7. Don't Knock Arizona

protect her privacy, let's call her Amy. My phone buzzed. It was Amy. Her son had just injured himself. She said she was at an urgent care. Could we reschedule you? Of course I was disappointed, but the unexpected free time was nice. Paul and I went to dinner at a Mexican place and plotted out the coming days. The next morning, we met up with Tom Davis, the Arizona Department of Public Safety investigator who helped interview Jerry Paisley in nineteen

seventy four. While working undercover. Davis had also secretly observed Paisley's wedding to Peggy Baggatte. One of the key questions I had for Davis, for everyone really, was whether or not Paisley told the truth truth. As a society, who do we choose to believe? Who do we instantly right off? Should we believe the politician discard the inmate? Why? What about Jerry Paisley? Specifically? I asked Tom Davis, would you

be able to tell if he was lying? What were you looking for in terms of markers of deception for each and every story? Uh, consistency number one, and Davis said Paisley's story remained consistent. More importantly, everything Paisley said that could be verified, Davis in fact verified, including specific details about unsolved murders. I said, tell me something I can check out, and he says, well, you remember a supposed suicide in the Sahara. The Sahara was a Tucson motel.

He says, well, during that period of time my life, me and Louis Marconi were running dope. Marconi, Paisley's friend was an ex cop. And I said, okay, I said what kind of dope? And he says cocaine. He said, we dabbled in, dabbled in marijuana, but moved over to cocaine because there was more money involved. So he goes and tells me that they're doing cocaine, and this end of edile that they had entrusted the cocaine to or gone. He had gone out and picked up the cocaine was

back at the Saharah tried to rip him off. So the opening of the story was that was supposed to be a suicide. But he says, if you check with TPD in the coroner's office, he was shot twice and I said, okay, I said, now here's the flip side of that. Did you shoot him? Yes, I shot him twice in them out and Louis and I fought with him in the room. Um, we got him on the bed, I straddled him and shot him twice. Them out. Because of this confession, Paisley was convicted again in murder. In court,

he was cocking and sarcastick. He thanked the jury for stopping by and called himself quote an honest liar. Obviously Paisley is not the most trustworthy person. Obviously he lied often, but he also told the truth at least part of the time. In fact, telling the truth is what earned

him a second murder conviction. So if Paisley lied about Peggy Baggette meeting with Joe Banano, if he lied about Banano Lieutenant Joe I. Tarola giving him a locked briefcase to carry to Alaska, if he lied about Danny z Ivenach telling him the briefcase contained high tech explosives and that the missing congressman had been assassinated. Why why would

he lie? What did he have to gain? The most obvious answer typically would be that he wanted some kind of leniency, time taken off his sentence, something like that. But he was already serving a long sentence for murder. He had no chance of getting out. And not only did he not receive leniency, but because he spoke, he was also convicted of a second murder, which earned him an even longer sentence. What then about money? Paisley made no money from this fame. Paisley made no concerted effort

to talk to the media. What then about Peggy Beggatt. Did Paisley just hate her? Did he want to get revenge again? There's no evidence of this. Paisley and Peggy were long divorced, and in the interview, Paisley was ambiguous about Peggy's role in the alleged plot. He questioned whether or not she even understood what she had gotten herself into. What about notoriety or some kind of legacy. It's true that Paisley wanted to be remembered for his mob ties.

It was undoubtedly a better look than his prison affiliation with the Aran Brotherhood. But what notoriety did he gain? So Paisley got no time taken off his sentence, he was convicted of a second murder, He made no money from his claims, he got no media, he didn't seem to have some boiling atrid to peggy baggage, And he gained no notoriety and told this show, And for that, I'm truly sorry. I don't cherish the idea of giving Paisley what he wanted at all, but I don't really

care what he wanted. I care about the truth, And to that end, all three of the investigators who interviewed Paisley think there's at least a strong possibility that he did tell the truth. Furthermore, Paisley later offered to take a polygraph or lie detector test. It is, of course possible that Paisley just lied. Maybe there's no reason why, maybe he just did. Beyond scrutinizing his possible motivations, I wanted to see which parts of his story I could

definitively prove. It was tough, but during my research I found evidence to corroborate much of what Paisley said, the parts that could be corroborated. But maybe he was just a good liar, mixing in truths and falsehoods. That's certainly possible. However, what I improve mob ties the marriage the business dealings has left me with an uneasy feeling and a hunger

to find the truth. Late in the evening on the day I interviewed Tom Davis, I sat down in my hotel room in Phoenix and kept digging through databases trying to track down sources. One of the key players I was looking for was Gene Fowler. Fowler and his brother Larry were two of the six people Paisley named as having played a part in whereas having knowledge of the alleged bomb plot. Three of the six were dead. Joe Banano, Joeya Tarola, and Larry Fowler to refuse to talk with me.

Peggy Beggett and Danny z Ivanitch so that left one person, Gene Fowler. I had looked for Jean for a long time without success. I can't tell you how many dead end numbers and emails I tried again and again. Maybe this Gene Fowler is the right one, Maybe this number will work. Be completed as did the number and dial again. So that night I shot off some emails, then fell asleep. Around two or three am September two, nineteen, I awoke to a surprise email. I found Jean Fowler, but it

wasn't Jeane who emailed me back. It was his son, Steve. Steve was cautious, but he agreed to meet with us later that day at his house near Tucson. Excited, I texted Paul, our producer, and we agreed to meet downstairs for breakfast around eight am. We had a busy day planned. We were supposed to interview Amy, Paisley's daughter, and damn it, Amy canceled on us again. She apologized, saying her family

wasn't comfortable with her doing the interview. I was disappointed, but I told her that I understood and that if she changed her mind to call me. I walked to the hotel breakfast area spotted Paul and said hello, thinking of Gene Fowler and are just canceled interview with Amy. I told him I had some important news. I got an omelet set it down on our table. But before I could sit down, my phone buzzed again and again

and again. Today is September two thousand nineteen. Uh, Paul, one of our producers, and I are at a hotel in Phoenix, and we just went in to have breakfast. Uh. But wow, it's but a crazy A few hours Um, it was literally texting with Jerry Paisley's daughter, who I was supposed to interview on Sunday, and she backed out, um because she said her son was hurt. And then

I was supposed to interview today at ten am. It's almost eight in Arizona where we are, and I was literally texting with her and setting food down on a table um when I got a text from Bob Martinson. Bob Martinson, remember that name. He's going to be very important to this story later on. You also told me something I hadn't heard, which is very kind of overwhelming and upsetting to hear at this very moment, which is

that Cokie Roberts just died. Um. Also last night, U I U finally figured out where uh Gene Fowler lives. Fowler is the man who Jerry Paisley alleged. Um it was at the airport in nine two when Paisley says he carried a package for the bananas to Alaska. So I have all this swirling. I just walked out on Paul.

He's sitting there eating and my my foods getting cold. Um. Really a kind of upset to hear that about COKEI Uh family seems to be very nice family, and you know they they lost Tommy a few years ago and Lindy too so and and to to hear that in the middle of all this, I mean, while I'm texting with very multiple people related to this story, is it's just weird. So I just sitting in a chair outside in a courtyard in a hotel and Phoenix. But um, I haven't had time to look too much to see

what happened. But I believe Coke he died from breast cancer, which I didn't know she had. And I mean, I would like to express my adults start her family. Okay, it was overwhelming all at once. Cokey Bob, Paisley's daughter Geane Fowler. I sat outside for a while and just stared at the sky. Cokey was the last surviving child of Hale and Lindy Boggs. I had spoken briefly to her brother, Tommy. He agreed to do an interview, but several days later, before we could speak, he died of

a heart attack. Coke and Tommy's sister, Barbara, the former mayor of Princeton, New Jersey, was also dead. She died of cancer, and now cancer had taken Coketo. Coke's death hit me hard. Only ten days earlier, the day before my birthday, my mom had gotten confirmation that she too had breast cancer, stage four inflammatory breast cancer, a rare and aggressive cancer. On top of lupus, which he's battled

for thirty years. It seemed like a death sentence. Days before I flew to Arizona, I had flown home to North Carolina to see her. My mom's diagnosis weighed on me heavily. As we produced this show. I mostly kept it quiet, but there were times I wanted to share it with certain people, like the Baggage kids, so they could see that truly, at this moment, I could, in some way at least empathize with their loss, that I

was human too, and not just some parasitic reporter. As of this recording, my mom has undergone chemo surgery and physical therapy up next radiation. Also, as of this recording, we as a world are in the middle of a devastating pandemic COVID nineteen or the novel coronavirus. I always planned to discuss loss or looming loss, or the possibility of looming loss, but I never imagined it would be under these circumstances. What I want to say most is that I've felt loss or the threat of it, nearly

the entire time we've produced this show. It's been difficult to work, hard to focus, but given the circumstances, given our current global situation, I want to say this, We're all going through collective trauma right now. It hurts. Some of us have lost loved ones, some of us are terrified of losing loved ones. I just want you to know that I feel what you feel that fear, but we're in this together. And for anyone out there who's scared,

who's afraid, who's depressed, who's anxious, I get it. This is horrible, but we will get through it. Be there for each other, love each other. We'll get through this. In Arizona, Paul and I still had a very long list of people to find, doors the knock on and places to visit. We were about to drive to Tucson, but before we left Phoenix, we made one final stop. I'm standing in the parking lot of the Clarendon Hotel.

It's a hotel in Phoenix, Arizona, And on this very spot on June two, x Don Bowles, who was an investigative reporter who looked into the mafia and uh corruption around the state of Arizona, was killed by a car bomb. He said a few things before he died, John Adamson, emprize and mafia, And with those clues, investigators found a man named John Harvey Adamson, who was convicted of putting a remote control bomb under bowls car. It's abnormal for

a journalist to be killed in the United States. It's extremely abnormal for a journalist to be killed by a car bomb. Um but car bombings happened. They happened in Arizona, they happened in Alaska in the and I mean I've read about this killing for a long time. And as weird to stand here because it's just an average parking lot in Phoenix, and a man was blown up here

in the seventies. In old news footage of the Bulls bombing, you can see the exact spot where I stood, The exact spot in the parking lot of the Clarendon Hotel where Bowls was blown up. The pavement is soaked in blood. The assassination of Bowls in ninety six enraged his colleagues. Journalists from around the nation descended on Arizona to continue his work, to show that if you take out one

of us, good luck, we'll dig deeper. These journalists launched the far reaching investigation into crime and corruption that became

known as the Arizona Project. Good Evening, a group of newspaper, radio and television reporters charged today that the state of Arizona is now the major card or for narcotics into the United States, that the state has been invaded by organized crime, and that some of Arizona's major political figures, including Senator Barry Goldwater, have condoned organized crimes invasion of the state. The reporters took on their Arizona investigation to finish a job started by Don Bowles, a reporter for

the Arizona Republic who was murdered nine months ago. The investigative work was painstaking. For six months, the team probe through public records, doing the slow, tedious, methodical work of the investigative journalist. What they found in records of land transactions and corporation documents and court documents would not have attracted the attention of most people. What they found were records of loans and canceled checks and request to politicians

for help on certain projects. The reporters conducted hundreds of interviews and recorded many of them. They exchanged information with law enforcement agencies. They traced the geniale g. Of the mob families and located some of them in Arizona. At this point, as the reporter speaks, the camera pans over several books, including Honor Thy Father, the best seller on the Banano Family, the same book that tied Jerry Paisley

to the Bananas. As the Arizona Project reporters dug deeper, they found pervasive rot They say in their reports that Arizona is now the major corrator for narcotics, that the state has been invaded by organized crime, that major political figures of the state have made an easy and profitable accommodation with the underworld. The major bank in Arizona, a large restaurant chain, the nation's foremost land swindler, corrupt law

enforcement officials all find places in their stories. If you're curious at this point as to why I'm discussing Don Bowles and the Arizona Project at all, how they tied directly into the story of the missing congressman, let me explain. First, both Bowls and reporters for the Arizona Project dug into the two mob families. Jerry Paisley worked for the Bananas and the Lick of Olie's, who were not just in Arizona for some son. Both families were active and wielded

powerful influence in the state. Second, Bowls was killed by a remote control bomb in Arizona less than four years after the missing congressman disappeared. Less than four years after, Jerry Paisley said he transported a bomb from Arizona to Alaska that was allegedly used to assassinate the missing congressman. Finally, I want to emphasize that it was a different time. Back then, bombings were much more commonplace in the six seas and seventies, and they weren't just concentrated in big cities.

They were scattered around the nation. In fact, only four months after Bowls was killed by a car bomb in Phoenix, a woman named Muriel File was killed by a car bomb in Anchorage. So here in night Seen in the span of four months are two examples of bombings that killed people, one in Arizona and one in Alaska. Neither were directly tied to Paisley. But all this to say the idea of a small plane being bombed in Alaska four years earlier is not as outlandish as it seems.

After we left Phoenix, Paul and I drove to Tucson. I was quiet for most of the ride, staring out the window, eyeing the desert. I texted Steve Fowler a few times. He sent me his address and a code to get into his gated neighborhood. Remember, Steve is a son of Gene Fowler, one of six people Jerry Paisley named as having taken part in or having knowledge of the alleged bombing of the missing congressman's plane. So Paul and I didn't really know what to expect. We figured

Steve would be piste here. We were digging into his dad. When we pulled up to Steve's house, we just sat there for a minute. There was no car in the driveway, no movement. Then slowly the front door swung open, but we couldn't see anyone, just an open door leading into a darkened house. I got out of the car, Paul grabbed the recording equipment. We eyed each other like this is creepy. And then there was Steve. He smiled and welcomed us in. We sat at his kitchen table. He

offered us water. He was friendly, which surprised me and made me suspicious. When name is Stephen Fowler. I am a native to s who spent about how of his life in Anchorage, Alaska, and from a very large family, and most of them are now gone. My father came from a family of three girls and eight sons, and my father is the only one that remains alive. At this point, I knew that Gene Fowler, Steve's dad, was alive,

but I didn't know where he was. Half of me thought maybe that he was standing in a room down the hall, pushed up against the door, listening to our conversation, Steve said that when he was a kid, his family split their time between Arizona and Alaska. Jean his dad worked construction and mining jobs and found other ways to

cash in on the Alaska oil boom too. There was a lot of opportunity to make a lot of money in a lot of different ways, and members of my family one of the things they did was they got into after hours gambling. They would open a place with a couple of black check tables at a poker table, and they didn't sell alcohol or anything like that. But when people had their paycheck, they cash it and now they wanted to have fun with it. So it was it was a big, a big period where nightlife was

was huge. It was tough time for law enforcement. There was a lot going on. There was a lot of crime. Cocaine was everywhere um and it all stems back to the fact that there was a lot of money. The free flow of money brought in the cremble element, the drugs, the prostitution, the illegal gambling, and there was always somebody there to take advantage of the guy that just cast

his paycheck. And probably from the time I was fifteen on, I started learning very quickly that there are two sides to Anchorage and the one side I never really saw, but as a teenager I learned there was a very seemi side to Anchorage. There were lots of bars that had a lot of crime involved with with those bars. There were shootings, there were there was prostitution, there were people were being beat I remember stories about the bars

being firebombed, switching gears. I asked Steve what he knew about this story, what he remembered of the planes disappearance, which names he recognized, etcetera. So I'm gonna throw names at you, and you tell me what you know of these people. Jerry Paisley, Jerry Paisley, Jerry Paisley was a bar operator that, as I understand it, had ties to organized crime UM. Jerry Paisley, I believe he went to prison in Florence, Arizona, UH for more than a life

term for killing someone in Tucson. I also believe I heard many years ago that while he was in prison he started confessing to taking six, seven or eight lives up in Alaska, and I think some of them were allegedly through bombings UM. Back when he was in Alaska, when Steve said this, it blew me away. Before our interview, I had, of course been honest with him about who I was and in general terms, what I was investigating.

But with every source who might have important primary information, I'm also extremely careful not to taint their memory, so I hadn't gone into too much detail. I had not, for example, discussed the specifics of Paisley's claims or even told Steve Paisley's name ahead of our interview. So it really surprised me that not only was Steve familiar with Paisley, but he also knew to some degree what Paisley said in I asked him where he heard it the details

of Paisley's claims. Steve said he probably picked it up from the Anchorage Daily News, but he definitely didn't. The Daily News never published Paisley's allegations, trust me. So. Jerry Paisley, originally from Detroit, lives in Tucson, was also in Alaska. Did your father and your uncle Larry, did they know Paisley in Tucson or just an Anchorage. I believe they knew him in Tucson. My uncle had a closer relationship with him. And and and when I say that I

don't mean to say that they were close. They knew each other better than my father and Paisley and in Alaska, probably because my brother, my uncle was a bar fly. Dad's brother. Uh he Larry probably knew Jerry a lot better than my father. Larry Fowler, Steve's uncle, was again the man Jerry Paisley said he Geane Fowler and Danny's Ivanitch met up with on the day Paisley allegedly transported a bomb to Alaska. Larry is the guy who was shot to death in Anchorage only twenty seven days after

Paisley did a follow up interview with an investigator. Steve was close to Larry. You know, Larry was was one of the biggest hearted guys I've ever met. Uh. He was a very nice man. He wasn't well educated, but he read a lot when he got older, and so he was a good guy. Um. I think he was like that junkyard dog that didn't have any teeth. He liked to be tough and gruff and tell people I know Jerry Paisley, and I know this guy, and I know that you know that guy. Um. And he acted

like he was tough. He he walked with a gruff demeanor. So let me, uh kind of underscore one word that I always associated with him. He acted tough, but he was a coward. The circumstances surrounding Larry's death, do you find them suspicious? At this point? I'm not a conspiracy theorist. Um, I don't even know if I would say suspicious, But there were a lot of unanswered questions. I asked Steve to tell me more about his dad. He told me that one of the defining moments of his dad's life

occurred in nineteen seventy. My father in nineteen seventy, in June, was in a ditch in uh In, Alaska, very deep ditch with clay walls and water in the bottom, and the ditch caved in and broke twenty six bones and and my father's back laura, ribs, pelvis, legs, feet, and uh. He wasn't supposed to make it through the night. He was in traction in the hospital, and thirty days later he walked out and I asked him once. I said, why did you have so much determination? He said, because

my family had forty dollars to our name. When I went in the hospital. We were living in a rental, and it's something that had happened to me, I would have left nothing for my family. Jean Fowler was all about family. Steve said, are you close her dad? Yes? And you were closer Uncle Larry too. Uh. Cut from totally different cloth than them. I have a different u uh, different ethical standard. I have different kind of character than them.

I love them dearly. Um, they're good guys, but we're different. And I had tried to interview your dad, Are you comfortable sharing why that's not possible? Three years ago Dad had a major stroke. He's had a number of minor strokes since, and then about a year year and a half ago, he had a major heart attack. He's very hard to understand. In fact, just as you were pulling up to meet with me today, Dad had been trying to tell me something over and over and I didn't

understand it. So I had him write it down on a piece of paper and have my mother called me and read to me what he wrote. And even he even has trouble with that. So, um, that's why he's not part of this this podcast. Do they live nearby here? Uh? They live seven miles away. So there we go. Of the six people Jerry Paisley named three were dead, two wouldn't speak with me, and the last one was alive

but unable to communicate. I circled back to Paisley's allegation, about which Steve seemed to know a little, but not a lot. But that little, the fact that Steve somehow knew about them at all still intrigued me. You mentioned, uh that Paisley was speaking with law enforcement and or investigative reporters, or to my knowledge, that was never in the papers. Do you remember who told you that? No?

I don't. Uh. You know, there were kind of a network of scuttle butt that always somehow ended up getting to my uncle and others. And I think before my uncle passed away, he had told me that he had heard that Jerry was talking to some officials or somebody about um, some missing bodies in Alaska, some unsolved crimes, and my uncle had been into soon just days before his death. I don't know if that played a role in and how he got that scuttle but but uh,

that's why I think I heard about her. Are you aware that Jerry mentioned your uncle and your father to law enforcement. I don't know that. So Jerry had a very fascinating tale number one, and there were many unsolved killings, and he copped to at least five, I think six killings.

One of the other things that Jerry said was that in nine seventy two, in the summer of seventy two, that he was asked by an associate of the Banano family to transport a package a briefcase to Alaska, and that he did, and that when he got to Alaska, there was a man named Danny, and your father met him at the airport. My father did, yes, Oh wow,

did you did you not know that? No? No, that's just the only thing I know about anything to do with with with with what I think you're talking about is Jerry was telling people there's a real big deal about to go down, and that was right about the time that the that the Biggage plane went down. But

uh no, this you're blown me away with this. I went on to read Steve documents detailing Paisley's allegations that Gene Fowler and Danny's Evidence picked up Paisley at the Anchorage Airport in nineteen seventy two, when Paisley allegedly transported a bomb from Arizona to Alaska, and that the three men later met up with Larry Fowler. Wow. Um, I can respond to what you read by saying a couple of things. I know my father and I can't say he didn't take Jerry Paisley to uh An airport or

picked Jerry Paisley put An airport. My father would never ever knowingly do anything would bring harm to anyone. That's that's just my father. UM. Neither with my uncle. Um, local was just a coward. If they if they had had knowledge of it, do you think that they would have said something to someone now that I'm not sure of. UM. I know Dad was afraid of how bad people hurt good people. And Dad has never never thought it was wise, um to run to the police and tell police things,

because it could jeopardize your own safety. Um. The allegation here is that your father and your uncle Larry, not that they were directly involved in any kind of bombing. The allegation is it was a different man, but that your father just picked him up at the airport, and that Paisley met with your father and your uncle on

that trip. Well, if if, um, if I were to hear that again, of course my mind was racing as you were reading is to me and in so many ways, it's unfathomable that my my father could ever be involved in anything. Steve said that, like me, he was frustrated. Now he had a million questions for his dad, and

his dad couldn't answer them. Why I was so interested to talk with your father is because there's so few people who actually and I know that I can't, but there are so few people related to this number one who were still alive number two who could theoretically provide any insight about the possibility of the plane being bombed.

It's would would anybody believe anything Jerry Paisley said if it were not for the fact that he married the widow of the missing congressman and then later made these claims. Does not mean he was telling the truth, But it's like it becomes it's much harder than if he was just an average guy on the street who you wouldn't listen to him for two seconds. Again, it does not mean everything he said was true, and but this was

this was enough that Dateline seriously investigated it. This p I was an army intelligence guy before he was a p I. Uh, there were very seasoned investigators who were significantly suspicious. Everybody that I've talked to who is reputable, who most of them quote called bullshit for a living, they have not and won't call bullshit. And it's not

because they have any affiliate affinity for Paisley. It's because, like you said, if you hear this, this crazy tale from Jerry Paisley, and you know, I can find business records that show this or certain things can be corroborated. Well, maybe he was telling the truth, maybe he was lying, maybe he told partial truths. It's it's so hard to get to the truth here, It's almost impossible at this point.

So that's why I was so excited to speak to your dad, not because I think your dad had any deep involvement in this, but because Paisley named your father and your uncle as people who might have had knowledge of this, and there's so few of those people left. But hearing me say that Jerry Paisley claimed that your father picked him up at the airport in Anchorage when Paisley brought a package two Anchorage from Tucson on behalf of the bananas. Do you think that's possible. I was

as possible dead picked him up at an airport. I think it's is It's no different than if random cab driver picked someone up at the airport that had just cut his wife's head off. Um, in a different state. That doesn't mean the guy knew anything about it or had any association with it. And I think my father is guilty by association in that in that narrative there, But that doesn't mean for a moment that I think that Dad had any knowledge of anything about anything like that,

because that's not my father. Um wow, I mean it just blows me away. What convinces you that there's no chance that he had any knowledge. That doesn't believe in hurting people. He doesn't like it when people hurt each other. Um, he's just he had horrors people getting hurt. Um, he values life. He's um, He's just he's not. He's not that person. M that that suggests that he is. And that's all I does is suggest doesn't say he had

any knowledge of it. I mean I could believe all of that stuff and that even Dad took him to the to the airport unknowingly picking a guy up that might have had a bomb but not knowing. But my father would never knowingly pick somebody up that had a momb I can tell you that it did. Jerry Paisley, to your knowledge, have any problems or any beef with your dad and Larry to the point that it would prompt him to say something, not that I'm aware of, but you know, as you were reading that a while ago,

the thought did cross my mind. I mean, why would a man say something like that. What's interesting to me about Paisley's claimed beyond the fact that certain parts of it are provable, again, does not mean all of it's approvable or true. Paisley very well could have been lying about all of it or part of it, and that's something that I want to be very clear about. I'm not here to do some bullshit conspiracy thing. I want

to find the truth. It's really hard, but what Paisley said is just I mean, you understand why putting your father aside, just focusing on Jerry Paisley, you understand why it just seems suspicious, even too politic or winning reporter to a dateline producer, to law enforcement that this mob guy low level, medium level whatever, but had proven affiliation with the bananas and look of always would marry the widow of a missing congressman less than seventeen months later.

You can't. It's crazy, um, But a lot of that happened. We know a lot of that happened. The marriages happened, that Blane went down. We just don't know a lot of the wise and what really happened. Well, I think I think it. You know, we go from what was the most logical explanation. The most logical explanation is the plane went down a bad weather, and I think, however, people just took that for granted and maybe when there should have been more follow up on other ends, there wasn't.

I think people were just kind of happy to close the book on this. What I said to Steve is what I believe. I'm not looking to force a story here. I just want to find the truth. But other than Christal the Dateline producer, but he really looked into Paisley's claims, and that lack of follow up is what pisces me off. Do you know if your father or uncle were ever contacted by any members of law enforcement or the FBI

to discuss Jerry Paisley's claims? No? No, The only the only knowledge that I have about Dad being contacted by law enforcement was right after the first hijacking. What was the guy's name, dB Cooper, Wait Wyatt. So dB Cooper supposedly hijacked the plane. I think that flew out of Portland or Seattle or somewhere. Dad had a friend in Alaska that loved to jump out of airplanes. This guy jumped out of airplanes all the time, and he would do it drunk, he would do it sober. He said,

I don't care if I had the worst parachute. I'm comfortable. In fact, if you take the parachute off, I think I could hit the ground and still survive if I planned it right. And Dad thought he was nuts. And shortly after that hijacking, the the FBI came to Alaska and they said, you know, we understand you have association with one of these guys that are on our suspect list. And that's the only time that um I know of that Dad ever was involved in any kind of investigation

like that. It was just that he knew a guy that jumped out of airplanes. And I'm assuming that guy was not dB Cooper. Dad's to this day thinks it was dB Cooper. Yeah, he never saw the guy again or anything. He didn't think he was capable of something like that. But the guy disappeared after after the hijacking, and and nothing's ever come of it. What was this guy's name? H boy? You know Dad told me his first name when he would tell the stories when I

was young, but I don't remember. That was back in the sixties. I know, I know. A wild turn. Just when you thought the show had it all, here comes dB Cooper. Anyway, back to Paisley. Okay, So I interviewed the three men who the three investigators who talked to Jerry Paisle. It was Mike Grimes, Tom Davis who was in Arizona investigator, and Dave Tullis, who was an Alaska state trooper. And I was amazed they all agreed to

speak on the record. It's it's not common. The thing that these guys said was they were very disappointed in the lack of a follow up by the FBI, that if Paisley's claims were true, that was a very serious allegation. They turned it over to the FBI. The FBI did investigate them, but it seems that it was a lackluster investigation to say the least. Um it just seems like, the going thing here is Jerry Paisley is a criminal.

There's no reason to believe him, and I understand why people would say that, but it also just seems like a kind of convenient, lazy excuse to not follow up on information. I have no sympathy for Jerry Paisley in that sense. I mean, I don't know what he went through to make him the way that he was, but he killed people, He hurt people, he used people, and you know, the idea that these claims could be part of that legacy of hurting people is painful to the

people obviously. I mean it bothers me. His was a life of crime, and in a life of crime, everything you do involves deceit, and so I'm sure he was a very accomplished lie. Was he lying about this? I don't know. I've done a lot of embezzlement work and chased down embezzlers, and you take everything in and you chase it every thread to its logical conclusion. And so when people get lazy and they close the books on allegations made by a guy like Baisley, I think I

think that's a disservice to everybody involved. And when I say, everybody involved. On the day that plane went down, however, it went down into the side of a mountain, blew up, went into the water. I step, who knows when that plane went down, It was like throwing a stone in the middle of a calm lake. Those ripples are still going out and impacting people, and so it's it's it's important to the integrity of the of the investigation and to the lives that are impacted by those ripples that

have continued to expand over almost fifty years. Now, it's only fair you follow every lead to its logical conclusion. You don't close the book just because it's inconvenient or you've got three more cases on your desk. But unfortunately

that's what happened. Does it bother you that I'm still digging into this fifty years later, No, because, like I said earlier in the interview, Uh, I don't believe there's necessarily anything here worthy of a conspiracy theory, but there are unanswered questions, and I think wherever they are unanswered questions, uh,

it makes sense to pursue it. So I actually commend you for trying to get to the bottom of this, and at the same time I recognize, and it's hard for as as hard as you're trying to to mitigate the pain it might bring to people. Um, people like myself hearing about my father's name at the airport, or if you sit down with Mark, Mark Baggage, Nack Baggage, Tom Baggage, you sit down with them, it's going to bring up pain to them. It's going to bring pain

to them at some level. UM. Put At the same time, UM, no pain, no gain. And in order to get to the answers, you've got to do what you're doing, because law enforcement isn't doing it anymore. The fact that this didn't go public with what Jerry claimed to have have said, it doesn't sound like it triggered an FBI investigation or anything. If it did trigger one, but it was brief. Yeah, that tells me that you're doing in the right thing. I recommend you, so I'm not angry at you at all.

I legitimately though, I hate confrontation. I don't like showing up at people's houses. You know, why am I doing this? I mean, it's a fascinating story. They're unanswered questions. There are a lot of questions nobody ever asked and I'm not really the type of person to just give up, but this is it for me. So whatever I learned here, it's somebody else can take up the mantle, or more

likely we're just never gonna know the full truth. They're just again, you know a few odd things here or there, but there are just so many things, and there are a lot of powerful people in media and politics in Alaska that are aware of some or all of this that never said anything. So is your hope that this effort on your part, whether you take it much further or not, will genuinely will generate sufficient interest by one or more people to pick up the batone the torch

and run with it. I would hope. So, yes, what I would really like to see, and I think what would have been fair to your dad is if people are innocent, then do a proper damn investigation and clear them, Because if what Jerry Paisley said is not true, then there's a lost opportunity that a better investigation wasn't undertaken in the mid nineties five years ago to clear people's names or to prove people guilty. So this is how

September sev ended. At the end of this very long day, forty seven years after the congressman's plane vanished, and twenty five years after Jerry Paisley said it may have been bombed, I've found myself only seven miles away from Jean Fowler, one of the key players in Paisley's story, one of two men Paisley said picked him up at the Anchorage airport when he allegedly transported a bomb from Arizona to Alaska.

It's stung to be so close to possible answers, and to know that if I had shown up three years earlier, I could have interviewed Jean. Now that was impossible. Stricken by strokes and a heart attack, Jean couldn't speak reporting this story. During the past nine years, as people have fallen, ill and died, I've watched evidence evaporate, knowledge disappear, but not all is lost. There are still answers to be had.

Other people have important information. Many of these people are in two old photos, one color, one black and white. These are the photos of Paisley and Peggy Baggett's wedding, the originals that investigator Tom Davis gave me straight out of his Organized crime Bible. These are the red dot photos. Next time on missing in Alaska. How long after you arrived in prison did you meet Jerry Paisley. I met

him in late two thousand and four. I think this week one task, using primary sources like newspaper archives, research what mob boss Joe Banana was up to between July nineteen two and November ninety two. I've already done this, but it would be nice to have your help see if I missed anything, see what you find, and if anything jumps out, feel free to contact us. You can reach us by phone at one eight three three m

I A tips. That's one eight three three six four two eight four seven seven again one eight three three six four two eight four seven seven, or you can reach us via email at tips at i heeart media dot com. That's tips T I P s at i

heeart media dot com. An important note, none of the people Jerry Paisley claimed took part in or had knowledge of the alleged bombing Joe Banano, Joeya Tarola, Danny Zevnach, Jane Fowler, Larry Fowler, or Peggy Baggage were ever charged with or convicted of crimes tied to any of Paisley's allegations. Peggy Beggatte and Danny Zevinage declined multiple requests for an on the record interview. Gene Fowler was unavailable for an interview.

Joe Banano, Joeya Tarola, and Larry Fowler are dead. Louis Marconi, the X cop who was friends with Paisley, also was never charged with or convicted of any crime tied to any of Paisley's allegations. Marconi declined multiple request to do a recorded interview. Ben Boland is our executive producer. Paul Decan is our supervising producer. Chris Brown is our assistant producer. Seth Nicholas Johnson is our producer. Sam T. Garden is our research assistant. And I'm your host and executive producer,

John Wallzac. You can find me on Twitter at at John Wallzac j O n W A l c z a K. Footage for this episode was provided by NBC Special Thanks to Steve Fowler. Among other things. Steve is an author. He didn't ask me to plug his book, but I will anyway. It's called Spy Games Inside the Murky World of Corporate Espionage. You can find it on Amazon. Missing in Alaska is a co production of i Heart Media and Greenfork Media