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Hey, Elizabeth Dutton, how's it going. I'm pretty good. I've been waiting for you. Oh yeah, it's fine, but it's fine, Elizabeth.
Okay, whatever, I wasn't waiting blood. You know what's ridiculous?
I do? Okay? Can I tell you?
Yeah?
I'd love it before Bruce Willis took the role. Bruce Willis out of guy. Lots of other people were offered this part. Arnold Schwarzenegger, he was offered it. He turned it down. Why because he wanted to get into comedy. Elizabeth Sylvester Stallone he turned it down. Clint Eastwood, El Gibson, James Kahn turned it down, Richard Gear turned it down. Finally, the role was offered to Frank Sinatra. He also turned it down. Now that actually made the most sense, even
though Frank was in his seventies. Now, why did it make sense to offer a role to Frank sinatchra before Bruce Willis and that role turned out to be die Hard?
That was gonna say, That's all I could think when die Hard?
Wow, Yes, the role Diehard originally was going to Frank Sinatra was better fit. And I honestly, he can tell you. There's a good reason. Diehard is based on Roderick Thorpe's novel Nothing Lasts Forever. In that novel, retired detective Joe Leland takes on terrorists in the headquarters of the Claxon Oil Corporation on Christmas e. Nothing Last Forever was the
sequel to Thorpe's nineteen sixty six novel The Detective. Now, if you know your Sinatra filmography, then you know that that book was also adapted into a movie of the same name, and it came out first obviously in nineteen sixty eight. The Detective featured joe Leland as the officer investigating a supposed suicide, and joe Leland was played by Frank Sinatra.
One of the.
Biggest box office hits of Sinatra's whole career was The Detective. It was one of the highest gropasing movies in nineteen sixty Ye you ever heard, I know a lot of people haven't. I've watched it. It's actually kind of enjoyable, really gritty. Yeah. So if Sinatra had returned to the role of John McClain, which they would have still called John Leland, Diehard would have been a sequel.
Wow, you know whatdiculous? It's ridiculous. Do you want to know what else is ridiculous?
Dude?
Do I highbrow Kleptomania? Oh, this is ridiculous Crime a podcast about absurd and outrageous capers, heists, and cons. It's always ninety nine percent murder free and one hundred percent ridiculous. You heard that. How many books do you think you owned?
Zarin Books?
Jeez?
A lot?
Like I have a pretty good library. I don't even have all my books with me, like in my living space, so I would thousands.
Really. Yeah, My mom has a library in her house and then they are also well they are like bookcases in all the other rooms, so I think her total has to be well north of a thousand.
Oh no, he is like, yeah, it's a ten thousand lot of books, a lot of books, stack, a lot of novels and stuff. Real quick.
Oh yeah, well, I like I have bookcases and then I have books stacked on the ground in my in my office. And I moved to ebooks because storage was becoming an issue. And then I moved to audio books because I'm an old lady. I'm really enjoying it, like in the garden.
Okay, anyway, some old radio shows. I haven't even gotten audiobooks yet.
I'm feeling the audiobooks right now. But speaking of books, Yes, what would you say are your top five books? Like, in no particular order. I know it's a tough one, like top five, you know, top five bands or songs. That's really hard. You know, we should we should just have an episode that's us listing our top fives of stuff and then accusing each other of the crime of neglecting. That's my indulgence. But anyway, what would you just, off the top of your head? Top five books.
I'm gonna go top five, not the top five I think that are best. I'm gonna go with most formative, because I think that's easier for me to exactly. Okay, Number one the Bible according to Mark Twain, Okay, the full title.
Yeah.
And number two Lynston Hughes, The Big Cu. Number three that's his auto that's his autobiography or one of his books is autobiographical. Number three, The Book of Laughter and Forgetting Wlankandera. I really liked that one Fear of Flying Erica Jong because of when I read it, it meant a lot to me, and I love Tropica Cancer by Henry Miller, so I put those kind of together. But if I said Tropic Cancer Hendry Miller is.
Just like, really, you were perfect?
Yeah, exactly once again, So I'm gonna go with the zipliss f of Erica Jeong on this one instead, So Fear of Flying and then lastly, if I'm being honest, I would say Fear of Fear and Loathing Las Vegas. I read it one day in a park and it was an amazing novel. And I was really young. I was in college, and of course it was the exact perfect time to read a book like that. I was blown away by the use of the language to tell you the storytelling. I mean, so, I thought that was
a really powerful book. And I had read other stuff his prior to it. Yeah, I thought that one was just really great and I read it all one sitting, which is I recommend I read to Dartha like that.
It's really weird formative.
Also, your book Driftwood coming in at U number five is with an asterisk because I feel like you'd be like, no, you can't say that your book drift Woods.
Oh, thank you?
What? Top five?
That's good? Here are my top five. Thank you for asking. Oh yeah, what are your no particular tell me what Joan Didion's Run River, or if I were to go like nonfiction slouching towards both the Him one hundred Years of Solitude, Gabriel because Steinbeck's Grapes of Wrath, or maybe like Travels with Charlie or with cortes Ian Rankins, Knots and Crosses. I don't know that that's the first Inspector Rebis novel.
You told me about Inspector I like, I want to check this.
And then The Heart is a Lonely Hunter by Carson I think would be like some of these I love for the craft of them, and then some I love because they remind me of the place and time in my life. When I read them, like you were.
To formative books, it stayed with me.
Yeah, exactly. And so you know, like any like if I would have like a song or a movie or band list, it's shifting sands, you know. It's sort of like in this what you come up with off the top of your head. Listen, rude dudes, tell us your current five top current top five books in the comments on Instagram.
Ridiculous crime book clubs.
Really eager to see what people love seriously, So yeah, go to Instagram and put your top five in the comments. So anyway, books, I have a ton of books, but I don't have any rare ones. I have like the giant Old Family Bible, but like it's not worth money in the real world.
You don't have like a first printing of the de camera On.
No, just no, I have. I have assigned Anne LaMotte bird by bird, and she told me she doesn't sign books, but I was like, I was able to browbeat her in the signing.
Really.
Yeah, so that's like the most you know, high level I have. Do you have any rare books? And then where are they located in your house? And how far are you from the nearest rare bookstealer. I'm just just curious.
Just curious. Now. Actually, I do have some books that are worth something. A couple of them are like weird aesoteric books. I've got some really old Freemason books that a friend of mine gave me that are like from the nineteenth century, wow, that are definitely worth something. I have some American history books that are some first printings that are like written by people from American history. So yeah, I'm not going to tell you about where they are because I don't trust you. Call me a freak.
Well, there are people who dedicate their lives to rare books.
And well some do you do you have any rare books?
No?
I just told you you have none, none.
Zero, zero, second time.
And LaMotte bird by Bird and then I have a gigantic old family bible that has like deeds in like real estate letters from the gold Rush era. That's all I have. But so people, there are people who dedicate their lives oh their books. Some are like they collect. Some are there to preserve. They really just want to preserve them, the first editions and such and zaren you know what happens when there are valuable objects that are portable and sold with little or no paperwork. Yes, crime, yes,
exactly crime. Enter John Charles guilty. My dude was born in Modesto, California.
I know where that is.
In nineteen sixty eight.
I'm wearing a Modesto Nuts minor league baseball cap. Right.
Their minor league team is called the Nuts, and you have a hat and you're wearing it. Go Nuts, Go Nuts. It's the craziest looking at Anyway, I've mentioned Modesto briefly before, and you know you laughed at it. But I think it's a I think it's a great Central Valley.
Oh.
No, I picked because I'm from Davis, so I'm out of the Central Valley, and therefore I look down on Stockton in California.
Central Valley feeds the world, and you gotta respect, please, you gotta give respect. Modesto ninety miles east of San Francisco. It's like smack dab in the middle of robust farmland.
San Franisco's on your way to the Gold Country.
Do you know how the city got its name, by the way, Modesto.
Yeah, for being a very demure and modest environ Well.
It started out as a stop on the railroad that connected Sacramento to Los Angeles. Yeah, Central Pacific. Yeah, eighteen seventies when it was created. One of the founders of the railroad company, Mark Hopkins, he wanted to name it after his associate, a banker named William Ralston, and yeah, Ralston told him to pick something else, don't call it Ralston.
And then a railroad employee overheard this conversation and then said really loudly in Spanish that Ralston was a modest man, and so the other founder of the company, Charles Crocker, another big he decided to call the place modest though, in honor of Ralston's Yeah, exactly, the modest one. Moestah, so guilty Modesto's own. I'm not sure if you would call him modest. Well, judge, you'll judge for yourself when.
You try not to judge Elizabeth just watching judging.
When he was a little kid, he started showing his true colors, you know, as we all do. But his true color was a hue called kleptomenia.
Oh.
Yes, he could not The kid could not stop stealing.
He rant color.
When he was nine, he stole a baseball catcher's mitt. He got it home and he realized the mitt was for left handed people and he's right handed. Ramp So where did he get these thieving ways, you know, that's the big question. Well, his parents, they wound up helping him out with that in later years. So I think it was like a nature nurture even balance for this modesto nut Gilkey. He doesn't just love to steal. He has other passions like reading. Oh, he fell in love
with reading. Thanks to Richie Rich comic books.
Hey got to start somewhere. That's a good place.
The Richie Rich character who's called the poor little rich Boy, only child of super wealthy parents, girl's richest kid. Yeah, you just want to like smack him. He was so rich that, like his middle name was a dollar sign, so gross, gold toilets all around. Did you ever get into Richie Rich?
Look at me? Do you think I wanted to read a Little Rich Boy? No, I wanted.
He never did it for me.
My sister liked Actually, so they were in the house.
I saw, okay, And I told you I had this weird thing where like I felt I could like probably beat him up, and I didn't respect that.
I barely Casper the ghost. I mean, I can tolerate that kind of a kid like these, you know, and also like a Heathcliff another one. I'm like, I don't know, Garfield, what is this?
So?
Uh?
You know what? When I was a kid, I had those Garfield books. I can remember like laughing hysterically at them, and then I've looked at them since and.
Being like what my parents worried about me?
I'm sure at the age of five, what was I on.
Well, at least we've got two kids, because this one little that's not right.
Okay, So for both of us, and we are speaking, I'm trying to just make my mom proud. So Richie rich comic books. They sent John Charles Guilty into a fantasy world of wealth and instant gratification. And he was there for it. He was living for it.
It was his Calvin and Hobbes.
Yes, so or bloom County County. So you know you love reading, you love books, you love stealing stuff.
Yes, talking about me or friends.
We have a mashup on our hands. So in nineteen ninety seven, Guilty was twenty nine years old. He went to his first ever antiquarian book fair, Zarin, Where was your first antiquarian book fair?
Elizabeth? I'm so pleased to you ask me this question. It's lying there in the promise of the future before me somewhere. I can't quite see it. It's not come into view, but I can feel it approaching an antiquary coming. Do you see it? Are you going to bring it to me?
I think so, because it would be my first antiquarian.
Did dawn break on the horizon?
I bet you'd be cool. So in his first antiquarian book fair, he bought three tomes yes, a first edition of The Dunewich Horror by H. P. Lovecraft, Rosemary's Baby over eleven, and seven Gothic Tales by Isaac Dennison.
Likes them dark tails.
Yeah, he's a spooky boy. And then you know, he and the vendors, they're charmed by this whole thing. They're just having a great time until the vendors realized that he had paid for all three of them with bad checks and maxed out credit cards. Oops ooopsies. To quote Sophocles, profit is sweet, even if it comes from deception. Then, and to quote Homer, so Gilki he had. He had a real job. Sometimes. He got a holiday temp job at Saxsmith Avenue department store in San Francisco. He was
the perfect employee. Everyone loved him. He even got a promotion, which I didn't think was possible for holiday temp work. But what have you. Maybe they promoted him to a full time gig. Either way, he was working. While he was working, what do you mean, Elizabeth, What do you mean, Elizabeth? Great question, Dave. So he was spreading holiday cheer and collecting credit card numbers oh.
I love doing that. Hundreds of great way to holiday.
He would record a credit card number and then wait a month before using it, which is smart. Yeah, No one suspects that the information was lifted at Sacks. You know, could be anywhere after a month. And I figure, if you're shopping at SAX in the holiday season, you're putting some miles on that card. The plastic is getting put through the paces to melting exactly. That back and forth teaching is that a lot of friction. So once he had the card and enough time had passed, he would strike.
He'd hit up a payphone in a hotel lobby and from there he'd place book orders at rare booksellers and he'd either pick up the book and say that he was just a friend doing it as a favor for the buyer, or he'd have his dad go pick it up. Oh wow, Yeah, his dad was all about this.
They did teach him the life.
Yeah, oh yeah. His dad loved criming. So but I don't know if his dad, like I think that Guilkey brought his dad into criming. But you have to have some element at home if you can.
Yeah, or at least you know, you lean that way.
Yeah, so Gilkey and his dad. They researched the Modern Library's list of one hundred best novels looking for potential high value targets. So if you want books that are or something, they have to have credibility with the people. So guilty steps were impressive. Autograph copies of Mayor of Casterbridge by Thomas Hardy, an Invisible and an autograph copy
of Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison. Huh. A first edition of the Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck, which was like, oh my god, unipper O Sarah, founder of the California Missions. Another one of.
Those find edition.
Just cursed. First editions of Jack Kerouac's On the Road Tennessee, Williams the street Car Named Desire, Kay Thompson's Elouise in Paris, and Mark Twain's Life on the Mississippi first edition. He was racking him up.
He's also going for all big names.
He was, though, about to cross pads with another character in this tale, a white hat on the horizon, ready to take down such a vile thief, Ken Sanders, a man named Ken Sanders.
Future Kentucky chicken owner, Yeah exactly, and Colonel in the army.
Dude was born in nineteen fifty one to some lapsed Mormons in Salt Lake City, Utah, and early on he decided the best way to approach religion was to quote stay the hell away from it. Yes, head, So, Ken Sanders is more than a non Mormon. Though he's a book dealer. He's also the head of security for the Antiquary and Booksellers Association of America a BAA A BAH. Another thing about Ken Sanders, he's an amateur detective, a self appointed quote biblio Dick.
Yes that I.
Cannot stress how much I love this, the whole thing. I'm savoring all the details, so biblio Dick. Sanders. He noticed a trend. He heard about more and more book dealers who'd been the victim of bounce checks, fraudulent credit card charges. Dealers. You know, they report thefts to the ABAA A BAA in what are called pink sheets, and they're piling up. So when when he notified the police of this pattern he was seeing, they just did not care.
Whatever.
Nerds poured a keg on him and like push him into a locker.
I could, biblio Dick, because it sounds like something Vincent Price would play like this really confident nerd.
You just would Would the biblio dick be dissuaded?
Yeah?
I gotta know, are you I doubt it?
Are you pickling kidding me? So Sanders he sounded the alarm. He let other book dealers know about the rash of thefts, and he said, most dealers in rare books are quote a very small mom and pop operation, So losing five thousand dollars book is pretty serious adverse economic impact.
Yeah, that's huge rrect Yeah.
You can't have that. So the biblio dick he took action.
Oh so he got to like not to shoe leather but book leather.
Right, he just bounded on up. So Sanders he developed an online system to track thefts, and he also came up with a way to get the theft notifications to other booksellers as quickly as possible, less smart so no more pink sheet filing stacking up nineties baby. So, with his data set established, he saw a pattern. There was one thief who worked pretty much only on the West coast, using stolen credit cards, and the books were later picked up by a quote friend. But there was a curious
detas tail in this. The books never resurfaced on any market for resale, never came up. Let's take a break. When we come back, we'll continue this developing Guilty Biblio Dick Cat and Mouse game.
Yeah, Hello was.
Aaron, Hello Elizabeth. We're talking biblio dis.
Biblio Dick Modesto's own Charles John, Charles Gilkey Utah's finest ken Biblio Dick Sanders. I just love saying.
It's your heart out Montana.
Books are important to both of these fellas, and so let's look at Sanders' backstory. His love of books and books selling started at a young age, just like Gilkey. It started with comic books. He'd sell comic books to his pals in grade school. His favorite character not Richie Rich spider Man, like it, Gordon spider Man, dds spider Man.
I love the crime fighting dentist.
Sanders explained quote he had powers, but he was messed up. What awkward kid wouldn't be attracted to him? God bless My.
Best friend of was a huge Spider Man. J Charlesworth loved the Spider Man.
Nice.
I know so much about him just from our bike riding conversations.
So this guy biblio Dick. His grandparents would take him to Bertrand Smith's Acres of Books. You ever heard of Acres? Yeah, it was a huge independent bookstore in Long Beach, California. It's no longer, but at the time it was the largest and oldest family owned secondhand bookstore in California. It had more than a million books in stock. Yeah, it
sounds like heaven and it was for Sanders. The future Biblio Dick would talk to the owner Bertrand Smith himself about Edgar Allan Poe, Maxfield Parrish, Lewis Carroll, which I love Maxfield Parish art. It's cheesy, but I love it. I love a lot of things.
Yeah, I love a lot of cheesy.
So what do you always say?
What everybody corny?
Everybody corny? When you embrace that, yeah, it's all okay.
Yeah, once you realize you hang out, he probably surprised. You're like, oh, man, I was hanging out these people I thought were whatever, cool, tough with it, and they're like they were just because you know why I hung out with everybody? Everybody corny?
Yeah exactly, So the biblio Dick he corny too. Smith, the owner of the bookstore. He was impressed by the boy's curiosity, so he would let him into the rare book room at the store, and that's where Sanders got to see first hand stuff like first edition Edgar Allan Poe, the Rate. And so this is how he recalled it, quote,
I have always been a bookseller. I created Cosmic Aeroplane Books out of Steve Jones's old hippie head shop in nineteen seventy five, founded my own publishing company, Dream Garden Press in nineteen eighty and I've been running Ken Sanders Rare Bookstown Salt Lake City for the past twenty five years. My dad joked that when my mom gave birth to me, I was clutching a book. It's the only world I ever wished to know. Wow, Yeah, I love this guy.
Cool.
So you take that love of books and then a sense of justice and you get biblio Dick.
Yeah, and that that little bit of spider Man. I can do this, Yes, example don't expect me to, but I can do this.
So this is how he said quote. I would certainly be the last person to deny that I'm obsessed with books. If you want to say I'm obsessed with book thieves as well. I probably wouldn't argue that point either.
Yeah, fair point.
So one time Sanders chased a book thief on foot and then smashed their car window as they were attempting to drive away. Like he does not play, Ye, Biblio Dick does not play.
He's reminding me more and more of my friend exactly.
Sanders, driven by the love of books, justice detecting, he coordinated a sting. Oh yes, so January twenty ninth, two thousand and three. Gilky's now thirty four years old.
He got heel like he would bring in furries to help him, Like you now, I like this guy. Do you see the furries who did like the hacking recently, there's like a team of furries who've been out there like hacking all these like spaces like then, like shutting things down and it doesn't matter.
They go, they put on a furry costume, like a costume.
Yeah, they're like amateur superhero furries. So there, their superhero costume is a furry.
They just sweat it up.
Oh yeah, smells bad exactly. But I imagine like that would be his kind of friends. You know, he could like call a friend, his friend shows up and like he's driving over to furry costume in a Honda Civic.
See. I didn't connect him to the furries, but that same sense of like righteousness, like and like interest your own way. Yeah, okay, I'll give it to you. So guilty. Thirty four years old. January of two thousand and three, he got on the phone and he called a rare bookstore in Santa se California, San is So he ordered up a rare edition of the Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck, six thousand dollars out the door. So guys like, great, can I get your credit card numbers? Like sure, it's one, two,
three for jan five, Potato six. Cool. Like what are you going to pick this book up, mister page r Bookington And he's like, oh, you know what, ship it to my hotel in Palo Alto. It's like San Jose and Palo Alto aren't that far apart. Palo Alto is a lovely town that's been ruined by Facebook. Another tech nonsense. That's another crime for another time. So ship it to Palo Alto, he says. Little does he know the bookstore
in santase was working with Sanders the Biblio Dick. So as soon as they got the call and it matched all the other Hanky patterns, they alerted him and Biblio Dick went right to the cops. That credit card number they ran it stolen, So the cops they go to the hotel and they wait and Guilkey he showed up and the police nabbed him. He told him, dude, I'm nothing but a transient, a mere drifter. Really yeah, yeah, no, I just made that up.
I am nothing but a mere drifter.
I'm going to go to where there's like police activity and just walk up to them and be like, I am nothing. I am a mere transiend I'm mere drifter.
I want you to promise me that you've ever see news cameras ever walk up and act like you saw whatever the crime was, and start giving an impromptu interview on camera.
Now, my grandfather, oh I want for my birthday, Elizabeth, did you doing a on camera interview as a character. My grandfather, when I was growing up, he would call us at the house and be like, you gotta watch Channel seven six o'clock news, and he's like, just watch because he would see them doing like in San Francisco he'd be you know, they'd be filming something like that,
and he would walk back and forth in the background. Yeah, And we just watched him walk back and forth, back and forth, and he'd be like, did you see me? I'm like totally grand book. That's awesome anyway.
See, you got a family tradition double I do.
So I'm a I'm a TRANSI and the moondrifter h And he's like, someone paid me twenty bucks to just pick up a book. I don't know what it's about, but I'll take twenty bucks.
Sure.
So the police let him go, but then they followed him to where he said the exchange point was going to be, you know, the like I'm supposed to pick up this book and take it over here to this Wiener Schnitzel or whatever. No one shows up, so they arrest him. He gets booked for credit card fraud and grand theft. And because of this, a search warrant was issued for his apartment on Treasure Island in San Francisco Bay.
And where is that, Elizabeth.
It's a fake island. It's landfill. It's a fake island. It was built for the nineteen thirty nine Golden Gate International exposition, the World's Fair. It's in the middle. It's at the midpoint of the Bay Bridge that connects San Francisco to its better half. Oakland t I as we call it, or as I call it, or as no one calls it. It's attached to a real island. You're a buena. It was a military base top Island, Traysure, I call it Treysure Island. It was a giant film
stage at one point. Right now it's been developed out with housing and little dude had an apartment there. So when the cops get into his place, he.
Lived in the middle of a bridge on a fake If you have to take a bridge to leave house in either.
Direction, whatever you're going to do.
Yeah, if you want to go east, you gotta take the bridge twice.
Yep, exactly. So they go in and they find twenty six confirmed stolen rare books, and then they found way more rare books that they thought are likely stolen, but they didn't have evidence for those, so they you know, left and b where Jesus flaying him. But they got the twenty six that were like, okay, these were actually reported stolen, so guilty. He told the police that he was unemployed, and he had no place of residence, which is surprising since they were to his apartment.
Since they're in his house.
And then he threw another supreods all your stuff, you have a house, so like queen for a day. So he posted bail for fifteen thousand dollars and so where okay, where'd you get that? Then off he goes, Yeah, off he goes. So the cops they keep their fingers crossed that he's going to show up for his hearing scheduled for February eighteenth, two thousand and three.
I'm going to take a flyer and say he did not.
Yeah, he did not. He did not. So we have we have this fantastic tension with Gilkey the Fraudster book thief and Sanders the Unstoppable biblio dick. Oh yes, I think we need to add a new character up the action of attention. Can I give you Alison Hoover Bartlett. I know Bartlett. She's a journalist. She wrote a book called The Man Who Loved Books Too Much. Yeah, she saw this crazy thing playing out and she not only wrote about it but inserted herself into the story too.
Joists Oh god.
Yeah, Bartlett said quote, we were all tenacious hunters. Guilkey for books, Sanders for thieves, and me for both of their stories.
Me for the story.
So Bartlett is sympathetic to Guilkey. She even compares them to mister Rogers.
Well, they both like sweaters. I suppose they got a comfortable shoe thing going on.
Railway to a magical world. So here's her assessment of the biblio dick though quote when people steal from anyone in the trade, Ken Sanders feels an almost personal attack on him, and he wants to do anything he can to catch these guys. He is determined to catch book thieves as guilty was in stealing the books.
I don't know.
I don't think I think it's a bad read. I think that he's more determined. You're selling him short totally.
So Bartlett spent lots of time with Guilkey trying to understand his motivations. Apparently he used the term quote getting things for free when he talked about his thefts. I got this book for free library box, someone handed it to him. He also complained how he quote didn't want like to spend his own money. Yeah, no kidding, right, So me neither kid, But what you know, this is life. Bartlett figured that guilty quote actually stole for love the
love of rare books. That is so apparently rare book theft is actually more common than fine art theft.
Oh yeah, more access.
Yeah, and forgery is also popular, which makes sense. So like there aren't crazy minting marks and seals on old books, and the materials aren't too hard to source, like if you can find old stock of stuff like but when I talk about the forgery, here's an example. The Great Gatsby without a dust jacket, like a first edition no dust jacket is worth one hundred and fifty bucks. Throw an original dust jacket on that puppy and you're looking
at four thousand dollars. So thieves are going to want to conjure up some old looking books.
You've got to stop getting rid of my dust jackets.
That's what I'm missing the moral of the story.
And also what about when I put in the fake signature autograph from the author? Should I be doing that? Is that good?
You just got to want to source older ink. You want to make sure that you're using the time contemporary materials. Just it's easy. So back to guilty, he eventually went to trial. He did show up. He didn't plead out during his trial. You know, he claimed to be innocent, but at the same time he's telling everything to bartlet So over the course of a year after the sting.
He then eventually pleads guilty to conspiracy, grand theft, identity theft, credit card theft, and possession of stolen property.
Did they just run out of charges? Well, that's all we got. The book is done, bro.
He stole like about two hundred thousand dollars worth of books, two hundred thousand dollars with the books mostly inner around San Francisco between nineteen ninety nine and two thousand and three. So he gets sentenced to eighteen months in San Quentin Prison. Yeah, which is a pretty that has a pretty robust library.
As far as that's actually, I've.
Been in San Quentin before. Yeah, it's you know, looks like a prison from the thirties. It's crazy views outside, spectacular right on the bay. Did you know that there's actually a college located inside the prison.
I did know that, Elizabeth, because you told me.
It's called Mount tamil Pias College. It's an independent, nonprofit, actual college in a prison. It's not connected. It's like not a state college. The professors are all volunteers from places like Callan Stanford's amazing, so look it up. Guilkey, he cooled his heels in sand Do.
Have a podcast?
Yeah, Houseley, So Gilkey, he's in San Quentin. He gets released on parole less than two years later. And what did you do when he got out?
Started stealing books?
Bee?
Hey Bartlett? It was it.
What's that girl?
Yeah?
So Bartlett, I couldn't stop thinking about you.
Bartlett asks him, like, what are you going to do for a job, and he says, quote work. Actually they do have an opening at a bookstore. Like, oh, your horror, you nave So they did go to a bookstore together though, okay, and not for a job.
Search a date.
There is a date, sharn close. I want you to picture it. Yes, you are John Crichton, owner of the brick Row Bookshop in San Francisco. It's founded in nineteen fifteen. The brick Row one of the oldest antiquarian book businesses in the whole United States. Today it's quiet and you're behind the counter organizing a new batch of small Victorian books you picked up recently. Charming little tomes no bigger than your hand, each with beautifully embossed art new vague covers.
You have KCSM, the local jazz station playing quietly in the background. The bell dings as the door opens, and two people enter your shop, A shorter, balding man and a pleasant looking woman Guilty and Bartlett for those of us in the know, you're currently not in the know Zarin aka John Crichton. So these two they chat quietly to each other as they enter the store and begin to look around. The guy looks familiar, but you can't really place him. You ask if they need any help.
They tell you they're just browsing. Where do you know that guy from it's driving you crazy? Does he live in the neighborhood? But there's like something about him that's giving you.
Bad vibes, say my bowling league in the seventies.
But then that's it. You got it. A couple of years ago you sold a copy of Hardy's The Mayor of Casterbridge to a guy. Of course, great sale, twenty five hundred dollars. Then a month after that you got a call someone was complaining of a twenty five hundred dollars charge on their credit card, even though they'd never been to brick rope. For that is the castor bridge guy man f that guy, you think, so you begin to follow the pair around. Gilkey loudly complains about rare booksellers.
He moans about how the first editions he bought weren't first editions after all, how books get described as having dust jackets but they arrive naked. He goes on and on about how antiquarian booksellers are all cheaters and liars. The woman with him is like cringing. She looks like she's dying inside. You're made to tough stuff. You don't survive in the cutthroat, scheming, ultra violent, rare book world
without having some grit. It's you just keep following him around, waiting for him to make a mistake, try and pocket a book or something. That's when you're gonna go full John Wick on the guy. He doesn't know about the network of book assassins that you have, or quick staple the upstairs filled with tattooed telephone operators waiting to put a price on this guy's head. Or maybe that's all just fantasy. Maybe whatever, you're tailing guy and you're enjoying
the jazz playing in the background. Then finally they leave the store, the bell on the on the door bidding them, I do you get on the phone? Who are you gonna call? Kenny Sanders Biblio dick himself. Let's take a break. When we come back, we'll see how this butting friendship between the journalist and the thief develops. Welcome, what's up, hi, Bartlett? Yes, he went with Gilkey to the scene in one of his crimes, and he peacocked around the place, rubbing it
in dude's face. In your face. Darn ever, he rubbed it in your face. So when Sanders found out about this visit to brick Row, he was pissed. But he was so pissed he dashed off a strongly worded email to Bartlett.
Downed a glass of pepsi, and said that man has it coming.
Quote, I don't want to hear about your sick games. Ever again, he's not having it. So Bartlet, though, just kept going deeper and deeper into the enigma that was Guilkey. She visited with his family and was told by his mother quote, I mean it's innocent. Maybe he was just wandering around or looking around with a book, and he must have forgot about it and then he got caught.
Ma'am, mom, come on, come.
On, missus Gilkey. She showed Bartlet Gilkey's bedroom quote. His shoes were neatly lined up on the floor, and artwork he had collected hung on the walls. I made a move to leave, but his mother motioned toward the closet, which she opened. See how he keeps his things neat, she said. And look more books, Yes, more books, stacks and stacks of them. Their spines faced the back of the closet, as if in hiding. This seemed the most private,
most intimate corner of Guilkey's room. But instead of looking inside to see if I recognize any of the books he had stolen, I turned away. I was afraid of what I might find if I drew the books from the pile, what degree of crime and what degree of responsibility I might bear in knowing the books were there.
I'm less of an investigative journalist and more of an accomplice. Yeah. Wow, So so he's living with his mom basically in his little boy lifestyle, and his mom I want to see his room, she like. I made the bed so please forgive this, and then yeah, the whole like, do you want to see my boy's room? And then she's say the books all turned backwards, no spines forward, and she's like, I don't want to touch the book pile. What did she glean from this trip?
A book? She wrote a book from it. Yeah, So Guilkey and Bartlett they keep meeting for interviews over the course of three years.
Wow and slow dating totally.
Not speak dating. Per book reviewer Joel Hyde quote, it is easy to blame Bartlett for not cooperating more in the apprehension of a thief, for embarking instead the fool's errand of trying to understand his heart. It is easy to blame her for blurring the distinction between the desire to possess books and the desire to steal them, not to mention the distinction between the desire to possess books and the love of them. And then he goes on.
Every profession affords ethical dilemmas, and being reminded of how difficult and necessary it is to struggle with those dilemmas is of some value. It just isn't anywhere near as valuable as it would be to get back books that were stolen from.
Us exactly, so you can do both. You can return the books and then wonder.
Yeah, Guilkey, he'd been hard to catch because rather than resell the pieces he acquired, he hoarded them for himself.
And they never had the markets again.
Right, So it's totally true. According to biblio Dick, these are iconic, valuable books that everybody knows and they're very distinctive. But I could never find any trace in the marketplace of them resurfacing or being sold, so it's not this is like, oh, he's living on this.
Yeah.
Guilkey confessed to Bartlett that what he really wanted was a rare book collection that would be worth millions all to himself.
Totally. He's like that collector in the Twilight Zone, or his glasses break, or he's got all the books.
It's like, yeah, so Bartlett, She wrote that Guilkey was obsessed with quote the image of an English gentleman with a grand library, and Bartlett said, quote he told me he wanted to have a fine gentleman's library, and he'd have a big oak desk with a globe on it, and he would wear a smoking jacket. People would look at his book collection and see that this was a man of culture, an aeradype man, and that's what really drove him.
So he wanted to be Thomas Jefferson politics. He wanted to be Richie rich You want to Ben Franklin. He wanted to be one of those guys with a big He.
Wanted the world to see him as cultured and debonair. And that's what he thought would be his ideal self.
Books that smelled of leather.
And so, according to Bartlett, quote, he has the love of books, but he also has a love of what the ownership of books.
Says, Yes, what it means to others.
Yeah, just like collectors talk about their books on the shelves is kind of a memoir that reflects on who they are and what their interests are. Sure, Guilty's no different, he told Bartlett. Quote, there's a sense of admiration you're going to get from other people. So he's doing it, you know, for four others.
Yeah, collecting books that no one ever will see. But he's doing it so that he could imagine that other people would find him more interesting, his imagination of others would perceive them.
So she said that Guilty was trying to build an identity for himself, and he was trying to keep it in the world. Yeah, but guilty said quote I never take books from libraries, yet many people do and then sell them at large profits. That would be stealing.
I think they're both stealing. I think you can qualify. It's not like only one of them can be stealing.
So most of his thefts remain unrecovered, and they're believed to be in a storage unit somewhere in northern California. Let's get hunting, let's figure this out.
You could probably find it. I would bet on you.
I could probably find it. So the full extent of his thefts and the exact whereabouts the whereabouts of all the books he stole totally unknown. Some think that the mysterious storage unit contains not just rare books, but like autographs, prints, maps, stamps, comic books, like Hollywood memorabilia, coins, maybe Guyeri's Lamba Yeah yeah, and like since there isn't a.
Set on like basically a lottery ticket, and people know that he's alive and it's somewhere, yeah, I feel for him.
Yeah. So there's not a specific list of actual items that have been stolen. And are believed to be in the unit, So even if they knew where it was, they don't have probable cause for a warrant. A judge would never sign up. H Bartlett had all this access to Guilkey, and Sanders, who'd never actually met him, had a request. He told Bartlett, quote, ask him to tell you the location of his storage unit where he hides the books. It must be near his home in Modesto.
Gives me a clue. Guilty refused. He heard that request, was like no.
Yeah, He's like, are you kidding? Whatever reason I did all.
This, He's like, whatever, girl, Yeah, you're not mad.
You're not my mom. Only she can make me make my shoes be straight.
I'm picturing Sanders biblio dick in his like film noir office with theories and evidence and red string on the walls, slamming his hand down on the desk when he hears this, and then the furry at the desk and go for yeah.
You got it.
It's like, I'm so close to like triangulating the location. Let me just call Elizabeth and we'll work on this. It's amazing that it is a much better story, right. I just imagine like a big lavender tale.
Yeah, exactly, like an NFL mascot that's sexier. Totally to that Directionndy, what you want.
Well, this is what biblio Dick has to say.
Quote.
He has this irrational belief that he deserves to have a fine library, and since he can't afford it, we who are in the trade, who have all of these lovely books, deserve to just give them to him, And since we won't, it's his or ordained right to steal them from us. He's a dirty little book thief and there's nothing romantic about it. There's nothing noble about him. He might have a passion for books, but his passion is for thievery. As far as I'm concerned, he's the
man who loved to steal books too much. And that's where you good. Then he's a dirty little book thief.
He ain't no Robin Hood no.
According to Bartlett, quote, he has absolutely no remorse for his crimes. He told me the details of how he went about it, which I described in the book, but he feels that it was his right to take the books. During a phone conversation, he told Bartlett that it's like he feels like he's sixty percent wrong and forty percent right, and that well, he said that like book dealers are like keeping these books from the public, which like you with shoving them.
In them from the public. They're offering them for sale to the public.
These books.
One point, he said, quote, how am I supposed to build my collection unless I'm like this multi millionaire?
Well, has he ever met a thought that actually followed through on? Or did you always stop in the middle and make a turn?
Apparently not so.
During two thousand and nine, a bookseller in Canada got in touch with Sanders. She'd sold a book for five hundred dollars, but the check was bad. Name on the check, John Charles Gilkey, whoa chase was on He's back Fall twenty ten. Gilkey gets arrested.
Oh so it wasn't like a copycat doing a little nod.
No, he was just put his actual name on a check.
That was like a loopan move. He like blaming someone else.
My god, that would be perfect Fall twenty ten. He gets arrested, not for kiting checks, stealing credit card numbers so that he get like a first edition of Ojy's if I did it. No, he was arrested for threatening to burn down a print gallery in San Francisco after the manager declined to sell him an item.
See I'm telling you the boy I wrist.
I was going to say, the boy ain't right, Like he just burned it all down. December fifteenth, twenty ten, he gets arrested again in San Francisco trying to steal two antique maps. Okay, I don't know what became of those arrests. July of twenty eleven, John Waite the security chair of a baa Antiquarian Booksellers Association of America. He posted a circulation please be aware that convicted fraudster and thief John Gilkey is operating once again, likely out of
northern California. And like the alarms went off and there were people like, oh my god, put my pants on, I got to do this on the phone. Totally, there's a hustle, there's like network lights loading their weapons the continent. Totally. That's all I keep saying with this. Antiquarian Booksellers is like a complete John Wick universe in my head, but not as ultra violent.
Okay, sure for you whatever for me.
Cartoon violence, Yeah, I love cartoon violence. A comic book dealer in New York State is his latest victim. In addition to rare books, he's moved on to print stamp comics like.
She worked on LPs. Go Vinyl Right.
He was arrested late last year in San Francisco following a parole violation, but he was released after he or someone posted seventy five thousand dollars bail.
Bartlet.
This is this is the detail that's driving me nuts. He's driving me modesto nuts. He's not selling the books for cash. His family isn't rich, Bartlett. She wasn't there for the first bail out, and she's not rich. Who's bailing him out?
I'm telling you it's Bartlett's my guest.
Do you think so?
I think she loves it over that three years, but a time I think she's like started to see something in him. Maybe she's looking for book too. I don't know.
But he's skipped bail, of course, and there's an outstanding warrant for his arrest and an ongoing San Francisco police investigation. Really yeah, good luck with that. He basically disappeared, but he's still active. So John Gilkey, if you're listening, you are welcome to come on the podcast and tell your story. We promise not to call Biblio Dick, although I probably will. She will because amazing for her too. Biblio Dick, if you want to come to hook it up, I want
to hear all your ridiculous crime story. I git one hear your side, Gilkey, hit us up online. Let us know you're still alive. Tell us what you're going to steal next. Tell me where the where do you? Where's your storage in case you need to ride? Do you need to ride to your storage studio?
Yeah? I mean I'm gonna be a modesta for a game. We can go nuts.
I can take you anywhere, just I'll drive you there as Aaron. What's your ridiculous takeaway?
Wow?
For this one, I think it's got to be that Bartlett thought that she would learn anything from this hanging out with him for all these years. Because everything the quotes you told me and what we've learned about him, you're telling of his story, I did learn something. I don't think we learned anything from her version, because it seems like her perspective was kind of skewed, if that
makes sense. So I feel it's kind of like ridiculous that she spent so much time around a person that she should have just been dating, and then apparently she got a book out of it, you know, So I'm like, oh, you missed.
Yeah, it's fat. I'm fast.
You're ridiculous takeaway. Thank you for I did not try that sometimes, Okay, I will.
I'm fascinated by her and her getting sucked into this. You know, it makes for a good story. Biblio Dick hero of all heroes.
Oh, I love me a good Jack Mormon. I grew up in a town with a lot of Mormons, and the ones who are ex Mormons fascinating. Well, a lot of strength of character going against all of your family and your culture. And really I often like.
This guy's like so dedicated to books and literature, and his investment in not just the value of the books is like you know, commerce, but what they.
Mean and you know to others, not just to him.
Right, And when we're talking about like our top fives, you think about what those books mean to us, and that if you could have like first editions of those or signed copies, how important that would be to you and how connected you'd be because of the stories that these writers have crafted. So if you want a first edition signed driftwood.
That just about a second. If I had the first edition.
Signed paperback has the better cover, I always go with the paperback on that one.
I would be willing to steal one of those. You know, do you have one? Don't answer that, don't ask.
Well, that's all I have. You can find us online at ridiculous crime dot com. There's merch there. I heard sometimes no, sometimes yes. We're also at Ridiculous Crime on Twitter and Instagram. I quit Twitter? What I deactivated my account?
You did?
I did?
Wow?
You know up his.
I'm not as brave as you do.
Not email?
Do it? Do not email ridiculous Crime at gmail dot com. And then, but please god, why aren't you people leaving talkbacks on the iHeart app?
We do like those. We'll start playing with you.
I ask very little of the root is and I give so much and all I wanted some talkback?
You have the woman a pete.
Uh, yeah, that's it. Ridiculous Crime is hosted by Elizabeth Dutton and z Aaron Burnett, produced and edited by First Edition Dave Cousten's Who Research is by Marissa handbound copy of Leaves of Grass Brown and Andrea Brahmstoker's Dracula printed on a silver dagger song Sharpened Hear. The theme song is by Thomas Original Nancy Comic in a plastic sleeve Lee and Travis Moneyball with no dust jacket. Totally naked,
totally legal, totally cool. Dutton Executive producers are Sergeant at Arms of the A B A A. Ben Bollen and Shadow Chancellor of the A B A A. Noel Brown.
Dus Crime Say It One More Time.
Ridiculous Crime is a production of iHeartRadio four More Podcasts, my heart Radios, the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows,