Pushkin, a Malibu dad who killed his wife and her young child out of greed. It sure looked that way to stand Rodin, the Santa Barbara District attorney. This is Dempsey Billy, a DA's investigator who worked on the case. I think we had five or six or seven criminal investigators, and then about probably about twelve deputy district attorneys, and so the round table to see if the district attorneys I should file that case. When the facts of Fred's
case were presented, there were crickets. Nobody really wanted the case. They didn't think it wasn't think there's enough evidence there to hues Fred Railer. And then Stan Rowdin so very strongly about it and took it and ran with it. Stan Rodin was the elected official, the boss, and he wanted to argue the case himself. He was determined to bring Fred Rayler to justice. He is the one, I'll say it myself. He put the full weight of his
office behind the effort. Law enforcement was investigating five deaths with possible connections to Fred. Verna Doug, the navy diver who had drowned while using Fred's scuba equipment, and also Verna's first husband, Bill and Fred's first wife, Jean. The Santa Barbara detectives Fred Ray and Claude Tuller had turned up a ton of dirt on Fred. For every person in Malibu who admired him, it seemed another one thought he was a creep. He was cold, he was harsh,
he was weird, he was kind, he was true. You could trust him with your life. Fred hired a high powered defense attorney and engaged a team of private eyes. They started reinterviewing the detective sources, all those Malibu people who had talked to Ray and Tuller and told the tales the detectives wove into that scandalous fifty four page affidavit. But when Fred's investigators fanned out over Malibu, they heard
a very different story. Kathy Pullis, a Malibu mom, had talked to detectives back in March of nineteen eighty one before Fred's arrest. In the affidavit, Detective Tuller wrote that she quote described Fred as being strange, stormy, and rigid. He also wrote, citing Kathy, the second marriage was not as happy as Verno's first marriage with Bill. She described Bill as being gentle and Fred as not gentle, and he wrote again, supposedly based on the commentary, Doug was
afraid of Fred. But two months later, when one of Fred's investigators went to talk to Kathy, she was appalled the detectives had taken her words and twisted them. I mean, I can tell right off about this is not quite an accurate Okay, why don't you consider accurate? Well, let me go back to the beginning, where it said Vernon had problems with his second marriage. Second marriage was not as happy as Vernon's first marriage was. Bill, I don't
know that, and I didn't say that. This kind of elaborates on what I might have said, you know, when I didn't hear the say more strongly than exactly. Um, where it talked about described Fred as being strange, stormy and rigid. Yes, I think his um his way of dealing. Maybe the discipline was rigid, but a lot of that is what I had heard. You know, I did not witness him beating up his children. No, Um, let me go on here described as Bill as being very gentle
and Fred as not gentle. I don't really know if he's not gentle. So you did not say that, No, that Kred was not gentle, I just exactly what I'm here for. Just go on making comments like you are as you're And I never said that Doug was afraid of Fred, because I never witnessed that Fred had some detractors in Malibu. She wasn't a fan, but had that somehow been turned into a criminal complaint against the guy, you know, And I don't know if some of these
people haven't asked to grind, you know, human nature. I mean, wow, a great scandal, you know, go with it. By the end of her conversation with the investigator, Kathy Pulis was angry, and I've offended that, you know, Natona did all insinuating here too make a case better or whatever. So no, I would say that this no, always, you would not testify. I would not testify Santa Barbara. Detective Fred Ray didn't respond to my interview request, and Claude Teller has died.
But they left a very long paper trail to build their case against Fred. They had to deal with an inconvenient reality. There was just not a lot of physical evidence, so they'd gotten creative and poked around the tight knit community of Malibu for clues. That was a gold mine. Everyone knew something or had heard it third hand from someone else. So the detectives gathered a lot of juicy
stories that presented Fred's defense team with a challenge. This is how one of the private detectives put it to him back in the spring of nineteen eighty one. Somewhere along the lines, It's been said that there are three Fred Rays. One is the one you think of yourself as, the other one is the one that people perceive you as, and the third one the one that you really are. So who was the real Fred Railer? I'm Dana Goodyear
and this is Lost Hills episode eight three. Fred's Fred needed to prove that the Santa Barbara detectives had it all wrong. They had him all wrong. He was a good guy, and he set about trying to prove it from his jail cell in Santa Barbara. Of mine for Fred beating back the image of him created by detectives Ray and Tuller in the affidavit. Here he is talking to the private eye. When I received the company of the affidavit fifty four page, I sat down and responded
to Yip page by page. After I did that, I went back and I wrote, probably at least one to two tablets, legal tablets. Just what we're going to be talking about right again, They went through a list of all the people Fred knew in Malibu, but not just that. They talked about his family, Verna's family, Jean's family. According to Fred, Verna's family and Jean's parents were totally supportive of him. There's a good dialogue and good communication there
as close to me really as my parents came. It's a unique situation that's, you know, that's going to be a strength as far as you're you know, to put it in a very pragmatic term, these people are going to be your best characterizes. It was important the investigator said that the persona Fred presented to the jury be credible. If there was a bad Fred, he needed to know about that too. See, we don't want to characterize you as any kind of a saint. Okay, you're a human.
You've got your strengths, you've got your witnesses as you've got the things that people know about you. And if we can get some kind of a composite then we can present you to a jury in a way that the jury's gonna say, hey, you know, here, we are one person who knew him well, and who Fred felt sure would vouch for him was his psychiatrist, doctor Paul Remis.
Are he am I Even Tarzana law enforcement had run into a contradiction in Fred's persona in the stories various witnesses told about him, the man who lived for his family versus the man who would brutally kill them. If Fred was capable of the cold murders the DA suspected him of, surely doctor Remus would have seen the signs. He'd know if Fred was faking right. Fred's private investigator went to interview doctor Remus, the psychiatrist Fred had consulted
after Jean died and again after Vernon died. The investigator wanted to know how Fred had presented himself in therapy, if his grief had seemed authentic. Here's doctor Remus. The first time that I saw Fred, and he talked about the fact that his first wife had died. It was an accidental drowning. I think he brought me the anthology report, talked about looking into how it happened, the cause of it. He was concerned and upset about it, but he didn't cry.
Doctor Remus said he wasn't surprised by Fred's lack of emotion to him. It didn't indicate that Fred had killed Jean, just that he didn't really like her. This was totally in keeping with his feeling about Jean, that they really weren't getting along too well. And he is by nature as a fellow who holds his feelings in, tries to intellectualize a lot, uses words in him, part data and facts, doesn't get into his feelings very easily at all, So that the fact that he didn't cry but he looked
upset was acceptable to me. I mean, have any question second time, but when Verna died, Fred's behavior was markedly different this time. When I saw him with Verna, the very first thing he said for sentences soon was my wife is dandy, and he looked at me he broke into tears, strangely to remiss. This was real sorrow, an unfathable, authentic emotion. That was very significant to me because this is a guy who tries to use intellectual defenses all the time, and here I don't believe he could have
faked it. But I didn't have that feeling that there was a manipulation of my feelings at all. The actions spoke for themselves. He was moved to the point of reacting. Nature of the relationship with Burnam was entirely different than his relationship with a Gene that changed his life. And I think that that's enormously significant. You see, here we have a guy, Verna, doctor Rima said, pushed Fred in
a good way. She demanded that he experienced life, and his connection to her was entirely different than his connection to Gene. To get on with to you know, be in love with Verna meant you had to get into yourself. You had to do so. She meditated, she was on nutrition therapy, she started jogging. She you know, she lived, and she was his life. In fact, just showed him the way that life could be. You know, I don't know. You know this is not to say Nate comments as
well he would want to get rid of Gene. I'm not saying that. I'm saying Verna meant to him something that money couldn't buy. His phrasing is arresting. Verna meant something money couldn't buy. Verna and he fit together, both of them having lost a partner and both of them having children, and she essentially knowing how to take children a lot better than he did. It was a functional thing for the boat, he thought. Verna had also helped Fred process Jean's death. Things between Fred and Jean were
so acrimonious at the end. Gene death was especially hard for Fred, we MIAs said, because deep down he kind of wanted her to go away. You know, his worst fear, which is to to have your thought played out in action. You know, you can hate somebody because you find them. Dad, it's your worst fear. You know, you wouldn't want that to happen. And so he was blown away. That's where Verne came in. She was a religious person, okay, and
he wasn't. She you know, grounded him. She really gave him some kind of a basis for understanding, Yeah, an emotional basis sense. He understands things very well intellectually. Oh, I know, he's heard right, fell that's right her. But emotionally, it's difficult for him to sometimes get into into his feelings. He's not really had a lot of experience in communicating feeling to other people about how he feels inside. Difficult
for him to express his emotions in the fields. I'd go farther than that, I'd say that often people like Fred can express themselves pretty well, but deep inside they know they're holding out. They're not really wide open vulnerable. As the work difficult to be vulderble he was vulnerable when he came into the office the second time. Medical professionals who saw Fred right after the drownings told the
detectives about odd behavior they'd observed. Fred's vital signs were normal and he had no obvious injuries, but he was acting really out of it, seemingly drifting in and out of consciousness and refusing to answer questions. They had suggested to the detectives Fred might have been faking. The investigator wanted to know if Fred knew enough about psychology about what was expected of him to be able to act shocked and horrified when Verna and dug died. The answer
is yes, but balance it against other things. Again, the odds are point one percent that he you know, he's you know, he psyched out the whole thing, figured out, you know, how to react, and there's nothing in his past that suggests that there's just that kind of psychopathology that makes good TV story, you know, where the criminal is so clever that he fools everybody. I believe you to do that in real life, Remas said, Fred's love for Verna was genuine, and so was his investment in
his children. He didn't think the family Man persona was an act, and he definitely didn't think Fred was smart enough to Jedi mind trick him. But mostly he approached the problem practically. Besides loving Verna, Fred needed her, so why would he kill her? Law enforcement was theorizing that Fred needed money more than he needed Verna, that he was driven to kill in order to collect insurance money. Looking at his finances, it's hard to see a different
source of income. He needed a change of fortune if he was going to keep living the dream in Malibu. But law enforcement didn't necessarily understand the real estate market in coastal southern California. Here's Fred talking to one of the private investigators he hired, explaining how he got into the housing game. He started with a place in a Silver Strand neighborhood in Oxnard. We paid some enormous amount of money, like eighteen thousand dollars for his house Silver
Strand in nine two. Yeah, and we still have with this day. He's still on the household. Ye, it's worth a little more praised at one hundred and five or something as business. Fred's friend Mike Kelleen told that same investigator that Fred's instincts for real estate were the key to his financial solvency. Oh, I can tell you story. It's really easy because you remember what happened between like seventy and seventy six and seventy seven. Things were crazy.
It was a story that hinged on the massive inflation of home values in the region. When Fred and Jean moved back from Berkeley, they purchased a house on Califine. My recollection is that they paid somewhere in the fifty to sixty thousand dollars as for that house. I don't know how creative he was in financing, but again, the guy doesn't have to be wealthy to put that together,
and he put it together. He had income property in Oxnard, he had income property Amalivie and Berna had some income property am And with that going on, that's how I suppose he would pay his mortgage. And as far as I knew, he probably had some resources to draw from a little bit of savings. Was Britain all consumed with making the almighty dog. The man has the soul of a part of a grating business learning check who thinks that the dollar is the most important thing. But he's
not not a stupid man. He certainly realized the value of his prudent investment. Certain No, Mike's point. Fred might look over extended to the investigators, but all these properties were working for him, making him money, and home values were surging. For months, Fred sat in a jail cell
in Santa Barbara. He made a lot of notes, long lists of things for his defense team to do in passion for rebuttals of the witness statements against him, Lists of reasons why the accusations were so bone headed in the first place. Law enforcement was overreaching, out of control, quote bad news, coaching investigation targets, and putting words in their mouth a no, no, unquote. One list he made
was titled why not. At Santa Cruz Island, January second, nineteen eighty one, there were thirty eight numbered reasons why not. Number six could have waited till we were in Mexico and had them done in by bandits. Number twelve would have picked a boat that sank. Number fourteen would have beat them up on rocks to mask anything. I would have done Number fifteen could have cut them and had sharks in ten minutes. Number sixteen could have had them done in on a secluded part of Malibu Beach, could
have been jumped by dopers. Or number seventeen could have had them kidnapped. Number eighteen, why would I want to ruin a dream boat trip? Could have waited till everyone wanted to go home or I was ready to go home. Fred wasn't the only one strategizing. He had a robust
defense team led by a high powered defense attorney. A few of his friends from Malibu and one of his brothers were also helping, and so was Fred's friend Bill Fairfield, the lawyer who was part of all those hot tub parties back in the gene era, who'd advised him in
Verna on estate planning and set up the trust. Here they are troubleshooting Fred's defense, addressing the things that made him seem guilty, the awkward facts they were going to have to work around, and our purpose in being congregated here this morning is to discuss some ideas and hopefully bring out some suggestions that may be of benefit to Fred's defense in connection with the upcoming trial. Awkward fact
number one, Verna and Doug could swim. One of the things that certainly has come to my mind and that has certainly become a major issue, is the swimming ability of both Doug and Verna. Have any of you experienced or a visualized Doug in any type of panic situation before he was a hyper kid. Wasn't he high stroke which with spetual motion, which would indicate to me, whether ties or not, I don't know, but it would indicate to me that under a situation of panic, you would
tend to react. Now, but a lot of kids would. I mean, my kid two days ago got turned over by a wave and was in a terrible shape. You know this was this was three feet from me and was in a panic. You know so. But if your kid is just the average kid in terms of energy, perfectual emotion of dog, maybe Doug would react even yes, crash about even a bit more, which again is why I wonder about that. I mean, you can come up
with ten, twelve, twenty ways. Perhaps the dog could have been hit in the hand, the oar, the camera action Fred falling over as they're all falling out of the boat, and Burnham grabbing something, and maybe that something was dug and push Doug down into the boats. Awkward. Fact number two. Fred could really swim, you know, to the mecca Vellian mind. Here as a man who is more expert in the water than nine of the population, so he knows exactly. I mean, he is in his element when he's in
the water. So therefore he knows what to do to I mean, if he wants interpret in calculating fashion, riot to do that, he knows what to do. And this could rebound badly against him as a possibility I can be used in Romans show. That's why Freend survived. Here was no water along damn time. Okay he was. He swammed those people along ways, and that's I don't like to him about it. You know, I think I'd have bought it well long before he was in the water, up to least an hour as far as we can
tell them, maybe an hour and a half. So I mean, I think you know you can you can use it to cut both words. Let's to consume. Let me let me awkward Fact number three, Lady eat the dog. He was able to save his dog, wasn't he The dog was okay? Well, okay, but the rock wall is exactly that, the sheer rock wall, and so well, you know, and so the idea, I don't know, maybe you as I say, physically, the idea of shouting somebody out, it's diffic lost one of them, Okay, so no one could really explain how
lady got up there. M awkward fact number four. Fred his whole manner, it was wooden. Fred comes over on that tape to the officers, is very calculating and deliberately with respect to the story and speech type well for them most part, Like in the first first hour hour and a half of the interrogation, he rarely breaks down him at all. I said, when when he mentions Vernon's name, where he mentioned aside his name, he does appear a little bit choked up. It's fleeting. It's just there for
a moment, and then he's back to normal Fred. Fred's are very reserved individual who's being very calculating by nature. And he also knew with what those guys meant. In pre trial hearings, they said Fred was coming off as stiff aloof and wanting to smile a little more and look a little bit more relaxed when he's sitting at the bench and had a bail hearing where he was denied release. Fred had shown no emotion. One of those just put hand since they be saying, yeah, you know,
his expressions changing on at own. I wanted him to be a little good destiny. Now, when you get a jury up there and Fred gets on the stand to testifying his own defense, indeed, if he comes across with some of what you've just said, almost called calculating, call us a cucumber, matter of fact, except for you know, emotional chokes that you know, the jury could say, um, jeez, you know this guy is so bloody calculating that that it's conceivable for They were hesitant though, to give Fred
too much direction, especially if the prosecution was going to put on a case thing he was a phony and a fake. No, no, no, And then that's you know, that's the worst thing you could do, it to say, you know, give us a give us a movie of the week performance. Well maybe he takes the volume for that. But but the thing is you can react to you can react without being contrived. This tape, he was stifling and he was trying to push it down. So I
think Joe enhances communication with the absence. But I think he, hey, we needs to be we needs to guns from girl's friend. Allowed to well up, let it come out. You get a little bit more emotions on when you feel you know, let that come out display. Anytime you want him to break down, he just marches three kids in the back
of the courtroom and he will be in tears. In essence, what your comments are that you feel that Fred's state of mind is so bad because of all the tragedies that's happened in his life, that he's basically just kind of prepared himself. That it's not a guy that said, well, jeez, I hope I get away with us. It's a guy that's saying, what what next? Awkward Fact number five The elephant in the room Jean Fred's first wife, who also
drowned under murky circumstances. The gene gonna be admissions. We're working on a no. Yes, I don't think it is well. Would you say right now, Bill, that's what you're thinking is too Yeah, but how can you keep it in how well they The thing is that the indicial systems not allow evidence of Chrier crimes to come in just to show up as a final disposition on the half definis, and it's more in clinic than the crimes than anyone else. Sometimes you get an in the shoal common scheme, planet
design tender or knowledge. This will all depend upon upon the rulings fly That's yes, That's what I was going to be Internet. It's a discretion time drilling. The outcome of the trial might turn on whether the judge allowed the DA to talk about Gene. If the jury saw a pattern and thought that Fred was killing his wives, that would be tough for Fred to overcome. But but there's no doubt that the prosecution has to has to bring in the Gene death and some of the insurance
history to prove that case. I mean, I mean, if they don't, the case is blown out of the war. Well, it's severely impaired. Let's put it that way. You still have Fred's story, whether or not inscredible or not. The outcome of the trial would depend almost entirely on Fred the only witness to the drownings of Verna and Doug, and Fred was confident in his ability to explain the
strange circumstances of their deaths. After all, he had experience, he'd done it before, he'd silenced the rumors stirring in Malibu after Jean's death. He'd even manage to persuade one of her best friends, Verna, to marry him. But this time he'd be facing a jury, twelve strangers, and a formidable adversary, Stan rodin the Santa Barbara Da Coming up on the next episode of Lost Hills, Fred's trial draws a crowd. People like it is about rich people and
rich people doing bad things. You know, this is mythology. If somebody got life insurance and killed their wife in a glamorous situation on a yacht, you know, on a holiday weekend. Wow, that's a big deal. And look we've got this highly technical evidence about it because it's you know, we're such a hot shot prosecution that we can do this. That's next in episode nine, Prejudicial Effect. Lost Tails is
written and reported by Me Dana Goodyear. It's created by me and Ben Adair and produced by Western Sound and Pushkin Industries. Subscribe to Pushkin Plus and you can hear the whole season add free and get early access to the final two episodes. Find Pushkin Plus on the Lost Tails show page in Apple Podcasts, or at pushkin dot Fm.