True Crime Campfire - Wolf in Sheep's Clothing: The Stalking of Joy Silverman

Episode Date: July 10, 2020

Imagine waking up each morning with a knot in your stomach—a sense of creeping dread. Imagine knowing that there is someone out there who is obsessed with you in the most unhealthy way imaginable. You are their full time job, the sole focus of their life. They’re always lurking there. Thinking of new ways to force their way into your most private spaces. They may call or text you incessantly. They may veer wildly back and forth between cajoling and threatening, between telling you how beautiful you are, and promising to gut you like a fish. They may post about you on social media—spreading lies, acting as though the two of you are intimately connected. People may believe them. They may communicate with your family, your friends, your employers, your colleagues. They may share humiliating stories or pictures. They may send you things, leave notes on your car or in your mailbox. They may vandalize your property—key your car, throw a rock through your window. They may hire someone to find information about you. They may follow you. You may or may not know they are there. They may threaten to kill you. They may do worse. According to the Stalking Resource Center at the National Center for Victims of Crime, 7.5 million people in the U.S. are stalked every year. For over 85% of them, the stalker is someone they know—for just under 15%, it’s a total stranger. And this one’s really scary: About 11% of stalking victims have been stalked for five years or more. Stalkers can have incredible staying power. People of all genders can be victims of stalking, and whether it results in violence or not, being stalked has a devastating effect on the victim. Today we’re going to tell you about one of the most fascinating, most bizarre stalking cases we’ve ever heard of. Sources:Double Life: The Shattering Affair Between Chief Judge Sol Wachtler and Socialite Joy Silverman, by Linda WolfeInvestigation Discovery's "Vanity Fair Confidential," Episode "Love and Obsession"Follow us, campers!Patreon (join to get all episodes ad-free, 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. Imagine waking up each morning with a knot in your stomach, a sense of creeping dread. Imagine knowing that there's someone out there who is obsessed. with you in the most unhealthy way imaginable. You are their full-time job, the sole focus of their life. They're always lurking there, thinking of new ways to force their way into your most private spaces. They may call or text you incessantly. They may veer wildly back and forth between cajoling and threatening, between telling you

how beautiful you are and promising to gut you like a fish. They may post about you on social media, spreading lies, acting as though the two of you are intimately connected. people may believe them. They may communicate with your family, your friends, your employers, your colleagues. They may share humiliating stories or pictures. They may send you things, leave notes on your car or in your mailbox. They may vandalize your property, key your car, throw a rock through your window.

They may hire someone to find information about you. They may follow you. You may or may not know they're there. They may threaten to kill you. They may do worse. According to the stalking resource center at the National Center for Victims of Crime, 7.5 million people in the U.S. are stalked every year. For over 85% of them, the stalker is someone they know.

For just under 15%, it's a total stranger. And this one's really scary. About 11% of stalking victims have been stalked for five years or more. Stalkers can have incredible staying power. People of all genders can be victims of stalking, and whether it results in violence or not, being stalked has a devastating effect on the victim. Today, we're going to tell you about one of the most fascinating, most bizarre stalking cases we've ever heard of. This is Wolf in Cheap's clothing, the stalking of Joy Silverman.

So, campers, we're in New York, New York, fall 1992. Joy Silverman, a beautiful 45-year-old socialite and political fundraiser, was waiting for her 14-year-old daughter, Jessica, to come home from school. She was always a little on edge waiting for Jessica these days. When the phone rang, she jumped a little. On the line was a voice Joy had come to dread, deep, threatening, clearly altered with some kind of creepy voice-changing device. He said, listen to me very carefully.

He was always demanding that she listened to him, as if she was likely to get distracted at a time like this. Yet again, he said, if Joy didn't give him $20,000, he would kidnap Jessica. He said, you won't see your daughter again. You're damn right, I'm threatening. And he went into great, horrifying detail about how he'd abduct Jessica. He said, I'll snatch her off the street. She'll spend Thanksgiving with me, and you'll regret the day you were born. At that, the line went dead.

Joy couldn't stand the thought of somebody hurting or scaring Jessica. They were such a team. They adored each other. When Jessica got home from school, Joy caught her up in a hug and the two of them spent the night cuddled up together, unable to get much sleep. This had to stop. Neither one of them felt like they could take it much longer. But let's put a pin in that for a little bit and get a little background. Joy Silverman was, at the start of our story, a wealthy woman, but she wasn't born into it. Joy's mom was like her, a single mom, and they struggled for much. of Joy's childhood. But then, when Joy was 15, her mom, Jeanette, got a job working as a secretary

for the super wealthy builder, Bibbs Wallisoff. And we got a comment on the name. Yes. Bibbs. Why do rich people have names like this? I don't know. Muffy, Bibbs. Mimsy. Mimsy. Buffy. The Uffy names are very common. Buffy. Muffy. Scruffy? No, not Scruffy. Not scruffy. Okay. So Bibbs, Wallaceoff. He fell for her hard and fast, and they got married, catapulting Joy and her mom into a wealthy lifestyle, just all of a sudden. It was a rags to riches Cinderella-type story, kind of stuff every little girl dreams about, right? Joy got to go to a fancy boarding school, she had gorgeous clothes, a beautiful home, and best of all, a father for the first time in her life. Bibbs had strained relationships with his own grown sons,

but he adored Joy, treated her like his own daughter, and when Jeanette passed away, he promised her on her deathbed that he would always make sure Joy was taken care of. So Bibb set up a trust fund for joy And he got a close family friend to manage it A rock star judge named Saul Wachtler This guy was the youngest person ever appointed To the state appeals court in New York State And he later became Chief Justice of the New York Supreme Court

An interesting little fun fact about Saul Is that he's the one who coined the phrase I could get a grand jury to indict a ham sandwich Which if you've ever watched one episode of Law & Order You've heard because it's like in the contract That they literally have to say that in every episode Yeah, and it always makes me wonder what the ham sandwich did. Like, was it murder, assault, embezzlement?

It's just wrongly accused, Katie. You're right. All ham sandwiches are innocent. Ham sandwiches are blameless. That's true. So, Joy, in case you haven't figured that out yet, had friends in high places from a very young age. And she had her trust fund, so she didn't have to worry about money. Must be nice, right?

Right. She was kind of lost without her mom, though. She wasn't really sure what she wanted to do with her life. She was a little bit insecure, a little uncertain. And from the book that we read about the case, which is Linda Wolfe's double life, which is fan flippantastic, we highly suggest you read it. It was really interesting. From the book, it sounds like Joy's mom had drilled into her from the time she could walk that she couldn't be a complete person without a husband. Yeah, yikes, right?

Different time, but still, yikes. So it could be that she just never got the message that she had to decide who she had to decide who she. she was independent of that. So she kind of flitted around for a while. She tried college. She stopped just short of graduating. She married and divorced a couple times. She had a baby girl who only lived a few hours, which was really sad. And then she had a son named Evan. And in 1977, Joy got married for the third time to super wealthy real estate developer Jeffrey Silverman. They adopted a daughter, Jessica, and when Joy was 37, Bibs Wallaceoff, her stepdad, died. She's devastated to lose the only father she'd ever known,

but shortly after he died, to her surprise, she found out that Bibbs had left her a huge portion of his multi-million dollar estate and left very little to his biological sons. Wow. Ouch, Bibbs, damn, dude. That is cold. So the sons, unsurprisingly, contested the will, and Saul Walkler, ham sandwich guy,

her trustee and already one of the top judges in New York, York State at that time decided to step in and represent Joy in court. And they won. And after that, Saul and Joy became friends. He and his wife Joan had been really close to Bibbs and Saul became a bit of a shoulder to cry on as she grieved for him. He started advising her about everything from her finances to where to go on vacation and what to do with her life, so kind of a mentor ward relationship. In fact, he referred to her as his ward. Joy started coming around to watch Saul speak at events. calling him more often to ask his advice and one afternoon she showed up at a conference where he was giving some sort of keynote speech or other and saul tells this very cinematic story about it he said

she came up to him after the speech and like gushed about how brilliant he was as a speaker and they stepped outside afterward and it was a cold winter day with snow swirling around and joy sort of brushed her hand against his by accident as they were walking and saul said it was just like an electric shock went through him oh boy Now, Camper's the way he tells it. Despite the strong attraction that he was suddenly developing for joy, he was totally opposed to the idea of getting romantically involved with her in any way, shape, or form. He'd been married to his wife, Joan, for almost 40 years at this point.

They had four children. They had grandchildren. And Saul had always been really vocal about his contempt for politicians who kept mistresses. He joked that the screwing you get now is not worth the screwing you'll take later, right? It's true, though. agree. But after that convention, Saul says Joy started pursuing him relentlessly. So, according to Saul, she called him and called him. She popped in to see him at work all the time. She sent him gifts. She cleverly engineered ways to get him alone. And this is a fun fact that many of you might not know. Campers, did you know it's actually illegal for a man to reject the advances in an attractive woman? Facts. Did you know that? It's true. If you're a man and a pretty, you're a man and a pretty, woman makes it clear that she is warm for your form you have to by law respond favorably it's the

law if you're already married tough tits you don't make the rules you just follow them however much it hurts because you are a goddamn patriot yeah you know i i have always found that i'm just whenever somebody is like providing that stone cold exterior that shows no interest in me i pursue them harder you know that's that's straight out of my claim because you want to get hurt But whatever. Saul says he tried to resist her siren call. Oh, bless him. He took Joy out for lunch one afternoon. That's he still resisting, guys. Yeah, yeah. And told her point blank that they couldn't be anything but friends. Joy's response was noncommittal. She basically said, eh, who can say what might happen six months or a year from now? Let's see what develops.

But she agreed that they'd just stay friends for the moment. By all accounts, Joy's husband, Jeffrey, was clueless about her crush on Saul. He was 17 years older than she was, but Joy was captivated by him. Saul was, as you said, a rock star in the New York legal community. And in addition to being a formidable presence as New York State's chief judge, he was also very much beloved by people who knew him personally. People describe him as caring, kind, gregarious, fun to be around, family-oriented, a man of deep integrity, a brilliant jurist, a fair man, a man who seemed to care about people from all walks of life.

Damn. Yeah. One lawyer who practiced in front of him said he came across as regal. Dang. Yeah. This guy made him. impression. He had political aspirations. At the time our story gets really going, when the stalking begins, he's talking about running for governor of New York. He was a Republican, but he was one of those people who had a lot of friends on both sides of the political aisle. Yeah, that used to be a thing that happened. Like back in ye olden days, I actually remember it. Yeah, some of Saul's views were progressive and others were more conservative, so both Republicans

and Democrats really liked the guy, for the most part. Saul had always been driven, and he'd always known he wanted to be in politics. He'd built this impeccable reputation as a fair and incorruptible leader. But as so often happens with golden boy slash golden girl types, there may have been some rebellion brewing deep down. In 1991, in a letter to an acquaintance, Saul wrote, I cannot escape the feeling that I could enjoy life a bit more,

if I didn't care quite as much about what others thought of me. Unfortunately, the strictures of a civilized and easily scandalized society have kept me from the ultimate happiness of saying or doing whatever I wanted at any given time. Yeah, I mean, you know, welcome to adulthood, man, and civilization, and especially welcome to politics. I mean, you know, most of us don't get to or even really want to, I would think, say and do everything that we get an impulse to say or do. We weigh the benefits and the consequences, and most of us managed to find a balance that works. But Saul seems to have been chafing against his perfect, impeccable life. Golden Boy wanted to get a little tarnished.

And finally, one evening, Joy came up to his judges' chambers and they kissed. According to Saul, it was a kiss to end all kisses. The soundtrack soars and whatnot. After that, his whole, I'm not one of those. men who have affairs, schick, pretty much bit the dust. He and Joy started a hot and heavy affair. They met whenever they could, discreetly. And y'all, this blows my mind. Joy had a therapist, unlicensed, and as far as we could tell, totally unqualified. And she persuaded Saul to start seeing the same one. Her goal, and she came right out and said this to both Saul and the

therapist was for the therapist to help Saul get up the nerve to leave his wife. So Saul started seeing Joy's therapist. And this woman, I shit you not, would let Joy and Saul use her and her grown daughter's homes to have sex in. Oh yeah. And this therapist would cover for Joy and Saul if their spouse is called while they were in there together. What the hell kind of therapist is this? Does she think she's in an episode of The Young and the Restless? I'm so confused. Lady, Jesus, do your job and stay out of these people's marriages. I seriously, like, I could not believe what I was reading. Yikes. I had to go back and read it again because I was like, this doesn't seem right. She was getting off on it or something. This lady's a freak. Holy crap. Totally freak. And this is,

this is why you do not go to unlicensed therapist, campers. Yes. Yes. This is like if, like, you and I had a shrink's office. We'd be better at it than this. That's true, but we would be popping popcorn and urging all our clients to spill the tea. 100%. I do think that maybe we wouldn't go as far as this shit show of a therapist, but, you know, what do you know? Anyway, Joy pretty much worshipped the ground Saul walked on. She consulted him about everything. She barely made a move without asking his opinion first. Gross. And by all accounts, Saul's wife Joan, who, by the way, was Joy's step-cousin, because this is totally an episode of Young and the Restless. It really is. It's a soap opera. Had no idea about the affair. She knew he had been her trustee

for years and that he considered her a sort of ward, but Joan didn't like Joy. She thought she was crude and gossipy, and she could not understand why Saul spent so much time, quote, mentoring, you know, wink and advising her. Yeah, Joan, bless her. her heart. She seems like a classy lady in many respects. I mean, based on the book that we read, she was smart, she was accomplished, she ran a program for the elderly at the YMCA, and she used to head a mental health

counseling center, and she came from an affluent family. She's pretty much the platonic ideal of what an aspiring politician wants in a wife. Very poised, very lovely, but, you know, also she didn't fawn all over him. She had shit to do. She couldn't spend every waking

moment telling Saul what a special boy he was, right? The betrayal. But Joy consulted Saul about everything, as you said, and she'd been kind of spinning her wheels for a while, but she'd always been interested in politics and the 1988 election was coming up. So Saul, who was very much enjoying his role as the powerful mentor to his mistress, encouraged her to pursue her interest in politics and become a fundraiser. And Joy wasn't sure she should at first. She didn't have a college degree. She didn't have any experience. But Saul told her, you'll be great at it. And damn, if he wasn't right.

Yeah, fundraising is all about schmoozing the right people. I used to have to do this in college for various, like, athletics events, and it is exhausting. I would hate it like poison. Yeah, you have to be nice to everyone, even when they suck, Whitney. No, thank you. But for someone like Joy, it was a perfect gig. Yeah, and she went to work fundraising for George H.W. Bush, which is Bush Sr., and she was really amazing at it. Joyce's an interesting character.

She rubbed some people the wrong way, and it definitely sounds like she had a gossipy streak, like she would make fun of people's looks and stuff like that, which isn't great. Some people saw her as kind of a shallow social climber, but other people just adored her and said she was huge fun to be around. She was generous with gifts and compliments if she liked you, you know. She was crazy about her daughter. And she worked her ass off for the Bush campaign. There's no doubt about that.

And the Bushes loved her, Barbara especially. They liked her so much, in fact, that once Bush got elected, he not. nominated her to be the U.S. ambassador to Barbados. And people pretty much laughed her out of the room. I mean, it was true. She had no experience whatsoever. People saw the nomination basically as political pork. They thought it was gross. They thought it was an example of a new president, just blatantly handing out appointments in exchange for donations, which is pretty much exactly what it was. Yeah. So all that played out in the press, and Joy wasn't confirmed, and it, you know, it crushed her for a while. And around this time, after about 11 years together, Joy's marriage to Jeffrey Silverman started to fall apart. She suspected he was cheating on her.

Now, Jeffrey denied this, and according to the book we read, he's always denied it. He says it was projection on her part, just her way of justifying her own affair with Saul. And, I mean, we know people do this. In fact, therapists will tell you that one of the biggest clues that your partner might be having an affair is if they start accusing you out of the blue. But Joy seemed convinced he was cheating on her, and she would tell you. tell people he was cheating on her and she was very offended and self-righteous about it, which I think is kind of hilarious, like, despite her own indiscretions with Saul, it's just funny to me how people can twist their brains into these bizarre mental pretzels in order to rationalize their

own behavior. But anywho, she left Jeffrey and she took Jessica with her and they started divorce proceedings. And like her mother before her, Joy was now a single mom. But her affair with Saul was going strong. And the thing was, ever since Bush got elected, Joy's insecure was gone. Her work on the campaign had really changed her, given her a lot more confidence. She was getting invited to the White House to hang out with the president and the first lady. She'd discovered that she had a real talent for political work. So for the first time in her life, Joy wasn't just someone's wife or girlfriend or some rich guy's stepdaughter. She was a successful person in her own right. And that's a powerful feeling, if you've never had it before.

Right. And maybe that's why around the time of Bush's election, she got off the nerve to give Saul an ultimatum. Leave Joan or else. Saul, for his part, hemmed and hawed. He was worried about running for governor as a divorcee. He was worried about how his kids would feel if he left their mom. So he waffled. He told her they could be seen out in public together with the few people they'd told

about their affair. Then he told her they couldn't. He told her he wanted to marry her. Then he pulled back. But finally, he agreed to tell Joan about the affair and leave her by Labor Day. But shortly before Labor Day rolled around, Saul asked Joy to dinner, and he told her some earth-shattering news. He'd just been to his doctor for a regular physical, and when he mentioned he'd been having headaches and some other weird symptoms like his left foot dropping sometimes, his doctor gave him a brain scan. and he discovered a brain tumor.

Oh, gosh. Yeah, inoperable, advanced. He might have as little as six months to live. Oh, wow. So now, right on the cusp of starting a new life together, they got this devastating news. Joy was, of course, crushed. Saul told her she should move on with her life. Look for a new man, not waste any of her youth and energy on nursing him through his last days.

But Joy was horrified. She'd never leave him just because he was sick. She'd stick by him. She'd take care of him. But Saul was firm about it. He didn't want her to see him fall apart bit by bit. He said, look, Joan doesn't know about us. She'll take care of me.

And it wouldn't be fair to her to let her find out now that I've been cheating on her for the past few years. She doesn't deserve to have to deal with that and her husband dying. at the same time. Yeah, that's real noble, by the way, letting your poor wife stay in the dark and take care of you so you don't have to be alone at the end, dude. That is super classy. It's super fucked up. Gross.

So Saul started his treatments, physical therapy to prepare for the loss of motor control he expected to kick in soon, stuff like that. They kept up their affair for a little while, but soon they weren't seeing each other as often. And before long, one of Joy's friends set her up

on a date with a guy named David Sampson. David was, in the words of one of Joy's friends, a damn Jewish Adonis. Samson was a catch. He was a very successful attorney. He was younger than Saul, richer than Saul, prettier than Saul, blue eyes to die for, cheekbones for days.

Yeah, and Joy, who I guess felt like Saul had put her through it for the past few months with all his waffling, back and forth about Joan, told him so. Ouch. Yeah, outchies. She and David felt hard and fast for each other. And that was pretty much that. She broke things off with Saul, and Saul wasn't happy about it.

He tried to turn her off this new guy, telling her he was a bad guy. He was still married. True, but they were separating. He'd done some shady stuff she didn't know about. She and Jessica might not be safe with him. Joy was like, you were the one who said I should start dating other people. David's a great guy. Saul tried to convince her to at least see him on the side, but Joy seemed offended by the

thought. She said, I'd never date two men at once. Girl, you were married while you were seeing Saul for the past four years, but Joy said that didn't count. And Saul couldn't believe it. He got all mopey and depressed, and he called Joy as often as he could to try to kind of rekindled a spark between them, but Joy just wasn't interested. She'd found her new guy. At the same time, all this was going on, Joy was still going through her divorce with Jeffrey Silverman,

with her lawyers going back and forth about maintenance money and visitation with Jessica. Joy heard through the grapevine that Jeffrey was dating a new girlfriend, but she was happy. She had this perfect guy on her arm. He was everything she ever wanted. He even made President Bush laugh at a dinner party. She'd scored big. But, as the poet Robert Frost once wrote, Nothing Gold can stay. And not long after she and David Sampson started getting serious,

somebody started calling Joy's apartment and hanging up without saying anything, just over and over and over again. They called David Sampson's office a couple times, too. Joy kind of suspected it was Saul, but he and Joy's lawyer told her she was being ridiculous. And she and Saul were still talking on the phone quite a bit as, friends, so, you know, that plus just the kind of person he was. I mean, it did make it seem unlikely. Soon things got weirder. Joy's soon-to-be ex-husband Jeffrey Silberman claimed he got a call

from a man who identified himself as David Purdy, a private investigator from Houston, Texas. And supposedly, Purdy told Jeffrey that David Sampson's wife Elaine had hired him to follow David around and he'd uncovered the affair between David and Joy. He said he had some compromising pictures, of the two of them, and he offered to sell him to Jeffreys. Like, this will help you in your divorce, man. But Jeffrey said he wasn't interested, which good for him, you know. That's integrity.

Soon after that, Elaine Sampson, David's estranged wife, started getting similar calls from the Texas P.I. David Purdy, just as he had with Jeffrey Silverman, he told her her husband was having an affair with joy, and he had proof. And he tried to sell her the pictures. And just like Jeffrey had, Elaine said, no thanks. So Purdy then tried to cajole Elaine into giving

him David's unlisted home phone number. But again, Elaine would not play ball. He called again and again, and she was understandably freaked the fuck out. Elaine also started getting love notes and cards ostensibly from her estranged husband David, but she knew they weren't from David. Now this was creepy. Someone was clearly trying to disrupt things for David Sampson. David was representing a company called GAF in their bid to build a hazardous waste incinerator in the little town of Linden, New Jersey. Now, a lot of the residents of the town were opposed to the idea, and they've been trying to fight GAF in court. One of the leaders of their group was a woman named Beatrice Bersnott. She started getting calls, supposedly from David Sampson, but sounding nothing like him,

asking to talk about the incinerator project and heavily suggesting that she might be able to bribe him to make the company back off. Hmm. And then the hang-up calls Joy Silverman had been receiving gave way to something more sinister. First, it was dirty greeting cards. One for Joy, one for little teenage Jessica, both signed David Sampson.

The signature looked similar to David's, but Joy knew he'd never send her daughter a gross card full of dick jokes. They weren't from him. Then she got a couple more. These ones had handwritten messages inside. One had a cartoon of a woman on the first, with her head about to explode and it said under the circumstances you seem to be handling things

fairly well and inside the card someone had printed but soon i'm going to fuck you over three exclamation points which as british satirist sir terry pratchett has pointed out is a sign of an unsound mind yes that's so funny all caps too right at least injudiciously used i mean you can occasionally use them for comic effect or whatever but lay off on the all caps soon after that a card arrived for Jessica. So Joy was feeling cautious, obviously, so she opened it herself, and on the front was this cute little picture of a kitten sniffing a flower, so Joy thought, oh, okay, this must be from one of her friends. But when she opened it, a condom fell out. Someone had typed a message inside and said, I look forward to visiting you this summer. School should be great fun for you,

but you must be careful. The enclosed should be used by your boyfriend before you do it. P.S., I have a picture of your mother doing it, which I will send soon. It was signed David Sampson. This campers is a 14-year-old girl. So, right around this time, Saul, who was still trustee of Joy's inheritance from Bibbs Wallaceoff, started trying to convince Joy to let him cut off her trust fund money for a while. He said it would help her win more maintenance money from Jeffrey in the divorce. But Joy was pissed. She had a gut feeling that this had done.

nothing to do with helping her out in the divorce. She felt like it had to do with control. Saul was trying to keep control over her through her money. Let her know he could still have sway over her life and she was not having it. She told her lawyer to tell him, no way. And it started to dawn on her that if Saul would try and use her trust fund to control her, if he would take a step like that, would he also send her dirty letters? Signed with her new boyfriend's signature, perhaps? So she told her lawyer to tell Saul she suspected that he was the one sending the letters. And this poor lawyer who knew Saul was pining over Joy, but couldn't imagine New York's chief judge doing something like this, met with Saul and told him, Joy wants the harassment

to stop. And Saul said, she's crazy. Soon, Joy received her first letter from the same David Purdy who had tried to stir stuff up with her and David's exes a few months earlier. It would be the first of many. Purdy told Joy he'd been hired by one of the civic leaders in Lyndon, New Jersey, to dig up dirt on David Sampson. You know, to try to stop that company from building that toxic waste incinerator in the town. I can understand that. Yeah. He said that in the process of investigating David Sampson, he'd uncovered their affair.

He had dirty pictures, he said. He had audio of her talking about her personal life and some of her Republican muckdyamuck friends. He threatened to sell the pictures to Jeffrey to use against her in the divorce, and to her big-wig friends. He threatened to send them to Jessica's school. He swore a lot. Joy was in total disbelief and horror. She talked to her lawyer, and even to a private investigator about figuring out who sent the letter. She told them that she had a pretty good suspicion about who it might be, and they told her it would be really hard to prove.

Around this time, some people close to Saul noticed he was getting a little tough to be around lately. He was hyper. Wouldn't stay still during lunch meetings. He'd get up and pace the floor, gesturing and getting all red in the face. And he wasn't as attentive and caring as he usually was. When a colleague told him about his mom's cancer diagnosis, he didn't say anything. Normally, he'd commiserate and sympathize. Joan was worried about him as well.

she knew he was stressed he was suing the governor of New York over a dispute about funding for the court system he won by the way that's not a small thing so she figured that was the problem but she did wonder if it might also be the medication he'd started taking

a drug called tenuate that his GP had prescribed to pep him up Joan called their family doctor to come to the house and have a look at him and the doctor told Saul to knock off the speed and start taking two other meds, an antidepressant named Pamelor and a sleep aid called Halcyon. Heavy, heavy stuff. Saw the disease was told, though apparently he later went and refilled the tenuit, the speed. Most of the time, though, he was his normal self, still brilliant

on the bench, still friendly and charming with colleagues and friends. There were just those little occasional flashes of something not quite right. And meanwhile, the letters kept coming for joy. The stalker knew intimate things about her, specific things about her body. He said he'd been watching her. He'd bugged her in David's apartments. He knew things about her place, the color of her bedspread, for example. I've been inside your apartment, he told her. I like that blue nightgown you left on the bed.

He told her, you can't protect yourself from me. He said disgusting sexual things, stuff he'd like to do to her. He knew the address of her summer home. Joy appealed to her in Saul's therapist, the frickin' weirdo used to to let him have sex in her house, you know, to talk to Saul about the letters because he was still seeing her as a therapist, too. And when the therapist brought this up with him, he flew off the handle. Like, how dare you suggest it's insane? How could you or she or anybody think such a thing about me? And he was very convincing. He was super pissed. And then afterward, he would talk to the

therapist in sessions about how much it hurt him that Joy could think that he was impersonating this David Purdy person, harassing her. And then, in the fall of, of 1992, a man showed up at Joy's building and told the doorman to tell Joy he was asking for her. He said his name was David Purdy. He most definitely made an impression. He was heavy set with a big belly. He had a hunchback and he was missing most of his front teeth. And on top of all that, he wore a big Stetson hat and a bowelot tie, had a sort of limping, swaggery walk, and spoke with a really thick southern accent. Not somebody that you would easily forget. He handed the doorman a letter to give to Joy, and when she opened it, it was full of more threats. He said he'd

installed some more better bugs in David Samson's apartment, and then he said this. I'll pick Jessica up from school in about a month or so when I'm back in town. Don't worry, by that time, like I told your doorman, I'll have my new teeth in. I wouldn't think of embarrassing her. Not nearly as much as the four pictures of you getting it and Watermill would embarrass you, although some of your friends and I know who they are, would love to see them. I have the negatives and can make an unlimited number of prints. If you are ready to talk business and you better be, put a notice in the October 1 out-of-state edition of the New York Times. It should read, Lost Texas Bulldog, answers to name David. The ad should be placed in the lost and found section. I will contact you at the listed

number and we can talk terms. Don't disappoint me or you'll be very sorry. So, Joy had held off on calling the authorities about the harassment for about a year, and I think there were a number of reasons for this. First, I think she was scared and intimidated and hoping her stalker would stop on his own, which is really common in stalking cases. And also, she had a lot of friends who were telling her, look, wait until you have a specific threat. And then once you have a specific thread, they can nail him. So Joy hired security guards, and she kept an extra close eye on Jessica, and she waited. But once she got this latest letter from David Purdy threatening straight out to kidnap Jessica and trying to extort money, all bets were off. It was

time to call the FBI. In fact, according to some sources, she called President Bush, and he was actually the one that made the call to the FBI. And unsurprisingly, they pulled out all the stops. The agent in charge, who I like to call agent badass bitch, partly because I'm not sure how to pronounce her real name. I think it's Brazinski. Yeah, it's Brezinski. She called the stalker's methods, trace, track, tease, torment, which is dead accurate. Especially, since sometimes the stalker would lull joy into a false sense of security by pretending to back off. The agents were frustrated right out of the gate when they couldn't find any fingerprints or on any of the letters or cards. The agents were open to the idea that Saul Wachtler might be

behind the harassment, but they didn't want to get tunnel vision. They brought up a bunch of possible suspects to joy, exes, political rivals, even Bibbs's angry family. All of the those were definite possibilities. Oh, sure. Jessica was so scared, she started sleeping with her mom. Oh, baby. Can you imagine the level of terror you'd have to reach as a teenage girl before you'd want to sleep in the same bed as your mom? Poor kid. She must have been petrified. Bless her a little heart. Right away, the FBI found a David Purdy PI in Texas, but he did not match the description, and he had no idea what they were on about. So it was pretty clear he wasn't their guy. One more lead dead in the water. So, as we just told you, Purdy's latest letter demanded Joy place an ad in

the classifieds for a lost Texas bulldog who answered to the name David. He also told her to put a phone number in the ad, a designated phone line just for him to call. The FBI were thrilled. Do it. Hell Yeah. So she did. And they set up a trap and trace on the number. They coached her about what to say to the caller and how long to keep him on the phone. The first call was a hang-up, but they didn't need long to trap the call. They got it. And lo and behold, it was a mobile phone registered to the New York court system. It matched the number for Saul Wachtler.

Everybody was stunned and horrified. This was the chief judge of the state of New York. For God's sakes. Yeah, and the U.S. attorney, Mike Chertoff, reacted pretty much like every DA on law and order reacts when a rich and powerful person comes up as a suspect, which is basically to like bang his head on the desk in despair for a while and then say, damn it, okay, we can go after him, but you better be careful. Because if we're wrong, we are screwed. Our asses are in a sling. It's a career ender for all of us. You know, they always hate having to go after rich people. It's so gross. It's so gross. I mean, Okay, they have traced the calls to a phone in this guy's office, but that doesn't prove it's him. It really doesn't. That's true.

It could be someone in his office. Someone could be trying to set him up, which that's true, right? That's fair, yeah. And you don't want to give him time to start hiring a team of lawyers. So they kept up the surveillance, and the phone calls continued. Here is a charming excerpt from one of them where it, Herdy demanded $20,000 for the dirty pictures he had of her and David Sampson. And as much as I would love to regale you all with my fabulous southern accent, I'm going to let the true Southern Bell do this one for us.

God, no pressure. Well, God damn, you better understand me. You're going to get a letter from me, and you better listen to every word of it and do what it tells you to do, or you're going to be in serious, deep trouble. And you're not going to see your daughter again. You hear me? I'm a sick and desperate man.

I need the money and you'll be hearing for me. Yikes. They were all like that. All the calls and letters. Some were a lot worse. Yeah, my personal favorite is the one where he described one of the dirty pictures that he allegedly had of Joy and David Sampson. He said, his hand is on your head and you're holding his wad.

He's definitely not from Texas. The next picture in the series, you're putting his wad in your gobbler. Okay, so there's a lot to unpack there, obviously. let's take you one step at a time so first of all he's trying to get in a little dig about samson's penis size i guess with that he's definitely not from texas comment but it's clear to me that he is also using the word wad to mean penis here and honestly i'm a little concerned like dude i'm pretty sure wad is not a recognized penis shape yeah if yours is a wad you really need to see somebody about that yeah am i right or am i wrong i feel like if if any part of of the

Penile anatomy resembles used gum in any way. Just go see a doctor, please. Because a wad is just like a little, yeah. It's just like a little lump. That's not good, right? It's not good. No, go to your GP. Yeah, for God's sakes.

And then one night when David Purdy made one of his gross little phone calls to Joy, they were able to trace it to a pay phone in an isolated area. Two of the FBI agents decided to haul out. out there and take the phone receiver to the lab to check for fingerprints. And when they did, guess whose fingeprints they found? It was Mr. Saul Wacklers. Oh, my goodness. It's on now.

But U.S. Attorney Chertoff was still a little squirrely. Jeez, dude. He wanted proof positive if he was going to go after somebody of Saul Walkler's standing. You know, I wish they took every arrest this seriously. No kidding, right? It's like, yeah, you should be looking for proof positive in every case you handle. But, okay, let's give Saul W. The Benny of the doubt.

You've already got far beyond a reasonable doubt here. Come on, man. So they decided. It was scared. It's understandable. It was the chief judge of New York State. I mean, it's, you know. It's understandable. It still pisses me off.

So they decided to set up a sting. David Purdy was still demanding that 20K and saying he'd leave her alone if she paid it. So the next time he called, she agreed, and they set up a money drop at a laundromat. Joyce Dorman would leave the money there in an envelope, and Purdy would pick it up. So the agents put surveillance on Saul. They all sat around on pins and needles as the time for the money drop approached. Would Saul show up? Would somebody else? Saul was at his office up in Albany all morning, but as the time for the pickup got closer, the agents saw him leave his office, get his big old Mercedes and start driving toward the city. Oh my God. But once he got there,

he didn't pick up the money. So the agents watching were confused. They were frustrated. Like, what the hell is going on? Was he on to them? Was an accomplice going to pick up the money? But then they watched in, I can only imagine, complete disbelief as Saul drove a few blocks away from the laundromat, parked, got out of his car. He walked around to the trunk and there on the sidewalk in front of God and everybody started stuffing cloth under his shirt, putting on a Stetson hat and a bowelot tie,

blacking up his front teeth with some kind of theatrical makeup. Y'all, this man, the chief jurist of the state of New York, was putting on his mother-grabbin David Purdy disguise. Holy shit snacks. I think you mean holy Scooby snacks

because this is a scene right out of Scooby-Doo. Oh my God, it is. So they could not believe it. And once he was all like gussied up as David Purdy, he limped over a block or so and hailed a cab. Like he had the whole stick down. Like he was actually limping. He moved differently. Bunkers. So the agents watched him, hailed his cab, hand a note to the cabby in an envelope. And then the cab drove off in the direction of Joy's apartment building and saw got back in his Mercedes and started taking off his purdy gear and headed out of the city. What is

happening? Oh my God. So a couple of agents ran to interstate. up the letter that Saul had given the cabby and it was a peach. It was like, did you think you could shake me this easily, bitch? You expected me to give you everything I've collected and learned for 20 grand. Are you stupid or do you think I'm stupid? I may be a shit kicker, but I'm not a dumb shit kicker. That's an important distinction, obviously. And what followed was a litany of complaints about all the time, money, and effort.

It had supposedly taken the sick diabetic purdy to surveil Joy and David Sampson all this time. He said, do you think I went through all this for a shitty 20K? I saw how and where you shopped. 20K is loose change to you. When I need more, I'll be back if I don't croak. Now, he said he wanted $200,000. And he ended the letter by saying, I'm going back to Texas now.

You better hope I die soon, because if I don't, you'll wish you were dead. You better kiss your daughter good night every night. Woof. So now, Chertoff was finally satisfied. and it was, at long last, habeas grab us time. So they picked his honor up on the drive back home to Joan. He'd just picked her up some bagels.

Get you a man who's considerate, am I right? And so went the beginning of the unmasking of the most powerful judge in New York. Womp, womp. So, of course, his attorney's first move was to get him evaluated by a team of psychiatrists. Saul's explanation was that he'd originally set up. out to break up David and Joy, just so he could win her back. Yeah, so there you have the calls to Joy soon to be X and to David's wife Elaine telling them both about Joy and David's affair. And when he didn't get the response he wanted,

when Elaine didn't try frantically to win David back or threatened to go public about his cheating, Saul got frustrated and decided to kick it up a notch. Yep, so next came the attempts to get David Sampson's name in the press for corruption. That's why he'd called that civic leader in Linda, New Jersey, and tried to convince her that Samson would be willing to take a bribe. When that didn't work, when Samson didn't get accused of bribery attempts in the press, it was time for Plan C. Plan C Campers is basically the first N in the Dennis system for those It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia fans. Nurture Dependence.

Meaning he figured he'd scare the living shit out of Joy and Jessica. and maybe this would drive Joy back into his arms. He'd always been her champion and protect her, so he figured if he could throw her off balance, she'd drop David Sampson and come running back to him. Which is flippant hilarious, given that this woman was literally friends with the president of the United States at the time. Like Saul, honey, if she needed a champion right now, it wouldn't be you, bro.

It wouldn't be you. That's like if we had Dwayne the Rock Johnson, his phone number. Yeah. Yeah. And he was also the former head of the CIA. Like, I'm sure he's got this. Thanks, Saul.

He's fine. And when that didn't work, and when, in fact, Joy started accusing him of being David Purdy, Saul once again decided to kick things up a notch. He figured if he dressed up like David Purdy and made himself as unrecognizable as possible, Joy would believe the creepy PI was real. She'd believe she was really. danger and he'd get what he wanted like the giant mulling man baby that he is so naturally the defense psychiatrists were just thrilled to have a crack at him don't you know one thought he was

suffering from bipolar disorder at the time he was harassing joy and he wrote all the letters and made all the calls when he was manic the other doctor blamed it on the tenuit the pick me up slash amphetamine Saul's doctor had prescribed to keep him alert at work. He basically said Saul had poisoned his poor brain. Not surprisingly, the state psychiatrists felt differently. One of the experts they brought in was Dr. Lewis Schlesinger. After giving Saul a battery of psychological tests and having multiple hours-long sessions with him, he came to the opinion that Saul Wachtler was a man and a mask. At first, he was struck by Saul's charisma and social skills. Saul could make you feel like the most important person in the world. But the more time he spent with him, the more the doctor

realized that Saul's apparent concern for other people was affront. Underneath was a shallow pool, a man with a deep need to be admired and adored. Schlesinger said Saul was highly vulnerable to rejection. And he had the kind of personality where if he did get rejected, it would feel like an injury to his identity. It would feel like an attack. He was like that kid that wouldn't share his toys, even when he wasn't playing with them. I used to nanny for a kid like that. Oh, the worst. So it shouldn't surprise anybody to hear then that Dr. Schlesinger thought Saul was probably a narcissist, probably had narcissistic personality disorder, in fact. And that definitely fits for me. the really intense reaction to joy rejecting him,

even though he was the one who made up the whole thing about how we need to cool things off because I don't want you to have to see me through to my death and everything, and just his unbelievable entitlement to her. One of the other state doctors said he believed Saul's behavior was more about anger and obsession than mental illness or medication, and he pointed out, stalking is a vengeful deed,

not an act of love. I would add that it's an act of entitlement, an act of possession. Yes. and it shows a total lack of empathy for the victim or in Joy's case victims because whatever anybody may say about Joy Silverman and from the book we read

it does seem like she could be a bit difficult to deal with at times Jessica was an innocent kid she was a 14 year old girl who was traumatized by Saul Walkler's disgusting behavior God only knows what this did to her views on men and relationships and by the way even if Joy was the biggest bitch in the world even if she stomped on Saul's heart with stiletto heels and laughed while she was doing it,

she didn't owe him her time or her body or her fidelity. She was entitled to move on with her life for whatever reason she wanted to. Yes, ma'am. So far from a burst of manic passion, what he did was a methodical, well-planned, elaborately thought-out scheme. This dude did not snap. This was a step-by-step attempt at manipulation, and he would go right from one of his,

David Purdy calls to the bench, and he'd hold everybody spellbound with his brilliant legal opinions. He would write a long letter full of disgusting sexual comments or a gross, like, sexually charged card directed at little teenage Jessica, and then he'd go speak at an event, and he'd be charming and hilarious. In fact, an hour or so before he wrote one of the most threatening David Purdy letters, he had just done a phone interview with a reporter from the New York Post, and the guy said he was his normal self, intelligent, and insightful, and Charming, no mania in sight. Yeah, this shit drives me fucking bananas, right?

Because he used the mania to handwave his actions. But the fact of the matter is that you are responsible for your own mental illness. Absolutely. If he was feeling manic and out of control, he should have checked himself into one of those fancy mental hospitals that celebrities and rich people always go to. Go to fucking therapy, my guy. Stop terrorizing your ex and her fucking daughter. just because you didn't get what you wanted. Yeah, and I mean, I do think the medications could have been a factor, the tenuate in particular,

because, you know, speed is not good for you. It's not conducive to a rational thought process and to good judgment. But as the prosecutor would point out of the sentencing, he started the David Purdy stuff before he started the antidepressant, before he started the halcyon. He was taking the tenuate, yes, and I think it very well may have been a factor. I agree with Linda Wolfe, who wrote the book that we read about this case, that the role of the speed in this case was probably just to disinhibit him. Yes.

It didn't create the desire to harass joy. It didn't create the narcissism. It didn't create Saul's inability to handle rejection or his anger. All it did was kind of loosen the ropes a little bit. It just took away his inhibitions enough that he let himself off the leash. And can we talk about David Party, please? Yeah. Saul was so proud of his creation.

Oh, yeah. So proud, in fact, that after he was arrested, one of the shrinks who evaluated him said he spent 45 minutes of the session in character as Purdy, bragging about how he'd altered his stance and voice to be convincing. And Purdy was everything Saul wasn't. He was crass. He was gross. He was toothless. He was poor. He lived at the YMCA.

he was a caricature of a poor person, really, and a detailed one. He wasn't thrown together. He was a nightmare tailor-made for Joy Silverman. Saul knew how important wealth and beauty were to her. And y'all, we had to leave out a lot of detail to fit everything into this episode, but you would not believe the amount of time and effort that he put into the development of that David Purdy character. Like just one little example, he called the Houston Texan. YMCA, because Purdy was supposed to be from Houston, to find out how much a room cost

there, just so he could be extra convincing. And he practiced walking and talking as David Purdy. I mean, it was elaborate. But despite all this, a lot of people seemed very willing to believe Saul's mental illness defense, or his, I was on speed defense, or his, oh, I was love sick defense, or really any defense he wanted to put forward. This included Stepford, wife, Joan, who trashed joy in the media and stood by her man like you do. Yep, yet another deer in the headlights-looking politician's wife, just smiling like a robot into the camera as her shitty husband apologizes and talks about how he's looking forward to taking some time away from public life to get right with his God and his family.

Blech! Joan, girl, you deserve better. While Saul was out on bail waiting for court proceedings to move along, he got invited to a fancy dinner party with a bunch of other lawyers and judges at Tavern on the Green. And he was reluctant to go, but he did. And when he walked in, people clapped. People called him chief, even though by now he'd resigned from his position and been stricken from the New York bar. Some people even cried. Oh, my God. This chap, U.S. Attorney Chertoff's ass badly. Yeah, and this was his reaction, quoted from Linda Wolfe's book. What's the matter with those guys?

Don't they understand that what Wachtler did isn't simply a case of boys will be boys? It wasn't just this crew, judges, who got it wrong. Ever since the case began, he'd been meeting people who shrugged their shoulders and said, well, man, woman stuff, what do you expect? Didn't they know this was a crime of violence? Well, there was no act of violence, but you had to be very inexperienced in the ways of the world not to understand that just by making threats, Saul had effectively done violence to a mother and daughter.

Damn right, Chertoff. So, in the end, Saul skated on charges of extortion and using his judicial office to obtain information and promote his scheme. He pled guilty to using interstate facilities to send kidnap and blackmail threats. The plea agreement allowed him to include an affidavit from one of his psychiatrists, saying he was suffering from a, quote, major mental illness during the time he made the threats. Apparently, depression is a get-out-of-jail-free card, according to Saul. Yeah, and as someone with mental illness who has never stalked, harassed, or threatened to kidnap anyone, just fuck off, Saul.

Same. Just fuck right off. Yep, yeah. Same. Saul had done some interviews while he was waiting to plead, and in pretty much every one of them, he had a beautifully catered pity party for himself. Like, I think he had those little sandwiches, too. It was probably catered by Tavern and the Green.

At his sentencing, Chardolph fired back. He commented on the fact that Saul, even after his arrest, had the almighty nerve to pay himself almost $40,000 for administering Joy's trust fund. Joy obviously protested strongly. And Saul argued that he'd done good work on the trust in the previous year. So he was entitled to the money. The ball's on you. Oh, my God. Yeah. Chironoff was like, uh, okay, so you were so mentally ill and drug adult during this time that you shouldn't be held responsible for your actions toward Joy. But you were

also so together that you did exemplary work on Joy's trust. Do we not see the contradiction here? Apparently not. And he also said this, which I love so much that I want to buy it a box of chocolate. So this is again from Wolf's book. So he says, you know, a guy comes in, he says, My entire life, I was devoid of love, success, prosperity, and health. That's why I committed the crime, so don't punish me. But, hey, we don't accept that as an excuse for breaking the law, even though in some ways it's a more powerful argument than I was rich, I was powerful.

I had prestige and unlimited vista, and I didn't get something I wanted, so I committed a crime. But don't punish me. I've been punished enough because I lost all my advantages. burn, right? And here, by the way, was Saul's lawyer's charming response to this, which is gross, I'm going to warn you. He says, Your Honor, could I please have a few minutes of response time? I will not be long. In terms of women's issues, there's another dimension to this case. It involves relationships, not just between Joy Silverman and Judge Walkler, but between

Joy Silverman and Lauren Walkler, her friend, that was Saul's daughter, who Joy was friends with. And Joy Silverman and Joan Walkler, the judge's wife. Yes, there was a whole women's issue surrounding the case, he tried to point out, and it wasn't the one Chertoff had been talking about. But he didn't call it by a name. Did he mean Joy's sexual betrayal of her cousin Joan? With the innuendo left hanging in the stale air of the courtroom, he moved quickly away from the matter, insisting there's no attempt to blame Joy Silverman for anything. Sure sounded like you were trying to blame her, and what exactly are we supposed be blaming Joy for here? Saul's responses to his crime, his explanations, all seem to blame

everybody else but Saul. It was Joy's fault for breaking his heart. He was just a love sick swain. It was joy's fault for not stopping him sooner. She should have gotten an order of protection. She should have appealed to his family to intercede with him. She should have called the FBI sooner. This was all stuff they brought up. Are you fucking kidding me with this? Yet again, miss me with this victim blaming bullshit. If you are so heartbroken that you feel the need to stalk and harass your ex who you dumped. I know, he dumped her. I'm going to say it again, just to drive the point home.

Go to fucking therapy. With a licensed therapist. Yeah. There are people out there that are equipped to untangle your bullshit. But don't you fucking dare blame your victim, you sentient lump of gutter slime. Yeah, we don't like him very much in case you guys haven't noticed. And, oh, by the way, Joy was fired from her job as a fundraiser after all this. So there's that, too.

Anyway, gross. So he was sentenced to 15 months in prison, which was several months longer than the defense tried to get, and a couple months shorter than the prosecution tried to get. So basically the judge just kind of split the difference. He did his time at a minimum security correctional institution in Pensacola, Florida. And I would love to be able to tell you that this man lost his long. license permanently, but unfortunately, he got it back in 2007. He's an adjunct instructor at a law school today. He's the chair of the Law and Psychiatry Institute at North Shore

Long Island Jewish Hospital. And that's super? I think that's just swell. Isn't it nice how men can do shit like this, just totally blow up women's lives, and then be welcomed back into the warm bosom of society, just no hard feelings at all? Yeah, that's fun. That's fun for me. Yeah, this was before the Me Too movement, but, you know, that's a cold comfort. He got his life back. He's walking out in the world right now, y'all, without a care in the world. Get mad. Stay mad. I am mad. And for God's sakes, hold men accountable for their fucking actions. He wrote a book, too, and did the talk show circuit. His interviews after he was arrested. And again, after he got out of prison, drip with self-pity and victim blaming.

he said he was sorry but he always seemed to come back to the reasons why none of it was really his fault oh and by the way he never had a brain tumor either the absolute cock of course not and let's please not forget that he made up that nonsense before he'd ever taken one dose of any of those drugs yeah that was pre-speed as well the brain tumor lie yeah he was just like oh I can't tell her the truth. So I'm going to make up a life-threatening cancer. Which I can't even imagine what his endgame was with that. Like, obviously you weren't going to die.

So were you just going to tell her, it's a miracle. I'm better now. I don't know. He's an idiot. Yeah. As smart as he is, he's a fucking moron. The basic script in the media, while all this was going on, was that Saul was a love-sick swain brought low by a scarlet woman.

never mind that he was cheating on his wife never mind that he threatened a teenage girl never mind that he lied about having a tumor yep just you know sure she la femme joy pretty much went into hiding after this happened for a while anyway she lost friends over it there were incredibly gross headlines about what a like awful person she was and she wasn't a perfect person but she didn't deserve this

and he does not deserve our pity and there's a post script to this story while Saul was in prison if I remember rightly he was in a psychiatric ward of the prison when this happened I'm not sure why but he was being treated with antidepressants and stuff and he alleged that while he was lying in bed one day somebody came in put a pillow over his face

and stabbed him with something that made marks that looked like they were from like a fork with one of the tines removed so the FBI came in they investigated and their investigation found that the wounds were likely self-inflicted. They were shallow. Plus, the only other person who was even around that day was a delusional inmate who wasn't functional enough,

in their opinion, to have been capable of this. So just, wow, I don't know what that was, like not getting enough attention that day, maybe, or feeling the need for some sympathy. Of course, we don't know that he stabbed himself. That was just the FBI's conclusion. so we really have no idea, but we thought you'd want to hear that story

because it seems to me to be the perfect cherry on top of the giant banana split that is this case. By which I mean, it's flipping bananas. And I'll leave you with this, Campers. When Saul was interviewed about what he planned to do

when he got out of prison, he said he wanted to teach people about mental illness and what it can do. One of his friends thought, and I'm quoting again from Wolf's book, educate the public about mental illness? I've got a better idea.

Why doesn't he get out and start a foundation devoted to stopping the harassment of women? The problem's endemic, but he could have a real impact. He could set up projects that would give men's sensitivity training, and he could get grants to teach women how to handle harassment. He'd be a hero again. Yeah, he wasn't interested in that, though. His focus was on mental illness, his excuse, the narrative that absolved him of responsibility.

Typical narcissist crap, isn't it? so that was a wild one huh campers you know we'll have another one for you next week but for now lock your doors light your lights and stay safe until we get together again around the true crime campfire and we want to send a shout out to our newest patrons thank you so much to katherine sarah alicia melissa and kelly we appreciate you to the moon and back and if you're not a patron you're missing out patrons of our show get every episode ad free at least a day early sometimes more plus a free sticker and while supplies last, for patrons in the $5 and up categories, this rad enamel pin. So if you can, come join us. You can follow us on Twitter at TC 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.