doing all the things they could. So I mentioned that this day, the family was going about their lives. Early in the day, Bill had played golf, probably pretty normal for someone like him. Sunday morning, doctor goes out and plays golf. Not just a doctor. A lot of

people go out and play golf Sunday mornings, but Haley had gone to the beach. Jennifer and Michaela, who the family called KK. So they called Michaela. They called Michaela. KK. They had gone to the grocery store to get a few items, but it was here at the grocery store that they caught the attention of a man in the store that turned out to be Josh Komosargevsky. Komosurzegovsky. That's actually pretty good. Pretty good. We will talk about that much more later on, but I think it's important, right? This is where he first sees them. Now, eventually the family all ended up back at home. And I think this is very typical, at least in my household. Now that my daughters are older, everyone kind of seems to go their separate ways during the day.

Everybody has something that they need to do or they want to do. But at least for us, we always try to meet back up for dinner. That's very important. Michaela loved to cook. and she had whipped up some type of bruchetta and pasta dinner, which sounds good. I got my head turned from me. I know. Like brucetta, pasta. And the family enjoyed this. Gibbs, this is also the reason why I think this one hit me kind of hard.

Because obviously, we're about ready to talk about some very tragic events. From what you've heard, other than the fact that these people are rich, this is very much like my family. Oh, yeah. Two daughters. One's about ready to go to college. The younger one loves to cook. That is my family. It is your family. My wife also works at a school. Yeah. Now, I'm not a rich doctor. No. But besides that. Take that out of the equation. It is your... Very much like my family. And the more I researched it, the more I kept thinking, oh my gosh, this is so eerily similar to my situation. So it was around 10 p.m. The girls watched their favorite show Army wives.

So the mom and the two girls, that was their show. Right. A lot of people liked that show back in the day. And Bill fell asleep on the sunroom couch with the paper on his chest. He had a long day, right? He played golf, probably a lot of sun. He ate a ton of pasta probably that night. He was tired.

What wrong with that? Took a nap. The Army Wives show ended at 11. So at that point, it turned off the lights, check to make sure the doors are locked, everything that you would normally do, right, before you go to bed. Haley went into her own bed, but Michaela stayed with her mom. And she started reading the brand new Harry Potter book that had just come out the day before. Oh, yeah. Now, you know a lot about that.

Oh, yeah. I know a lot about that. Both of our daughters have and probably still are been huge Harry Potter. Oh, really huge, yeah. And it was like, you know, the day that one of those books came out, we were getting it. Way did the line, didn't you? I probably ordered it off Amazon. Probably did.

I order everything off Amazon. I'm so lazy. So Michaela snuggled up with her mom. She's reading this new Harry Potter book. It was around 2.3 a.m. Bill Petit woke up to like an unbelievably sharp pain and he had this sensation of warm liquid in his eyes and running down his face. You know how it is when you first wake up.

You don't know what the hell is going on. For me, sometimes it takes five minutes and a cup of coffee and I'm still not sure where I'm out. You're still in your haze. It took him a little bit, but Bill eventually realized that he was being beaten by a baseball bat. Somebody was hitting him in the head. And to make matters worse, it was his own Louisville slugger that he kept. around the house.

Can you imagine? Taking a bat to the head? Yeah. Over and over. I can't. Josh Komizar-Jefsky later testified that he stood over Bill while he slept for minutes, deciding what he was going to do. And eventually, obviously, we know what he decided.

He started to rain down blows with this bat. But Bill's awake. He's hurting. He sees two men. One of them is holding a gun. And the other guy says, if he moves, put a bullet in him. And the next thing Bill knew, his wrist and ankles were tied with zip ties. Then he was bound with rope.

Then they did the same thing with his ankles. And on his ankles, they used some wire. So they really had him, you know, they were really trying to bind him up pretty good. Well, definitely restricted his movement. And then they covered his face with a pillowcase. Now, what the men told him was that they were there to rob the house. So they asked Bill where the safe was. Well, he said there was no safe.

I don't know if they thought because these people had money that just naturally they had a safe full of money and valuables. Yeah, I think so. You know, they're nice area, doctor. You've got to have some personal safe somewhere. Or you keep your stuff at the bank. Well, yeah, but, you know, they're not thinking that. No, no, I know. They're not thinking that.

But there is no safe. That's what Bill tells him. So they drag him down to the basement and they tie him to a pole in the basement. But strangely, one of the men put some pillows under Bill so that he's more comfortable. They've just beaten this man almost to death. Now their conscience is stepping in. Yeah. Now they're saying, you know, we're going to try to make you comfortable.

Now, one of the issues Bill had was he had some heart issues. and because of that, he was taking some blood thinners. Well, obviously, if your blood is thin, you bleed. And so he was losing blood faster than most people would. Right. In this situation from all the blows to the head. So basically, he's tied to this pole in the basement bleeding. Josh and Stephen Hayes headed upstairs and they located Jennifer, Haley, and Michaela.

They tied them all up. They put pillow cases over their heads. They ripped out the telephone cord so that nobody could call the police. Right. And so then alarms tied to it wouldn't go off as well. Yeah, that's a good thing. And then they began to rummage through the house. Again, somewhat reminiscent of a Golden State killer.

You know, he would come in, he would tie people up, and then he would go rummage through the house. But they really didn't find much. I mean, if you think about it, Gibbs, and you know, this wasn't that long ago, how many people really keep loads of cash? I mean, most people don't even carry that much cash on them because of debit cards and credit cards and all that. I never have any money on me. Well, that's for a different reason. But yeah. You have money.

You just don't want to keep it on you because there's a chance that it may leave your hands into somebody else's. and that would ruin your night. Well, yeah. So I don't care it with me. What they did find was $103 in cash in Haley's room. So at this point, they think they've struck out, right? They're not going to, there's no big haul. No.

Right? From this robbery. And then they find a Bank of America bank book showing the couple's accounts and saying that they have between $20,000 and $30,000. And this is when they come up with a plan. And the plan is. is for Stephen Hayes to escort Jennifer to the bank in the morning, have her withdraw a bunch of money. This is how they'll get their money. Josh is going to stay at the house and make sure that

no one gets away. Everybody stays tied up. They're going to get the money and leave. So you have the wife and daughters tied up. Bill is tied up in the basement. He's fading in and out of consciousness. And this guy's a doctor, right? He knows that he's taking a bunch of blows to the head. He has to stay awake. So he's doing squats. He's moving around, trying to stay awake the best he can. He's also trying to keep his blood pressure steady. But eventually he does fall asleep, wakes up at about 5 a.m. to the sounds of the sprinklers in the yard. Again, these people were somewhat well off. Sure. You know, really, that's my line.

If you've got yard sprinklers, you're doing pretty good. If you've got an irrigation system, life is treating you pretty darn good. If you don't have to haul out the one sprinkler that you have and move it around every 20, 30 minutes, you're doing pretty well in life. How about if you just have a bunch of hoses and leave them there? Still not good, is it? Well, then you're just disorderly. Yeah. And I can't have that.

Yeah. All right. ground irrigation system. That's my line. That's my line in the sand. I don't have one. So I'm not doing that well. No, you do not have one. That's for sure. Well, you didn't have to say it like that. All right, Gibbs, let's take a quick break to talk about our sponsor ZipRecruiter. Listen, you and I both know how hard it is to find and hire qualified candidates. It takes a long time. You get a bunch of applications that you have to go through, and really only a handful of them are qualified. But ZipRecruiter makes it easy.

All you have to do is go to ZipRecruiter.com slash T-CAT. ZipRecruiter sends your jobs to over 100 of the web's leading job boards, but they don't stop there. They have this powerful matching technology. And with it, ZipRecruiter scans thousands of resumes to find people with the right experience, and they actually invite them to apply to your job. And as the applications come in, ZipRecruiter analyzes each one and they spotlight the top candidates so you never miss a great match. ZipRecruiter is so effective that four out of five employers who post on ZipRecruiter get a quality candidate through the site within the first day.

And right now, our listeners can try ZipRecruiter for free at this exclusive web address, ZipRecruiter.com slash T-Cat. T-C-C-C-A-T-C-C-C-C-T-C-C-C-C-T-C-C-T-RUter.com slash T-C-C-C-C-C-T-C-C-RUter.com. Cat, ZipRecruiter, the smartest way to hire. So Bill wakes up. He hears his wife's voice talking about needing his checkbook and a change of clothes. And then everything goes quiet. And then all of a sudden, he starts hearing a bunch of thumbs, like very loud, thumbs as if somebody was throwing, you know, 20, 50 pound sacks around on the floor. Okay.

Which you know would be very loud. Absolutely it would be. Take one of those Morton salt bags and just throw it on the living room. That's going to be very loud in the basement. But you know, you think about Bill. He doesn't know what's going on. He knows his family is upstairs and he can't do anything to help them. What a horrible feeling for a father.

No, you never would want to feel that way. And unfortunately, what is happening upstairs is bad. Because while Stephen Hayes and Jennifer, go to the bank, Josh is all alone upstairs and he violates 11-year-old Michaela. And Josh would later say, admit, you know, the things that he did, he took pictures of her on his cell phone during this, you know, whole event, Gibbs, this girl's only 11 years old. It's stomach turning. Yeah, it's terrible.

But I mentioned Bill and how horrible that would be for any father. he is trying like hell to get out of the binds. He knows he has to escape in order to save his family. He don't know exactly what's going on, but he knows he's got to get up there. And really at any cost. Oh, yeah, as a father, you don't care. You don't care.

You're doing whatever you have to do. Now, surveillance cameras catch Stephen Hayes at a gas station around 7 a.m. getting about $10 worth of gas in a container at 9 a.m. that morning, they make it to the bank in Jen's minivan. And Jen goes inside the bank and she tells the teller that her family's being held hostage and that if she can't get this money, they're going to all be killed. She spent about 20 minutes inside the bank, and when she left, the teller called 911. Obviously, I mean, what's she going to do? So I want to play a little bit of audio from that call.

We have a lady who is in our bank right now, who says that her husband and children are being held at their house. The people are in a car outside the bank. She is getting $15,000 that if the police are told they will kill the children and the husband. She is petrified. Imagine being that teller. You go to work Monday morning. It's early.

You just got there. And this is what, you know, happens first thing Monday morning. There's video. Obviously, banks have, you know, cameras everywhere. Plenty of Guazoo. So there's video of Jen standing in front of this teller looking pretty worried. Now, the other thing that teller said, though, was that it wasn't on the 911 tape. I think this would come out later, that she was surprised at how calm Jen was.

It's just a point that people bring up a lot when they talk about this case. And maybe she's just that type of person. Some people are like that. There's definitely people that can stay calm during those type of events. I don't know if you can maintain that calmness, though, as you see things develop. Yeah, not forever. But, I mean, you're right. There's different people handle situations differently.

some people freak out from the get-go. Right. Anytime something, you know, bad happens. Some people are able to say, okay, this is what's going on. This is what I need to do. You know, rationale. Yeah, however, you know, get through it in their mind to say, I'm in a bad spot. This is what I need to do to be okay.

It seems like maybe that's what Jen was doing. So the images from the bank are the last that, anyone would see of Jennifer. So they get back to the house. And Stephen Hayes finds out what happened to Michaela while he was gone. Josh says that he should do the same thing to the mom, Jennifer. And he does. Stephen Hayes sexually assaulted Jennifer and then he strangled her to death. And then he committed necrophilia on her corpse. So this has gone from a home invasion robbery, which is extremely bad in its own right, to sexual assault, now to murder. Jennifer Pettit is dead.

And Bill is still in the basement. And he's trying to get loose. He's trying to get loose. And he eventually does. He's able to break free. And he's eventually able to escape through the cellar door. of the basement. Don't see a lot of those today.

No. I don't think a lot of new houses are built with those. Now, I don't know about like Oklahoma, Kansas, some of the places up through like Tornado Alley. Yeah. Do they still have those? Because that's kind of a place where you hunker down. Yeah, they had it in the movie, uh, tornado.

So I'm sure they all have it, you know. It was a Twester. It was Twister. Okay. Yeah. So I meant to say this up first. front. Yeah.

You know the whole discussion about three o'clock high, my bodyguard. Oh, yeah. There actually is a movie called three o'clock high. Thank you. Yeah. It's not the one you were thinking of. Hey, you don't know. But a lot of people message me.

So I have to eat a little bit of crow on that. Yeah. But going back to the door, you're talking about like a cellar door. You would see that in that movie with Harrison Ford when he played. the CIA agent guy. Yeah, because Harrison Ford's only been in like two movies in his whole life. Yeah. Why do you always pick people that have been in like 300 movies?

Well, you know, he's good actor. But anyway, Jack Ryan. He plays Jack Ryan in a number of movies, doesn't he? Well, it's the one when he, the Irish people come over to try to get him and he's at his house. Patriot game. Yes, they have one of those doors. They try to go out. They go out and they put the, you know, the typical shove of rod through the outside so the people can't get out.

That was a long way to get to that. I was. Okay. I don't know how many people listening will know what that is. But, yeah. I mean, like Wizard of Oz. Didn't they have one in Wizard of Oz, I think? That they got down in.

I can't remember. You know, I can't remember either. I think Dorothea slayed her in her bed and spun around. I thought the rest of the people got in. That's why they, she was the only one that went away. I don't know. Maybe. But he is able to escape.

But he's hurt. I mean, he's hurt very badly. He can barely, you know, get out of this. basement, he collapses at the top of the stairs and essentially has to roll. The guy can't even walk. He's trying to roll his body over to his neighbor's house. And this is his very close friend, Dave. And he finally gets to like the front of the garage door. He's banging on the door. Dave comes out. He doesn't know who this guy is. I couldn't imagine. You're looking down at him and you're like, I don't know who what's going on here?

I mean, just the panic alone, this the... Well, that plus, his face was so badly beaten that he's unrecognizable. Bill has to tell Dave who he is. Yeah. That's how badly he was beaten with this bat. And it's around this time that the cops show up, right? The bank teller called 911. The cops show up.

They find Bill. They're trying to ask him, you know, what's going on, who's in the house. All he can do is. repeat himself talking about his girls. You know, his wife, his girls. As he's talking to the police, the house goes up in flame. Because what happened was Joshua and Stephen, they saw Bill. They saw him making his escape and they realized that they were in trouble.

So they had the gasoline. They poured it on Michaela. They poured it on Haley. gives both of these girls alive. Yeah, it's sickening, man. Not only are they alive, but they're tied up to their bedposts. They pour gasoline in the kitchen, in the living room, basically everywhere that they can, and they set it on fire.

And this is why this case is so horrific. You have the aspects of sexual assault. You have the mother who is strangled to death. But then you have these two girls who are set on fire while they're still alive. So the guys light the fire and they run out of the house, jump into a car. They're going to make their escape. And they're like hitting cars. They're, you know, they're trying to do a Dukes of Hazard thing.

But they're ultimately caught by police. Haley and Michaela died of smoke inhalation. And one of the really sad things that they figure out is that, Haley was able to get out of her restraints, make it out of her bedroom to the top of the stairs. And that's where she collapsed and died. So this whole family, Bill Pettit is the only person to survive the ordeal. Really is just a brutal crime, man. It really is. And I think you mentioned it up front. You remember seeing it on the news. It got a lot of coverage. And I think this is why. You and I talk about it. Why do some.

cases get the coverage and some don't. I think this one's pretty easy to figure out. This is an affluent family in, you know, a super nice neighborhood. And then you look at the horrific way that, you know, some of these individuals died. That's going to make the news. It's not only making the local news. It's making the national news because of all that. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I mean, this is going way beyond local. But you go back to Bill. And, as a father think what this guy had to deal with in that moment and, you know, in the days after and for the rest of his life. Very tough. My thought is Gibbs, and it's just an assumption, because obviously I've never been in this position, you would constantly be thinking,

what could I have done? Or what would have happened if I could have gotten free sooner? You know, it's like all those things that go through your head. Well, definitely probably would just torment you for life. Yeah. How could I have saved them? Yeah. But you look at Bill's situation and you think, what could the guy have done? He's beaten half to death, tied up.

It's just very rough. So they had the funerals for Jennifer, Haley, and Michaela. What said drew over 4,000 people. That's quite a bit, man. It is a lot. Yeah. A lot of people came out to pay their respects to these three individuals. But like I said,

They were very well loved and very well respected in their community. You know, after this whole thing went down, there were some people that speculated that police officers could have potentially saved the Pettit girls if they had burst in immediately. Because, you know, when they got there, I think basically what they did is they set up a perimeter and they kind of waited. They were trying to figure out what was going on. I think this was something that Jennifer's parents have publicly questioned. You know, did the police do the right thing?

I think that's a very tough one. Yeah, I mean, you could play that on either side, right? No, I think you could. I mean, did they know what was going on? You can make the argument that they knew something based on what the bank teller told them in the 911 call, you know, how much of that information was disseminated. Now, what they probably didn't know is that these two guys were about ready to set this place on fire. Yeah, I definitely think it's always rough to try to quarterback it after the fact.

But, you know. Yeah, I don't think it's something you and I would do. But Jennifer's parents definitely did. And they had the right too. They were upset. They thought that it was not handled correctly. So now let's talk about these two men, 26-year-old Joshua, Komasargevsky, and 43-year-year-old. year old Stephen Hayes. We're doing it a little bit backwards, but we've got to get in some history on

these guys. Joshua was born August 10th, 1980 in Vernon, Connecticut. His mother was only 16 when she had him, and he was given up for adoption at the age of two. Do you think that's strange? Yeah, I mean, I definitely think it's strange to, to me it's strange both ways. To wait, if you're going to give up a child, you normally would do it right away out of the. the gate. That's why I was asking the question because I usually think of babies being put up for adoption, you know, after not long after they're born. But to hang in there for two years and make that connection and, you know, you're making it harder in yourself, but then to give up two years, I mean, you had to have a really strong reason, I would hope. Yeah, maybe there was. I

just didn't see it. Now, she was only 16 years old, and maybe she thought this is what she wanted and decided a couple of years in that, you know, she just couldn't handle it. I don't know. Maybe she couldn't handle it. Maybe she couldn't afford it. Who knows, right? Yeah. Joshua was adopted by a religious couple.

They raised him as their own. And they later had a daughter. But Josh didn't have a very easy life. You know, this new family brought in a foster kid that was 17 years old who sexually abused both Joshua and his younger sister. So obviously this is going to come out later. Joshua was going to tell this story. There are different accounts of how old he was.

I've seen some as young as four years old, eight years old. But he was a young kid, no matter what the age was. He never told anyone that this was going on back then. His parents didn't find out until his sister came forward. So there is corroboration. Okay.

Right. This is not just him telling a story. I mean, his sister backs all of this up. They were both sexually abused by this older foster boy for a number of years. I don't know how long it went on. But I think it was huge in Joshua's life. He talked about it a lot. I also think it was big Gibbs when you think about what he did prior to setting that fire, making the decision to, molest sexually assault and 11-year-old girl. You just wonder how much, if any, that played a part in that. I'm not saying because someone, you know, was molested, that they just automatically would molest somebody themselves.

No, I don't think, yeah, I get that. But I think with other characteristics that could add to it. Yeah, I think you have to ask the question. Yeah. But I think this molestation that he's, suffered as a kid, it definitely changed him because, you know, what came out is that he started acting differently. It was said that he would sneak out of the house. He would take all of his clothes off and just lay in the woods. And not only that, but he would roll around in brush,

stickers, things that would, you know, tear up his body, scar his body. And later on, he's going to say that that this made him feel better. This is almost like a version of self-harm. He stole panties as a youth. He was a peeping Tom. And he suffered at least eight major head injury. That is a big number. Yeah, that's a lot.

We've talked about a lot of serial killers with head injuries that didn't have that many. You think people that listen to this that have little kids now, just have like helmets on, like, all the time. I'm like, I'm not letting little Johnny come up to be a serial killer, and they got the little bike on what's on. Yeah, there's definitely that. But the other thing that I hear a lot or I see a lot on social media is people that have had a lot of head injuries. Yeah.

For whatever reason, I think now are wondering, are they at a greater chance for developing, you know, some kind of strange thoughts like this? Yeah, it's not exclusive, right? Definitely. But Joshua started struggling in school. He was diagnosed with. ADHD. He also was diagnosed with dyslexia, something that you know a lot about. I do. And have talked about it. Um, but along with dyslexia, he had dysgraphia, which is apparently where you write your

letters and numbers backwards. Had a little bit of that. Had a little discraphy. I've never heard of that. Yeah. I heard of dyslexia, you know, a bunch, but you're Bs, Ds, ours, you know, things like that. I know my wife sometimes, like, if she's thinking 34, she'll write 43. Oh, really? Yeah. Just that number alone? No, no, no. I'm just making up a number.

Okay, I got you. But I don't know if that's what that means. Well, I just think that, I think of that as like transposing numbers, but. Is that why she said happy, when she wrote me, happy 35th birthday? Yeah, yeah. She was thinking 53, but she said 35, and I thought, well, that was sweeter. She thinks I'm only 35. You're lucky she shouldn't rate 73.

Well, I mean, it was nice as she put it on the cake that she baked me. I know. She's very nice. Yeah. So he's going through a lot of stuff, right? As a kid, one teacher told him that he would never amount to anything. I don't know what kind of teachers you're hiring, but you might want to, you might want to replace that one. Yeah, that's not a good thing, you know.

I mean, you're supposed to be there to develop the kid's mind and encourage him and growth. Well, especially you're talking about a kid that has been diagnosed with. with a bunch of different things, and you're just going to then ram him into the ground? Yeah. So his mom found this out that the teacher was bad-mouthing him, and she pulled him out of school, started to homeschool him. And this was a Christian-based homeschooling that basically revolved heavily around religion

and said that, you know, anything negative that happened or, you know, any affliction, It was all as a result of the devil. So what Joshua has said, and again, take all this from, you know, with a grain of salt, it's coming from this guy, but he thought that the sexual abuse that he endured, he thought that the disabilities that he had were brought about by the devil. He has said that at the age of 14, he was gang raped by two men. that he didn't know. And he never told anyone about it. Joshua spent some time at Elmcrest Mental

Hospital. He was there for about a month, was diagnosed with, you know, major depressive disorder, oppositional defiance disorder. It was also known that he was smoking a lot of pot. But his parents were very strict. His adoptive parents, they didn't believe in medication. So they took him out, brought him home and figured that the church would help him through his issues. I think 14 was a very rough year. I just mentioned that he was sexually assaulted by two men. It was also at 14 when he found out that he was adopted. He didn't know.

And I don't think he took it very well. This is when he really got into drugs and alcohol. He was self-medicating. Now, his parents might not have believed in it, but he believed in it. You know, he was homeschooled until 15. He eventually graduated with a vocational degree, went to vocational school. Okay. And took carpentry.

That's cool. Yeah. Then at the age of 18, he joined the Army Reserves. And right before he left, he proposed to his girlfriend. He'd been dating this girl for about four years. When he got back, he found out that she was seeing someone else. He was devastated. Well, nobody likes a cheater, man.

No, nobody likes a cheater, but it's the way that he dealt with it, right? He turned back to drugs and this time it was much harder. It was crystal meth. And as he's exploring with this crystal meth, he overdosed a couple times and really the rest of his life. He was addicted to drugs. So he would do drugs. He would try to get clean.

It wouldn't work. He would turn back to the drugs. And it was because of the drugs as it was. is with many people, then he turned to robbing houses. Drugs are expensive. Drugs are very expensive. Especially if you've got a serious habit. Yeah.

You've got to pay for that somehow. I think there were a lot of times that I read that he was unemployed. He had a hard time keeping a job. Another side effect of drugs. Sure. Yeah. You know, hard to be a carpenter when you're, you're whacked out on meth. Pretty easy to cut some shit off.

Yeah. with some of those power tools. So he started burglarizing homes to feed his drug habit in May of 2000. He's 20 years old. Joshua started dating a girl that was only 16. The next year she became pregnant. Right before this girl is about ready to give birth, Josh is caught burglarizing a home and he admits to police to 18 burglary.

And this is the strange thing about Josh Komazerjewski. He doesn't just say, hey, I robbed 18 houses. He had this amazing ability to essentially recall every detail of the robberies. He was able to tell police exact dollar amounts, street names. These are details that not a lot of people would remember as the years go by. And some of these robberies that he says he committed, they were never even called into police. because the people who live there,

they didn't know they'd been robbed. Like it wasn't obvious, right? He was pretty good. He knew what he was doing. Yeah. But there was one connection with all his robberies. They all happened at night. They all happened while the people were home, sleeping.

And they were all nonviolent. He never hurt anyone. And this is what I think was so strange about what, you know, we just talked about what's ultimately going to happen. happen. He was not really a violent guy. But for these 18 robberies, he got nine years. He spent four and a half years in jail. Yeah. Was paroled in April 2007. So we're getting very close, right? We know that the murders happened in July. He's paroled in April. He has to go to a substance abuse program. And his roommate there is Stephen Hayes. So this is where the two guys meet. So this is, this is it.

They don't meet till like April of 2007. Yeah. It's not like these guys had known each other for a very, you know, for years and years and years. Lifelong friends. Sure. It's not like me and you decide that we're going to go out and start robbing houses. What do you mean?

Allegedly. Allegedly. But that is a nice watch you got now. It is. I love it. Yeah. So they meet, but it's not until a couple of months later that Stephen convinces Joshua to start burglarizing houses again.

And it's really that same month, right, that Josh sees Michaela and Jennifer at the grocery store, follows them home, sees where they live, and makes the decision that they would be the perfect family to rob. One thing that was fascinating, Gibbs, is that it came out later that Joshua Komisarjewski was wearing an electronic monitoring device until about four days before the murders. So we know how those work? Well, I don't, but yeah, I get what you're saying. Yeah, and I'm surprised, you know, that, I mean, I get it, you right? The courts took it off just days before. Mm-hmm.

But, I mean, he just didn't wait at all, did he? I mean, he didn't have much downtime in between dropping the monitor off and getting back out there again. Well, and not just getting back out there and robbing houses, right? We know what he did. And we'll talk about it. Is that because he wasn't a lover? is that because he was with Stephen Hayes? But you're right.

He does not wait long. But it's probably also the reason why he wasn't out burglarizing before that. He was wearing an ankle monitor. So then you talk about Stephen Hayes. Very different upbringing than Joshua Komisarjevsky. He was born in 1963. Like we said, he was quite a bit older than Josh was. He was born at the Homestead Air Force Base in Florida.

He moved to Connecticut. when he was just one. Okay. And he doesn't have, you know, really the same record of head trauma. Didn't find any record of abuse. He had two younger brothers. And it was said that he would bully them. But again, is that that out of the norm?

You had brothers. They were older, right? I had one older, one younger. One younger. So I'm sure the older one bullied you and you probably bullied the younger one. Something like that. And maybe you don't call it. it bullying, but give them a hard time, whatever you want to call it. Yeah, you had your fun.

Yeah. Or they had their fun with you. But Stephen had this kind of strange way of messing with his brothers. He would steal things. He would destroy things in the home and then he would tell his parents that his brothers did it. So they would get the belt. Sounds familiar. Yeah, it sounds like something you might have done or you might have had done to you. But I guess the thing was, and it would really go throughout his life, Stephen never wanted to take the blame for his actions. He was a very manipulative, conniving person. His brother told a story that one time when Stephen was home, he lit the stove. And he told his brother that it wasn't hot and even put his hand over it to prove it.

Yeah. And then when his brother put his hand over it, Stephen smacked his hand down and held it onto the burner. Oh, wow. So that's pretty rough. That's a different level than most brothers would go. Yes. Right. And that's what I'm trying to kind of, this wasn't a, you know, you're my brother.

I hate you, but I really love you. Right. I'm going to mess with you, but I'm going to protect you. I think it was a little bit worse than that or a lot worse than that. His parents got divorced when he was about 10 or 11. And again, this is the age where he began drinking alcohol. He began smoking weed. probably a little bit of a correlation there.

Most likely. And I think a lot of people have that in their lives. He first got into legal trouble at the age of 15. He was stealing cars, smoking weed, skipping school. He smoked a lot. It really talked about, you know, he was a heavy marijuana user. And he dropped out of school in the 11th grade. He tried to live with his dad,

but he was getting into so much trouble with police that his dad shipped him off to live with his mother. It's bad when you're going to be shipped back to your mom. Back to your mama? Mm-hmm. So a couple of kind of highlights here. Age 17, Stephen gets his hands on a revolver, puts it to his brother's head, and tells him he's lucky it's not loaded.

That's not brotherly. No. I didn't have a brother. But that's not brotherly messing around. No, that's not what you do. No, that's a whole different level. At 27, he had his first. child, a daughter, and what was really the only serious relationship that he ever had? And then two years

later, he had another daughter at the age of 28. He broke into an apartment, stole a crossbow and a 223 rifle. But the bigger problem is, is, you know, a couple years from then, he's going to develop a taste for a better drug, more expensive drug. You know, he's going to go into the cocaine arena. Are you saying cocaine is better than marijuana? Because you did use the word better. I think depends on what your ultimate outcome is. I didn't know if you were ranking your drugs for the audience. I'm just saying, and they both have...

It's a more expensive drug. It is more expensive, yeah. And it's going to have a different use. Obviously, for you, it's better. Because you consider it better. You're putting that out there. I'm not saying... I'm saying if...

Well, how can you say it's better? better if it depends on what you or what your attempt is i love it when you say something and then you try to backtrack out of it yeah that's my favorite that's my favorite part but but you're right turns to cocaine and what is he going to have to do gibbs in order to be able to afford this cocaine he's going to have to start robbing houses yeah and that's what he does steals cars robs houses trying to do anything you can and get some money so really over the next 10, 11 years, he's in and out of jail, right, for theft and drugs and all of this stuff until eventually in 2007 he meets Joshua Komisarjevsky at the halfway house.

So we're kind of full circle, right? Back right. Right. Como so jetzi. It's hard to say. It really is. Stephen's like 43, 44 years old. But now he's got Josh.

I think the thought was he wanted Josh. he wanted Josh to go with him because Josh was good at this. Now, yeah, Josh had spent some time, but he didn't get caught near as often. All right. So we talked about how they met. We know they're caught, right? They're in custody. A judge gave them each $15 million bail.

That's a big number. It was a huge number. Now, what they did was horrible. Really, very quickly after they were captured, they started pointing the finger at each other. It was him. wasn't me. He was the mastermind. They were each saying that. They also each said that it was the other person who had the idea to kill and to burn up the house. So really it's just a he said he said at this point. It's true. Police eventually concluded that it was Josh that was the real mastermind.

Here's a little bit of audio of a police interview with Komisarjewski. you know why you're here he said i thought it would be nice house he said i thought it would be nice to to be there someday yeah to be rich and not have to worry about all the financial stresses well go out and get a damn job trying to take the shortcut man

and work your way up the ladder and go to school do something man you're right it's the shortcut of taking instead of earning right they're breaking into houses nowadays, I think people just steal your identity. They don't bother. It's too hard to break into your house anymore. Oh, yeah.

I think they just steal your identity and try to steal your money that way. Take your money that way. Get in your Amazon account, start shipping stuff to them. But it's all about getting what you want without working for it. I don't know. Unless you win the lottery, I just don't know how it happens. Legally. Legally, yeah.

So at one point during this interview, the police asked Josh, why he didn't untie the girls from the beds before they started the fire, his reply was, it just didn't cross my mind. You know damn well. He knew that if that house went up and those two girls were tied to a bed, they weren't getting out of their lives. Yeah, I mean, he knew. They knew exactly what they were doing. Yeah. Yeah. Both Komisarjevsky and Hayes, they faced capital felony, multiple murder, kidnapping, sexual assault and arson charges. They had so many charges piled up against them. Hayes was going to go on trial first.

And there was some issue about that. They finally came to the decision that they were going to try them separately. Hayes tried to plead guilty. But the courts wouldn't let him do it. When he was evaluated, they found that he didn't have the mental capacity. In their opinion, to make that type of decision. But it's thought that Stephen Hayes was consumed by the guilt of, you know, these people

dying and him being responsible for it. He tried to kill himself a number of times. In 2009, apparently he had saved up like seven days worth of Benadryl, Clonopin, and a bunch of other prescription drugs. Yeah. And he took them all with some type of battery acid. He put that into the mix. He was really trying to do himself in.

He really was. Yeah. But didn't work. It failed to kill him. Although I'm not sure how. That seems like a, like a rough cocktail. You know, the next year in 2010, he was found unresponsive in a cell. Again, he had saved up, you know, a bunch of days worth of prescriptions.

and taking them all at the same time. But I think the key for me is, I think it's pretty obvious that he was riddled with guilt. He talked about it. And I think he was pretty sincere. Yeah. That he just didn't want to live knowing what he had done. But obviously,

the penal system cannot let you kill yourself. They can kill you. Right. But they can't let you kill yourself. And they're not going to. Can't allow you take the easy way out. No. He said at one point that he was going to stick his head in the toilet and then try to do a

flip that would break his neck. I've never heard of anyone trying to kill themselves in that manner. But ultimately, he said he was too afraid because he figured it wouldn't work and he'd end up paralyzed, which is probably true. Probably true. It wasn't until October of 2000. that he was found guilty on 16 of the 17 charges. And he was sentenced to death by lethal injection in December of that year.

They have to keep him in isolation. He's monitored 24-7. They have a video feed of him. They have to keep his light on at all times because he's just a major risk of trying to hurt himself. It's said that he's lost 85 pounds. Wow. Since he's been in jail. I'd like to lose 85 pounds, but I don't want to do it that way.

Yeah. I mean, you can pretend to do the prison workout, you know, and get you a little room down here, and you're staying it the whole time and get the... Make it a five by nine or whatever it is. The missus can just open a can of corn and heat it up and give that to you for dinner and drink some water and that's it.

She'd probably be okay with that. Yeah. So Josh's trial was a little different. And his experience in jail, was a little different. He openly admitted to other people in jail that he committed to crime, but he tried to paint himself as the nice guy. And I don't know how you do that in a crime like this, but, you know, putting the pillows under the dad to make him more comfortable. He even used Michaela's nickname KK in describing some of his crimes. He did this in one. He did this in

one of the police interviews, it's enough to make you sick. We know what he did to this girl. Right. 11 year old girl. Ultimately, killed her after he sexually assaulted her. It just seems like extra disrespectful to call her by the nickname that her family called her by. I don't know why, but it does to me. Well, that's because he doesn't have the right to do that. Right. And I, yeah, I think you're right. And he probably would have to say her name in, you know, telling the story, but to use her nickname. I just think that's wrong. So he pleaded not guilty. But he went as far as he even waived his right to a hearing of the evidence against him.

He was also found guilty in October of 2010. He was found guilty on all 17 charges. But it wasn't until January of 2012 that he was. sentenced to death by lethal injection. And what got me gives is how long it took. I mean, if you hear me giving out some of these dates, right, how long it took to get them to trial. Then I thought from the time that they were convicted, especially with Joshua, to sentencing. It was a very long time. It was almost two years. Quite a bit of time. From the time that he was convicted until he was sentenced to death, this is something that Bill Pettit had a huge problem with and he was very vocal about it

throughout the whole trial or throughout this whole you know the legal proceedings right you know why is it taking so long to get them to trial cutting through all that tape I guess I mean he went public and railed against the system that it was just ridiculous that it took essentially three years for them to even go to trial. But the trial was brutal. We're not, we don't have the time to spend going into the details. We've already talked about the details and they're bad. One of the papers said that after the one of the trials, it was the first time in Connecticut's history that the state offered PTSD assistance to the jurors because of how bad the evidence was. I can get that, man. I mean, we've done some research and it's messed me up for a little bit, you know.

So I can imagine sitting on a brutal trial like that, seeing. Well, because they get to see everything. Yeah. I don't, I shouldn't say get to. They have to as part of their duty. Yeah. They have to review everything. We're talking about some very disturbing pictures.

And the testimony would be the stuff of nightmares, right, to hear every detail. So Comasargevsky and Hayes, they're going to be put to death, right? They got sentenced to death. But then 2015 rolls around. And the death penalty was abolished in Connecticut. So their charges were changed to life in prison. And again, you have Bill Petit, right? The survivor lost his wife.

He lost his two daughters. Before the murders, he said he didn't believe in the death penalty. But afterwards, he did. He believed that these two men should be put to death. And he thought they were going to be until it was found to be unconstitutional in 2015. But this is another thing that he continued to rail against, you know, to preach on about these two men deserve to die. The other things that he did, he established the Pettit Family Foundation. It's a nonprofit.

aimed at fostering the education of young people, especially women in the sciences. It also helps to support efforts to protect and help those affected by violence. And obviously, he set this up to honor the three most important people in his life. His wife and his two daughters, all of them were inspirational in the fight against multiple sclerosis. Like I said, Haley especially had raised thousands, tens of thousands of dollars to help fight this disease. The house was demolished, which you have to do.

There's nothing else you can do with that house. Not that house. So it was demolished. They turned it into essentially like a little garden. Not really a park, I don't think, but more like a garden. And it's maintained that way today. You can look it up on Zillow or Google Earth and see it. One of those many services out there.

Sure. Bill has written a book about his ordeal. He's made all the talk shows. But I think, you know, one of the important things Gibbs is he has been able to get on with his life. He's never going to forget his wife. He's never going to forget his daughters. But he has fell in love again. And he has a son.

And I think that's important. I mean, I think you have to move on. You can't get stuck. You can't get mired in the fact that you lost loved ones and you're just going to wallow in that sadness forever. You can't, right? You have to move on with your life. Well, you think you need to move on. I think.

Well, still remembering them forever. But I don't know how hard it is to move on. I think it would be incredibly difficult. And I think for some people harder than, than, from. other people. Yeah, I think there's some people that can never move on. No, I, I, I think there are a lot of people that never get remarried, but that's maybe their choice. Sure. I definitely don't fault this guy at all. I think he, he has a right to move on with his life. He's actually become a state representative. He got into politics. I think one of the reasons is, is because he's still fighting for

the death penalty. He does not think it's fair that these two men took the lives of Jennifer Haley and Michaela, but they're, you know, getting three hots and a cot and will until the day they die. I don't think he thinks it's right. I don't even get three hots. And I think a lot of people feel that way. And obviously, we know there's a lot of people that feel the other way that just do not believe in the death penalty at all. But that's it. That's it for the case of the Cheshire murders. Like I said early on, I think this is one that really hit home for. for me just because I saw myself in the role of Bill Petit. Yeah.

You know, I have the wife. I have the two daughters that are close to that age. They're doing similar things. I just really could feel it somehow. Yeah, I mean, I think if you look at this, right, you can be sitting in your car or in your office wherever you are when you're listening to this and you can think if it happen to them, it can happen to anybody, which means it could happen to you, you know, and then you have to start evaluating, you know, could it happen to me, really?

Sure. And you have to realize, yeah, it really could happen to you. Well, that's what I was thinking. I mean, I'm knocking on wood here. I almost hate to say this, but could my wife and daughter be at a supermarket and catch the eye of someone? Absolutely. Yeah.

And could that person follow, you know, them back to see where we live? I mean, any of that stuff can happen. If you dwell on it too much, your mind would never be able to rest, man. Yeah, you could spend, you know, every waking hour. Sure, any time. Thinking about the what-ifs and. Yeah, your wife said, hey, running up to the store, you're going to be like, hey, let me know when you get home. Hey, make sure you lock the door.

Yeah, I mean, you're just going to constantly be checking on them. Yeah, I think, again, I think all you can do is try to protect yourself and, you know, not make yourself an easy target. not do things that put yourself in in you know bad positions but going to the local grocery store to pick up a few things is not putting yourself in a bad position Gibbs that's what I'm struggling with yeah you just happen to catch the eye of a bad person intent on doing something bad well that's why you should carry one of those teacat whistles you should have a set of skills you need it all multiple set of skills A K-bar, maybe, you know. You need everything.

Yeah. But that's it. That's the case of the Cheshire murders. We've got some voicemails. Yes, here. Check those out. Hi, Mike. Hi, Gibby.

I love the true crime podcast. It's amazing. I did want to, I do have a suggestion. You thought about doing the 22 caliber killer that was there around Hebron or Norfolk, Ohio. It was pretty good. My aunt worked with one of the. brothers and she said she would have never known because they were so awesome. I just thought I would give you that suggestion. I am a major gibby fan and keep her in time picking back.

Wow, I'm a major gibby fan too. So we have that in common. That's awesome. Appreciate it. That is a good case. That's been on the list for quite some time. We probably need to break down and do that, 22 caliber killer. Yeah. She said something interesting there though. She said, you know, people that knew these guys said that they never would have believed it because they were awesome guys. Now, you do have that a lot, but you also have the, you know, Golden State Killer who's yelling at people in his front yard and it goes both ways. It does. You have different kind of people that kill. But yeah, we're definitely going to do that. I mean, Dexter's a super nice guy. Yeah, very meek until you've done something wrong. And I kind of equate Dexter. Dexter.

extra to you. You are super nice until it's time to not be nice. What's that from? That's a little tip of my tongue, man. Roadhouse. Patrick Swayzee. Yep. Yeah. But that's the way I think of you, you know, deceptive. Okay, Mike and Gibby, I, this is Michelle, I'm called, Deadfile. That somebody needs to move right away because of the demons or whatever that's living in their homes because of previous murders, I think what the heck, what they're going to do is sell their house to somebody and give somebody else their problems. So I think that you can collaborate with us that have people that have died in them and you could do killer real estate. I love that idea. Anyway, that's just my thoughts. Episode on John. Anyway, keep your own time ticking.

I still love killer real estate. I know. I think it's a big hit. The people at HGTV for some and will not return my calls. Oh, they've returned the call. They didn't get back with you? No. Did they reach out to you? I guess I shouldn't talk about it. Okay.

Don't want to, you know. They want you to do it as long as you don't bring that fur with you. I think that might be what it is. I'm from Waco, Texas. I've been with you guys for a while. But something here just happened to me. I'm driving through Indianapolis. And guess what pops up on my podcast screen on the playlist?

this. Episode 14. Herbbaumaster, the I've 70 Strangler. So I went ahead and listened to it again. And right now, I'm pulling through Dayton calling you guys. Keep up the good work on the show. Have a good time. How about that? He should have pulled up the one we did in Dayton.

Yeah. Yeah, we got. So that kind of makes me think, Gibbs, you could go on a tour, right, of all the ones that we've done in United States and kind of pull up the episode, listen to it, go to the site. I mean, if you had unlimited time and unlimited funds. Well, you know, just enough to get gas money and a sandwich ever now and then. Yeah, but you got to work. Well, you know. You need to use all your vacation to Yeah, just take 30 days off. What if we had, what if we had TCAT tours where you did, you drove the bus and talked like Kramer? Oh, it'd be great, wasn't it? And you pointed out all the things. Yeah.

That would be awesome. Be like, we'll buy a double-decker bus. We can take some loads of trash to the dump like Kramer had to, just, you know, make some extra money or with muffin tops or something. I got another idea, T-Cat T-Cat tours. T-Cat tours, killer real estate. The idea is just keep flying. You're going to be a true crime mogul.

Hey, guys. My name is John. I'm Benging. I just listen to the Gertrude episode. I listen to your podcast to fall asleep, and I just kind of wanted to leave a message and say how much I appreciate what you guys are doing. and it's awesome. I've really never had a podcast like this, but I like this much, and I want to thank you. I listen to your podcast to fall asleep a lot. I think it's your voices. They're very calm and soothing,

and I don't really know, but you guys did an episode about the Vampire of Sacramento. I couldn't sleep after listening to that one. All the other ones, not so bad. That was some sick stuff, man. I don't really listen to it to go to sleep anymore. I just thank you guys for what you're doing, and stay safe and keep your own time, 50. You know, we get that a lot. We do fall asleep to you. Your voices are soothing. But here's what I've never understood. I couldn't do it because, just like he said. Now, obviously, some of our episodes are rougher than others. It depends on the content, but I think I would just have some bad dreams. Or, I mean, I guess I have some some because of the research, but I'd be more concerned. It's all these people that listen to.

to us is that fall asleep with us in their ears. But they don't realize is that I input subliminal messages throughout the whole podcast. So when they wake up, they've listened to those in their subconscious. So now you're using a lot of big words. And they are all coming out 100% correctly. Well, that's because. Because the episode's almost over. Yeah, exactly.

So we just know that when you sleep with us in your ears, when you wake up and something's different. That sounded weird. know. Sleep with us in your ears. Anyway. And you have a hankering to write a check to Gibby, give him all your money? Yeah, yeah.

When you start writing that check out to me and send it, you know. That's why. That's exactly. All right, Gibbs. We had mailbag. Oh, yeah? What we got in a mailbag? Big fans, Patreon supporters, Nikki and Tommy Evans.

Oh, yeah. Their whole family. They got the whole family. I think it was Tommy started it. And now the whole family's listening. They sent a chip, a Harley chip from Toad Suck Harley in Conway, Arkansas, which is easily my favorite name for a Harley dealership. Toad. Toad. Toad suck. Toad.

Okay. Toad suck Harley. Well, I don't know what you're into, man. Toad suck. Okay. And somebody else sent something from there, too, and I can't remember what it is. I remember that, actually. I got a ride down to Arkansas to see this Toad Suck Harley.

Well, you go ahead and do that. Hey, you know what else? Didn't come in the mail, but it came in a photo on the Facebook page. What's that? There are two good listeners and Patreon members went out and got some T-Cat tattoos. Yeah. Yeah, that happened recently. So the first that we know of, T-Cat tattoos, done by two friends, they got them together at the same time.

and that was pretty cool. Friendship. They called them friendship tattoos, and they just thought because T-Cats such a big part of their lives. Yeah. You know, it's kind of one of the things

that draws them together. They thought they would do it. I thought it was awesome. Well, yeah, yeah, I did too. All right. That is it, Gibbs, for another episode of true crime all the time. So for Mike and Gibby.

Stay safe and keep your own time ticking.