True Crime Campfire - Tangled Web: The Murder of Bernie James

Episode Date: June 11, 2021

Do you believe in love at first sight? What about love at first sound? The sound of a soft, sexy voice, that is. There's something uniquely intimate about a phone conversation, especially when you're having it late at night. There's anonymity because you can't see each other, but there's intimacy too. You can bond quickly, share secrets you'd be too scared to share face to face. How many of us have had one of those marathon, up-til-dawn phone sessions with a new love interest? How many of us have fallen asleep while still on the line? Soo sexy. Sexy enough, perhaps, to cloud your judgment. The guy in tonight's story found that out the hard way. Join us for a wild story about a manipulator who was years ahead of her time.Sources:Investigation Discovery's "Evil Stepmothers," Episode "Deadly Role Play"https://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/fl-xpm-1988-11-02-8803040310-story.htmlhttp://miamiheraldstore.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1980532&CategoryID=58643&ListSubAlbums=0Follow us, campers!Patreon (join to get all episodes ad-free, at least a day early, an extra episode a month, and a free sticker!): https://patreon.com/TrueCrimeCampfireFacebook: True Crime CampfireInstagram: https://gramha.net/profile/truecrimecampfire/19093397079Twitter: @TCCampfire https://twitter.com/TCCampfireEmail: [e-mail]: https://shop.spreadshirt.com/true-crime-campfire/Become 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. Do you believe in love at first sight? What about love at first sound? The sound of a soft, sexy voice, that is. There's something unique about a friend. There's something unique about a friend. phone conversation, especially when you're having it late at night. There's anonymity because you can't see each other, but there's intimacy too. You can bond quickly. Share secrets you'd be too shy to share in any other context. How many of us have had one of those marathon up till dawn talks with a new love interest? How many of us have fallen asleep while still on the line? So sexy. Sexy enough perhaps to cloud your judgment. The guy in tonight's story found that out the hard way. This is a tangled web, the murder of Bernie James.

So as we were saying, campers, there's something extra intimate about a phone conversation, and I can attest to that personally, because my husband and I met on an internet message board in 2002, in the early days of such things. And although our initial one-on-one contact was via email, the fireworks didn't really start flying until we started talking on the phone. And Tim Ott can back me up on this. In 1986, Tim was 32 years old, working the graveyard shift as an emergency dispatcher

at a fire and ambulance service in Broward County, Florida. Tim was a sweet guy, but he was painfully aware of what he considered to be his limitations. He worked alongside hot firefighters and EMTs every night, and as their wives and girlfriends came in to pick them up from work or bring them dinner, Tim was confronted with the fact that he'd never known what that's like. He's never dated anybody in his life. His life revolved around his job and his bowling league, and that was pretty much it. He wanted a woman in his life desperately, but he got tongue-tied around women he always had. He knew he wasn't the most

conventionally attractive guy he was insecure about his looks and when he liked a woman he would just clam up around her just really sad right i know it sucked i mean some people have no interest in romantic love and if that's you that's a okay but timot was interested very interested he wanted a wife and kids in the worst way and at 32 he felt like he was getting older and his time to find someone and start a family was ticking away probably more true in 1986 than now people We're waiting later and later to have kids now, but back in the 80s, you know, that wasn't the case. So by mid-September of 1986, Tim may have been a little bit vulnerable to falling hard and fast for the first woman who showed a little interest. And that campers is a dangerous place to be.

You know how they say you find true love when you're not looking for it? I think that's actually true, but I don't think there's any magic to why that is. the reason I think this is true is that when you're desperate to be partnered up with somebody, anybody, a few things tend to happen. So first, you're more prone to giving off those desperation vibes, which can be off-putting, right? I mean, it can make potential partners think that you're liable to turn fatal attraction-y or want to have their babies after two dates or something like that, right? And even worse than that, your standards tend to drop.

So this means that you're not on the alert for red flags. not good you're likely to ignore big flashing neon warning signs that you would definitely notice if you weren't so eager to be with someone and of course you're more likely to put up with bad behavior so lying cheating taking you for granted so anybody you end up with in that state is probably not as likely to be your true love or a true love right and in tim's case it was going to be way worse than any of that one night he answered the phone to a soft voice woman asking about a quote for an ambulance transport. She said her dad had just passed away and she needed an ambulance to take his body to the funeral home. And as they talked, Tim was surprised to note a flirty tone in this woman's voice. And he was not used to this. Tim did not habitually have women flirting with him. And I imagine he was a little intoxicated by that, despite himself, even though he's at work and he's talking about transporting a dead body to a funeral home. But, she was flirting. She said her name was TJ. She was a flight attendant. She told him he had a nice

voice. In fact, she told him he sounded adorable. No woman had ever said anything like that to Tim Ott before. And much to his surprise, on the phone, he seemed to be losing the shyness that he usually felt around women. He said, you sound pretty adorable yourself. And they ended up having a fun little conversation that night. And Tim set up the ambulance transport for her father. and assumed that, you know, that would be that. I had a fun little conversation, and I'll probably never speak to this person again. But the next night, T.J. called back.

And this time, it wasn't because she needed anything. She just said she wanted to hear his voice again. And this time, their conversation lasted for hours. And that was the first of many hours-long conversations between Tim and T.J. Over the next couple of weeks, they learned everything there was to know about each other. and this probably won't surprise anyone.

The talk soon turned sexy. Ooh. Yeah, temptation too was too much to resist. Even though I love the image of him sitting at work at his desk, you know, with like firefighters and EMTs coming and going and other dispatchers around him. And I imagine he would like cup his hand over the phone and say, so what are you doing? Tim, you're at work. I imagine him being like, oh, hold on.

there's an emergency. I have to take this next call. Exactly. Sorry, I got to send some, I got to send an ambulance over to the nursing home. Anyway, where were we? So, I'm unbuttoning your shirt. I mean, it's really not the sexiest environment, but whatever. So, anywho, T.J. described herself to Tim, and from her description, her looks matched her voice. Sexy. She was blonde, tall, slender, blue-eyed, everything Tim could ever dream of. And, yeah, and more. So after hours of conversation, T.J. would often fall asleep with the phone line open so that they could resume their conversation when she woke up. And have you ever done that, Katie? Yeah. It's like the softest kind of romance falling asleep to somebody on the phone. It's so soft. Yes. You sound sarcastic, but I actually. No, no, no, no, no. I'm being genuine. This is where the salt in my natural tone comes through of me. I'm just not used to hearing you being so social.

sapy. I just pressed my hands to my cheeks and I was just like, aw. No, I, yeah, it's super sexy, right? Like to fall asleep on the phone and then like you both fall asleep and then you wake up together. I'm sure many, because I think that's totally like a high school thing, many a parent has been horrified by their phone bill because of this exact thing. But yeah, I think there's something really sexy about that. And when my husband and I were talking on the phone in the early days of our relationship. So he is British. So he was over in the UK and I was here in the States

and so we kept different hours obviously because of the time difference and he would call me every morning so you could listen to me waking up. Isn't that sweet? That's so cute. Yeah, he said I make cute noises like a cat or a baby dinosaur. So, and there's something just really intimate about that

about having someone's voice in your ears you're waking up and I imagine that this built the closeness between Tim and T.J. as much as, or maybe even more than these marathon conversations that they had. So T.J. told Tim she was a single mom of three kids. Their names were Michael, Irene, and Nicholas. And she asked him, you know, does that scare you that I have kids? And he said, oh, not at all. He loved kids. He hoped to have kids one day. And she said that these kids were not hers biologically. She had adopted them. And their story was absolutely. heartbreaking. Their biological mom had died, and their dad, whose name was Boots, interestingly,

well, Boots was a monster. Boots was an abuser, Boots was a molester, and he was in an asylum in Maryland because he had molested all three of the kids, which it just doesn't get any more horrifying than that. The court had ordered him into rehabilitation, and T.J. hoped he would never, ever see the light of day again. So now they were with her. the kids were thriving. She said, they're my angels, and Tim said he'd love to meet them someday. T.J. told Tim she wasn't seeing as much of her kids as she'd like lately. She was traveling a lot for work, of course. And when she was away, the kids stayed with her mom or her best friend, both of whom were awesome and adored the kids as though they were their own. And when she wasn't traveling for work, she was spending a lot of time in Houston, tying up loose ends on a ranch she'd inherited from her grandmother. She told Tim it was an absolutely beautiful place. She was planning to sell it, and she expected to get a nice chunk of change from the sale.

Geez, oh, Pete's, could this woman be any more perfect? I don't see how. No, she had a good job, a kind heart, three kids, a ready-made family, as Tim sought. And now it seemed like she was coming into money, too. Damn. And not to mention she was a smoke show. Right, exactly. A few weeks into their relationship, which by now had become pretty serious, despite the fact that they'd never seen pictures of each other, Tim started pushing for a face-to-face meeting.

Once her work schedule allowed, T.J. agreed, and they made a lunch date for the next afternoon. Tim showed up all excited. He had on his best outfit. He brought flowers, the whole bit. He waited and waited. Oh, no. And waited some more. I imagine the waiter brought him a couple of drinks and baskets of bread. But T.J. never showed. Tim sat alone in the restaurant until he finally realized she wasn't coming. Oh, man.

She, so, okay. He was obviously hugely disappointed and a little worried, too. He waited for her to call that night at the dispatch center, and she did, right. on schedule as always. She apologized over and over. I'm so sorry. Nicholas is sick and I couldn't find anybody to watch him. I had to take him to the ER and I just couldn't get to a phone. And I mean, this is a thing with people with kids. Like I've been stood up, I don't know how many times by, you know, friends with children and then they just call you later and they say, oh, I'm so sorry. The kid had an ear infection or whatever. And, you know, it's just part of being friends

with parents. So it's, you know, there's nothing particularly suspicious about this, right? No, and this is before cell phones. Like, it's very possible she couldn't get to the phone. Exactly, yes, in the 80s. You had to get to a pay phone or something. And then she would have had to call the restaurant. It would just be a mess. Yeah, absolutely.

So she seemed so contrite and so disappointed that she hadn't gotten to meet him. So, of course, all Tim's irritation and insecurity melted away. And they picked up their conversation where they'd left off the night before. T.J. told him, you'll get together soon, I promise. She called him honey. But the next time they scheduled a meeting, it was the same old story. This time, her excuse was that she'd gotten a last-minute call to report to work.

So they set another date. And on try number three, Tim looked up to see a woman approaching his table at the restaurant. Yay, finally. I know. But it clearly wasn't T.J. Ah, shit. This woman didn't look anything like T.J. had described. herself. T.J. was tall and blonde. This woman was blonde too, but she was short and full

figured. And Tim noticed that she had a huge scar on one side of her face. Hmm. Before Tim could ask any questions, the woman introduced herself as Demi. She said Tim, T.J. got called into work again. But she's really sorry. She asked me if I could come meet you for her and explain. Demi was T.J.'s best friend, the one who watched the kids for her all the time while she was working. She and Tim hit it off immediately, not romantically, but in a buddy-buddy way. And he was thrilled when she showed him a picture of T.J. posing with one of her children. She was every bit as gorgeous as he could have dreamed. She was a cover girl. He was excited to see her, but kind of worried, too. She was so gorgeous that Tim's main reaction was, oh, man, she is way out of my

league. He probably sounded sadder than that. Yeah. Oh, man. He couldn't imagine this perfect woman being romantically interested in him once she got to look at him. Man, that is so sad. And also, so often not the case, too. And I'm sure that many people are listening have had this experience too. Like, don't you know plenty of couples where, like, the people don't necessarily match in terms of conventional attractiveness? Yeah. And just happy as can be. So I think that that's a total myth that that doesn't happen. I think that happens all the time. And yeah, but I mean, I can see how if you've been insecure about your looks your entire life, you would worry about such a thing. Sure. Yeah. And yeah, like you said, looks aren't everything. Absolutely. And sometimes it's just all about

chemistry. Absolutely. Tim had brought a picture for TJ2 thinking if they hit it off in person, she might like to have it to look at when they talked on the phone. Again, this is pre-computers. We couldn't just, I mean, even when my husband and I first met, when I laid eyes on that man for the first time as he walked off the plane to come and visit me, I had seen, I think, two pictures of him.

And they were, like, one of them was online. and he had like scanned it in. Oh, wow. I think it was his college graduation picture. So he had his cap and gown on. He looked so cute. Oh, my God. But it took like an eternity to load.

And I remember I was so nervous that I made my best friend look at it because I couldn't because I was already so attached to him that like I had basically decided I didn't care what he looked like. Right. But you know, you're always rooting for like, I hope there's a physical attraction. So I was so nervous as this thing because it was dial up internet in 2002. So it was like, you know, the pictures like forming from the bottom up. and I was like oh nice chin okay the chin is good the chin is good oh I like the mouth the mouth is good

the bottom lip is pretty solid and I just couldn't do it finally so I turned around and I made my best friend look and she's I remember she said he's a babe I was like oh man really and I turned around and he was and he still is but yeah I mean he had seen I think two pictures of me and I had seen two pictures of him one actual snapshot that he mailed physically from the UK and one online oh it's going to a cry that's so romantic very different today nowadays people seeing each other naked before they ever be in person it's incredible that just floors me i know i just have to continually remind you all how ancient i am but no i think it's weird too i can't it's a whole different way of meeting people

it really is just bananas it's it's really interesting to me yeah it's as an old married lady it's a whole new world we're about to have our 17th anniversary by oh my god anyone cares We should do a special episode. A good spouse murder to celebrate Whitney's 17th anniversary. Yeah, I know lots of those stories. Looking at me like, I know you do. Better watch your ass, buddy boy. I would never.

I adore him. Oh, man. We need him with me. Just given Nancy Grace more material for when I inevitably snap and kill some. and Nancy can play this audio and then me saying we need him Whitney because he's our editor you're going down with me for sure like whether you're actually guilty or not just because you're the co-host oh Nancy please be nice to me okay one of these days I'll treat you to my Nancy Grace impression and you'll probably all unsubscribe because it's it's so good disturbingly accurate it's so good

you guys we'll do a we'll do a special when we yeah just for the patient Latrions, though, because we can't afford to lose too many subscribers. Oh, Lord. All right. Please continue. I apologize. That was great. So when he gave her this picture, he was like, you know, this probably means I'll never hear from her again.

And Demi laughed it off. She said, no way. T.J. really likes you. You just wait. She's going to call you tonight. And lo and behold, that night, T.J. called the dispatch center as usual. and she reassured Tim left and right. She said, you're perfect, you're a teddy bear, you're all the man I need.

Just imagine what this must have meant to a man who had never felt attractive to women. I know, bless his heart. He'd been insecure about his looks his whole life. And now here was this beautiful, intelligent woman who wanted to be with him. She found him attractive. Tim was so relieved he could hardly believe it. This woman's heart was as beautiful as her face. She loved him no matter what he looked like, and she was all his.

And that night, she let Tim know that it might be a while before they could meet in person. She was going to have to pick up some extra shifts at work, and her grandmother's estate was close to wrapping up down in Houston. She was going to be out of town for the foreseeable future, but she had a suggestion. She said, why don't you get to know the kids while I'm gone? Demi was going to be taken care of them, and she, I put that in past tense. Why don't you get to know my kids while I'm gone? Demi is going to be taken care of them, and she really liked meeting you today.

She can be there to introduce you all. Okay, I'm sorry. What? Yeah. Like, okay, I don't have kids, as we've said. You don't have kids. But does this not strike you as odd that a parent would say to a guy that, she's never laid eyes on in person.

Hey, why don't you go hang out with my kids while I'm not there? I mean, granted, like, there was somebody she trusts, so it's not completely crazy, but that's weird to me, right? But introducing a bunch of ostensibly traumatized children to a strange man. Right, exactly, to a strange man. Exactly. Yeah. I think that's kind of bug nuts.

Yeah. That's. T.J., come on. No, no, no. Oh. So, Tim was like, great. He started hanging out with T.J.'s kids and Demi. They'd meet at a restaurant or a park, and the kids quickly warmed up to Tim and vice versa.

Oh, well, thank God for that, I guess, like that the kids liked him. Yeah. And as they sat and watched the kids play on the swings or the monkey bars at the park, Tim and Demi became friends. Tim pumped her for information about T.J., of course, but he also liked her for her. She was nice, a good listener. She'd had a hard life with her scar, and Tim could relate to that. They'd both been bullied at school. Demi for her scar, Tim for his weight and shyness.

Tim began to think of the three kids as his future family. It drew him closer to T.J. And added some intensity to their phone conversations, which continued even while she was traveling. So Tim was starting to think about a future with T.J. He couldn't wait to meet her face. face, which she kept assuring him what happened just as soon as she wrapped up her grandmother's estate and could afford to slow down at work. And then one night, T.J. called the dispatch office absolutely hysterical. At first, Tim couldn't even recognize her voice. That's how upset she was.

And he said, slow down, honey, slow down. What's wrong? She was sobbing hysterically. And she said, it's boots. He's out. Boots. The kid's abusive biodad. T.J. was terrified. She said Boots was threatening her. He'd shown up on her doorstep, demanding to see the kids. He was threatening, in fact, to try to get the kids back. And he said, if T.J. stood in his way, she was going to regret it. She said, he's going to hurt me. I just know it. He's going to hurt us all. She was absolutely petrified and absolutely inconsolable. So Tim, of course, was just devastated to hear the love of his life so upset. And once he got her calm down, he promised her, look, I will never let anyone hurt you. I promise. It's going to be okay, honey. And soon after that conversation, despite the fact that their much anticipated first meeting still hadn't come off, Tim bought a diamond ring, which just astonishes me. He said, I know I can't give this to you yet. This is over the phone, but I want to be with you and the kids forever and he asked her to marry him

over the phone and T.J. didn't even wait for him to finish the sentence before she said yes over the phone over the phone and of course Tim was over the moon T.J was over the moon it was very

romantic I guess as he's sitting at his desk at the dispatch office and she's God knows where and what if it's an ugly ring yeah Yeah, like, you don't even know what that ring looks like. He could have gotten that shit out of a gunball machine for all you know. Not that the ring matters.

I'm joking, campers. Please don't roast me. It doesn't really matter. But, like, you know, I'd like, if there's one, I'd like to get a look at it. Right. That's all I'm saying. So the future he'd always wanted was so close that he could almost reach out and touch it. And as soon as T.J.'s grandmother's estate was finished moving through the system and she could sell that ranch in Houston.

and she'd have enough money to stop working so much, and they could finally be together. Or maybe they'd keep the ranch. Maybe they'd go down to Houston and live there with the kids. I mean, it'd be perfect. They wouldn't have a mortgage to pay. They'd own it free and clear. They could have horses.

You know, it sounded awesome. But as the days passed, T.J. became more and more upset about boots. He was not going away. He was calling. He was showing up at Demi's house and threatening her now, demanding to see his kids. And T.J. was terrified. Demi was terrified. The kids were terrified. It was a mess.

And one afternoon at the park, Demi told Tim that she had something she needed to tell him. She said, look, T.J. does not know I'm telling you this. She didn't want to worry you. She's going to be mad at me if she finds out. But I think you need to know that Boots has threatened to kill T.J. if she didn't hand over the kids. Like he said, I'll kill you. Wow. Yeah. And this is a little. a guy we already know is a very, very bad dude. So this is not good. And campers definitely this is something I've seen again and again and again in true crime stories. People who commit murder often do make a threat to do so before they actually follow through. So if you hear somebody threatened to kill someone, there's a pretty solid chance they mean it. A hundred percent.

So do something about that, you know. So and I think Demi did the right thing in telling him because you want to tell somebody. Yeah, because if they are serious, they need to be stopped. And if they're not serious, they need to understand that there are consequences for their actions. Yeah, they need to slow their role and stop saying stupid shit. So Tim's first reaction was, well, okay, so we need to tell his parole officer, because surely that's a violation of his parole. But the thing was, he wasn't on parole because he had been institutionalized, not incarcerated, so it was different. His psychologist had said he was cured. He was rehabilitated. So there was no one overseeing his release. He was just free and clear, which is terrifying. And Tim said, okay, well, we'll call the

police. And Demi's like, I mean, I thought of that, but what are they going to do? We don't have any proof. Boots is evil, but he's not stupid. He's careful. He hasn't left any evidence. He hasn't put anything in writing or anything like that. You know? And she said, look, Tim, he's not going away. He's going to hurt TJ, and if he gets his hands on those kids, he's going to abuse them again. I don't believe for a second he's cured. He's just smart enough to know how to fool the psychiatrist. I'm terrified here. We've got to do something. And over the next couple of weeks, it was all Tim and Demi talked about during their visits to the park with the kids. And during his talks with TJ, the threat of boots clouded every little bit of their joy about the upcoming

wedding. Between Demi and T.J., Tim learned more than he ever wanted to know in a million years about how Boots had treated the kids. In addition to molesting them, which is horrendous enough, Boots had also starved them, beaten them, taken out any anger or frustration he ever felt on them. No doubt about it. This man was a monster. Disgusting. Yeah, he's a bad dude. so late one night on the phone with tim t j said i think we have to kill him and at first tim was shocked but the more he thought about it and the more they talked about it the more he knew she was right he really felt like it was the only way and this was completely out of character for timothy aught he had never done violence to anyone before

in his life. And the very idea was abhorrent to him, but he just couldn't see any other way out of this mess. They had to protect T.J., they had to protect the kids. They had to predict Demi. And Demi agreed, T.J. said. They'd been talking about it. And Demi had agreed to help if she could. So over the next week or so, they planned it. T.J.'s first idea was to use Apple Seats. Now this is bizarre to me. She had read, apparently, that eating a large number of apple seeds could induce a heart attack. Now, I had never heard this before, but apparently this is true, but you'd have to eat like pounds of the thing.

Oh, I looked it up. Oh, you think I didn't do this research, Whitney? Of course you did. I did. You're such a nerd. I love you. You have to eat. Eat, finally chew 200 apple seeds.

That's not that bad. I could eat that many, like, sunflower seeds. Sure. But that's, but you, those taste good. You have to, yeah. That's nasty. It's such a concentrated amount to sneak into somebody's food. Right, exactly.

Yeah, 200 apple seeds are not going to slip in one serving. Unnoticed into like some mashed potatoes or something. Yeah, so it's a bizarre idea. But anyway, that was her plan. She and Tim came up with the idea that Demi would invite Boots over for a visit with the kids and she'd serve him lunch. So she was going to make a. casserole full of apple seeds which is just disgusting beyond words and hopefully the bastard would keel over and that would be that natural causes no questions asked but sadly it didn't work

boots ate the casserole why i can't imagine anyone would want to eat a casserole that clearly has apple seeds in it maybe she ground them up or something but he you know nothing happened he just ate it and probably felt kind of sick afterwards but can we deal with this apple seed casserole for just a second. So gross. You can find cyanide elsewhere because that's what it's in the seats. Why would they not just go get some damn rat poison or something, right? Listen, it's not hard.

We talk about how murder isn't hard all the time. So I think our campers maybe think we're murderous. We are not. Murderers are dips if you murder someone, you're an asshole. But you could go go. you could go get some cash out of an ATM drive two cities over buy rat poison with cash in a store with your hood up and no one would fucking know yep there's another clip for nancy grace to play on the show later on if one of us ever snaps but yeah i mean for god's sake it's just like in the clara schwartz case it's like they had to be all weird about it and say they were going to use hemlock like what just for god's sake go get a damn bottle of antifreeze like a normal person.

Anyway, so ridiculous. So that was plan A, and that failed miserably. So plan B was to poison him with botulism, which would be an ugly way to die, by the way. That would be a horrendous death. So Tim and Demi spent about a week searching every grocery store in town trying to find a bulging can that might be contaminated with botulism. They were going to repeat the apple seed plan, but this time Boots' dinner was going to pack a much more powerful punch.

But that plan fell apart when neither Tim nor Demi could find a likely can. So they're just going to grocery stores and look in. So I guess that... Do they think the kids or employees that are shelving these things see a bulging can are like, seems good to go. It's the worse that can happen. I think that speaks well of the grocery stores in this area, actually, that they looked for a straight week and they couldn't find anything.

So they had to find another way. And then, on March 24th, 1987, a call came into the Broward County 911. Now, this wasn't Tim's dispatch. He worked for an ambulance and fire dispatch, and this was the police. So a call came in from a frantic woman named Patricia James. Her husband had been attacked, she said, he was bleeding, come quick. So police and EMTs arrived to find 37-year-old Bernard James, bloody and dead in his driveway, and his hysterical wife, Patricia, sobbing over him. So Patricia James tells the police that she and her husband had been out to the grocery store.

They came home, and as they were getting out of the car, a man had come walking up to them asking for a light for his cigarette. Bernie had told Patricia, you know, I'll take care of this. You go ahead and take the groceries in. So she went in the house, and then after a few minutes, she got curious because he hadn't come back in yet. And she went outside to check on him and found him lying bloody in the chest. driveway. So cops noticed what appeared to be a massive head wound to the back of the victim's skull and some angry red marks on his neck that looked like ligature marks. Bernie's wallet was lying on the ground beside him and his wife told him there had been almost $100 in there, but it was gone

now. She also told him Bernie's gold necklace was missing. So at first glance, this appeared very clearly to be a robbery gone wrong, right? Money missing, necklace missing. Oh yeah. So the cops took Patricia James into the station So she could give a statement And describe the attacker to a sketch artist He was tall, she said Black, slender, he had a French accent And this got the cops' attention

Because there was a large Haitian population in the area So French accent That sounded like it might have been a Haitian guy So the artist made a sketch And quickly distributed it to the patrol cops By the way Real nice they're blaming it on a black person sure yeah because it's not it's not it's not as if people of color don't have enough problems yeah it's

like of course to yeah yeah but at the scene there were some things that didn't feel right for one thing cops knew that head wounds tend to bleed a lot and if you've ever like banged your head and cut it you know what i'm talking about and bernie james had sustained a huge head injury and one of his ears had been partially ripped off from the blunt force trauma which is just horrifying, oh my God. But there was hardly any blood at the scene. And one of the detectives realized very quickly he wasn't killed here. This is not the murder scene. Weird, right? So they confronted Patricia with this and she changed her story. Red flag. She said Bernie had been killed by an acquaintance of theirs, a man he sometimes went bowling with. She said they'd gone over to this guy's

house earlier that night and at one point she'd excused herself to go to the restroom. While she was in there, she heard raised voices. She was scared to come out, so she didn't until things quieted down. When she came back out to the living room, Bernie was laying bloody on the dude's floor, so of course

the cops wanted to know why this guy wanted Bernie dead. Patricia burst into tears. It's my fault, she said. She and Bernie had a tumultuous relationship. He was an abuser. She'd confided some in this guy and then he'd actually witnessed some of it that night. I think he killed him to help me, she said. I didn't want him to. But once Bernie was dead, she said she panicked. She was scared. She was confused. She knew

this man was only trying to help her. So they loaded Bernie's body into Patricia's car and brought it to her house and made up the story about the mugger. And she said Bernie's killer, who was trying to help her, had threatened her. Yeah, that doesn't make a whole hell of a lot of sense, does it? No. He said he'd kill her and the children if she said anything. I have such a strong objection to this man hitting and abusing you that I'm going to murder him, but if you say anything, I'll kill your children.

Yeah. That, yeah. That sounds like a- Carry the two. Yeah. That just doesn't make sense. It sounds like a good profile that we have gone. Yeah. So they asked her, what was this man's name? And Patricia took a deep breath,

steeled herself and said, Timothy Ott. And she agreed to help the police get him as long as they promised to protect her and her children. Police found Tim Ott at home. He didn't seem surprised to see them and he agreed to come in for an interview without an attorney. Tim quickly admitted to killing a man that night, but he said he didn't know any Bernard James. The man he killed was named Boots. This man was a monster, he told them. He had to do what he had to do to protect his fiancé and her children. Tim launched into the whole big story with T.J. and boots and abuse and threats.

And he said his and T.J.'s friend Demi had brought Boots over to his home that night. and Boots had sat down in front of the TV while Demi went to the restroom. And as Boots, this monster who he knew was responsible for so much pain and so much suffering and who was threatening the love of his life, sat there staring at the TV. Tim worked up his nerve. He paced around a little. And then he reached for an aluminum baseball bat and he brought it down full force on the back of that monster's head.

And as he did it, he thought, this is for T.J. This is for Michael and Irene and Nicholas. This monster is never going to hurt them again. But the blow to the head didn't kill boots. He was still breathing and moaning and whatnot. That was not the plan. So Tim had to grab a length of clothesline and strangle him. Yikes.

Oh, yikes. And Tim said, look, I'm not proud of what I did, but I had no other choice. This monster never should have been let out of custody in the first place. The system put me in this position. Yeah, basically it's your fault that I had to do this. It's funny to me how often killers say I had no choice. You might remember that from the David Mesa case, you know, where he killed his sugar daddy and said, I had no choice.

Well, I did have a choice, but I felt like I had to do this for my family. You have a choice, okay? You never have to kill somebody, well, unless it's in self-defense. Exactly what I was about to say. Unless it's a life or death situation and you are facing down death, you never have to kill somebody. You don't have to kill someone because they're inconveniencing you or in your way or making your life slightly more difficult. That's not the same thing as having no choice. Or would make you money dead.

That's not a real choice. Absolutely. Yeah, not okay. So the cops were confused. The murder sounded very much like the murder of Bernard James, but they didn't know any boots, any T.J. or any Demi. And when the police said the name Patricia James, Tim seemed confused. I don't know a Patricia James, he said. So the police showed him a picture of Patricia.

Tim looked bewildered. He said, that's Demi. Oh, my God, oh my God. Can you imagine? Oh, my God. Yeah. Yeah. So it took a while for the whole thing.

to unravel, but soon the truth emerged. Patricia and Demi were one and the same, as were Bernard in Boots. But Bernard wasn't a child molester, and he hadn't just been released from an institution after molesting his children. Bernard James was a loving, hardworking park ranger who adored his three kids, Michael, Irene, and Nicholas. He was going through a separation from his wife, Patricia, and it had started to get ugly in recent months.

Oh, my God. And the worst part of all, T.J. didn't exist. T.J. was Patricia James, disguising her voice to sound younger and sexier. And I bet some of you figured this out quite a while ago. Yeah. We wanted to try and maintain some suspense about it. Yeah. So the picture she'd shown Tim of T.J. with Nicholas, it was a shot of a random flight attendant

and Patricia had seen walking down the street one afternoon and asked to pose for a picture with her son. They tracked her down and the woman had never even heard the name Tim Ott. God, she must have thought she got lucky that day, right? Just seeing a woman that looked exactly like the kind of woman that T.J. was supposed to be in a flight attendance outfit. And she says, hey, pose with my kid. Yeah. Wow. Because that, you know, to me, when I was first reading about the story, when I saw that about the picture,

the kid and then it was the kid I thought okay well that's interesting yeah you know it kind of like made me a little less inclined to be suspicious of what was going on right yeah it's just it boggles the mind and they had come to realize the investigators that tim had been nothing but a pawn in a very dark game of chess Patricia had used him from day one as a means of getting Bernie out of her life in inheriting his $170,000 life insurance policy. This was the latest and worst in a long series of manipulations and cons that Patricia had played all her life.

Tim was devastated, and he quickly agreed to help police and prosecutors nail Patricia James in court. He wept and apologized to Bernie's family and friends and to the children he'd come to love almost as if they were his own. And the kids had come to love him, too. That's one of the saddest things about this case.

Tim said, I was so stupid. I'm so sorry. Holy crap on a cracker. That's sad. It's really sad. Just awful from start to finish. Those poor kids, God.

Tim ended up serving 10 years in prison before being released. I have no idea what he's up to these days. So Whitney How do you feel about Tim? Yeah, that's a really good question And I'm curious to hear from the campers as well I mean obviously this is a man who did a very bad thing And a very stupid thing

To kill someone for someone That he's never laid eyes on So yeah, I mean I don't know I can't really help having some sympathy for him Yeah Because I feel like he was vulnerable and she swooped in and detected that vulnerability and used it against him. Yeah.

I have a little bit of sympathy for him. I certainly think it was appropriate that he go to prison and serve time. And interestingly enough, the kids are grown now and they have said they've forgiven him. Oh, interesting. Yeah. So I'm glad that they've been able to find forgiveness. Like they realize he was used and obviously he felt terrible about it, but that doesn't bring Bernie James back, now does it? No, it doesn't. And I think it's, this is one of those really sad cases

where it's really fun to roast idiots for being idiots. And I can't roast Tim, not really. Yeah, I know. And it's a bit of a departure for us because normally we do just rake these morons over the cold. But with Tim Ott, it's like, it's just kind of sad, really. I mean, I'm sure some people would make fun of him. He was pretty dumb and gullible. He was, but I think it was, you know, he was, he got so involved in the narrative that he didn't stop and see the big picture. Yeah, exactly. Of course, I need to go to the cops. Right.

If this man is threatening my fiancé. Yeah, and I think people like Patty James, just like Bill Bradfield from season one and Clara Schwartz and Dyson Koff and so many of the other killers that we have told you guys about is just a really good manipulative. later, and she did a damn good job as her two different characters of convincing him that going to the police wouldn't help. Right. So essentially what we have here, Campers, is an analog catfish story. Yep, that's exactly what it is. Patricia James catfish Tim Ott by phone before computers were even part of everyday life for most people. Isn't that bananas? It is cuckoo bananas. And it's easy to judge Tim for falling for it. But remember, this wasn't a thing that existed on most people's radar in the 1980s. Now everyone knows the word catfish. Yeah. But back then,

a catfish was just a water-dwelling creature with whiskers. That's true. And if you've ever seen that MTV show Catfish, which I have because I love trash TV so very much, so I've seen almost every episode of that show, and it is ridiculous and hilarious. Or if you've ever watched any of the 5 million Dr. Phil episodes about online love scams, you know that people can be very susceptible to this kind of stuff. And like I said earlier, the phone, just like the internet, can create a weirdly intimate space where people can get really close, really fast. There's not a lot of small talk in that context. You tend to get to the big topics really quickly. People tend to get sexual really quickly. So people can tend to bond closely in a short period of time. And I think it's actually,

you know, if you're dealing with an honest person, a really good way to meet people. You meet somebody kind of from the inside out. Yeah. And there is an intimacy about that, you know, which is kind of contrary to what you might expect because you don't have that hormonal, you know, physicality going on. But there's something about the mystery that that creates. And I guess you don't have that so much anymore because now you get to see pictures and video and you can video chat and stuff. So yeah. Yeah, well, you and I met online. Can we say that? Yeah. Sure. Yeah. So it turns out we're not catfish. We finally met in person, but yeah. We did the Cindy James episode when we met in person for the first time. It's a great episode. Everyone go back and listen to it. But the thing about catfish

is they also have a very specific pattern, which I personally find interesting because I'm a huge nerd. Because, especially those like Patricia, because they lie, but they lie slowly. So they first, like, drop little lines about fantastical stories. Like, for example, the kids with the tragic backstory that she adopted. Yes, absolutely. There's usually some kind of dramatic tragedy in their past. Yeah, there's a sudden windfall. Sometimes they have amazing jobs.

They're famous or they're sick. And in all of these cases, they're... they're writing a fan fiction with somebody else's life being their target. Such a good way of putting it. That's exactly what they're doing. And it's easy to get involved because you're in, you're basically being written into a movie, you know, as a... Yeah, as someone else's character. Yeah. So I think with catfish is you've got to keep your head on a swivel, man.

It's scary. Absolutely. And also I think another reason why people are susceptible to this is because we hear what we want to hear. We believe what we want to be true. and we're very good at projecting our own desires and fantasies onto someone else and if there's nobody actually standing in front of you if that person is just a voice over the phone or lines of text and often on that MTV show people have never video chatted you know because they can't because they're lying about who they are so

people have there was one person who'd been in a relationship with somebody for seven years and they'd never even talked on the phone it was all text and they were ready to marry this person Wow. Bananas. But because, sorry, go ahead. I was just about to say, I love what you just said. I think that is a thousand percent the truth is you projecting on a blank slate. Yeah, and it's easier to do when the person's not standing in front of you.

So this medium of phone internet texting is perfect for that, and that's a danger zone. That's something that you have to keep in mind. Like you say, keep your head on a swivel. Insist on video chat, first of all, would be my advice. Because if they don't want to talk to you on the phone, and they don't want to video chat, there's a reason for that. And it's not that their friggin' webcam doesn't work. That's never the reason.

It's because they don't want you to see them. And if they video chat and it's just black, again, red flag. Shut it down. So, anywho, you know, love, infatuation, whatever you want to call it, is powerful stuff. And it can make us big stupid. So I think that's what happened with Tim. And for one, I kind of hope he's doing okay. And that he found love.

or whatever, but bless poor Bernie's heart. So we've told you about the lies in this case, and now I'm going to tell you the true story of Patricia James. The truth is that Patricia Donahue grew up in Washington, D.C., and she was born with a large tumor on her face, and the surgery to remove it left her with that big scar on her face. And perhaps unsurprisingly, Patty was bullied pretty mercilessly in school, because kids can be the worst, and anybody who looks different is going catch it and her mom took kind of a tough love approach to this she said look you've got this scar now you're going to have to find a way to live with it and not let it beat you which is good advice yes and patty did just that but not in the way her mom had hoped by high school patty had developed the

skills of a master manipulator she used her scar to get people to do stuff for her give her stuff stuff like that she'd tell people that she had just survived a horrible car crash and that that's where it came from or she'd tell them she had a terminal illness and it worked like a charm people bought her stuff had her over for dinner gave her rides whatever she needed and by adulthood patty seemed to view everybody she met as a potential mark in 1982 she called the ranger station at a maryland state park to talk to a friend of hers who worked there that guy wasn't there that day so a nice 30-something named bernard james picked up the phone and much as she did with timott years later she started chatting him up

and they hit it off and their relationship began just exactly as TJ and Tim's did with hours long phone conversations for weeks at a time like Timot Bernard James was in a vulnerable spot when he met Patricia

his wife who was the love of his life had died a year earlier and left him to raise their three kids by himself which is really hard and Bernard loved Michael and Irene and Nicholas more than life but it was hard, working full-time and raising three kids all alone.

So he really wanted a mom for them. So after a few weeks of phone calls, he asked Patty out to dinner, and she accepted, but she said, I have something to tell you first, and she told him about her scar. And to her surprise, and I'm sure delight, he said it didn't bother him. And to his credit, it genuinely didn't seem to bother him. So, you know, I guess for Bernie, he realized he had scars too. is just his were on the inside because he'd lost his wife. Yeah.

Their relationship moved really fast, much too fast. Again, relationship advice from true crime campfire, slow it down. Slow it down. Where's the fire? Bernie moved her in within a couple of weeks, way too fast. Do not move in with somebody after two weeks. Oh, that's crazy. That's bananas.

His family distrusted her immediately, and this was because she had told different family members, different stories about her background and her scar lying was just habit for patty and i think she just did it like breathing you know she would lie when the truth would work better one of those people so she had told different people different stories and she had talked about an inheritance that she was supposedly expecting soon and finally bernie's mom confronted her about it and patty did not take it well and after that conversation she insisted that she and bernie moved to florida to be close to her family. And much to his family's sorrow and extreme worry, Bernie said, okay, we'll move.

And while packing for this move, this is so awful, Patricia threw out all the photo albums with pictures of the kid's mother. They're dead mother. It's the worst thing I've ever heard. It's horrendous. And she said, you don't need these anymore. I'm your mom now. Just what the hell.

Oh, just, wow, that's awful. That's just one of the worst things I've ever heard. Those poor kids. So they didn't have any more pictures of their mother who had died like a year earlier. Freaking awful. In Florida, Patricia told Bernie that she wanted to adopt the kids. You know, this is, I think, a big reason why he'd married her in the first place and he was touched, so he agreed. And so she adopted the three children.

She is now their legal mother. And after that, Patricia soon set about cutting Bernie and the kids. off from their family back in Maryland. She would erase phone messages. If she picked up the phone, she'd say not to call anymore. Bernie doesn't want to talk to you. And half the time, Bernie didn't even realize that his family was trying to get in touch with him. Because he worked all the time trying to support the family and Patty's increasingly ridiculous spending habits, Patricia was at home with the kids.

The kids that she had wanted so desperately to adopt, and how did she treat these kids? Well, Patty James was pretty much the archetypal wicked stepmother from the fairy tales. And I'm not going to go into much detail about this just because it's really upsetting. But basically, instead of mothering these kids as she had promised to do, Patty neglected them. She didn't feed them enough, she didn't bathe them enough. And when the kids came to her and said they were hungry, sometimes she'd give them what she called vitamin juice. And one of the kids, who is now an adult, said on the investigation discovery show Evil Stepmothers, which is a wild ride, by the way, that show,

said that this vitamin juice burned her throat and knocked her out. And later, she finally realized what it was. It was cold medicine, like adult dose cold medicine. Wow. Yeah. So if the kids were hungry

and Patty didn't feel like getting up off the couch and making anything for them, she would just drug them so they'd pass out and then she could go back to watching TV. Yeah, holy shit. And she also yelled at them a lot

and just treated them really, badly all around. For example, one of the children got a little dirty one day because she was picking up some dirty stuff off the floor. So Patricia duct taped socks under her hands and made her wear them around for the rest of the day so that she couldn't pick anything up. Before long, Patty had such a tight psychological grip on these kids that they kept all this a secret from their dad, which I think is pretty common among abused kids. There's shame attached to it and also they're scared. Bernie was working so much that he just wasn't home enough to realize what was going on. And Patricia would tell the kids, you better not tell your dad about any of this or it'll get

worse for you. So that's a typical abuser M.O., sadly. And it's really sad. After all this came out, the people who lived next door to Bernie and Patty James said they hadn't even realized that any kids lived in the house. Jeez, that's awful. That's how isolated she kept them. And no matter how hard, Bernie worked at his two jobs. They could never stay afloat financially. This was because of Patty's spending. Instead of paying bills, she'd indulge herself. So they were accumulating debt. So, of course, Bernie would confront her about this stuff when he was home, and she'd deny everything or just scream at him. They were always fighting, and eventually, Bernie had enough and filed for divorce. Patty said, that's fine with me, but

I'm taking the kids. And if you try to fight me on it, I'll tell the court that you're never home and you can't take care of them. And of course, she had the legal right to do this. Yep. Legally, she was their mother now. I'm 100% sure. This is why she adopted them in the first place.

100%. Yeah, because it gave her leverage to use against Bernie if he ever tried to leave her. Yep. This woman is a nightmare. human being, am I right? Oh my God. It's so bad. So now poor Bernie James is in the position of having to fight to get his own kids back. I think the main reason he married Patty was to have a mother for his children and it had just gone horribly wrong. Again, don't move somebody into your house after two weeks. I'm not trying to victim blame here, but just cautionary tale. Yeah. Don't marry

somebody that you don't know very well because people can be on their best behavior for a while. You know, I always say don't do anything you can't easily undo until you're well past that honeymoon phase. Absolutely. You know, just don't do anything you can't easily undo until then. No tattoos. Oh, God, can you imagine? Getting a big necktat with your new boyfriend that you just met last night's name. Yeah.

Don't go to Vegas and sign any contracts. And don't move them in after two weeks. I think probably poor Bernie was just overwhelmed with three children. Oh, 100% he was. He needed somebody else in the house. I'm sure he was exhausted and he was still grieving. I mean, his wife had died like less than a year earlier, like 11 months earlier. Yeah.

So, I mean, I'd be a puddle on the floor. I certainly don't blame him at all. No, no, no. None of this is his fault. And I blame Patty, if anything, she probably was the one that suggested to move in. Yeah, well, she's, well, again, just like with Tim Mott, she sends vulnerability and she moved in for the kill. Mm-hmm. That's her M.O.

Oh, and just wait, campers, to hear that. this next part. So Bernie moved out at Patty's behest. And of course, of course, he's a great dad tried to see his kids as much as he could whenever he wasn't working. And this piece of shit, Patty started charging him to see them. Yep. A couple hundred bucks a pop. Yeah, we're not talking like five bucks, like a significant amount of money to see his own children. Yeah, what is it? Yeah, what kind of mother does that. Just unfriken believable. So now there was

a divorce and custody battle gearing up between Bernie and Patricia and in the midst of all that, Patty becomes aware that Bernie has a $170,000 life insurance policy with her as the beneficiary. Why he hadn't taken her off that policy

by then, I can't imagine. But that's the kind of thing that can slip through the cracks when you're in the midst of a nasty divorce. Yes. And And because it's easy for things like that to slip your mind, here's a public service announcement from true crime campfire. Campers, if you're in the process of a contentious divorce, do yourself a favor and take your soon-to-be-X out of your will and off-your-life insurance policy and make sure you tell them you did it. That step is very important. Make sure you tell them you did it.

So they know they have nothing financially to gain if you die. Just to be safe. Can't hurt, right? can't hurt. Anyway, now Patty knew that if Bernie died, she'd come into a nice little windfall of cash. Patty really liked cash. She liked it almost as much as controlling other people. So it was right around this time when Patty's father died, she had to call for an ambulance

transport. And who picked up the phone? Tim Ott. Ah, yeah. And you know the rest of the story. Yep. it's so interesting sociopaths and psychopaths seem to have a predator's instinct for singling out vulnerable people

remember patty started her whole schick about tj and started flirting with tim during that first phone call that's incredible isn't it amazing she must have sensed his vulnerability immediately how did she know he'd be susceptible to her creepy wiles i don't know but this does seem to be a power like almost like a super villain power that people who lack empathy have they just they can just smell vulnerability a mile off and zero right in on it yeah because it was that first phone call she lied about her name from the first phone call and it may have been that this was her plan regardless of who picked up the phone but that she would try this anyway but i kind of have the feeling, I kind of suspect that there was just something about him as they were talking

that clued her in that he would be a good mark. And I remember she had done this her entire life. She started doing this in like middle school, you know, manipulating people. And so she'd gotten real good at it. I remember reading a study that was put out by the FBI where they talk about how sociopaths and psychopaths that have been interviewed by profilers. talk about they can identify a mark basically on contact. They can tell somebody that is vulnerable to be a victim.

And they know just what little threads to pull on, you know, just which weaknesses to exploit and can figure out what you need for me and how to give it to you so that you are putty in my hands. It's very, very creepy. Yeah. And like you said, it's not the victim or quote unquote victim's fault or the Mark's fault. It's just that these folks are just really damn good at that. Yeah. Yeah. And I imagine that maybe old Patty started out with, oh, I'll tell him a fake name. That's kind of fun. And then could tell the guy was taken aback by your voice and was like, oh, game time. Yeah. I think that's probably exactly what happened. It's really interesting. And again, I know I've talked about this book a hundred times, but Gavin De Becker's book, The Gift of Fear, talks about this a little bit and actually has some practical advice for, you know, how to avoid being taken in by common manipulative tactics.

And if you have not read that book, you absolutely should. We should do an episode on it sometime. We should. Yeah, I think that's... Hit the high points. That's definitely on the true crime campfire reading list. On the syllabus, if you will. So this was a wild one.

Wasn't it campers? A catfish before there were catfish. So if you're looking for love online, watch your back. because we love you. We do. 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,

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