True Crime All The Time - Travis Baumgartner

Episode Date: March 2, 2020

In 2012, 21-year-old Canadian Travis Baumgartner was swimming in debt and struggling in life. After getting a job with an armored truck service, Travis began developing a plan to solve all of his problems. In June of that year, while still a trainee, Travis Baumgartner shot four fellow employees while they were replenishing ATM machines. He took off with the armored truck full of loot.Join Mike and Gibby as they discuss the life and crimes of Travis Baumgartner. at 21 years old, his life was really just beginning. What could have been going so hopelessly wrong that Travis would make the decision to murder three and seriously wound another? And, where did Travis think he was going to hide out with all of the money that he had stolen? This was a landmark case as Travis received one of the longest sentences since Canada abolished the death penalty.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 172 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. Gibby, how are you? I'm good, man. How about you? I'm doing great. Yeah. We have a lot going on this weekend. We've got this T-Cat. We've got unsolved. We've got a Patreon episode. Something for everyone. There's a lot. There's a lot of T-Cat going on. And we'll talk about it. But before we get into all that, let's do our new Patreon supporter shoutouts. We had Ariana Nicole. Hey, Ariana.

Bradley Jason House. What's going on? B.J.H. Lakeisha Smart jumped out of our highest level. She's really smart, too. Nicole Mosier jumped out of our highest level. Hey, Nicole, how are you? Veronica Hanson.

What's going on, Veronica? Ingrid Edge. She's Edd. She's sharp. Yeah. Brennan. Hey, Brennan. Angela Rose.

Hey, Thorny. Wendy dries. What's going on, Wendy? Neely. Just Neely? Whitney Taylor. Hey, Whitney. Ashley Sopensky.

Sopensky. Lark Bolin. What's going on, Lark? Diana Magifee. Magafee. Magafee. Yeah. Actually, I think you might be more correct than I am.

Probably am. Laura Amador jumped out at our highest level. Hey, Laura. As did Linda Ramirez. Wow. Thanks, Linda. Shelly McCullough. What's going on, Shelly?

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Olaf from Frozen? Yeah. Yeah. It's his daughter. I know it's one of your favorite movies. You know. Talk about it constantly. It just makes you feel good.

It's heartwarming. Yeah. If we go back into the Volkibs, this week we selected Angela Rhodes. Hey, Angela. Been with us a long time. So we appreciate all the new page. Patreon support and the continue. We do.

Patreon support. We had some amazing PayPal donations as well. We had Patricia Lopez. Hey, Patricia. Elizabeth Jorgensen. What's going on, Elizabeth? Katie James O'Connor. What's going on?

Katie. And Karen Martin. Hey, Karen. So very much appreciate it. Right. So I talked about everything we have going on. Right now came out last night, Saturday night. Yeah.

We have a brand new Patreon only episode. episode that's out on both audio and video, we're discussing the crimes of Joseph Corcoran out of Indiana. This is a guy Gibbs who at the age of 16 was suspected of murdering his parents with a shotgun before he boarded the school bus in the morning. A jury acquitted him. And then five years later, he committed a number of murders, some of them against members of his own family. Yeah. So that's intriguing in and of itself. But this is also a death penalty case

involving a man who many mental health professionals have diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic. So you have the death penalty verdict. You have Corcoran's mental capacity and how the two are linked. And the fact that both of them, both of these issues come up on appeal. And they bounce back and forth between different courts, ultimately being decided by the highest court in the land, the United States Supreme Court. Yeah, that's a good episode for sure. Yeah, I found it very interesting. And then on true crime all the time unsolved, we have a new episode out right now. We're talking about the murder of 11-year-old Holly Staker.

Heartbreaking. Heartbreaking case. This is another case, Gibbs, where. police felt as though they had the right perpetrator. Yeah. And it turned out that, nope, got overturned. Right. And so we'll get into all of that.

Dive into it a little deeper. All right, buddy, are you ready to get into this episode of true crime all the time? Yeah, I'm excited for it. We are headed up to Canada. We have not been there in a while. Hey, you hozer. Great White North. We're talking about a young man named Travis Baumgartner.

This is a man who in his very early 20s was so bogged down by life and debt that he chose to make the absolute worst decision that anyone can make. For some reason, he felt as though cold-blooded murder would solve all of his problems. Now, does that ever work out? How often is that actually the case? I guess it does Gibbs in those instances where people get away. with murder. I mean, I guess if you get away with it, it probably works out the way that you wanted it to. Right. And if you have no conscience, then does it really even bother you at all that you took someone's life? But what if you do have a conscience, Gibbs? That's something I often

think about. How many people right now are sitting in their living rooms watching television, knowing that years ago they took someone's life. They were never caught, but what they did in their younger days, it eats at them. It gnaws at them every day. They're remorseful. Now, not to the point of turning themselves in, you know, there's that self-preservation thing. Yeah. But they're remorseful.

And at the same time, they spend every day of their life looking over their shoulder, you know, waiting for that one day when the police are going to. knock on their door. I don't know about you, man, but I think that would have to be a miserable existence. It's rough, man, when you think any moment somebody's going to be coming through that door. Yeah. I would think it is rough. You're saying it like it actually is rough. So yeah, you know, I should have just asked you from the beginning and we could have cut out this whole part and you could have just gone straight to. It's today the day. Right. Yeah. You just never know. Right. Will he turn me in? Will he finally turn me in for the reward money?

Are you talking to me? Yes. Oh, okay. Yeah. I'm solid. Is he keeping me here longer than normal because somebody's on their way? I'm solid. Don't worry about me.

So Travis Baumgartner lived in the basement of his mother's home in Sherwood Park, Alberta, Canada. This is outside of Edmonton, to the east of Edmonton. He was only 21 years old and had recently landed. ended a job with an armored truck company named GS4 cash solutions. You know these Gibbs. You see them almost every day of your life, right? They're usually parked outside of some business.

And the first thought that always pops into my head is, I wonder just how much money is inside there. $22,464. It's the last one I, I know, I don't know. I don't know what kind of armored cars or armored trucks you're hitting. but I would be hoping for a hell of a lot more than $22,000. Why would I need an armored truck to carry around $22,000? I could just carry that around in your Pinto. They were just getting started.

Oh, okay. Or they were at the end of their run. Yeah. Maybe it's just me. I'm curious by nature. It's not like I'm thinking about how I could rob it, though. I want to say that. But have you ever thought if it was going down the road and the door swung open

and a bag or two fell out and they kept going because they didn't know any better. You pulled over, got the bag. What would you do? That's actually something I thought a lot about.

And not that specific scenario, but really more generally, what if you found, let's say, a million dollars? Right. Are you taking that million dollars to the police and saying,

hey, I found this? Or are you paying for everything that you can in cash for the rest of your life and saving the rest of it that you would have normally spent on your debit card. Yeah, you know, maybe you just... Tough decision.

You take it and you store it for whoever lost it and wait and see when they... Until they come and kill you in a mobster scenario. Yeah. It'd be the Ukrainian mafia. Why you always got to pull the Ukraine's into everything? That's what I pulled in last week. It was. You're always with the Ukrainians.

But there have been some daring... armored truck robberies over the years, Gibbs, there have been some people that have been able to take quite a bit of money in some of those heists. Travis was a trainee, having been on the job for only a couple of months in June 2012, when this heinous crime that we're getting ready to talk about occurred, he was having some serious money troubles.

He owed his mother rent. He owed $58,000 on a, new Ford pickup truck that he had recently purchased. But at the time, this was a guy that had 26 cents in his bank account. I actually did not realize that a bank account could get that low, 26 cents. Or lower. Can it go lower? I mean, what can you buy nowadays with 26 cents? Five pieces of five cent gum at the counter of some store. Maybe. Maybe a store. Maybe a stamp. Can't even get a stamp. Do you know how much a stamp cost? When's the last time you've mailed a letter? It's been a long time, man. You can't buy a stamp for 26 cents, and you haven't been able to for

a long number of years. Well, you know me, I don't like to crack my wallet open anyway. That's true. So you bought a lot of stamps back in the 70s, and you're still rolling with those. Yeah. I thought they were the forever stamps back then. Right. Travis had joked with some friends that he could end all of his money problems with the money inside the armored truck on any given night. Okay. Not something to joke about, especially if you're planning on doing something like that later on. So again, Travis Baumgartner was a young guy who obviously struggled with money. Sure, he had this new job, but was he really making enough money to go out and

buy a very expensive loaded Ford F-150. It does not seem like it. I can't even get a loaded. That's what I was thinking. I'm still driving my truck that's six years old. I looked at buying a new one the other day and I thought, man, they are just super expensive. It does seem like the kind of decision that young kids often make, a decision based on the need for immediate gratification, right?

It's kind of the world that we live in nowadays. Got to have it right now. On demand. Netflix. Yeah. I mean, you can, your phone, you can watch any video it seems like on YouTube or podcast. Oh, podcast. Instant gratification.

I got to have this truck. It's awesome. And I have to have it regardless of the fact that I can't really afford it. At the same time, he owed two of his friends money. So this was a guy that was increasingly being seen as one of those guys and Gibbs, we've all known this person who never had any money who was always reaching out and saying, hey, man, can you loan me 100 bucks or 50 bucks or whatever it is? I'll pay you.

I'll pay you back. And if you're inclined to do so to lend that money, you're doing it. knowing that you may or may not ever see it again. I mean, to me, you just never really want to be known as that guy. You never want to be seen as that guy. No. But every family's got one. Every workplace has one.

And every group of friends normally has one as well. Yeah. Speaking of, you got a hundred bucks or something you can know. I said that while staring you directly in your eyeballs. Yeah. I mean, my wallet's got money in it, but I'd have to get it out. Right. I mean, there have been heart transplant operations that have happened in less time than it takes

for you to figure out how to get the money out of your wallet when a check comes at dinner time. And that's no joke. It works for me. It works for everyone. It's a great way to increase your network. Yeah, yeah. But I know exactly what, you know, I've had. family members that can I borrow X amount of dollars? I need it to close on this house or I need

it for got to pay this bill. I'll pay you back, I promise. And then you don't see him when it comes time to pay back. But then they're posting pictures on the social media. Of a new car or something. In my case, they just went on, we're going on vacation. Yeah, like, going on vacation. Hey, where's my effing money? Maybe you pay me back first before you. go on vacation. But my experience with that, Gibbs, is it's not going to last long, especially with me. Once you burn me or, you know, you essentially lose any goodwill credits you have built up. Sure. It's not going to happen a second time. It's not like I'm going to be loaning you any more money or doing any more favors. Right. Unless you just feel like giving your

money away at that point because you, that's what you're doing. Which I do not. No, you do not either. You're not as bad as me, but yeah. So I mentioned. And Travis is a trainee at this armored truck company, but he's already been outfitted by his employer. He has his protective vest designed to stop rounds from entering the chest area. He was outfitted with a 38 caliber revolver and a couple of speed load. You look like you're getting a little excited over there. Well, I was going to ask you if you know what a speed loader is. Yeah.

Yes. It's a guy that loads the trucks really fast. It is not. So, I mean, I think a lot of people may not be familiar with speed loaders because they're used specifically with revolvers. Sure. Which not a lot of people nowadays. Revolvers used to be very popular. They're not as much anymore.

But, you know, you have to swing out the cylinder, right? To load a round in a revolver. You close it. You fire. when you're done, you have to swing out the cylinder again, empty all the empty shells. Right. And then like in the old Western movie, put each bullet in one at a time. What a speed loader does is it holds all six in like a perfect formation.

Right. That aligns with the holes in the cylinder. And when you put it up, you press the button, they all fall in. And you're done. It's like very, just much quicker. Yeah. loading a gun. Now, it's not the same as a semi-automatic pistol where you have these magazines that hold 17 and man, you just drop a button and slam it in. Put another magazine in and keep going.

Yeah, exactly. So basically they developed speed loaders to make reloading a revolver faster. On June 15th, 1992, before he left for his 7 p.m. shift at work, Travis got into it with his mother over some rent money that he owed her. So he's living with his mom, but paying her rent. And apparently he was behind on that as well. It's important, right? All of this money trouble. He owes friends.

He owes his mom. He for some reason bought a at least $58,000 truck because he owes $58,000 on it. Right. Good decision making skills. For sure. She later told police that as Travis, left the house for work. He told her, hey, don't worry, I have a plan. It doesn't even matter. I'm not coming home. So don't worry about it. You'll get your money. Okay. A little cryptic.

I think if you hear that from your son. Sure. I think on top of cryptic, you could also think of it as a little bit scary. But no way. Gibbs could Travis's mother have ever known. Just how bad. You could Travis's dark his plan was. Travis arrived for his shift that night of the 15th. Normally there were four guards that went out with the armored truck, but this night there would be five in the truck, four men and one woman. There were three trainees, Travis being one of them. The other two were 35-year-old Brian Illisic and 26-year-old Matthew Schumann. It was only Schumann's third day on the job. With the trainees were 39-year-old Eddie Regano, who drove the truck, and 26-year-old

Michelle Shigelsky, who was the trainer for the three trainees. Their job that night was to go out to various ATMs. and load them back up with cash. They had been making deliveries for a couple of hours when they pulled up to the University of Alberta campus around midnight. How much you think a single ATM holds when fully stocked? I will. Beepo, beepo, beepo, boop.

80,000 dollars. Hmm. Yeah, I really have no idea. I should look that up because I'm now very interested to know. Yeah. When fully loaded, how much can they put in one of the? those bad boys. Be curious.

Now, in Canada, it'd be a little bit less because the dollar's stronger. I'll be honest with you, it took me a minute to kind of grasp that one. But now I get it. Yeah. Ha, ha. Ha ha. The problem is because it wasn't smart enough to get it right away. Yeah.

It kind of loses all of its momentum. Yeah, it was pretty flat at this point. Well, and that's my fault because I didn't get it. Yeah, that's all right. So, Rajano stayed with the truck, right? He's the driver. He stayed with the truck while the other four made their way into a small locked vestibule to refill some ATM machines, right? This is on the campus of the University of Alberta.

And the way it was described was that, so I'm thinking these were ATM machines built into the wall. Right. There was a door that allowed you to get in behind them where you could fill up the ATM machine. but only obviously certain people had a key. It was very secure. The people on the armored car service had a key because they had to get in there. Sure. But you don't want drunk Frank to Tank just walking in behind and messing around in the back of the ATM machine.

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Just go to worthy.com slash TCAT to get started. That's worthy.com slash TCAT. Illesik and Schumann were, they were kind of down, right? Filling the machines while Shigelsky watched over them. And then for some reason, and maybe this was by design, it probably was, Travis Baumgartner was behind all three of them. None of them Gibbs could have seen what was to come. Baumgartner pulled out his company issued 38 and he shot all three of them in the back of

the head. Wow. So it was pretty much an ambush. Yeah. You know, you're out there with your coworkers thinking, all right, if anything, this guy's got my back. Exactly. he's keeping an eye on things behind me, making sure, you know, nobody's sneaking up.

You're not thinking that he's the one that's the danger. He fired one shot at Matthew Schumann and hit him in the rear left side of the head. He fired one shot directly to the back of the head of Stephanie Shigelsky and then two shots to the back of the head of Brian Ilson. Police later determined that he fired. the two remaining shots in his gun, right? It held six bullets into the wall for some reason, although I'm not sure if they ever figured out why or if he ever told them why.

If they did, I couldn't find it. It's a bizarre thing to do. Why do that? Why empty out your gun? Yeah, I really don't know. Now, he was going to have to empty it anyway to reload. So, but there was no reason to have to shoot those. last two shots. He could have just dumped the, the two bullets as they were. But all of this happened

very quickly. So quickly, Gibbs, that none of the three victims had any time to react, let alone, you know, draw their weapons or take cover. I mean, it was bang, bang, bang. Yeah, I'm assuming it was probably all done within five seconds. If, yeah, if it even took that long, as Baumgartner exited the vestibule, the door locked behind him. And so he started to make his way back to the armored truck. And this is where I say he had to reload. So this is where the speed loader comes in. And really the only reason why I wanted to kind of explain what it was. Right. Because he's loading his gun as he's walking back to the truck. And he shot Rajano three times, once in the face. And then I think as As he went down, he shot him twice in the head.

Then he got into the truck and he drove away. So this is brutal. No doubt about it. In a matter of minutes, he has shot four people, four coworkers. Right. That he had spent some time with, some more than others. I mentioned the one guy was only his third day on the job. But you're also at a university firing off multiple rounds.

Right. And there were a number of students, even at midnight, it's not like a university closes up. You have people studying. Yeah. You have people party in. They're out walking the campus. They heard the gunshots. A few of them made their way towards where these ATMs were located.

And they saw blood coming through underneath the door that led to this loading area that I was talking about behind the ATMs. They could see Schumann. on the other side of the door, but they couldn't get to him because the door was locked. Yeah, so they can't get him out. And it was pretty secure too. I mean, you're not going to,

you know, break into this door with a credit card or anything like that. He was talking to them, you know, saying he had been shot, he needed help. He didn't think he was going to make it. Right.

A number of 911 calls were placed by various students who heard the gunshots. And police were unseen very quickly. I read maybe as early as like 1212. Like I said, I think the armor car got there after midnight or around midnight. So fast response. Yeah, because it would have taken them some time to get into the vestibule to start unloading everything. Yeah. Now, we know or we can assume the shootings happen fairly quickly.

The first three very quickly. Right. And then it probably didn't take him long to reload and walk back out to the. the truck and fire three more shots and drive away. So police get there. They found Eddie Regano first. He was dead lying face down on the pavement. Then they made their way to the locked room. And again, they could see Schumann. He's still alive, but barely, right? He's clinging to life. It took them a few minutes to break into this room, to break down the door. But they finally did. and they found Illesik and Shigelsky dead.

But thankfully, they were able to get a hold of Schumann, rush him outside to the paramedics, so the paramedics can try to save his life. Yeah, he's in bad shape. I mean, you take a bullet to the back of the head from what is essentially point-blank range. It's going to do some major damage. Now, it's one of the reasons why I think I wanted to stress

that he wasn't shot directly in the back of his head. It was more on the side. And I think that's what saved his life. What a brutal scene those paramedics had a see. To see that type of wound. Yeah, it was a devastating blow. And we'll talk later on about exactly what his injuries end up being. But I will say this. I think he was damn lucky to live through. this encounter and I think it had a lot to do with the placement of the shot. So police are out there, paramedics are working to save Schumann. Meanwhile, Baumgartner had driven the armored vehicle back to where he had parked his truck.

He grabbed about $360,000 out of the vehicle. Yeah. Put it in his own truck and took off. Police figured out pretty quickly that. that Travis Baumgartner had been there with the others that night, but they had no idea what had happened. Had this guy shot everyone there? Or had he been kidnapped, right, as part of a theft of this armored truck. Either way, they wanted to find him. So they put out information on him. Now, I think it didn't take long, though, for police to consider him a person of interest in the actual shootings.

Because at some point, they're going to find the armored truck. Sure. And they're going to realize that, okay, it's parked pretty close to where he would have parked his truck. Right. So then they put out information on his truck. They alerted law enforcement around Alberta. they also alerted the authorities at the border crossings into the U.S. Travis Baumgartner has all of this money.

What's he going to do with it, Gibbs? Where is he planning to go? I mentioned earlier that he owed two friends money. He made stops at their places. And he gave them some money. It's like, here, I'm paying you back, man. Yeah. I couldn't do it on my own legally.

But I feel much better about myself now that I've paid you back. I had to kill three people for it and wound one other one, but I paid you back. So you're welcome. Gibbs, then he went to his mother's house. Now, she's asleep, right? This is pretty late, early the next morning, however you want to think of it. Right. So he went inside the house quietly and he dumped $64,000 on the kitchen table.

Again, it's like, here you go, Mom. Yeah. Enjoy it. I told you that you would. get your money. Told you not to worry about it. I feel better about myself now. Yeah.

I mean, I had to do some pretty bad things that get it. Oh yeah. I mean, never mind. I had to kill three people. Seriously wound a fourth to feel this way. But now that I've done it,

I feel a sense of accomplishment. Yeah. That I was able to pay everyone back. I'm no longer a deadbeat for that reason. Yeah. I'm a loser for another reason. But the other thing he did while he was home was he changed clothes. And he left behind his bloody work uniform and boots.

Obviously, Gibbs, if you shoot four people at fairly close range, right. You're going to have a lot of blood spatter on you. Clearly he wasn't the sharpest tool in the shed. Well, I don't know how sharp he was. IQ wise or intelligence wise. Right. What I do know is that when it came to certain aspects, it didn't seem as though he was all that worried about some of the things he did or that somebody was going to figure out it was him.

I think he knew that there was really no way around the fact that they were probably going to know it was him. So you figured, why even worry about getting rid of any evidence? That's the only thing I could think of because if not, that's pretty dumb to leave your blood spattered uniform and boots at the house. then he left again in his truck. But before he did, he traded his license plates for his moms. So you have to imagine this, right?

A mother waking up in the morning to find this big lump of cash on her kitchen table and a bunch of her son's bloody clothes on the floor. Sure, it'd be freaking out, wouldn't you? Yeah, you don't know what's going on. Now, very quickly, she's going to. hear the news of the shootings. And you know it didn't take her long to put it together that her son was somehow involved. Right. And like I said, it didn't take police long either to figure out that he was more likely the perpetrator of the crimes than he was any type of a victim or a hostage. Later that night, Travis's mother released a statement to the media. It read, you are not alone,

Trav, please, I love you. I want to help you. Call police now and end this peacefully. I'm sorry we had an argument last night and had bad words between us, but I want you to come home and do the right thing. Please, Travis, I love you. And I'm pleading with you with all of my heart to end this without further bloodshed. That's pretty tough for a mother to be in that position. Yeah. And I'm sure the way I'm reading it doesn't do it justice, but you have to think of her pouring her heart out in this appeal to her son. She doesn't want him to kill anyone else. And she doesn't want him to die in a shootout with police. That's true. I think both of those probably weighing pretty heavily on her mind. There wouldn't be any news on Travis Baumgartner until the next day. But when the news came out,

it was pretty big because it was around 4 p.m. the next day when Travis was approaching the Canadian U.S. border in his truck near Linden, Washington. He was caught by technology. One of those license plate scanners on the Canadian side alerted to his mother's license plate. And that's it took. As soon as that alert rang out, the guard, the border guards went over. They pulled him out of his truck and he was arrested. That quick. That quick. Yeah. I mean, it kind of is anti-climactic a little bit, but when you see the pictures of the arrest, it's almost comical. I haven't mentioned it, but Travis was a big guy. He was like six four. And in the pictures, he's kind of towering over some of these guards who arrested him. Yeah. The border guard.

searched his truck, they found, you know, $200 and some thousand dollars or however much it was in cash inside the truck. When they questioned Travis, he told them he couldn't remember much. Really, the only thing that he remembered was that he was abducted by a man who told him that if he didn't deliver the backpack to Seattle, his family would be killed. Okay. So he's already weaved a good story. So I'm pretty sure he can. came up with that either before or on the drive. Yeah. He was thinking about it.

And he's like, okay, this is what I'm going with. If it happens, I'm going to say this. Now, the next day, detectives from Edmonton showed up to interview Travis. He kind of stuck with the same story, right? Faulty memory, amnesia. But I was abducted and there were threats of violence if I didn't do this. Right. I just follow my instructions. The interesting thing I found was that he told the detectives his name was David Webb.

Now, does that name mean anything to you? It should because it's part of one of your very favorite characters of all time. Absolutely. Absolutely you know or absolutely you have no idea what I'm talking about. I have no clue. So David Webb, and I know you'll remember, as soon as I say it, was the original, the real name of Jason Bourne. Oh, that's right. When they go back and track his history before he was brainwashed and all that stuff happened, his real name was David Webb. That was the flashback scene. Yeah. The other thing that came from, you know, especially that first Jason Bourne movie was he had amnesia. Yeah. So it's like this guy has taken. taken pretty much the majority of his story from Jason Borg.

Exactly what he did, didn't he? Yeah. And it sounds like something you would do as well. Yeah. Now, not the David Webb part because you wouldn't remember that. No, I'd have to do something different. Yeah. So he's not confessing, right?

He's not coming right out and saying, yep, I did it. I killed them. So authorities had to get a little tricky with Baumgartner. They stuck him in a cell with, a fellow inmate that was actually an undercover officer. So this guy posing as an inmate. Right. And at first, Travis kept to his story, but it didn't take long for everything to start to spill out.

And eventually to this undercover officer, he confessed to everything. He told the officer that he killed those people. He stole the truck. He stole the money. and he ended it by telling the guy, well, at least I don't have to pay for the truck anymore. Nice. That's what he's thinking. You've killed three people, seriously wounded another, ruined countless lives.

Right. When you look at family and the extended family and branches and all of that. And you're almost jokingly talking about the fact that you don't have to pay for this expensive truck. What in the hell is wrong with you? Yeah, he's a sick mother. He really is. You know, statements like that, I think they just show you a callousness to someone, right? It's not like in the story, as far as I know, or from what I read, he was crying. He was remorseful. Nothing like that. He just said, yep, this is what I did. I did this. And you know what? I'm not going to have to pay for that truck anymore. Ha, ha.

Ha ha. Yeah. Well, I mean, that, that is a soul. callous person that has no empathy. So they got him, right? They have him confessing to the shootings, the murders. At his trial in 2013, Travis did not take the stand. Why would he? There's nothing good that could come out of his mouth at this point. No, nothing good.

And really on the very first day of the trial, he pleaded guilty anyway to two counts of second degree murder, one count of first. degree murder and one count of attempted murder. So prosecutors read out what was called this 15 page agreed statement of facts. So he had told them as part of the plea deal and they read it out to the court. It covered his admissions to the undercover officer. It said that Travis told the police that he intentionally, aimed at the heads of his coworkers.

Wow. Now, there's probably a reason for that because keep in mind, they're all wearing body armor. So. And of course, he knew that. And he knew that because he was wearing body armor himself. So he can't shoot him in the back. And that's not the most efficient way to kill someone anyway. Right.

But I thought it was an important point because it, it goes to his mindset that night. He was going to assassinate these people. Yeah. Nothing less. It was premeditated because he knew exactly what he had to do. It was definitely premeditated. Now, how far in advance, I don't know. Hours earlier that day, weeks before.

Remember, he had mentioned to people that, okay, I could solve my money problems. Right. Ha, ha. Told his mom that day when he left the house. Yeah. no doubt premeditated, I think the question is how far in advance. But in the eyes of the law, does it matter? I don't think it does.

No, I don't think so either. I don't think it matters if it was 12 hours in advance or two weeks in advance. Once he pulled his gun, he knew that he was going to shoot him in the back of the head. So he knew that's what he had to do to kill each of them, right? Because if he wasn't thinking like that, he could have just pulled his gun and shot him anywhere. But he had to think, I've got to make sure I shoot him in the head or they won't die. Oh, I see what you're saying. Yeah, I was a little unsure where you were going with that. You're saying, okay, he could have wounded them and taken their guns, locked them inside.

Yeah. They would not have, you know, taken their radios, whatever. They would not have been a threat to what he was trying to do. Absolutely. This thing detailed out the murders, the days after the murders, pretty much as we have outlined them, one statement read in court was that Baumgartner, told authorities that he threw both his gun that was used in the shootings and his body armor into a body of water as he drove south toward the border. So Travis Bumgartner stole what was really quite a big amount of money. I mean, it was nothing to sneeze at. Now, it was obviously nothing to murder anyone over. No. Not that there is any amount, but it was quite a bit of money. in the end Gibbs police were able to account for every bit of it except for about $1,400. So they got the money back from his two friends.

They got the money back from his mother. The rest of it was on him when he was arrested. Somewhere along the way, he spent $1,400 on something. Somewhere. Yeah. And his friends and mom got screwed again. Well, they didn't get the money that was owed to them. Right.

But I can't imagine that he. owed his mom $64,000 in back rent. No. I think he was trying to pay her back and then some. And I don't think, I don't think any of them would want that money. Oh, I'm, I guarantee you, once they realize how it came about. No, no. That's blood money. Yeah. Nobody wants that. No. Now, if you legitimately earn $64,000 and you would like to give it to me, I'd be more than happy to take it. But if you bring me $64,000 in cash and a large number of the bills are spattered with blood. And I drop it off and run off. We're going to have an issue. Yeah. I won't even buy your lunch, so you don't have to worry about it. Yeah, I'm not worried about you giving me $64,000.

The statement of facts also included admissions from Baumgartner that everyone at G4S, where he worked, teased him. He said, quote, I think I was just mad at everyone. And it built up into this blind rage. So the six foot four, six foot five guy was teased and couldn't handle it. And he couldn't handle it. Yeah. I'm not saying that didn't happen. What I'm saying is it doesn't appear as though that was the impetus for the murders. To me, it seemed to be all about money. At least that's the way. way I looked at it. Yeah, oh, I definitely think it was this about the money. I think he's using this as poor me. Think about what I was going through and why I did this. Extenuating circumstances. You got to look at this. They were teasing me. You got to factor that in. I'm not this terrible guy you think I am.

Family members of the victims took the stand. Michelle Shigelsky's husband told the court how Baumgartner had gutted his life. Her parents talked about the horrible feeling of hearing about to shooting and then later finding out it was their daughter. Gibbs, her father, had to go and identify the body of his little girl. That would be so difficult. It's every father, every parent's nightmare. Brian Illesick's mother told the court that there was no dignity in Brian's death. He didn't have a chance. He was executed. Eddie Rajano's widow, Cleo said she hated Travis Bonn. He was gardener for taking her husband away from her and they're two young boys. She said, our lives have been shattered. So we talk about these people that died Gibbs and I didn't delve

into their lives in a lot of detail because to be honest with you, there wasn't a ton of detail. Right. But they had parents. They had, you know, some of them had wives. They had family. They had kids. It's always tragic when people lose their lives. And then, for me, there's this other tragedy that revolves around like every facet of their family members' lives. It stays with them. You don't get over the death of your daughter. No. The death of your husband in this way. It's so senseless. It's not like at 80 years old, this man died in his sleep. He was a pretty young guy. This father, too, was executed. There was no opportunity for the family to say goodbye.

No, nothing. And the fact that I'm going to guess that these were all closed casket. Well, not to get too graphic, but most of the time when you're shot in the back of the head with a somewhat powerful round, that round will exit at some point. So you create a massive exit wound. Exit wound. So you don't even get that type of closure where you get to at least see and touch, you know, before they closed the casket up.

I don't even get that. Then you have to talk about Matthew Schumann. He didn't attend the proceedings. Instead, he sent his impact statement to be read by prosecutors. He said that he didn't want to be further traumatized by this man by having to sit in the same courtroom. He lost a large portion of his brain due to the actions of Travis Baumgartner. We talked about it. right shot in the back of the head but more to the side that's probably what saved his life but it also

caused massive head trauma massive brain damage he was at a much greater risk for chronic seizures couldn't feel the right side of his body couldn't sleep had horrible headaches lost partial vision in both eyes. And he said that his brain injury left him incapable of dealing with his emotions. And I guess this put a tremendous amount of strain on his relationship with his fiance. He was snappy. He just, he couldn't keep his emotions in check. He was snapping at her all the time for the slightest thing. You know, it just ruined his life. It did. Yeah. It caused them to grow apart. He ended his statement by saying, you ruined my family. And I think Travis Baumgartner did. Not just his family, but to a large extent, the rest of his life. He's still alive, but he's never going to

be the same. He's alive, but he's not alive, right? Not the way he was. No. There's no way that he can be. I mean, to that point, I mean, I think sometimes it'd be tough to find the will to move forward. And I think for some people it can be. You know, you have to be really strong. But so much devastation, Gibbs, three people lost their lives. One person permanently scarred both physically and emotionally. The shootings took a tremendous toll on the families. We talked about that, right?

Change their lives forever. This is heartbreaking. stuff. And you know what emotions Travis Baumgartner showed through it all? Nata. Nothing. Zilch. Emotionless, heartless, cold as ice. Yeah. As though it didn't bother him in the slightest. Travis had the opportunity to address the court and he declined. On September 11th, the judge handed down Baumgartner's fate and sentenced him to life in prison with no chance. of parole for 40 years. And Gibbs, you might be thinking to yourself, wow, that's a tougher sentence than we're used to

seeing in some of the older Canadian cases. And you would be correct. I was actually thinking that. As you normally are correct, this is one of the things about the case that I've found very fascinating. Canada had recently passed a new law that allowed judges to impose consecutive, not not just concurrent sentences when multiple murders were committed. And obviously, if a judge can give consecutive sentences,

it's going to mean more time behind bars, right? If you get four concurrent sentences for four different murders, well, you're serving the same amount of time. Yeah. But if they're consecutive, one doesn't start until the first one ends, right? Big difference. That's a huge difference.

And that's the way it should be. I believe it's the way it should. be two. I also believe it's why in some of the Canadian cases that we've done going back to the 80s, the 90s, even into the 2000s, people that have committed multiple murders didn't do nearly the amount of time that you and I thought they would do. Yeah, I mean, if you're guilty of killing two people and you get a 20-year sentence for both for this one and another 20 for this one, one doesn't mean you just do a 20 year stint and you're done you should be able to you have to pay for this one first and then go pay for that one yeah because to me it's almost like okay pick which one but

you're not paying for one of those murders so i could get a discount that's what it's out you know when you do the well you're fat you get 20 for each of them but we're just going to run you through 1 20 so basically you get a discount on the remainder yeah i think it's an injustice to the victims i really do now There are concurrent sentences in the U.S. For certain things. I get it. That's a part of the law in certain areas. But I don't think if you murder three people.

Yeah. And you seriously wound a fourth that you should be out walking the streets in five, 10 years. I just don't think it with the callousness that this guy showed. Yeah, I don't think he should ever be walking the streets after doing what he did. So I was really happy to see the sentence that this guy received. And I believe Gibbs, this was the first case prosecuted and sentenced after the new law was passed.

It was reported to have been the harshest sentence handed down in Canada since 1962 when capital punishment was abolished in that country. So it was kind of a groundbreaking case in that sense. The judge really took his time, too. He took three hours in detailing out his reasons for the lengthy sentence. He called Baumgartner a coward and a cold-blooded killer who betrayed his colleagues, the people that had placed their trust in him. So the earliest that Travis Baumgartner would be eligible for parole is in the year

2052. He would be in his early 60s. Yeah. And I really don't have a problem with that because there's no guarantee that he's getting out at that initial parole hearing anyway. I don't have a problem with it at all. And I'll be honest, I have had problems. And I know you have too with some of the sentences that we've seen coming out of Canada or that, you know, in years past. If you think about the amount of time he's going to be in prison, he'll probably not want to come out. A lot of guys have hard. a very hard time coming out of prison after spending so much time in there. And you base that all off of Shawshank Redemption. Absolutely. I know you do. Carve your name up on that.

Beam. Let everybody know you were there. Gibbs, as we're wrapping up this case, there were a lot of people that wondered how someone didn't see this coming. You know, apparently Baumgartner spent a lot of time on social media, as many youngens do and some oldens, and I'm looking directly at you, put my phone down, a person who, for your age, spends an inordinate amount of time on social media. Hey.

Not that there's any age that you shouldn't be on there. I do it for the show. Yeah, I know you do. And I appreciate it. But this guy made some posts that hinted that something bad was about to happen. Just a few weeks before the killing. He posted on his Facebook page, I wonder if I would make the six o'clock news if I just started popping people off.

It's alarming. That should be alarming. Another one said, two days until training, I get a gun, smiley emoji. Well, when you put those two together, those don't look good. The first one on its own doesn't look good at all. Now you wonder why places of employment, some of them actually look at your social media accounts now. Well, and I think that's part of what people were asking, right? This company G4S, they took a lot of heat in the wake of the shootings. Paula Simons at the Edmonton Journal,

she wrote a very good commentary article basically asking the questions. Why did G4S hire a 20-year-old kid with no formal education, no stable work history? no military training or discipline, and then arm him with a 38 caliber revolver filled with hollow point bullets and give him two speed loaders and body arm. Well, that's because he was cheap to hire. I would say that is probably dead on. But she went on to ask, why was there no one at G4S who looked into this guy's strange social media post to your point, right?

If you're doing a background check, hey, you might want to go out there and just do a quick look-see. Yeah. Make sure that somebody's not talking about popping off and making the six-clock news. It would be probably a critical function of any HR department. And a lot of this piece had to do with the differences between the hiring practices of law enforcement agencies and that of private security firms like G4S. But to be honest with he gives, I have.

don't think it's that much different here in the United States. I think when you're talking about law enforcement versus getting a job at an armored car service, an armored truck service, I don't think it's the same type of background check. But I could be wrong. I've never gone through either one, so I'm speculating. In June 2014, the families of the victims filed some large wrongful death lawsuits against G4S in their claims. They said among other things that the company failed to ensure that the defendant Baumgartner was psychologically fit to carry out the duties and in particular to handle cash and loaded restricted firearms.

The company should have been aware that he was inadequately trained, capable of violence, was financially broke and psychologically. Unstable. Brian Illisick's parents sued both GS4 and Baumgardner for $578,000. Eddie Regano's family sued for $1.7 million. And Illesick's widow filed a separate suit against both GS4 and the University of Alberta in the amount of $925,000. I couldn't find anywhere, Gibbs where the family of Michelle Shigelsky or the lone survivor, Matt, Matthew Schumann filed anything. Maybe they did.

Maybe I just couldn't find it. Yeah, or maybe they had a settlement agreement that no one's allowed to discuss. With a non-disclosure. Right. And I also couldn't find the outcome of the suits that were filed. I know GS4 fought them. I know that I didn't see where the outcome was documented anywhere. Well, you know, most of those type of suits go.

Eventually, some type of settlement occurs. And nobody ever hears about it. Yeah. they just kind of fade away. But that's it. That's the case of Travis Baumgartner. I thought it was an interesting case for a number of reasons. And you had the Canadian law thing, which I found fascinating, but you have this very young guy, you know, 20, 21 years old who somehow makes the decision that he can solve all his problems by killing people and, you know, taking this money, okay, you're giving money back to people that you owed money to, but then what are you going to do?

You know, one thing I never even mentioned, Gibbs, when they found him at the border, he didn't even have his passport on him. What in the heck was he planning? How was he planning to get into United States anyway? Not the brightest bulb. No, and we talk, I think it was premeditated, but I don't think it was thought out very well. Right. So it's kind of, you know, it goes together.

I mean, he could have thought that, you know, I'm going to do this. I don't know when. And when he was in that vestibule, he saw the opportunity because all of them were turned away from him. Yep. That he said, you know what? Now's the time to do it. And he polled and did what he did. And I do think there are some people that believe that, that, okay, there's no guarantee that he planned to do it that night because how was he going to know that he'd have the opportunity?

Maybe he's the one that night loading the money into the ATM. Right. But it turned out he wasn't. He was able to stand and watch, which really gave him the perfect opportunity to shoot all three people at essentially the same time. All right. We've got some voicemails. You want to hear those? Yes, sir.

Hi, Mike and Gibby. This is Michelle Willie from Burlington, Connecticut. I love your podcast. I've been binging it since September. I just finished episode 101 at Kemper. So I'm making progress with my binging. It helps me get through the workday. I usually listen to about three or four a day at least.

And when I have a long drive, it definitely helps out. My husband is a little worried, though, that I am quite obsessed with the podcast. I think he's worried that I'm getting some tips of what not to do to get caught. I am Team Ghibie, although Ghibi, you kill me with your movie references and not knowing, you know, the actual name of the movie. I eat more of those people screaming at the phone every time. But Mike, Fergie, I had to tell you during the Kemper episode, I laughed so hard when you were talking about how your mom bitch slapped you with the bag of marshmallows. I loved it.

She's awesome. But just wanted to say hi and keep up the great work and keep your own time ticket. Well, thank you very much. And that was a true story. My mom did hit me in the mouth with a loaded bag of marshmallows because my mouth got away from me. And there you go. And I deserved it. I don't know if she can get away with that today, Gibbs.

Your mom listens. You know that. Yeah, she does. Yeah, so you're probably going to get smacked in the face with another bag. It's not like she doesn't remember that it happened. Yeah. And I'm saying she was right in her actions. Hope she brings a bag over tonight when she hears this.

She might give you one too, right? And I'm kiss her. Probably. Hi. My name is Pam. And I started listening to Drew Kime from my mom. And I obviously podcast is all about listening to people's voices, and it took me a while to find ones that I could actually stand the sound of their voices, and I stumbled across you guys,

and I absolutely love it. You guys love the banter between you two. It just sucks me in. Also, my mom had told me about this one podcast, the Toy Box one, and the one that she had sent me, I couldn't get past the sound of his voice, and come to find that you guys covered. it as well. And I have to say that I am so thankful. I got my sister turned on to you guys, turned my mom onto you guys. We're always giving each other ones back and forth to listen to. And I love it. I just want to tell you guys, keep doing it. Don't ever stop and keep your own time taken.

Well, that is very cool. Gives were just turning people on all over the country, all over the world. Love it when families listen together. Yeah. What do we say? We say a lot. lot of things. Family that listens to true crime together stays together. They do. You don't listen to the word I say. And they cover up crimes together and they murder together and dispose of bodies together. Hi, Mike and Givie. It's Evie from across the pond. I just wanted to call in and say how much I've been loving the podcast. I'm actually, I think a bit late. I've only just heard of you, but I'm binging your episodes like crazy. You guys are great. I love listening to you. I love how much respect you give to the vet.

time as well. They're all trying to tell their stories. And I just, I have to call and say that I love your accents. They just, they, they tickle me to no end. I especially love when Gibby says wash instead of wash. So, you know, I just wanted to give you guys some love and I'm definitely going to be keeping up with the newer episodes. But in the meantime, now I have all these hundreds of other episodes to go back and stop from the very beginning. So yes, thanks, guys. Cheers. You know, they call it a pond. I've tried to canoe across that pond. It's pretty big. It's bigger than a pond.

Yeah. I'm just saying. I had to turn back a few times. And she says she likes her accents. I love her accent. But I will say this. Your accent is as foreign to me as almost anybody in any other country because of your idioms and your warish. I have my own language.

Rassling. Hey, don't you get me started. Hey guys, I'm Karen Martin from right here at Ground Zero, Dayton, Ohio. I'm wondering if you'd consider doing a podcast on one of Dayton's most notorious crimes, the murder of Barbara Butler, the girl on the Volkswagen floor. I'm probably your oldest listener, literally, having cut my true crime teeth on the granddaddy of the mall, the Cleveland murder of Maryland Shepard, wife of Dr. Sam Shepard in 1954. As a fifth grader, I listened to my mother and her sister discussed this sensational case during both of his trials.

I was hooked. Years later, while working as a young registered nurse in Columbus, I found to my astonishment that my supervisor was the widow of the warden of the Ohio State Penitentiary during Dr. Shepherd's incarceration. I cultivated our friendship enough and eventually got the nerve to ask her if her husband thought Dr. Sam was guilty. If you're interested, I'll tell you what she said. Meantime, thanks for the Super Podcast. Until then, keep your own time ticking. Did she just leave us hanging? A little bit, yeah.

That's a teaser. Now I'm very interested. It's funny, because you and I were set to do that, what, last year? Yeah. I think sometime when somebody else came out with it and we said, okay, we're going to, we didn't want to step on their toes. We were going to put it on the back burner. We haven't come back to it.

But we appreciate it, and we definitely need to look into that case. I'm not actually familiar with that. Me neither. So we're, we have to dive into it. We're on it. Gibbs, we had mailbag. Yeah. Tina Cervantes sent us a bunch of goodies from Stockton, California.

Awesome. I mean, almost too much to list. Harley chips, stickers, pens, notepad, you name it. Everything. And then Kel Madden sent us a bunch of crafts, goodies that she made herself by hand. Not sure if you remember, but it was her sister Rose that left the voicemail, wishing her a happy birthday and then kind of things snowballed from there. And Kell listens to the podcast as she does her.

She's crafty. Craftwork. She's crafty. So we appreciate it all. All right, buddy, that is it for another episode of True Crime all the time. So for Mike and Gibby, stay safe and keep your own time ticking.