True Crime Campfire - Dungeons & Dipshits: The Murder of Jane Bashara, Pt 1

Episode Date: June 12, 2020

Power and control. For some people, it’s the most important thing in the world—an essential element of any relationship. If they’re going to get involved with you, there’s a price of admission. If you want to be with them, you have to give them the reins to your life. And there’s an interesting thing about that: Some of these people, despite their constant obsession with controlling their partners, can’t seem to control themselves a damn. We’re about to learn about one of these people. For him, power was the ultimate prize. The ultimate aphrodisiac. The endgame in every interaction. And one woman was about to face the consequences of refusing to yield. Note: This episode involves discussions of BDSM, abusive relationship dynamics and non-consensual sexual violence. Please use discretion when choosing whether to listen, and please skip this one if you're under 18. Sources:Murder in Grosse Pointe Park: Privilege, Adultery, and the Killing of Jane Bashara by Steve MillerCNBC's "Deadly Rich," Episode "The Dungeon Master"Judge Vonda Evans' scathing sentencing of Bob Bashara: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JaOakftTMDEFollow us, campers!Patreon (join to get all episodes ad-free, at least a day early, an extra episode a month, a free sticker and more!): https://patreon.com/TrueCrimeCampfireFacebook: True Crime CampfireInstagram: https://gramha.net/profile/truecrimecampfire/19093397079Twitter: @TCCampfire https://twitter.com/TCCampfireEmail: [e-mail] a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/true-crime-campfire--4251960/support.

Hello, campers. Grab your marshmallows and gather around the true crime campfire. We're your camp counselors. I'm Katie. And I'm Whitney. And we're here to tell you a true story that is way stranger than fiction. We're roasting murderers and marshmallows around the true crime campfire. Power and control. For some people, it's the most important thing in the world. An essential element of any relationship. If they're going to get involved with you, there's a price of admission. If you want to be with them, you have to give them the reins to your life. And there's an interesting thing about that. Some of these people, despite their constant obsession with controlling their partners, can't seem to control themselves a damn. We're about to learn about one of these people.

For him, power was the ultimate prize. the ultimate aphrodisiac, the endgame in every interaction. And one woman was about to face the consequences of refusing to yield. This is Dungeons and Diphitschitz, the murder of Jane Bishara. So campers were in Gross Point, Michigan, a shishi community outside Detroit, January 24th, 2012. 9-1-1 dispatch received a call from prominent local businessman, landlord, rotary club president, and philanthropist Bob Bishara. He said, I don't want to overreact, and maybe it's too soon to call, but my wife is not around. His wife Jane had been due home earlier.

They were going to sit down and work on their taxes together, but she hadn't shown up. He said this wasn't like Jane at all to not show up and not call to let him know where she was and that she was okay. So Bob was worried. Her car was gone, her purse was gone. He couldn't get a hold of her. The dispatcher explained, look, if it's only been a couple hours, it's really too early for a missing person's report. Try calling around some more, see if any of her friends have seen her. So Bob started calling around, and some of Jane's friends came over to the Bishara's big, gorgeous house on one of the nicest streets and Gross Point to help figure out what was up. Bob and Jane, had lots of friends. They were a social couple. So a few of Bob and Jane's friends set out to look

for Jane, or at least her SUV. They fanned out all over the area she normally spent her time in, and meanwhile, Bob kept calling 911 and updating them. Not long after that, a tow truck driver in Detroit noticed a Mercedes SUV parked in an alley in a rough neighborhood on the east side of the city. It was January, so the windows were frosted over. He couldn't see much inside. The guy couldn't tow a vehicle without a patrol officer present, so he called it in. Patrol responded and quickly found the body of a middle-aged white woman in the backseat of the SUV. They noticed a prescription bottle on the front seat, spilled out of the woman's overturn purse, and their first thought was drug overdose. That was pretty common in this area of Detroit, sadly, though it wouldn't

usually be a well-dressed upper-middle-class woman in a luxury SUV. But quickly, the drug overdose theory started to fall apart, as they noticed clear signs of a struggle. The woman had bruising all over her chest, horrible marks on her neck, it looked like she'd been badly beaten or bludgeoned. Her purse had been dumped out and the contents strewn all over the SUV. Credit cards, makeup, her cell phone was on the floorboard, but oddly her wallet still had the cash in it. The credit cards hadn't been taken. So obviously, it's not a robbery, not to mention the luxury Mercedes SUV. So what does this sound like to you, Katie? Well, it sounds a bit like staging. Yeah. Sounds like staging to me too. And the victim's wallet also still contained her driver's

license with the name Jane Bishara 56 from Gross Point. So the Detroit detectives contacted the Gross Point detectives and immediately learned that Jane had been missing for hours and her husband and friends were trying to find her. So mystery unfortunately solved. At least the mystery of Jane Bishara's disappearance, but the real mystery was just beginning. Who would want this much-beloved, much-admired woman dead? Who killed Jane Bishara, and why? But we're going to put a pin in that for a minute and talk a little bit about Jane Bishara and her husband, Bob. They got married in 1985, and at first their marriage pretty much struck everybody as ideal.

Bob was a larger-than-life personality. A big guy, loud, gregarious. Sometimes his personality could rub people the wrong way a little bit, just because it was so big and bomb Bastic, but mostly he was funny, the life of the party. His license plate said Big Bob. He was that guy. What is it with these guys like Fred Andros with the vanity plates? That's so boring. Such a boring choice. Yeah, well, he needs something to substitute for a personality, Katie. And listen, if you have a vanity plate, we are not making fun of you. No, I'm sure yours is awesome. Okay. And they were both successful, both friendly, both really social, both active in the church, Jane especially. They lived in a gorgeous home, one of those houses that looks like it's straight out of the pages of a Martha Stewart magazine. Bob and Jane had two kids, and they were the kind of kids that every parent hopes for. Smart, high achievers. Both college age, Jessica was a star athlete. Bob Jr. was into robotics. Bob Bashara was president of the Rotary Club. He and Jane both appeared in newspapers a lot, hosting this or that charity event, attending this.

this or that society party, they were a power couple, a golden pairing, the envy of all. Yeah, sounds like it's going to work out great. Yeah, but as we know, from every episode of Dateline, not everything is exactly as it appears. For her part, Jane Bashara was smart. She was ambitious. She was successful. She was very well educated. She had an MBA. She came from a well-to-do family. And of course, she and Bob had considerable wealth themselves. Yet despite all that, everybody who knew her said she was really down to earth. At work, Jane treated her employees with the kind of respect and genuine concern that everybody dreams of from their boss. She went out of her way

to do things to help further people's careers. Stuff she didn't have to do. Jane really cared about people. Her employees adored her. She liked golf and tennis. She loved. She loved. loved her church, and she was a stellar mom to her kids. People described her as a sweetheart and salt of the earth. And she loved Bob. But every now and again, hairline cracks would appear in the facade of the perfect marriage. Once, at some social function or other, Jane was sitting at her table watching Bob dance with another woman. This was typical Bob. He loved to work the room. And Jane turned to her friend and said, You know, I knew I wouldn't marry someone boring,

but I never knew I would marry someone like Bob. Right? But that was all she'd say about that. Jane wasn't the type to air her dirty laundry. It was probably part of what made her so beloved. Jane was about listening to other people, helping other people. Nobody ever had a bad word to say about her. That wasn't necessarily the case with Bob.

Yeah, Bob Bashar was one of those people who either love him or you hate him. And unbeknownst to most people in his life, and certainly unbeknownst to the country club crowd of Gross Point, and mostly unbeknownst to Jane, although she'd occasionally discover little suspicious bits and pieces of it. Bob had a secret life. Specifically, he was heavily involved in the BDSM community in Gross Point. As I said in a previous episode, if you're not familiar with BDSM, you know how to use Google. I'm not telling you what it is. You can look it up. Yep. He'd made his first real foray into the scene in 2002 when he went to his first BDSM party and after that he was off to the races and

the BDSM scene started becoming more and more a part of his life. Not that he shared that with his wife, of course. He started calling himself Master Bob and he identified as a top or dominant, meaning he was interested in women who wanted to be submissive to him. Bob clearly thought of himself as God's gift to the submissive women of the internet, or possibly as God himself, I can't tell which, but his posts on the BDSM websites that he began to frequent in 2008 were just chock full of red flaggy goodness. So here's one of them, quote, Welcome to my world. I am Master Bob. I am a true master. Come to me. I am a most complete master who will open you to all this lovely life has to offer. I will bring you to my dungeon and open to you

all you seek to understand, learn, and know, I am here. Neal. Oh boy. Pass. Like the sheer audacity. The cringe. It's like a work of art. Yeah. And all Bob's posts on BDSM sites ordered women to come to him and kneel. In one post, he goes on a long rant about how most men just get into kink to use and abuse women but he wasn't like that of course at all he was a true master it just reeked of like milady style misogyny just red flags busting out all over and i have to say i'm not a member of the bdsm community myself but i know people who are and i spoke to a few of them about master bob because i didn't want to get this wrong if this was just boilerplate normal bdsm language i didn't want to make that sound like it was somehow creepy right every single one of the people

I spoke to took one look at his post and laughed. And one of them said, quote, these are exactly the profiles I avoid. And I love this. She described him as a dime store Christian gray. If you're not familiar with who that is, that's the guy from 50 shades of gray who acts like he can educate you about the one true path to sexual pleasure, like as if there's one path, as if sexuality isn't pretty much as infinitely varied as people are. So try again, Bobby. The one true path. to me rolling my eyes forever, maybe. So Master Bob was cruisin to dole out a bruising, and he did a lot of lying in the process.

For example, on his profile, he claimed he was a widower. Oh, that's a big honkin red flag. Oh, yeah. Bob said his wife had died three years earlier. He said he was a single dad, so you could practically hear just the tragic violins in the background, as he described how tough it was. was to take care of his two kids by himself. And of course, he shared none of these activities

with Jane. In 2007, Bob met a woman named Vanita. She was a pretty single mom in her 40s, and she was in some financial straits when she met Master Bob. As y'all will soon see, this is Bob's favorite kind of woman. Oh, yes. Tell Bob you're divorced, unemployed, and in financial trouble, and you're singing his favorite song. Bob loved swooping in on vulnerable women and playing white night. Now, don't get it twisted because it wasn't because he genuinely enjoyed helping people. Oh, no, no. He liked having people beholden to him so he could call in a debt whenever he felt like it

and guilt trip and manipulate them all along the way. This has been common in every kinky killer we've covered, by the way. they use the lifestyle to manipulate vulnerable people. We saw it in Fred Andros, Jay Smith, and John Edward Robinson. Yeah, which is not to say that people who are into BDSM are like this. That's absolutely not true, and we will get into that a bit more later. Basically, for now, I'll say as people like Bob are doing BDSM all wrong, from what I understand. So Bob helped Finita find a job, and he didn't make his friendship with her a secret.

He told everyone, including Jane, that he was helping this lady out, buying her and her kids' groceries, lending her money. Of course, they didn't know what else he was doing with her behind closed doors. To Jane and the Bashara's friends, Vanita was just an example of Bob's never-ending Christian charity. Well, bless his heart, he's such a prince, isn't he? Yeah. Yeah. Bob even had the nerve to bring Vanita and her kids to church with him and Jane and his kids. He took her to the movies with him and his mom. That's bananas. He let her help him plan a birthday party for Jane.

Oh, my God. Can you begin to imagine the audacity of that? Like, first of all, bring in her to the movies with your flipping mom. That's just weird. Hey, Spank, buddy, you want to go see a movie with my mom? Weird. But also, having your mistress plan your clueless wife's birthday party. Just what the fuck? Oh, I hate this guy. So much already. Yeah, we haven't even gotten to the good stuff. I know. We're barely into it, and I hate him already.

Yeah, it gets better. Mm-hmm. He introduced Vanita to his Rotary Club buddies who surely, surely must have suspected something. And he invited her over around Christmas to exchange gifts with her and her kids. He even opened her gift to him right in front of Jane. Holy shit, I can't with this guy. He also told Vanita he was thinking of divorcing Jane, by the way. Never got around to telling Jane that, though.

Just told Benita. And he and Vanita pretty much had a friends with benefits kind of relationship. They were both way into the BDSM lifestyle by now. In fact, Vanita helped Bob design and fit out the dungeon, a whole space dedicated to Kink. Bob put it in the basement apartment underneath a building he owned. upstairs was a bar called the hard luck lounge and that place will figure pretty heavily into the story later on I'd say their hard luck was being in the same building as Bob Boshara

so anywho this dungeon of Bob's was something else like tricked out he had medieval style axes and swords hanging on the walls what that has to do with sex I'm confused by but whatever along with a huge collection of whips and floggers and chains there was a bed obviously and also some more specialized furniture. For example, a cabinet with two butterfly doors that held ropes and chains and candles and sex toys. There was a TV and a DVD player for watching porn. There was a huge mirror tilted at a downward angle toward the bed that allowed Master Bob and his playmates to watch

themselves, you know, doing it. And by the way, I say blech because Bob's a repulsive sack of shit. Like, I'm not trying to disown VDSM if that's what y'all are into. That's fine. It's just, please God, not with Bob Bischaric is black. Please God. So Bob also had hooks screwed into the walls and ceiling for elaborate bondage hookups. I mean, if you were into getting chained up and spanked and whatnot, this was Zanidu. It was elaborate. And for the most part, Vanita liked having sex with Bob.

She was into being submissive. Bob was into dominance. Very, very into dominance. He liked to dole out pain, spanking, flogging, and something called breathplay, which is basically choking. Now, there are mixed opinions about breathplay in the BDSM community from what I was able to find out, and I did actually do a little research into this. Some say it's dangerous, and it shouldn't happen ever. It's too risky.

You go into cardiac arrest. Others argue with that viewpoint and say, you know, I can do it. I do it safely or whatever. Now, I've never done it, so I don't have a personal dog in this fight, but it's clearly, even within that community, a controversial topic. And Bob was heavy into breathplay. Vanita says he choked her unconscious, like on a regular bird. basis, like to full unconsciousness. And the thing was, Bob could get angry during sex. He had

erectile dysfunction, and sometimes he would get frustrated with that in the middle of sex, and that anger would kick in. And a couple times he really scared her, like choked her way too hard, and she thought, I'm going to die, and it was really, really scary. One thing Vanita didn't like was that Bob never seemed to want to do any normal couple-type stuff with her. They didn't go out on dates. They didn't go to dinner. She started to feel like Bob just viewed her as a sex slave and nothing more. So she started pressing for a regular date now and then. Bob said, sure, no problem.

I'll take you out for dinner and dancing this weekend. But then, on the night they were supposed to go out, Bob changed the game. He called Juanita and told her to come to the dungeon instead of the nice restaurant they were supposed to go to. And when she showed up, there was a nothing. woman already there with Bob. That's fun. Yeah, Bob introduced her as Rachel. Campers,

Rachel was Bucknicket. And it was clear that she and Bob were about to get it on. Oh, my God. Poor Vanita was just crushed. Of course. Furious. She pulled Bob into another room, and she cried, raged,

and begged for him to send this woman away so they could talk. She reminded him of the time very recently when he'd said, It's just you and me against the world. Well, now, apparently, it was her, Bob, and Rachel. Bob's reaction was ice cold. He turned around and went back into the sex room with Rachel. And Vanita could hear him and Rachel going at it. At one point, she overrequent.

heard Rachel say, you shouldn't be so mean to her. Yeah, no shit. Right? I'm like, how do you get into the mood after hearing this woman be crushed? I think if I had witnessed that, I'd be like, you know what? I'm leaving. Yeah, she and I are going to go to dinner and go dancing. No joke, right? And Vanita's my new best friend and neither of us ever speak to Bob again. That's what I like to see, ladies.

Yeah, come on. So Vanita realized she'd been used, and now Bob was done with her. She'd asked for one small thing. a date now and then and he'd just moved on and this was how he'd chosen to tell her the cruelty of that is just astonishing yeah campers I know

as soon as you figured out what this episode was about you were ready for some king shaming but instead at the moment I'm going to go ahead and hit you with some relationship advice instead I love that you said at the moment like we're leaving the door open for it it could happen we don't know if the mood strikes

If someone is not enthusiastically in the relationship with you, if they hesitate to do things with you, it is a sign that you're both on different pages. Definitely. For God's sakes, I am positive that Vanita thought it was so kinky and fun and bad. Naughty. Yeah, that he paraded her in front of his family. But what he was really doing was showing her the life she'd never be a part of. Mm-hmm. I think so, too. Campers, you do not have to settle for someone who doesn't want the same things you do.

Also, don't fuck around with somebody who gets so angry during sex that they hurt you non-consensually. For God's sake, right? That's terrifying. Yep. So the woman who would, in part, set the awful events of this case into motion was Rachel Gillette. And she came into Bob's life in August of 2008. They met, I mean, obviously. on a BDSM site. Her username was

just me as I am. And she reached out to Bob via email to let him know she was interested in a dominant submissive relationship. Rachel was submissive, but she sure as hell wasn't dumb. She figured out early on that he was probably lying

about being a widower. And when she confronted him about it, Bob was like, okay, yeah, you caught me. I'm still married. My wife is alive and well, but we're separated. Rachel still wasn't convinced, though, and she kept pressing him.

So Bob said, okay, okay, we're not separated, but we might as well be. Here comes the trickle truce thing again. Exactly, exactly what I was thinking. He told her he and Jane were in a loveless, sexless, grim sham of a marriage. They slept in separate rooms. He called Jane emasculating. Oh, Lord have mercy. I just love when they use that word.

emasculating, don't you? Something kind of tells me that Bob considers it emasculating for a woman to just exist in her normal life and not spend every waking moment stroking his ego, but whatever, she was emasculating. So Rachel Googled Jane, and she found tons and tons of pictures of her and Bob from the society pages and the newspaper, and Bob just looked happy as a clam who just won the lottery in every single pick. They looked like a real married couple. So Rachel ended things. with Bob and let's just say Master Bob did not take it well

he texted he called he emailed he was relentless and then and campers you're going to have to hold on to your marshmallows for this he called her grown daughter and said you need to talk some sense into your mother what the hell

who does this Jesus Jumpin Jack Jones dude no no no no no But for some reason, all this absurd man-baby behavior wore Rachel's resistance down eventually, and bless her heart, she took him back. Ugh, God. I'd be like, yeah, you need to fire yourself into the sun. I will provide the cannon. What the hell?

Leave my child alone. So she took him back. He invited her to the dungeon, and she loved it. I mean, she was into that stuff. Bob was obsessed with sex, and soon Rachel became smitten with Master Bob. But she wasn't his only girlfriend. So remember we mentioned the hard luck lounge a while ago, the bar that was over top of Bob's sex dungeon?

Well, the owner, Mike, who is a character, said you could always spot one of Bob's girls because of their tacky outfits, which... It's like me, ow, Mike. According to Mike, Bob hit on any and every woman he came into contact with, and he didn't seem to care a damn when he got shot down. He'd just move on to the next target,

which I like to call the boomhauer method for my fellow King of the Hill fans, right? Just literally hit on everyone, and some of them will bite. Mike said the people who worked at the bar hated Bob's guts. Mike's wife said he made the hairs on the back of her neck stand-up, and a lot of the waitresses felt the same way. The male employees hated him because he hardly ever paid for drinks. He seemed to feel that because he owned the building,

he deserved to drink for free in this bar that he did not own, him and his herd of tube-top wearing girlfriends. And on the rare occasions when he did pay for drinks, he was a shitty tipper. I'm shocked to hear that, aren't you, Katie? What? I know. You mean someone with a low regard for other people doesn't tip well? I know. I, for one, am flabbergasted. And I find this very interesting, by the way, that all the women were creeped out by him, like, right away. And as we get deeper into this story, that's going to really underscore what we say all the time on this show,

which is that you should always listen to your little voice, because it's not going to lie to you. Mm-hmm. Everybody at the Hard Luck Lounge knew about Bob's sex dungeon and the wild parties he threw there. So Bob was really not subtle about any of this. And yet it was a life he kept totally separate from his country club, businessman, married father life, and Gross Point. And he managed to do that very successfully, for the most part. So Rachel was certainly not Bob's one and only. but she soon came to be the main woman in Bob's life.

Rachel had had a bit of a tough life, and she had self-esteem issues that were pretty obvious to anyone who got to know her. She gave off a lost lamb kind of vibe. This was, of course, catnip to Bob with his white knight complex, or less charitably, his predator's instinct to go after the most vulnerable members of the herd. A year into their relationship, Master Bob demanded that Rachel moved to an apartment in one of the buildings he owned. By now, they weren't trying very hard to hide their relationship.

Though apparently, Jane still didn't know. In 2010, Bob gave Rachel a promise ring, because apparently he's 12, and other, like, smushy, sentimental gifts. Including family heirlooms that were supposed to go to his daughter. Oh, my God. Nice parenting, Bob, you fucking gross idiot. Oh, that's so awful. Yeah. Even worse, one weekend while Jane was out of town, Bob and Rachel had a threesome in Bob and Jane's marital bed.

Oh, nice. Shows the kind of respect he had for his wife, doesn't it? Oh, by the way, after the threesome was over, Bob made Rachel sleep on the floor by the bed. Well, maybe he finds it emasculating for her. a woman to sleep in the bed with him, Katie. She might expect some of the blankets or something. Think of it from his perspective. Oh, you're right. Won't somebody please think of Bob's little penis's feelings? So Bob and Rachel had a dominant submissive relationship outside the bedroom, too. Bob made her run errands for him, and sometimes he made her run errands for Jane. And Jane didn't know

about this, of course, but the psychological mind games involved in that are disturbing to think about. It's like he really wants to rub it in that she's not his wife. She's not as equal, and she's not Jane's equal either. But Rachel was okay with this stuff at this point, presumably. On the BDSM site they both used, she started going by the username M.B's Bella, meaning Master Bob's Bella. Ew. Around this time, Bob's perfect facade of the wealthy, successful businessman and community leader started to crack pretty seriously.

His BDSM obsession was cutting into his time and his final. finances, and he was falling seriously behind on his bills. At one point, to make ends meet, he took $10,000 from one of Jane's retirement accounts without asking her. And when she found out, she was pissed, and she changed the password on the account. Imagine that chapped old master Bob's ass, something fierce. She's like, Jane, you're not kneeling. She wasn't kneeling, Katie, it was upsetting him. It was emasculating, I'm sure, for her to change that password. That was probably super emasculating. so Bob had always kept his kink under wraps when he wasn't with other people in the scene but in 2010 he started to slip he was on the golf course with a friend one day when he suddenly just blurted out that he liked to spank girls

but that Jane didn't like that stuff his friend was like okay good to know we'd like never talked about anything like this before yikes and worse Jane and the kids kept catching him watching porn online like he would just do it right out in the open and people would just do it right out in the open and people would just be like walking through the living room. Oh my God. So obviously this upset them. And one afternoon his poor daughter walked in on him yet again. And of course she freaked out and asked him what the hell he was doing watching this stuff out in the middle of the flipping living room with people walking around. And this man told his teenage daughter, look, I have ED, meaning erectile dysfunction. I want to make sure it's not your mother's fault. Oh. Wow. Like just sit with that for a second.

What the flipping fuck are you doing? That is your daughter. Your daughter does not want to know this. Of course it's not your wife's fault, you dumb fuck. Of course not. It's a biological problem. And there's no shame in it. Lots of guys have it.

But for God's sake, man. Yikes. And as if that wasn't bad enough, soon after that, Jessica accidentally saw some texts between Rachel and Bob, in which Bob ordered Rachel to perform a sex act in a very profane, master Bob-like way, which is so not how you want to see your dad. And rather than apologize to her for having to see that

and making sure it would never happen again, Bob was just brutally honest with Jessica about his affair. So now, this teenage girl was burdened with the knowledge that he was cheating on her mom. What a massive jackass this man is. I cannot even believe it. So, of course, now Jane knew that Bob was cheating on her. She'd suspected it for a while,

but now she knew, which is different, you know. And Bob was just matter of fact about it. He told her, you know, you can divorce me if you want. Just wait until Jessica's in college. Ouch. And, you know, Jane, as hurt as she was, she didn't want that. She wanted to try to keep her family together. So she asked for counseling and Bob said okay. And they went. They talked about the sex issues and Bob's terrible money management. Yeah, the money was becoming a huge issue for Jane. Bob owed thousands of dollars in back taxes on his properties. He was constantly in court because he was basically a slum lord. He didn't keep his buildings up to code. He refused to do anything about rats and other pests. He wouldn't have

things inspected. So he got sued again and again. One business partner said Bob used to steal change from the coin laundries at his properties. God's sakes. What the hell? He'd also pocket rent money cash from sports betting pools with friends stuff like that that's classy uh-huh he liked to gamble but he sucked at it and he hardly ever won do you think this episode is going to be emasculating for bob oh we can only hope whitney you know bob darling if you're worried about being emasculated you've probably already been emasculated because really the true emasculation happens on the inside it has nothing to do with women, and our perceived submission to you, you gross fuck.

Absolutely. Basically, Bob was shady as fuck. He kept tenants' security deposits for no reason. He asked people to lie for him in court. He'd mismanaged things so badly that in 2001, Jane had to forego retiring as she'd planned to. They just couldn't afford it anymore. Oh, my God.

By 2011, his finances were a serious. mess. Jane made a good living in her job way more than Bob did. And Bob's income had plummeted. On top of that, Rachel wasn't happy being a side chick anymore. She wanted to be the bottom bitch. Between their meeting in 2008 and 2012, she tried to dump Bob eight times. Eight times. Eight times. But every time Bob begged and pestered the shit out of her. And, said he just needed a little more time to get out of his marriage. And sometimes he'd play the master card. Oh, my God.

In one email, he wrote, I will not release you. I am your man and you are my woman. I remain master Bob. Why do I always want to read that in the butthead voice too? Like, come to a butt head. I will not release you. I am your man and you are my woman. I remain master Bob.

That's my very bad butthead impression. But it's just so embarrassing. I'm embarrassed for you, Bob. Bob, no. At this point, he's not so much, you know, daddy as saddy. It's not yes, daddy. It's no saddie. Yeah.

And listen, campers, if you try to break up with someone, I will say more than twice. You get two and it doesn't stick. Just leave in the middle of the night. Yeah. That's fair. Rachel says that for the last eight months of their relationship, Bob led her to believe that he and Jane were actually divorced. They went house hunting in Gross Point. They were seen together all over town. They picked a house that was only a 20-minute stroll from Bob and Jane's house,

for God's sakes. A 300,000 five-bedroom home. Rachel was on top of the world. She told all her friends and family about it. But of course, it was a lie. Bob hadn't divorced Jane. In fact, Jane was feeling good about her marriage in early 2012. She told a friend that she'd prayed about it, and she wanted to try to work things out. Soon, she was telling friends that she and Bob started going on dates again, like in the old days. Huh. Hmm. Meanwhile, Bob and Rachel started to posting on the BDSM site that they were looking for a special girl, a third, to live with them and also be submissive to Master Bob. They wanted, quote, an attractive female, age from late 30s to early 50s, willing to obey his directions concerning finances, health issues, and

self-growth. She had to be, quote, gainfully employed. Now, hey, hi, it's time for Katie's kinkshaming corner. We need a little theme tune for it. I know, right? Like a, oh, God. I was thinking like a whip sound, a whip crack. That'd be perfect. A little jingle and then a whip at the end.

Yeah. Yeah. We'll get on it. Yeah, thanks. Hey, how about you don't use money to manipulate your sexual partners unless you're able to provide for them yourself? Also, if you are going to get in this kind of relationship where your finances are part of the kink, please, please, please, have a slush fund. Or another method of getting out.

Control over finances is one of the most basic, basic ways abusers control their victims. Now, we talk about how Bob isn't doing BDSM, right? He is not doing any of this in any form of safe, sane, or consensual. Oh, no, Bob's hurting for cash and he just wants to take this woman's money. And I mean, there are people who enjoy that, letting some somebody as part of their dominant submissive thing, take over their finances. And like you're saying, like, as long as you have a way out so that that can't be used as a method of controlling you and abusing you without your consent, I think that's fine. If that's what you're into, you know, whatever.

I can see not wanting to worry about bills, but he wants to take this woman's money. That's what this is about. And in the fall of 2011, shortly before Jane started telling her friends about how well things were going between her and Bob, Rachel posted that they had found their third. But Rachel was jumping the gun a bit, because Bob was misleading her. It was true that they'd begun corresponding with a 50-something pretty dental assistant in Oregon named Janet, and Bob was for sure coming on strong, like calling and emailing Janet all the time, but Janet was just interested in finding a couple to go on a couple of trips with,

like not to move in with. And she told Bob from day one, she wasn't anywhere near ready to talk about, like, moving to Michigan to be with him and Rachel. But he wouldn't let it go, of course. Bob kept at her constantly. At one point, and campers, I need you to psychologically prepare for how flippin, hilarious, and ridiculous this is, okay? I don't want to just spring it on you because it's intense.

At one point, Bob sent Janet a package to woo her. It contained an Olive Garden gift card, which is the best part, and one of his dirty t-shirts. He said he'd slept in it for a few nights, without showering, you know, so she could go out and have her some endless breadsticks and then come home and just cuddle up and breathe in his man musk all night long. Olive Garden gift card.

Listen. And a dirty shirt. Whitney, have you ever had Olive Gardens? Oh, I like the breadsticks. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, no, I'm talking about the yokey soup. That's so fucking good. No, I don't know if I have.

So good. So this is pulling back the mask a little bit. I went to college in a small town. And so there were no fun restaurants. There was like Olive Garden and Chili's. And so my best friend and I used to go to Olive Garden and just get the soup and salad bottomless and just gorge ourselves for two hours. I'm all about anything bottomless. I'll take the Olive Garden gift card.

Just take your nasty t-shirt. I don't want your nasty t-shirt. Gross. So, anywho, that was bananas. And their conversations got especially intense when he found out Janet's elderly. dad was a well-to-do rancher. He got real interested in that and kept telling her, make sure you're in the will.

And it's interesting, Bob's interactions with Janet really highlight his attitude toward women and toward dominance, and this is what we've been getting at the whole time. As I understand BDSM from the people I have spoken to who are into it, it's not supposed to be about one person just completely disregarding another person's feelings and wishes and desires and taking complete control. It's supposed to be a consensual, mutual exploration of roles. with the goal of everybody feeling respected,

everybody getting what they want in the end, right? I think that's right. That's what I've been told anyway. But Bob disregarded his partners left and right. For example, he wanted to come visit Janet in January, and she said, no, she couldn't do it right then. And the truth was, she was starting to feel a little scared of Bob. He was so intense and persistent,

and there were those creepy comments about her dad's will, and he was obsessed with breathplay, which she wasn't into at all. But Bob wouldn't let him. go. He would never let anything go. He guilt tripped her. And, you know, Janet was accustomed to being submissive with men. And eventually he just wore her down and she caved. And it fell off from the moment Janet picked him up from the airport. First, he insisted on driving her car, even though he wasn't insured for it. He said, I refuse to be a passenger. Add that to the growing list of things that make

Bob feel emasculated, I guess. In the restaurant where they went for dinner, Bob kept barking orders at her. Place my napkin on my lap. Hold my coat. Stuff like that. It even creeped out the waitress who was a friend of Janet's. Here's the thing. Janet hadn't agreed to any of this.

She didn't want to carry the dominant, submissive stuff into real life like this. This wasn't what she was into. But again, Bob clearly didn't give. two shits what she was into. The only thing that mattered to Bob was Bob. When they got to Janet's house after dinner, Janet's dog,

a sweet, usually friendly and chilled out good boy, took one look at Bob and peed himself in fear. This dog had never done that before. It was totally out of character. Yeah, that's when I think I'd just be like, okay, get out of my house.

Like, that is so creepy. Oh, my God. Bluh. Mm-hmm. Dogs don't. And cats know, too. Oh, dogs, absolutely no. Animals for sure know. I think especially dogs. Yeah. And I'm not saying that this should be the end-all be-all. But if you bring someone to your home and your pet does not like them, that goes in the con file for this person. And beyond all this, as if it weren't enough, Bob was just nothing like he led her to believe.

Janet was athletic. She liked hiking and stuff. and she told Bob this as they were getting to know each other that it was important to her to have a partner she could do active outdoor stuff with. He told her, yeah, yeah, sure, sure. I'm totally into that, all that stuff. I like hiking. Love it.

But when they went for a short hike, Bob was huffing and puffing and obviously hating every minute of it. And it was obvious he'd lie to her. This was all bad. But it was about to get a lot, lot worse. So we're going to leave it there for part one campers, but because we release both halves of an episode on the same day, feel free to move on to part two now if you want. Or save it for later, whatever catoes your nine tails.

But for now, lock your doors, light your lights, and stay safe until we get together again around the true crime campfire. You can follow us on Twitter at T.C. Campfire, Instagram at True Crime Campfire, and be sure to like our Facebook page. If you want to support the show and get access to extras, please consider becoming a patron. at patreon.com slash true crime campfire.