Ridiculous Crime is a production of iHeartRadio.
Zara Elizabeth Zarren.
Listen, Yeah, buddy, you know it's ridiculous.
Oh you mean this cold that we've given each other. Yeah, it's ridiculous. But either than that, we.
Each brought in, yeah, maybe two different streams.
And passing them back and forth in the studio.
Crazy mind virus is to go all over.
That would this is weird.
We're patient zero at zero.
Point zero can be patient negative one. Yes, He's like, I don't know how he got it. Twice I was doing research for something and I found that I thought was pretty ridiculous. I wanted to tell you about it because I know you like animals.
I do.
Nineteen ninety three, the Associated Press had the story with the headline A gorilla with a badge helps capture smugglers.
Love that.
It was like a gorilla bit the badge. I gotta click on that. So turns out the fifty year old suspect was this cat Victor Burnaal. He was the director of zoos and Parks for the Mexican State of Mexico. Know that that's all worked for the So in Monday, he's in an air On Monday, morning that in Miami suburb of Opa Laca, right, and he's there to meet with some people who promised to give him some gorillas and monkeys. These a middleman, right, So while he's there,
he's promised he'll paid ninety two thousand dollars. He wants a real gorilla and go. Yeah, And so the people from Fishing Wildlife, they didn't want to put a real gorilla in the cage to do their sting operation. So they're like, hey, Steve, you still got that gorilla suit
from the office party. So they had Steve go and put on the climb in the cage and they sent him to Opa Laca for this sting operation because quote, it's risky and dangerous to you use a real animal, so we had to use a willing substitute, an agent and a gorilla's outfit. So the unidentified agent flown down to Opa Laca. They busted this guy because he gets flown as I said, away, he's supposed to get flown
all the way to Mexican city of Tu Luca. Like if they missed this and somehow something went wrong, had a long time. Anyway, they busted the guy. He gets there when it's arrested, nag out on bail. But gorilla in the bas I love that.
What I wish I could have been there and watched.
That total the gorilla pulled a gun out of the seat. So there you got ridiculous.
Huh that is ridiculous. And do you want to know what else is ridiculous? I was hoping you had something for me stowing away. Stowing away is ridiculous.
There going away.
This is ridiculous Crime A podcast about absurd and outrageous capers, heists, and cons. It's always ninety nine percent murder for you, one hundred percent ridiculous.
Oh you damn right.
Do you like to travel?
Love it? Love love it? L o v E love it?
Elizabeth Heay, I love it until I've just completed some travel. What do you mean then I'm like, I need a break from this for a while.
Wait, you can travel yourself out of travel.
I can totally travel myself out of travel.
You're like so dumb with that.
I'm like all eagerly awaiting it. I get all excited and then I love it while I'm doing it, But then like I get home, I'm like, Okay, yeah, I got it.
Not for what?
Yeah? Thank god, I'm home.
You you do love being home?
I God, I do. When was the last time you were on a plane.
A little while ago? I couldn't tell you. I don't remember that was the trip?
Do you remember? If you don't remember which one?
I think I flew to Hawaii must no see I could before that. I flew to Florida. I saw tod see family. I think fluid to Florida family.
Yeah, did you have a dedicated ticket?
What are we doing? Yes? I shouldn't have a dedicated ticket. It wasn't It wasn't like somebody else's ticket.
I'm like, oh I got to you just had a ticket just sneak on.
No, No, I mean I I don't know how to do that. Well, I mean like it's real hard these days. If you put me in the eighties, I think I could have gotten on a plane.
Oh yeah, but now.
It's like real hard, like so many layers.
Not everyone gets a ticket though, you.
Know, really? Yeah, who you get on a plane when you.
They still always there? Oh I forgot exactly.
I'm over here buying pilot uniform.
No no, no, they just stow away. As you said, it used to be easier than it would be now, so of course.
I mean you could buy a plane a ticket on the plane.
Oh sure, yeah, but like security now makes it. Oh you're impossible, good luck, But it still happens. Remember Brian Robson, the guy shipped.
Shipped him out.
I got more stowaways for you today.
So are these people who are like going into like climbing on the plane.
Oh, you're going to find out. There are a couple of different ways to do this.
Okay, I'm into this.
Let's begin with the og. This is the first aerial stowaway.
Take me back.
Clarence Terhoon, Clarence Clarence Trehoon, nineteen twenty eight, Little Clarence, he's.
Nineteen twenty eight.
Yeah, he's nineteen yearsyears old.
That's a lot of faith. They've just gotten good.
Wait till you hear. Okay. So he's a native son of Saint Louis, Missouri.
Okay.
He had worked as a golf caddy. That was like his you know, have golf shoes, will travel, I think so idiots. He was loved. He loved stowing away on trains and ships.
Who does it was like his favorite thing that I could still do.
He also he loved to sneak into like big sporting events with the ticket.
Also fun used to do that.
Yeah, it was a rambling sort. So it's like he's in Saint Louis. He hitchhiked to San Francisco and back.
Okay, I don't like two.
Years nineteen twenty six to twenty eight, he's bounces all over the country working as a caddy here there like to make cash. So like he gets somewhere and needs to be that bag for him.
You gotta stay clean and smell good though, I guess well.
So on one of his trips, he gets out to San Francisco, sneaks onto a government ship and that takes him to Nome, Alaska.
It's not a lot of golfing up there.
But then he made it back. He made it there and back.
Actually don't know golf.
But then tragedy struck. His parents suffered a grizzly fate. One I'm not going to get No, it would have been rad if that. No, this is back in Saint Louis.
Not assion the time it was, it was, it was.
Bad, it was very violent. That's in July. Thanks for laughing at it.
That was in July.
Okay, I thought Sarah that we were respectful anyway. Okay, So July of twenty his world comes crashing down. But then October if that same year, opportunity arose. So that was the start of commercial transatlantic flights.
I was wondering.
And it kicked off with the airship graf Zeppelin oh flying across the Atlantic Ocean from Germany to the United States.
The blim the huh how long did that take.
For us real stow away forever? Like Clarence, Right, this is an opportunity. This is this is I'm up my gate in the sky, right, this is a whole new world.
It's so rich, idiot.
The craft Zeppelin is in Lakehurst, New Jersey, and like, the temptation is just too much. So he makes a bet with his brother in law that he can become the first stowaway in an aircraft. He's like, look, I've got trains down boats. Dang, I went up to the Arctic Circle and so.
A pioneer of a new game.
His brother in law, George Hall said, quote, it's just like him. He's been doing things like that for two years. But this is the biggest job he ever undertook.
This family.
He did so the graft Zeppelin came from Germany and to Germany, it had to return of course. Yes, Clarence has a plan, right. He sneaks onto the airship. Yeah, and while it's in the hangar, like.
I was wondering when and how he did this?
Yeah, then he pokes around and he finds the mail compartment. Okay, and so that he just cut tucked himself in there, sat and waited.
Huh.
And in no time he's going to be in Germany, right, Like, I don't know how long this takes, yeah, when the next years whatever. So he figured that, Okay, I'll get to Germany and then I'll bum around there.
It's like two weeks at least to make that flight. So you know, I looked it up.
I did. It took the graf Zeppelin one hundred and eleven hours and forty four.
Minutes eleven hours, okay, so it's like four and.
A days, four and a half days. So he's like, I'm just gonna tuck in with the mail bags. We'll see what happens.
They say, don't go longer in three days without water. He's really pushing it, and I.
Don't believe he brought anything with him. Yeah, so he's like, whatever, I'm just going to go to Germany and I'm going to do some German golf caddies there.
I'm sure they do golf.
They must must assume.
You.
I'll get a job so I'll have some more adventures, you know. Yeah. So but then he gets discovered.
In the hangar in the air to the air though he makes it into.
The air, but they and they don't make him walk the plane.
They don't make him turn around, you like.
No, They're like, we can't turn the ship around. Like they put them to work work.
Yeah, so the drinks, you know, the.
Captain made him do the dishes and like peel potatoes like in the traditional yeah.
Yeah.
And he also just had to like basically be a gopher, like go get me this, and he would.
Just lowest person on the order.
There was no steerage to put him because like Zeppelin's like you're saying this high class, that's trap expensive.
It's only for like the very luxurious find China and you know whatever bone China, whatever you'd expect have then very nice things.
On this particular one, there were ten passenger cabins and each had ten two bunk beds, which doesn't sound particularly luxurious in each cabin, but they're like sleeper cars and trail converted.
There's a long history of making that luxury.
There was a day to night look for the sofa to bed.
I got the Orient Express. You would have bunk beds in your cabinet, and that's like definitely luxury, right.
Okay, I'll give it to you. But I'm sure there was a lot of velvet up in this place, velveteen son of So let's talk about how hair brained this plan was from the start. So, as we learned from lawn Chair Larry, it gets cold up there quickly, and they don't heat places like.
The mail compared why would they need to.
So basically, Clarence is really lucky he got caught. He frozen to death, and so there he is working away with the crew. Zeppelin lands in Weimar, Germany. Clarence he gets arrested right on the spot, foot on the ground. The They didn't even let him lay down and kiss the ground, like oh that I mean? This is this is his first flight. This is most people's first flight.
I have a couple cops, this guy may be a bit screwy.
Yeah, no, so he just they haul him away.
But like do you think he was cool with them? Like when he's getting on, like thanks for the.
Flight, that was great, he was, Well, here's like back then, when you got into Germany without a passport, you could get a fine anywhere between twenty marks and ten thousand marks. I'm gonna guess he had zero marks totally. And so the Germans they got in touch with the American Consulate to quote hasten an amicable settlement. And so the American Consulate they like they jump into action, like we gotta
rustle up a passport for little dude. This is what the New York Times wrote, quote a curly headed adventurer nineteen years old attained to prominence such as he had never known yesterday by becoming the first stowaway on a transatlantic airliner. He is Clarence Terrehoon, golf caddie, who had hitchhiked his way here from his home in Saint Louis because he wanted to quote see the world. The zeppelin stowaway Clarence Terrahoon is certainly the most talked about person
in friedrich Schaffen today. Quite a number of well known persons have indicated to the local police their readiness to take care of the young man until his people should be.
Heard from in their homes and stuff.
Yeah.
So there's another paper wrote quote, the daring of the boy's feet thrilled the Germans and gave them a good chuckleman. Yeah, and I guess the captain was like, oh, you rascal. Like everybody loved him.
So Wheneber They loved that baron he's going around. They love a good wild.
Person, and so it makes sense Clarence becomes a folk hero.
There.
You can see they love him, The Americans love him. Everyone wants a piece of him. Clad he gets dinner invitations, job offers. There's in fact, one of the job offers came in before he even landed and got arrested because everyone finds out, oh there's this stowaway. Store was like, well, we'll hire you if you want to work in our store, right like a department store, the like, we have a position open in the shoot department.
We could use them free advertising.
Yeah, and then fourteen different women offered their own hands in marriage, their own hands. Yeah, they're just I mean, times were tough. I hear you're invited to dinner.
Before the depression gets caught kicked off. Ye, the stock market crashed, but I know things are going early for some people to I don't know, but yeah, wow fourteen that's a lot of offers. That's a lot of offers publicly, I mean, like just coming forward, Can I join the list?
Clarence didn't stick around Germany. No, he was put on a French ship back to the States. It was not a bad adventure.
Right, great one. I'm jealous.
Two years later he popped up in an Associated Press piece. Really, the headline his a vanished fame nineteen thirty. So Clarence Terrahoon Zeppelin stow away unnoticed at air Exposition. So it's like dateline Saint Louis. This is so, it's so cold blooded. There's nothing but vanished quote fame for Clarence Terrehoon. In nineteen twenty eight, his name was well known for he became the world's first air stowaway when the graf Zeppelin
pointed at silvered bulk toward Europe. Today, he labored at the International Aircraft Exposition, twirling the crank of a miniograph machine to feed out stories of another file of quote paper heroes. Great and near great, stalked by the twenty one year old youth without seeing. No one knew him, no one cared. His temporary work drawing to a close, is fleeting, fame forgotten? He petitioned an exposition manager for a recommendation, just a note, he said, tell them I'm a good boy.
Oh man, Like, why why I publish that?
Why write this?
That is so fing?
This guy's a nobody, Yeah, begging for job.
Do you know how bad of nobody here that is?
Uh? Anyway, did hes.
Piss off the writer? I mean, like two years ago, Dania consult the writer, and the writer waited until I.
Know three years ago. The writer's girlfriend was like, will you be so that takes this? So we're in nineteen thirty and all the women just like everyone wants this guy. Two years after this, thirty two, Sure he's in the papers again.
Every two years, they're like, we gotta check in on Turhoo headline.
A round World hitchhiker stopped in China gives up.
Watch China, get out of here, Turhoo.
Clarence Turhoon, who stowed away on graf Zeppelin, returns to Saint Louis.
So that's the sub editor wild turhoo. Yeah.
Clarence Terhun graf Zeppelin stow away, great thirties voice, by the way, thank you so much. Who left Saint Louis March ninth on a proposed quote hitchhiking trip around the world. Returned home Sunday after being forced to abandon the journey because of unsettled conditions in China. Oh read yes, well, he calls himself read at this.
Point, Oh he's read now read tun said.
Yeah, he said he reached Shank And he reached Shanghai April eleventh, after stowing away aboard the Empress of Russia, but was prevented by conditions from going on to Russia. He stowed away on a dollar Liner bound for the United States and got a job in the engine room. Following his arrival in San Francisco, Tarhun rode freight trains to Saint Louis.
Anti shanghaied himself Anti fur.
He's San Francisco, exactly one of the few San Francisco he was allergic to buying tickets apparently right, and so it seems. At some point he studied under these really incredible aviators and became involved in the industry. Somehow I found an obituary for this UH aviation engineer who was also like a great pilot and instructor, and they listed read Turrhoon or one of his Yeah, So the only other mention I could find from him was his obituary
in nineteen eighty seven. Clarence Terrehoon, semi Coolin was zeppelin stowaway. Clarence red Terrehouon, a local resident who gained international attention in nineteen twenty eight when he crossed the Atlantic Ocean as a stowaway on the Graf Zeppelin. Died Sunday at Missouri Baptist Hospital after a heart attack. He was seventy nine. At mister Terhune's request, no funeral arrangements will be made.
The body will be cremated. Mister Terrehoon of Shrewsbury was the first aerial stowaway to Europe to make his adventure possible. Mister Terrehoun, who was nineteen at the time, hid among the mail bags of the Zeppelin a dirigible. Upon his return to the United States, mister Terrehoon was hailed as a great adventurer. Surviving or his wife Catherine, a daughter
Janet Seacats of San Dimas, California. San Diemus Hied football rules, a son, Don Lee Terrehoon of Manhattan, Kansas, seven grandchildren and two great grant children. So it sounds like he had a pretty marvelous true adventurer. You want to hear about another adventure. Let's take a break and we get back. I'll tell you all about him, deal zaren. Okay, we just had Clarence read love him.
I may you name a car read he should?
You should? Let's do it. I got another one for you. Liam Corcoran na Liam co he is an adventurer. In twenty twelve, Liam was eleven years old and he was out with his mom shopping and somehow he like slipped away from her over it and he made his way to the airport in Manchester, England, like a couple of miles away.
He got on a bus the heck of an adventurous queen.
Wandered around Terminal one and then quote tailgated another family as they went through security.
Oh, just stayed with it, right on the stuck right with him.
Twenty twelve.
That's smart.
Yeah, So an airport employee told the Daily Mail, quote often one parent has the boarding card for all their children, so the security guard should count the cards and the children, but obviously they failed to notice there was one extra.
So he gets through security and then just headed for the first gate that he could find, and he's actually like looking for restrooms, but he figures like whatever, I'll get on a plane, and so like with security, he blended in with other families traveling with kids, made his way onto a flight to Roam. Onto a flight, yeah the airline jet too. They didn't do head counts or like secondary boarding pass checks. So Liam just takes a seat and buckles up his first time ever on a plane. Yeah.
Pretty soon, like the other passengers are noticing that there's this boy all alone.
Yeah yeah, it also looking like he's never done this before.
Right, And by this time it's too late to like abort the flight and head back to Manchester, So they continued on to Roam and police intercepted him, interviewed him on the plane, they kept him on the craft and he had to stay right there until the flight went back to Manchester two hours later.
Basically, yeah, you get an air marshall now.
But apparently he's like unfazed. He's just chatting enough cool. Don't forget this is July twenty twelve, right around the London Olympics, and so this is like a major security lender. And so like the transport secretaries freaking out about it jet to the company. They suspended three employees who just like waved him through, and then they started initiating head counts on all flights. Liam was like told the Sun newspaper that it was super easy to pull it off.
He said, it was quote easier than doing my homework. I didn't have anything on me and no one asked me for anything, he said. A neighbor said, I think he's going to be a bit of a hero among his friends for managing it. I think, And then a relative of his added, Liam's an attention seeker. He runs away constantly, but he's never done anything like this. The little monster went off to Rome.
So this is twenty twelve, you said twenty twelve, So thirteen years later, she's twenty four years now. We're gonna hear from Liam again soon. I bet I don't.
I hope you do a good thing.
Yes, like you may not be busted, but.
So here, well, here I can I can tell you about being able to follow a story all the way through with that's one child on an airline that what about two?
Let's let's hop it, let's happen it Ireland. I'm ready.
Dublin Iron Kids, August nineteen.
Eighty five, eighty five, What a time Dublin eighty five.
Live Aid Fever as local boy Bob Geldoff raises millions of pounds for famine relief in Ethiopia?
Did you lie laugh the worst? I'm over here laughing, and you're like and and I'm still laughing.
We were there and I thought we were the sensitive types here.
I normally am until you get me on these hooks.
So there's these two boys. Yes, there's ten year old Keith Burne and thirteen year old Noel Murray.
Noel Murray and Keith.
Keith and knowle little Keith, bigger nol Keith. And so like any boys of this age in nineteen eighty five, they loved the show the eighteen and they loved it when a plan came together. And they also these two loved to get up to no good little chancers, as they'd say, they shoplifted, they robbed people.
They lived in the Murdock would be so impressed.
Oh my god, you have no idea. They lived in a rough area and they were just like these little adorable hoodlums. She's so cut.
You think they had nicknames from the eighteen like one called themselves.
Hannibal with ba barocas of course.
I thought they call themselves be A Barca, Murdoch.
Face and Murdoch some of them were. Yeah, and so they they talked a lot about bunking. That's basically riding public transportation without paying.
Oh like free riding bunking.
Yeah, so they would they would take buses and trains all over Ireland together without their parents knowing, just getting up to no good. So the parents would sometimes call the cops, the guardy and maybe the GUARDI would come and pick them up. They'd be dragged back home, only to do it again the next week.
So they're bring them around the pub.
They'd go to Donegal. They went to Galway from corner to corners. Yeah, they're all over the place. And then one day they went a little further where. Okay, so Keith's mom tells them to go down to the shop and pick up a bag of potatoes. A bag of potatoes for dinner. She needed potatoes, which, let's be honest, we all need potatoes.
Who does it now more than ever?
We need potatoes sweet and kind whatever? Sweet? I like that. Let's run with it, so Keith he obliges. On his way back from the store, he runs in a knoll. Want to hang out? Oh yeah, sure, let's do this, And so Keith he takes the potatoes home, drops him off spuds as he keeps calling, drops them off.
Yeh, the spuds.
His mom says these fateful words. Don't go far. Your dinner's nearly ready.
Okay, right, so we're talking like fifteen twenty minutes.
Yeah, they're already out the door because she yells us. And the first thing they did was go to the nearby train station, the Dart station, and they hopped on a train. Didn't pay, of course. And from there they went to dune Leary, like on the outskirts of done. So they walk around a bit, they see that the ferry is in port, and so they jump on the ferry. They've done that a couple times before. Okay, didn't pay, ever, so like whatever they you know, your ma is slaving.
Over your dinner, the hot potatoes.
But like, why not so they they duck into the duty free shop. They steal a bunch of cigarettes on the on the ferry, they don't smoke. This is just figure, just what I'm thinking, perhaps, And so there they are cruising the Irish seat not a care in the world. Ten and thirteen, the ferry docked in Wales. Wow, and the.
Boys they crossed the Irish Channel or the Irish.
The boys disembark with everybody else and then there's like, oh, we're at the train station and you know, we could just take a train to London. So off they go. Why not? Why not? Your mom slave it over your din? Okay, So they get on.
The train train from Whales to London.
Oh, they go to London. Somehow they made friends on the train with this guy and his girlfriend, and these two weirdos let the boys crash at their house overnight. I have no idea what load of bull stories the boys fed him, but it must have been amazing.
But this is very eighties. I mean, like used to make whole TV movies about doing this, sleeping at a bus station and common adults into like taking him in.
And that's probably where this came from. So there they are in London, they've obviously missed dinner and bedtime breakfast the next day, but whatever, they're in the big city. It's so exciting for them. London ten and thirteen. Dublin is this world capital, right, but London is another London and London in nineteen eighty five. So in the morning, the boys make their way to Heathrow and because they're not too far from it where they're saying and like back.
Home, pop over to heat.
Well back home in Dublin, they would go to the airport as a great place to go steal food.
Oh yeah, because you could like.
Slip into restaurants and take plates, or they go through the buffet.
Line and then before security. It was a great place because so much action's happening. People are leaving, no one's stay.
It's good, good stuff. So, as Noel says in the documentary, that's called nothing to declare, which is great, by the way. Yeah, he said, quote, we're too little.
The airport know who you are.
The documentary he's constantly apologizing for cursing and it's so sweet. Anyway, So at the airport they figured out they'd be able to jump on a flight back to Dublin. No one's the wiser, Bob's your uncle, you know whatever, just get up there. Now. They didn't have the security that we have now, but they did have security eighty five Heathrow.
I'm assuming that the bridge would have some because of all the issues with the IRA.
At that point, precisely. So the boys they had to figure out how to run that gauntlet. So they did, like Liam and Manchester, and they just trailed along with another family and as Noel tells it, quote somebody just fell for that and we kind of just held hands, like two little innocent brothers. So they're just hamming it up. So they make it through security. Now, okay, find a flight to Dublin. So the boys are asking people at each gate where the planes are going, and it's like
all very overwhelming. But then a man tells them that a particular flight is going to America, New York City. The boys look each other the A team like maybe we can meet be a barcas. So the next thing you know, they're on the plane. They're like, let's just go to New York City.
To New York.
Neither hauld it ever been on a plane before. Every time, luckily, the flight was nowhere near full, like a lot of empty seats. So the boys they sit next to each other in an empty rope. They buckle up and they just acted like they knew.
The first time I ever flew, I was thirteen. I flew by myself. I wasn't terrified, but I wasn't so chilly.
These guys, these are some little street tofts.
This is amazing.
It was all very exciting. The noise you got, the rumble of the engines taken off into the wild blue yonder. And it's an It's an Air India flight.
Okay.
So the flight attendants are in Sorry's with like Bindy's. They serve curry, and the boys hadn't really had it, and they thought it was way too spicy.
They're like, what, yeahm uses many spices.
Yeah, I'm thinking. So they watched a movie. They watched a classic film, one of my fas a view to a kill Bond double O seven Duran Duran theme song, Christopher, It's perfection.
Uh.
They took little snoozes. Uh, let's watch it. Maybe I'll do an episode where I just recount exactly next thing they know, They're in New York's JFK.
Are you kidding this? Is amazing.
No plans, just vibes. So they get off the plane. They're headed through the airport. They get asked for their passports and they say, oh, mam has them and she's just behind right. So the customs agent tells me, wait there and let's let your mom catch up with you. And so they do the whole like blink blink yes, sir, uh oh, we have adorable accents.
And then the.
Guy when he's not looking, they just slip through. So they hang around the airport for a couple hours and they're like sitting in those massage chairs, just people watching.
In they'd walk outside anyone.
No, no, not a bit. Uh yeah. But so they see a cop and they go up to the cop and they're like, excuse me, how do you get to the city center?
The city center? City center because that's what they call it, Dublin city Center.
Where's the center? And the cop is like, well, where's your parents? And as the cop describes it, quote, I said, where are your parents? And a little guy, well he was the mouth, he was the rig leader. He says me, mo, me ma, in the center of town. We're going to meet. I said, you're meeting your parents? In the center of town. Keith, that's the little one by the way. So Keith, he tried to clarify with the cop. No, mem isn't in town. We're here all on our own, like this little ding
Dong tells. So the cop, Officer White, he called his supervisor and he said, quote, as soon as I heard the brogue, I said, you know, these kids didn't just come from the Bronx. They thought they fooled people on the airline, that they could do the same with Officer White, and I, well, it turned out not to be the case, right, So before too long, the boys are in the back of a New York police squad car headed for a
precinct office. When they got there, the cops questioned them, trying to figure out like who who are these boys, where they come from, where are they going? You know, who's with them? If anybody The boys they're cheeky the whole time, like they don't give straight answers. What they don't take this seriously at all. They did give a solid account of their flight from London to New York. So the precinct captain, he made calls to London to
see if they were missing. Two wise cracking street tufts cute as buttons is the description with able bro Zarin close you app Oh, yes, I want you to picture. You are a police officer in New York City, name Joseph Stabler. Your son Elliott just graduated from the academy and is following in your footsteps, hopefully not too much, because you play a little fast and loose. You've been on desk duty for three weeks after roughing up a witness, so on this day you find yourself passing the time
going through old casepies. But then those little kids came in. Oh they're hilarious. You love them. You know an Irish accent a mile away, and those kids got them. You tried to tell the captain that how even though they were on a flight from London, those kids are Irish for sure, got the map of Ireland across their faces. Your grand used to say, the Captain of George you're
a loose cannon Stabler, a real cowboy. A patrol officer brought some soda and chips for the kids, and now all of you are kicked back and yucking it up. Phones go unanswered, papers occasionally slide from the desks. Who cares they've asked to see any real American money you have in your wallets. They lose it at the sight of ones and fives. You tell them they can keep them, and the boys are ecstatic. Then the little one, Keith, asks, if that's a real gun on your belt? Is you
tell him? Can I hold it? He asks, I've seen Hill Street blues on the telly. You and the rest of the guys laugh, Sure, you can hold the gun. You take the bullets out and hand it over to him. Keith immediately turns and fires the gun of Noel. Whoa. Everybody shouts and you grab the gun back. You can't do that, you tell him, even if there are no bullets in there. Just then the Captain comes out of
his office. I just got off the phone with Dublin, he says, and you boys are in a lot of trouble and scene so back in Dublin.
Immediately turns and squeezes. But I believe it probably the same.
So back in Dublin the Guardian they go to tell Keith's mom that he's been located and he's in New York and she says, York Street, no New York, America. So she's trying to process back in America. The boys they get brought back to the airport, specifically to Air India security.
Who has to pay for the tickets.
Now, Well, what's looming in the background here is that just two months prior, and Air India flight had exploded off the coast of Ireland as it made its way from Montreal to Delhi via London. Oh All, three hundred and twenty nine people on board were killed in the bombing. It's like tensions are high, especially with Air India, sure,
especially coming out of London. So the Air India folks they put the boys up in this luxury hotel suite with around the clock security while they straighten things out. They tried to cuff the boys at first, but their hands, their wrists were too small, so they just gave up. The boys though, they're loving it. They have McDonald's delivered in, they're watching TV, they're lounging around.
It was amazing for them.
My favorite part though, is that they had stolen jewelry from the duty free shop at heath Grows, Oh nice, and they wound up selling it to the security guards. So they befriend the security guards. They're selling them, I'm
sure the cigarettes too. The security guard to take them on a sight seeing trip around New York, like they give them the iHeart New York shirts and they see like the Brooklyn Bridge, the Empire State Building, they buy souvenirs, they get back and then they're like the interrogation really begins, and so they're asked like, how exactly did you do this.
I'm glad they got that little experience. Here's let's get you some ice cream in Central Park.
And besides, I bought some I bought the boys asked the security guys like, are you going to give this jewelry to your wives? And they tell the boys no, I'm going to give them to a hooker. And the boys are like.
What the boys exactly my girlfriend.
It's just like so nuts. Anyway, so they realized, now, okay, this is a big deal. When the interrogations kind of finally begin, and so they explain every last detail. Keith tells it quote, they didn't care that we were two young kids having the cracker messing about. They were seeing the serious side of this. So then we kind of started realizing, Okay, this is serious. We better help these people.
So the boys they had to go back to the airport and walk everyone through what they'd done, step by step, every last yeah. And so when all was said and done, everyone realized these aren't terrorists, these are just rascals. Yeah. So they put them on an aer Lingus plane home, Yeah, New York to Shannon to Dublin. And the boys are like, oh my god, we're in so much trouble. And so their parents are going to be mad. They're like, okay, well we stop in Shannon when we let's let's jump
off the plane and leg it and Shannon. But they just they were so knocked out by the whole thing they fell asleep and when they woke up, they were in Dublin. Everyone else had gotten off the planes and they're all blank blank and they're wearing their iHeart New York shirts when they get off the plane. It's just hysteric. But what wasn't funny is that thirteen year old nol he had warrants what. Yeah, so his reunion with his family was short lived and he was sent off to
a boy's home whoa yeah something. Yeah. Most of his family were like on drugs or in jail, so he was kind of on his own, and they basically sent him to an orphanage. Keith's parents sent him off to boarding school to straighten him out, and it worked for Keith, but not so much for Nol. So Keith bounced around. Eventually, he gets married, he gets a really good job, has
some kids. Noel just keeps crying, gets into drugs. But now he is cleaned up, functioning really, really well, and I want only the best things in life for him, for both of them, totally. I highly recommend the documentary. It's like a thirty minute doc and it's them as adults telling the story and they're the most charming people, and I just love it. Let's break for some ads, and then I have one more mad captail of stowing away for you.
Hell yeah, Zaren.
I mentioned Brian robson up Top Man who mailed himself love Trains. I got another one like that for you. Charles McKinley, also a self mailer. Self mailer, twenty five years old, having a hard time of things. So this is in like two thousand and three. He's born and raised in DeSoto, Texas, which is like Dallas. Basically, he's a good dude. His very sincere comes from this really good family, has a degree in microbiology. Just a sweet
mer cree. Yeah, he's living in New York, but it was really overwhelming for him, and then he and his girl had a falling out. He was making twenty five hundred dollars a month at a retail job in New York, but like in the less than three months that he lived there, he blew through fifteen thousand, so it was not working.
Yeah, so too fast a life for him.
Yeah, I just everything was way more expensive than a lot of money paid it. Yeah, So he moves down to Florida temporarily to like get himself together, try and make some cash. She's living with a he's crashing with a friend. So he gets a gig there at a financial firm and like things are starting to look up. He's just racking up money. So he's like, you know what, I'm going back to New York. Oh Happy two thousand and three to make okay. So he wanted to make
things right with his girlfriend. He wants to get back the.
Safriend still there, she's still there. He's still holding out hope for that life.
He wants to make another go at the relationship.
I'm pulling for these crazy cakes.
He wants to make another go at life in the city.
Yeah, you girl.
So he takes the cash that he had and he goes back. Quote my girlfriend and I had ended on a bad note and I wanted to smooth things over. This is what he told the Guardian. But that was a big mistake and it just made things worse. While I was away, she had overdrawn our joint credit card and checking account and I was back to square one and ready to give up. Oh all right, prot that's rough.
If you aren't like it, it's just your girlfriend or your boyfriend, or you're not you're not married, don't get a joint account.
I don't even recommend a joint account.
You're married, you can a joint account or joint just don't.
Honestly, I don't. I would not. I'm not gonna be telling people what to do with their money. But damn your peace of mind, I think too.
You always just have to think about your protecting yourself, and not necessarily if they're a bad actor, like you're going to rack that up, but if there's something we're to happen.
Whatever happens to the identity theft, you've now exposed.
It to two people away precisely so you know this guy, lessons learned for him, as we'll find out.
Okay, So this seems that you're telling me going from York to Florida. I'm just starting to paint a picture. Nothing against what I'm hearing, No, but yeah, meaning to be judgmental, but fifteen thousand dollars in a few months is a lot of money. Yeah, having a joint bank account with your girlfriend is.
A little sus, little suss. He's low, he is brought low by this. Okay, like darkest days.
Oh, I'm sure twenty five.
Yeah, and it's like, okay, what's the answer. Go home? I just got to go back to Texas, back to Texas. And apparently, like his mom and dad had foretold this.
People in Texas generally too are people who leave Texas, you'll come back.
Quote mom and dad always said I'd never make it in New York because I was a small town boy, and they were right. So at the end of August I told him I was coming home. Yeah. So when he went down to Florida on that mission to make money, he'd left some of his clothes and his computer at a friend's house in Long Island. Okay, Yeah, and so he went out to pick it all up. He gets and he walked back to Queens from Long Island.
Some of his choices are starting to see him a little dressed.
No little charge. So poor little guy got through.
Let's just put it that way, right.
So he's got his stuff is. He's walking along, walking back to Queens. He passes a church from Long Island and he hears music coming from inside the church.
Sure, Heaven sent.
It was Madonna rehearsing for an upcoming tour.
Are you kidding?
Yes, he dropped his laptop. He like strode into the building, wowing her with deadly dance moves that did not happen. No, he's walking, sucking from Long Island to Queens, and he walks by a church. And then here's what really happened. He noticed that there was a big wooden crate outside. No Madonna, Sorry, I got you all excited. He asked the people there, like, hey, can you set this aside for me so I can use it to ship my stuff back to Dallas the Great?
But these are the kind you put art in, okay.
But these are good carrying people of faith with love for a stranger.
Sure of course.
So they set it aside, and they kept their eyes on it. They did. They're like, all right, we'll after good good luck on your walk. So he's shuffling off to Queens. His mind starts cranking. He's like, I think I have an idea, or as he said, quote, I have no choice, he finishes. Brother, he said quote, I had far too much pride to ask mom and dad or my friends for the money. And I had literally no money of my own and no credit card that would work. But I did have a UPS charge card,
which I could pay off in installments. Even though it cost me more money than a passenger flight. It was the only way what.
Happened to freight trains. Brother, let me come on, I just swallow.
Your way down, swallow your pride and make it a lesson. Learn anyway. So he gets on the horn with UPS. He sets it up for the shipperd to pick up the car. He has a UPS card car. I think it's from like a previous job, so he he It's basically like a UPS gift card, is how I like? So he he's like, okay. UPS picked this crate up at four pm on September fifth, two thousand and three, outside this chair like, yeah, Madonna's inside, don't don't be star straight. How much is this going to cost him?
Six hundred and eighty eight dollars for overnight delivery, which is not bad. The same flight one way JFK to Dallas two and forty.
He can't can't get that with an can't.
Put it on a UPS account charge. So Charles was careful. He measured the box to make sure he would fit, that he'd be able.
To determine what fitting was.
Well.
He wanted to be able to sit straight up, like just sitting straight up. You remember Brian Robson was like, can I fold myself into a pretzel and not carry any water? He carried water, I don't know whatever. So no, He's like, I want to be able to sit straight up and like not be crunched over the whole time. Yeah, but I'm guessing he's like sitting cross.
Legged, okay, legs a caimbo kind of.
Yeah. So he tells UPS that the crate is going to be holding very precious, very expensive of very powerful computer equipment and it has to be treated with the utmost care, white gloves service. You have to protect the microchips there. So Charles he's ready to do this. He takes off two loose pieces of wood from the crate, squeezes inside, puts like head and shoulders first like worms his way in.
Does he have someone seal him in?
And he gets inside and then nails the slats back in place from the inside out, nails would wraps himself in a blanket and then waits and then just pretty soon, pretty soon, he's on a flatbed truck on his way to Newark Airport.
On his back. Imagine if he's crate, maybe he's standing.
Maybe he's sitting. He just wanted to be able to sit straight up. Okay, so I'm just imagining it's like a box, like a square box type.
Oh you're imagining a square box. I was maaging a rectangular box. Well either way, well one is sitting straight up. If you're in a rectangular box, it's more likely going to be sitting on one face or you know.
Yeah, so let's say he's probably on his back maybe whatever. Anyway, he gets very lucky and they put him into a pressurized hole because he made such a big deal about it. I mean he called them multiple times. I had it like I got to remind you it's computer equipment. So they they put them, they're like put a note on his file like this trouble. They put him on a commercial flight, not a cargo and so if he'd have been in a cargo flight, he'd died because it was like unpressurized.
The unpressurized to I.
Guess can't breathe. So he had to stay super quiet while he was being loaded into the plane. Didn't want to give himself away, he told The Guardian quote. I was put on a conveyor and started bumping into other containers. I could hear beeping noises and somebody calling out numbers. Finally, someone said everything, tag the pilots of the information they need. Then the voices disappeared, and I heard the door closed. We taxied on the runway for a while, and I
knew it was too late to turn back. After about twenty minutes, I removed the slats from my crate and squeezed myself out. I noticed some NBCTV equipment when I walked around a couple of feet within the container. I was happy to be going home, but I was nervous.
He gets out of the crate, gets.
Out of the crate. That moment of like I knew it was too late to turn back.
That's terrify you said that I had this sense of shows like I had that feeling You're locked in now, there's no way I can go back.
You just can't.
Got to commit now, hold on, but exactly.
Now, it wasn't a street shot from Newark to Dallas. No, he went from Newark to Buffalo.
That's the wrong direction, right the.
Wayne Indiana?
Oh my god, did he gets stuck somewhere where it's cold? Oh? I know?
And then then he's put on a plane to Dallas.
So he left Indiana.
He left New York at four pm on September fifth, and he gets into Dallas at seven am on September seven, So it could have been a whole off overnight. Yeah, that actually sounds like the New York at four arriving Dallas at seven am the next day. Kind of sounds like the classic Southwest multi stop cheapo. Like, yeah, taking this right exactly. I mean that's the thing too. Guy's like twenty five, right, think about when you're twenty five dumb?
So many ways I had to like suffer for my choices. Like now you get to go to five airports because you wanted to wait the last minute to fly on the holiday thirty dollars money. So here you go. Yeah, enjoy Midway Airport.
I hope you like Baltimore, but like, Okay. So he's bouncing around, but unlike if you're in one of those Southwest flights, he's not sitting in like a warm enclosed cabin or killing time at a Hudson News paying eight bucks for a bag of gummy life savers. No, he's in the cargo area. Quote. The second plane was hell. That's when I really wanted to get it out. It was so cold. When we stopped at Fort Wayne, I could hear dogs barking in the warehouse, and I felt
like I sat there for hours. I could see a US Customs building and other containers heading for huge scanners, and I remember thinking, that's it. I'm gonna get caught. Yeah, but I was one of the first palettes to be put on the plane. I began to feel sleepy, and when I woke up we landed, I just knew we'd made it to Dallas. You can just feel it when you're home.
Three things the dogs not I'd be worried they'd be barking. How did these dogs not smell the sweaty.
Guy in what I was wondering, are they like police dogs or are they dogs being shipped somewhere?
If sniffing dogs.
It could be like, you know how people are dogs, they thought. I wondered that when I read the quote.
Who And then also the second one, when you start to feel sleepy nervous about the carbon monoxide, like.
Do not get sleepy, force yourself slap in the face.
So I've yes, I've actually done that caused physical pain for an hour to keep myself yes exactly. And then third the feeling like I'm in Texas, Like you just feel like I'm in Texas. I can send it. I came down through the clouds and I in Texas.
Well you know here home connection but yees, So he did. He made it to Dallas to go, and then he was put on a truck and that truck made it's weighted to Sodo. And here's how he tells it, quote, my mom signed for the crate. My mom signed for the crate at the front door. The driver climbed back into the truck and backed it into the alleyway at the side of my house. Suddenly, as he was letting the lifting gate down. The slats fell out of my crate.
I quickly leaned out and picked them up. But as he came around the back he saw me peeking through the gaps. He just let out this sigh and said, oh man, such a So his mom and dad are there watching the whole thing, and quote, my dad said, this is like something you see on TV. Mom just said, I don't know what you've done, and I don't want to know, but you'r home and safe now.
It's such a perfect text of dance. Is really the whole South? Yeah, New York City.
The problem was to New York City.
You come back selling yourself in a box.
Look at you. The problem was the snitch delivery driver.
Oh, because nobody would have known the cops that.
So they took their sweet time.
Though, is he just mad?
I guess he's a security security comes out, Yeah, they'll be like, oh you didn't notice when.
Itself.
So the cops though, like they took forever. Charles had time to come inside, get settled, take but when he comes out, he's all fresh, clean changed. There's two DeSoto ped officers in his living room and they grilled him. They said he was lying. They said he wasn't telling him everything. They said he was a terrorist. They said he planned to like pop out of the crate and choke out the pilots.
They stand where the box.
Was about this though, two thousand and three. This happened after the towers.
Still, Oh, I had not put that together the whole time.
There's no joking around aloud, that crying out of new Yeah. So they locked Charles up for a.
Month, Homeland Security didn't come to his house.
Well that's what I think. Eventually happened. He gets charged with ten felonies, ten terrorism charges up the who hot and eventually he was able to shed all but one of them.
Good.
So February fourth, two thousand and four, he pleaded guilty to a charge of misdemeanor stowaway and he got four months house arrest and a fifteen hundred dollars fine that he avoided fifty years. Yeah, gitmo, So four months house arrest not so bad at all. His dad, a chemical engineer, had to pay seven thousand dollars in restitution to UPS for what that was?
My I have no ideas therapy.
Paid who cares? Damn who knows? And it got the conversation going about screening cargo because like you know, and that pops up every now and then about how uh, you know, how folderable we are in terms of cargo and they don't scan that kind of stuff. So Charles when he spoke with the Guardian newspaper in August of two thousand and four, he was working at the local walmart and he told the paper quote, I'm being flown
to Japan next month by a TV company. They want to interview me and do a reenactment of what happened. I don't know how much money I'm getting for it. My lawyer's dealing with that. There's also an appearance on the Oprah Winfrey Show in the works. I know they'll make a joke about it like everyone else, but I'm used to it now. And you know what, though the whole mess wasn't over.
No.
In fact, around the time that he said he was used to it, he really wasn't. House arrest means you have to stay at the house. He has to stay at his parents' house.
Did they like change his ankle or not? You know, he cut on the monit.
He wasn't supposed to leave the area without permission from the court. Okay, you know that's house arrest. So but at the end of August two thousand and four, he got stopped by Georgia police after failing to pay for gas at a station.
That's the wrong state, Elizabeth.
Right, bah bah bus states away. Yeah. So in two thousand and December two thousand and four, just four months later, Charles he's in court for this on the probation violation charge. He apologized to the US magistrate for leaving the state. He said that it was partly to escape the notoriety that surrounded his case. So here he's saying like, oh, I'm used to it. No you're not.
Also, if you would have stayed inside your house, you probably wouldn't have gotten the notoriety unless you the news, turned the TV or whatever turn.
The radio, wanted all the reporters.
Outside your home in Desoda.
Yeah, so he he had to do a little bit of time for that.
I don't believe this kid, but he tell me he gives quotes to the press. They always sound like he's trying to portray himself in a certain light.
Well, here's the thing, I couldn't find anything on him after that, which I'm going to take a good sign. I want that to be a good thing. Stay out of the papers, y'all.
There little line.
I'm pulling for this kid unless he like milkshake ducks, in which case I wash my hands of the whole thing.
Definitely. And I'm hoping that he goes back to Texas in a way that it returns him to his roots in some way that's beneficial for him.
Yeah, and then he has something fulfilling.
Some purpose, happiness in the room.
We've all been in our mid twenties, and oh boy.
I'm surprised I survived my twenties, honestly. And then I'm also surprised that I've survived just as long as I have. But I mean, like my twenties in particular, that was a lot of like rough businessman. Why would you think that would be a good anyway? What's your takeaway the graph Zeppelin? Like, no, actually strike that. I think it's Keith the Irish kid, like out of him being like lippy And then like I just something, I really want
to see his portray. I'm gonna I'm gonna check that documentary. I'd like to see them done up as like a TV movie or something. Well, they just like to see some child actors.
I know that that story has been options.
It's it's right. I mean, that is so mazing, like a fun I mean not like obviously an A twenty four movie. This is gonna be a little bit more mainstream, middle of the road, but that's a fun. Yeah.
The Irish papers had stories on the on the story getting option for production, and then I tried to trace it and I couldn't see.
Yeah, a lot of stories get options, of course. Yeah, who knows, what is Elizabeth? What's your ridiculous takeaway?
Right? All of these people are so charming to me. You did a good job of finding, you know, because there are some not so charming ones.
Last guy maybe a little worried. I was constantly worried about it.
I'm pulling for all of them. But yeah, they're all really fascinating characters. So I was I was pleased with that that I didn't have anyone that I have to be like, we're.
Going to skip over this part.
Yeah, exactly, Dave, I need to talk back.
I got one for you.
Oh my god, he went.
Hi, Sarah, Elizabeth, producer, Dave Interns and all those who are responsible for the Ridiculous Crime Podcast. Thank you for bringing so much laughter in my life right now, especially when things are tough. You also remind me that those who are making it tough for me are going to be in your show sometime in the future. Can I wait to listen to their stories? Thank you.
I love that guarantee.
This is the thing, like we've we've got to thank you Dave for giving us a lot of love on the talkbacks this week. True, but I think we need to be very gentle with each other. And I think this is another thing that I've always said, not even when times are distressing, but it's always really important that if you if you enjoy something either about media that you consume or also just about people that you know, tell them.
Yeah, like the little shop owner you see all the time, let him know I was looking forward to seeing you, yeah, Or.
Just like there's so I have a friend who every time I see her, she just makes me smile. And I told her that once, and it's like, every time I see her, she just tells me how much it means to her. And so it's like, when you have those feelings, you got to share them. That's how we survive.
And as a guy. I gotta say to you men out there, you know how rarely you get complimented. Try to compliment a man because I think they're doing a lot. And I'm not saying like we should all compliment man. I didn't say that. I said, guys, you should compliment a man. We should all look at each other.
Come.
Yeah, I mean meaningful, not in some bs.
You mean it s so excellent? Yeah, I tell you we're shutting dark, Elizabeth. We're gonna go to positive sunshine. Elizabeth can hear against all delusion?
Me.
God, I love a good delusion.
Uh.
That's it for today. You can find us online at ridiculous Crime dot com. We're also on Instagram blueski uh and I think that's about it. Email Ridiculous Crime at gmail dot com and number one leave a talk back on the free iHeart app reach out. Ridiculous Crime is hosted by Elizabeth Dutton and Sarah Burnette, produced and edited by FAA Airport, Margaritasur Dave Cousten, starring Analys Rutger as Juden.
Research is by baggage claim manager Marissa Brown. The theme song is by guy who always exposes his bare feet on the plane. Thomas Lee and Guy in a Cold Sweat who Hates Flying Travis Dutton. Post wardrobe is provided by Botany five hundred. Guest hair and makeup by Sparkleshot and mister Andre. Executive producers are Duty Free Cashier Ben Bollen and Secret Flight Attendive No Will.
Grapdus Clime Say It one more Timequeous Crime.
Ridiculous Crime is a production of iHeartRadio four more podcasts. My heart Radio visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.