In their new podcast, deviant hosts Andrew Iden and Dan Scimitar of its take you into the dark corners of what human beings are capable of. In their gripping first season. They embark on a chilling journey into the life and crimes of Israel. Keyes, one of the most methodical and terrifying killers of our time. The show has access to new recordings of interviews with the killer.
I've listened and watched and read about people that do horrible things for 20 years, and this is, without question, some of the most horrific stuff I've ever heard. Some people are wired for bad and some are wired to be deviant. Join us for an interview with Dancy Matovic and Andrew Eitan on a study of strange. Welcome to the show. I'm Michael May, your guide and to. Well, all things strange and mysterious. And today I'm joined by Andrew Aydin and Dan Matovic. Welcome to the show, guys.
thank you so much for having us, Michael. It's great to be here. Good to be here, Michael. Appreciate it. So normally, I'm sharing a tale of strangeness to a guest. But today is going to be a little bit different because you both have a new podcast, deviant. And I'm excited to talk to you about it. But first, I do want to mention that I am a big fan of Down the Down the Hill, The Delphi Murders, another podcast you guys did. Yeah. Thank you, thank you, thank you, I appreciate it.
You know, you had there was a third host on now. Yeah. We had we had a third part of our team. Her name is Barbara McDonald. She's not court TV, but she and I nice worked together at HLN and CNN for a long time. Fantastic. And on that note, I'd love to learn just a very brief kind of background about you both. let's start with Dan. Dan, tell us just a little bit about yourself.
Yeah. I you know, I'm celebrating the 20th year of my career and, started in public radio and, in Tampa, Florida, pivoted to CNN, where I worked in audio at CNN. Then I was in public radio again for a little while on the national scale, NPR in American Public Media. And then I went back to it was Warner Brothers at the time. and that's where I worked with Andrew.
when I was, I was making podcasts for all the different brands, true TV, you know, TNT and banana, you know, HLN was interested in doing a true crime podcast. And with my background in news and sort of knowledge of that, you know, it was a natural marriage. And that's how we ended up working together on the, the podcast you mentioned down the Hill, the Delphi murders. No, no. What about you, Andrew? so I started about, I guess, 21 years ago at CNN.
bottom of the chain, you know, an entry level, getting coffee, all those things. But, I moved over to HLN in 2005 and worked for Nancy Grace for eight years. after that, I had left that show on it, bounced around CNN and a couple of different jobs. I'm an editor, and I've been a field producer, news producer. went on to join Ashley Banfield, who was, starting a show. And there being 2016, all true Crime and Time. And then in 2019, I did go back to LA looking down the hill.
And so basically my for the majority of my career has been in true crime, but I'm in justice court, all things legal. So and that's kind of my, my family and our, you know, we we're both obviously with the same company, but, we ended up parting ways, last year and I decided to start our own, outfit and, you know, tell stories on the tell the stories we want, the way we want to tell them. Oh. That's wonderful. I love to hear that.
You know, I've been in the film business most of my career, and, I, I realized I listen to more podcasts than they do. You watch movies or TV anymore and really wanted to get into that. But I'm just a big proponent of just creating content. And also, I love when people go out on their own and try to create their own thing. So it's always excited to hear about and you do a great job.
I started listening to DV and and I love that you say it dives into the dark corners of what human beings are capable of. I just love that phrase and you hear that, Dan? Yeah. Good job you're. well, and before we dive into deviant and you guys are talking about Israel Keyes right now on the show. Before we get into that, I wanted to share this because just a few nights ago, I was at a dinner party, which is part of this, like, networking event, and my podcast came up. Not for me.
Someone else mentioned I do a study of strange and people started asking me of like, why? Why are you interested in these dark, strange things? And in my my interest is very broad. It's not just true crime, but I definitely cover true crime in it. And I do get this question from Time Shadow. Like why? It's like, these are terrible stories. Why do you want to hear them? Why do you listen to them? Why do you want to share them?
So I'd love to get your perspective because you guys have done such amazing work in this field and worked in news as well. Why is it important to share these stories? you know, I think, Dan and I have debated and talked about this a lot, and I think a lot. What is very interesting about true crime is that I think there's a very, it's relatable in a lot of ways because I think a lot of people see here read experience these stories. And the first thing they think is, what if that were me?
How would I deal with that? How would I handle that? What that must have felt like. And so, you know, I really think it's a relate ability factor.
first, and, you know, we, we walk the line all the time of what we're doing, these stories and at CNN to get me and Dan on down the hill and all the stuff we've done together is like, we're constantly trying to to kind of walk that line of, like, making sure people have the info of what happened and what, you know, people went through, but also trying to make sure that we are, bringing some value. Right.
And trying to understand, you know, there's such a close link between these true crime stories and psychology, and some of that is what we're getting into in DV. And it's like the psychology of people, why they are wired certain ways. And so I think people, frankly, they just kind of connect with the idea of like, there are people that are walking down the street that just operate on a different level and we can't see it. We can't necessarily hear it.
Sometimes there are tales, sometimes there's not. And so I really think at the end of the day, it's just kind of like, you know, people, people say, oh, it's just like you and me. And it's like, well, no, we're not all the same. We're all wired differently. And so that's what I think is really one of the appealing things about this genre is to kind of relate ability factor and understanding that, yeah, do you think about it like, you know, we all have friends, we all know people.
And we say like, you know, we have our own contexts, we have our own way of thinking, and we have our own way of being. And this probably happens every day to all of us. I know it does to me. Like, how could that person say that? How could that person think that that could be our friend or that could be our boss, or that could be your coworker? Like, we just don't understand how they could possibly think this one particular thing. Right? And that's probably for something extremely mundane.
But those are things that we latch onto and, you know, make part of our every day. We've talked about serial killers or criminals that is so far outside our context that I just think there's something of a fascination in trying to understand how that person could be, how they could exist, how they could look like us, how they could sound like us, how they could be technically a human being. But they're so far outside of, you know, what we understand to be what it is to be human.
And if I can add just one other thing, one of the things that I always think is interesting about these stories is back to that relate ability. It's like these things affect people differently in different ways, and I am fascinated with people's ability to be resilient and to overcome these things, because obviously, and we should we always talk about the victims of some of these horrific crimes, who they were in life, what they could have been, what they would have been.
But also what it's always been fascinating to me is talking to the people over the course of my career who've been kind of on the periphery. Right? There's a ripple effect. There's family, there's friends, there's children, there's husbands, wives, coworkers, everything. And I'm always intrigued at asking them, how did you get past this? And I think that the human condition is incredibly resilient and I think you'll find that everybody has a different answer.
In fact, you know, I one of the last interviews I did when I was at CNN was with a woman who had lost all three of her children to her husband. And I asked her, I said, you know, how did you get up and keep moving? And she said, I didn't have a choice because the only other option was to sit and wallow in this horrific, horrific thing. And she said, honestly, at the end of the day, there really was no choice.
And I think that's always fascinating to me is delving into how people get up off the mat and move forward in the wake of all these horrific things. That's really well said that I think that's very well said. And and the question I posed there, I don't always have an answer to it, you know, and, and I think your answers have actually been really enlightening a little bit to me is because I always kind of debate this, whether with other people or just internally.
But let me ask you, I feel like the stories that you tell, and I love the kind of stories that you tell, like early in my career, I work early morning radio and coast to coast and would get me to work. Yeah. Awaken alive. Right. And so I love the sort of subject material like, what is it what what fascinates you about this stuff? Like the stories you tell. You know, it's a great question because I always think I know the answer to that. And then it'll change like two weeks later.
And but I think what I've, what I've started to notice about myself while doing, a study of strange is I love how stories can change over time, and I love how pop culture affects what people know about strange mysteries. And true crime can be lumped into that broad statement as well. And so I like trying to to figure out what actually did happen with this story. What are people ignoring or forgetting as these things are retold through time?
Which is partly why I tend to tell older stories, because I like to see how they've changed through time. You know, it's a great point. Like stories are dynamic, right. And yeah, and storytelling is dynamic. And I guess the reason that we're interested in these stories can probably should be dynamic too, right? Absolutely, absolutely. And but there's also I also I'm interested in everything you guys just spoke about as well.
I'm interested in the psychology of serial killers has always fascinated me. And, the psychology of how people can deal with that and get up and move on as well. I think that's a huge part of my interest in this world, too. So but yeah, it's it's very broad in the more I do it, the more I start to sort of see things differently or I'll be like, hey, wait, I've always liked that. I didn't even think about why I've been interested in this kind of thing.
Also, I'm a bit of a nerd for research, so it's just something entertaining. Yeah, yeah, I'm a big believer in research. Yeah. And talking about the psychology of stuff. I do want to get into Israel Keyes, because right now, at least you're focusing on Israel Keyes. The little bit I know about him as a serial killer is that. Well, I guess my first reaction to learning about Israel Keyes and even hearing some of his interviews is he's annoying to me. That's a great word. Yeah, he's very annoying.
And, but but let me back up a little bit. If if either one of you, I don't know, who would you prefer to answer this? But if someone could give. Just give me a little bit of synopsis about what you're doing with the show and specifically with Israel Keyes right now. Go ahead. Dan. Sure. So deviant.
you know what we're doing, what we're trying to do here is tell good stories about bad people who do very bad things and just sort of our, you know, brief thing about our strategy, what we're trying to do is, you know, a lot of times a true crime podcast will spend, you know, 8 to 10 episodes telling a story than to leave for a year while they find the next story, then come back, hopefully a year later.
you know, we're sort of trying to split the difference between that and, you know, weekly shows. So our philosophy is to tell a story for only as long as it deserves. Right. And so for Israel Keyes, right now, we're planning on our first seven episodes. It may flex to eight being about Israel Keyes, and then we're gonna move on to another story, and then another story and then another story. And that's that's sort of our strategy. And we'll keep doing that until we drop dead of exhaustion.
we should have rethought the strategy because it seemed like a good idea at the time. We'll see how it goes. But, Israel Keyes was the first one we chose because he is so fascinating just to give everyone to sort of a Israel Keyes 101 here. here is the, here here is that Israel Keyes was a serial killer who the FBI thinks was active from 2001 to 2012. And they the FBI believes that his the FBI believes that he killed 11 people.
And the reason they think that is because, after his capture in 2012 and in March of 2012 and a couple months before his suicide in December of that year, he killed himself in jail. A search of his jail cell found a painting that he made in his own blood with 11 skulls and the message, we are one. And that is why the FBI things, you know, I use the word think, right? Big blaring letters. They were able to confirm four of those, potential 11.
But the reason he's such a mystery is because of the way he operated his M.O.. We say that he may be the most famous serial killer you've never heard of. He's definitely the most, probably the most meticulous, pre-planned, known serial killer out there. What he would do is he would travel all over the United States country, travel through Canada, he would travel internationally, and he would kill kids in random locations, anywhere. And then he would leave and come back X amount of time later.
Sometimes it was years. Dig up those kill kids and then find a victim. And he didn't have a victimology. Like a lot of serial killers. He didn't like large people, small people, blonds, brunets, male females. He did that. That was another thing is very different about him. He would just kill whomever in a random location and then he would leave. So police didn't know that there was an active serial killer out there.
They did it because, you know, it was all these different bodies and different locations that they don't know and still may not know was attributed to this one person. And then he got caught because he eventually departed from this extremely effective M.O.. And that's when he started talking. He was never tried. He was never even charged with these crimes because he he confessed immediately, like, I'm the serial killer you have. You caught your monster is what he said.
All I want was to be executed by the federal government. So let's negotiate. You give me what I want, and I'll give you everything you want. And you know, we've gone through 20 hours of these tapes, these interrogation tapes now. And he detailed some pretty horrifying stuff. And, but he plays a lot of games, too, with the truth. Yeah, he he was really one of the bedrocks of what he did and why he was able to get away with it for so long was he was incredibly disciplined.
And he talks about that in these interviews about how he never committed crimes close to his house. He never did them when, you know, wherever he was, was living at the time and the cruel, you know, nature of what he did was because of that discipline.
And what's incredibly ironic is, and Dan alluded to it, is that the reason he was caught is because that control in that discipline started to slip, and the reason he was caught is because he, of all things, he started using an ATM card of his final victim. And so that was what got him. That's when he popped up on the radar, because there was a a girl that was missing and her debit card was suddenly being used across the southwest, New Mexico, Texas.
And so the irony is that all of that control in that discipline that he held on to for so long started to go out the window. And that's what got him caught. And that's why investigators finally sat down in an interrogation room with a member like, oh, this guy is completely different. He's a lot like anything we've ever really seen before. Yeah, they had no idea what they had when they captured him. Quick coded. So that is when they captured him.
The only thing that they could charge him with was credit card fraud. That is the only thing that they had to charge him with. They knew he took Samantha Koenig, the girl that they were looking for. But the only thing they could charge him with was that credit card fraud. They didn't know whether she was still alive or not at that point, and they had no idea that he was a serial killer. And the only person who the only way they found out that he was this person is that he told them.
And what year was it that he was finally caught? 2012, 20, 2012? And do you guys think that his ego might have gone into that, the him kind of slipping up and starting to use the card because he is a very egotistical individual?
I think so, I think so, you know, I think one of the hallmarks of serial killers, essentially, is that they are all their biggest fans to a certain extent over, there are others who who find, you know, the glory in the media coverage, in the notoriety and all of that stuff. And Israel Keyes was different because he didn't he actually didn't seek out, like, attention.
Yeah. and he says in these interviews, like, he didn't want he didn't want his name attached to a bunch of, you know, news reports and one of the things in the negotiation with law enforcement was that he really wanted to keep this kind of, like, out of the public eye.
However, with that said, where he did like the glory and you can hear it in his voice is sitting in that interrogation room across the table from investigators and engaging in that dialog and that back and forth, because he loved knowing that I know everything. And you guys only know some of these things. Yeah. And I think I think that's why I call him annoying because there's this, like, egotistical, I'm better than you. I'm smarter than you saying when he's sharing these stories.
And also he'll laughs at these terrible moments and and it just is. That's terrified. but also just makes me just really dislike letting the guy, which is such a stupid comment to make. He does not make himself easy to like. Yeah. You know, and we've listened to all these tapes again. We're we're up to about 20 hours. We just got our hands on some new ones, you know, about 20 hours now. And he never gets less annoying. And, you know, we've listened to him multiple times.
And there are times where, you know, we were going through these and deciding what to use, what not to use. Also a source of spirited discussion. But one thing we can always agree on is sometimes you just want to punch this guy like he he is. So, you know, arrogant, small minded, you know, he's clearly an aberrant person. And it's interesting. Like, it also depends.
He almost seems to change when you're listening to these tapes, when you're watching him, when you have that opportunity or listening to it, you can hear him almost physically change depending on the topic. Right? When he's negotiating or playing games with federal prosecutors or detectives, that's when he's at his most arrogant. That's when he, I think is at his most. I'm smarter than everyone else in this room. I am controlling this situation.
When he does get into details, that's where you can hear his voice change. It gets low, it gets intense. And the detectives we talked to who were in that room would say that, you could see him physically change to, like, you could tell he was reliving these moments when he's actually talking about his crime. I believe one of the tech.
I believe one of the detectives told us that, you know, he was in this wooden chair, and, you know, he would rub his hands back and forth and like, he had his handcuffs and chains on, and like, there there was a time where he actually rubbed some of the wood off the chair. He was just so into reliving these experiences in these memories. That's I think those are the points when you hear him do that. Where he had is where he's at his most genuine.
Oh, I we've also talked about, we've had spirited discussions, many of them, one of them is that, you know, what if he's just full of it? What if he's just lying? And, you know, we we know that serial killers lie. We talked to a psychologist who's like, that is a very normal, regular, factor here. And, you know, we've we've entertained ourselves in our conversations about, like, what if that drawing with his blood of 11 skulls, what if it's just all garbage?
What if it's just some sort of like, you know what my final flourish here is? I'm just going to throw them off. And so that's something we've discussed and debated. And, you know, I think, trying to figure out the reality of that is what we've kind of charged ourself with. and so yeah, but you know, he is very arrogant and he is also annoying. You are correct.
One thing we do know is that he is, at the very least responsible for four murders below Marine career in Essex, Vermont, Samantha Koenig in Anchorage, Alaska, and Deborah Feldman, from, I believe, Hackensack, new Jersey. And so you mentioned that you have some new tapes or new interviews. are those already part of the show or are they coming out in the show or, we're actually working those in now?
no, those are you know, there are there are tons of tapes that are out there about Israel Keyes, the ones we're sorting through now. you know, when we made our initial request to the U.S. Attorney's office to get material, there was a portion of those tapes that they were not releasing. They were the very first ones. And so that, you know, the request for that material that we made was a long time ago.
Since then, some of those that were previously unreleased and not accessible have made their way to the internet as everything to us. and were, you know, as we speak, actually now going through the process of trying to authenticate, to make sure there's a real because obviously with, you know, anything can be thrown on the internet in any way with AI and everything. So we are in the process of authenticating those. And, you know, we have gotten pretty close to the point of doing that.
And what those tapes reveal is a very clear picture of why they didn't want to release them is because they are. I just said to Dan a short time ago before we did this, this recording is that I've, I've listened and watched and read about people that do horrible things for 20 years. And this is, without question, some of the most horrific stuff I've ever heard. And it's, it's clear to see why they didn't necessarily feel the need to release those.
And to be a little more specific, without getting specific in the way you fear. I'm about to I'm not going to do that. But, yeah, it's specifically about, it was his confession, over the murder of Samantha Koenig and what he did to her. And it's beyond horrific. And that's not hyperbole. That's that's coming from from someone who's who's done this for 20 years is the worst I've ever seen. These guys who've who've seen a lot. Yeah. So I, I don't want to give anything away from your show.
People should listen to to deviant. But what can you give us that people may be able to take away from your coverage of Israel keys that they're not going to get from another podcast or YouTube video or, you know, television show. you know, I think one of the first things that we set out to do when we started talking about this story is, you know, what we didn't want to do was just sit down and talk about a guy and talk about what he's done for the sake of just talking about it.
And I've actually had multiple conversations with people about the reason why we felt this was a good a good story to tackle is that what we have is an opportunity that is not often presented, which is there are hours of this guy speaking to authorities about who he was, what he did, his psychology, why he did it, how he did it, all of those things and what we wanted to make sure from the beginning is that we're providing some value.
And I think that that value sits in the margins of understanding and trying to wrap our heads around how people operate. And if understanding Israel Keyes is psychology, and what he did can have some value in being able to prevent further people from behaving this way. Because if there's one thing we know, there are people out there who are probably capable of the things Israel Keyes is capable love.
If understanding Keyes can curb the ability for others to behave that way, then I think that's the value we're looking for, you know? So I think we're and I think we're also bringing our sort of, you know, many years of storytelling experience to the table here to, you know, the stories that we want to tell to everything that, that, that drew said, you know, to sort of apply that.
Right, you know, to to combine that all, to make it an experience that makes you feel like you were are experiencing the story in an almost firsthand way. Right? You know, we're we pride ourselves on sort of the craftsmanship of of what we do. You know, we want to create scenes and, you know, sense bound stuff that really, you know, transports you to the scene that you're that you're listening to and really trying to immerse you in the story.
So, you know, you know, and I think to achieve the things that we want to achieve is really laid out. You really have to invest someone in the story. And I think the best way to invest someone in the story is to make them experience the story. And that's what we're out to do. Well, you're doing a great job at you too. And and everybody you work with are so good at what you do. And I've already enjoyed it so much. I think I'm three episodes and and and I'm hooked. So.
So you're doing your job. You're caught up. Yeah, I yeah. And, Yeah. So the future of DV interior not to sound like I just want to plug things because that's not the point of this, but do you already know where you want to go after Israel? Keys. And you don't just say what it is. If it's a secret or tease, you can you can leave it. But do you know where you're going to go or who you're going to cover? I think so we've yeah, we've kicked around a few ideas.
We have a we have a spreadsheet that's got about 60 rows of, of ideas. and I think we've sort of landed on one, nice. And what I can tell you is that it is there is no doubt that it falls under the umbrella of devient. it's a it's, it's a, a horrific story for a couple of different reasons, but, yeah. So Dan mentioned earlier kind of that always on mentality we're going to have with the show, which is, as he also said, may kill us, but we're going to give it a go.
but I mean, the unfortunate thing is that there is no shortage of people that fit that description of deviant and sitting outside of what society considers normal. so, yeah, we have we have our eyes on a second story. We got our eyes on the third, fourth and fifth that could change, could move around. But yes, we are. Yeah. Like, one thing is, I want, I want to I think we both would like to underline is it's not just going to be the serial killer. A monster of the week, right? Or, you know.
Yeah, serial killers are very obvious deviants. And, you know, we'll be telling those stories. But there are other kinds of stories that I think fall under the umbrella, of deviance as well, in crime. Right. and I think we're exploring stories that people, I think would really latch on to in that way as well. That makes sense. Makes sense. Is there anything I didn't ask you about that you guys want to mention about the show or anything else?
Well, you know, obviously, you know, we'd love everyone to follow it. and the best way to do that is, you know, wherever you get your podcasts, find deviants. You know, if you're a chart browser, we're towards the top of the charts for true crime. and Apple right now, just look for just look for the big red logo that says deviant. please follow, please follow the show. That way you're going to get new episodes as they come out and we're on social two.
you know, we're we're we're on Instagram and TikTok at deviant Dot podcast. And yeah, you know, you know, this is we're really excited about the work we're doing and we're really hoping to not just, you know, we'd love you for you to listen, but we're also want to build a community of people who want to, you know, experience these stories with us. So, you know, we have a Patreon, too. And there you get access to the discord. You know, we'll be there chatting.
We'd love to hear your ideas for what stories you want to hear. we've already got some great suggestions from some of the people that, you know, have commented, or left reviews or, you know, another appearances we've made, like, you know, stories we haven't heard of, that we look up or like, wow, you know, we had no idea that existed. So, you know, we're sort of on this quest, you know, sort of the more I say it out loud, the more it's terrifying.
The never ending quest, you know, to keep, to keep, you know, running down this sort of trail of the, of deviance. Well, it's well said. And I'll have links in the show notes for everybody as well. And yeah, I can't thank you guys enough for doing this. I really again, I've already said it, but I, I love your work and I'm thrilled that you were able to join me today. And I'm looking forward to listening to more DG oh my gosh Michael, thank you so much for having us.
We really thanks a ton Michael. We've done a lot. We've done a lot of conversations. This one this one was very enjoyable. so you know thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you for listening to a study of Strange. Check out our show notes for more information about the deviant podcast Cold Open Media that produces the show. They are exceptional at what they do and producing content.
And before you go, please take a quick second hit that follow or subscribe button and please leave a rating and review. It goes a long way to helping more people find this show. And if you want more strange content, check out our Substack, which you can find through our website. A study of strange.com. Thank you and good night.