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Uh okay, Hey Elizabeth Duttan, Hey, thank ah, I just woke up. You know it's ridiculous, I do okay.
What you you have blue hair? Yes, I mean that's a little ridiculous, but it's not really.
Really, it's it's kind of ridiculous.
Yeah, so you have blue hair? Do you live by your own rules? Because of the blue hair?
Not because of the blue hair, but it's kind of indicative that I do live by my own rules.
Yeah. And I've had blue hair before.
Have you had red?
I've had red, pink flor Oh.
Yeah, that's a good look for.
I've never you know, I've never gone into like the yellow orange.
No, I think yellow orange is actually kind of hard to wear for most human skin tones.
But if you live by your own rules, and if you live la dulce velvida, which is apparently a lifestyle, yeah, hold hold on to your pants. Ladulce velvida is a lifestyle, Saren, And if you really want to live it out loud, you can die your hair velveta gold.
Uh huh yeah, so velvida dulcevelvida. Yeah, they did this to my man. Fellini.
Yes, okay, did go on.
So Velvida is launching its very first hair dye, Velveta Gold. Now here's the thing. They put out this press release on April first, twenty four, so I'm like, oh, this is another garbage. We get so many messages about bad fake product mashups around April Fool's Day. Of course, this one came in from listener Jill Patterson, who was the only person to stumble across this this beauty.
So I look it up.
I'm like, okay, well it's got to be like fake. But then I go to Amazon and you can buy Velvida Gold semi permanent hair color. It is the color of Velvida. And you know how they launched it, like how they their big product launched. They it says the brand tapped the queen of self expression and unapologetic boldness. Julia Fox, that cuckoo.
Bird, Yeah, the one who's with Yeah.
So she's a little bonkers and she she'd wore it around town. I don't know, there's pictures of her with Velvida hair.
It's a very specific color.
It is very specific and it's spot on. When she has it in her hair, she looks like she got a bunch of velveto on her.
Well, let me know when they have cheese whiz color. That's the pretty much the same. But I want the ruffling.
What I'm trying to say is, if.
You truly lived by your own rules, you would ditch the blue and go with velveta gold.
But if I listened to you, I'd be listening to someone else's rule.
No, I'm I'm omnipotent.
You're just suggesting. Is that going with the wind?
Like, yeah, if I you know whatever, Okay, fine, you make a point there.
Well that is ridiculous. I know it is, Elizabeth. Yeah, I got one for you. Okay, yeah, Okay. You're working your day job at a small suburban bank, right, ok, just a normal Friday morning, and then boom, all of a sudden, you look up and you have a firearm pointed in your face. I don't like that, I know, right. Which gets worse because the man holding the gun he looks like President George Bush. That's George Herbert Walker Bush, the first one, not the dumb fun son Elizabeth. This
one is a wild story. This is Ridiculous Crime a podcast about absurd and outrageous capers. Heists and cons. It's always ninety nine percent murder free and one percent ridiculous. Yes, oh, Elizabeth Is I know you don't watch TV, right you know, no, I don't, but you do watch movies, right?
Yeah? Sure?
Okay, what's your favorite bank robber movie?
You've asked me this Q and I said, I don't know.
I gave you time, like weeks, months, possibly, I don't remember. What's your favorite one?
The bank Robber?
Okay, your new answer is Point Break?
Now I gave you I do love that movie.
Okay, there you go. Next time I ask you, my favorite bank robber movie is point point Break.
I remember that point Break Point Break, because otherwise I was gonna be like Bank Robber Joe and The Mystery of the Bank Vault.
It's French you probably haven't seen. Yeah. Well, I think Point Break is good for you as your favorite.
Because you you have an f b I agent.
You already know it exactly. So what's your third favorite scene?
When can is all wet?
So I'll tell you? Thanks for asking? Okay, yeah, it's pretty today. What's your third favorite scene in Point Break? It's simple? Uh, Nick nalty utah, give me.
Two wait, flee and Anthony Keitas.
Yeah, they are.
That's my that's my third favorite anything. They're in fight on the beach huh.
Yeah, they can break surfboards and stuff.
Yeah, I like it. Okay, I don't like the whole party scene just.
In general, any of the party scenes.
Isn't there like a beach party scene, the moon Doggie.
Yeah, they have played football and then they have moon Doggie with they're squirting.
Yeah.
I don't like that in the Yeah, I don't like that. Don't like any of that. Okay, Well, anyway, Pois Break, Yes, aside from the party scene. It was directed Catherine Right, Yeah, and came out in nineteen ninety one, So remember that date, nineteen ninety one. It'll be important later. Okay, now you know the gist of the movie. We kind of gone over that. But a gang of Malibuu surfers they rob banks in LA to pay for their life of surfing and skydiving and just generally getting.
Radical Reagan masks.
Yes, and when the surfer gang robs the banks, they wear the mask of ex presidents, So they wear the Halloween mask of Ronald Reagan, LBJ, Jimmy Carter and Tricky Dick Nixon. Because you got to have ticky Dick Nixon. So well, point Brak came out nineteen ninety one.
The idea came out in nineteen ninety one, by the way.
Yes, it began in the eighties, right. A producer apparently this is the story. He says he took a surf lesson. Afterwards, he's sitting on the beach watching other surfers, and he thinks to himself, hmmm, A gang of surfers robs banks in LA to pay for their surf safaris, and an athletic FBI agent starts surfing to go undercover. Boom. That's pretty much the whole story.
It sounds so bad when you described it that way, but it's so good, like the athletic FBI like.
This song named Johnny Utah.
Johnny, Like would you take a step.
Back, former college quarterback?
I just let myself get buried ignor it?
Yeah? Yeah, Well, Catherin bigelows she infused into the script, like she took her genius and basically fused that into the script. That makes it rise above your basic genre picture.
Right.
She turns it into this indie crime film with big name stars, and you know she also sees that keanner Reeves could be the next great action star. She's the first one.
She makes him and it came out in nineteen ninety one.
Exactly good before any of the other movies.
Yes, A Walk to Remember, even.
Johnny Mnaeamonic I believe, and the early like, let's make Kean into something the post speed movies Fielding Minnesota. Wow, that's a deep ball, Okay, fun fact I learned in the original draft of the script the bank robbing surfers they wore the Halloween masks of ex presidents, but they were the ones on the money. They wore Washington, Lincoln, Jefferson, and Grant mass the dead ex president that right immediately now it's James Cameron.
Do you like your dead president's crispy?
Of course you know this. So entered the director James Cameron, who happened to be Catherine Biglow's husband at the time.
Right, So maybe one we're getting into like T two turt exactly.
He's exactly working on T too. So while she's working on a script rewrite, Cameron tells her having George Washington in the bank is not as cool as next in er Reagan. So she's like a good point, Jim changes it up and then filmmaking history. Now, then think about getting robbed by Dick Nixon. How much funnier that is than getting robbed by George Washington? General Grant, I mean, like,
how would you even as this? Not to like pick on the screenwriter, but like, come on, man, how do you say, yeah, they're running president's masks and you do not think of Dick Nixon?
Well, with Nixon you can do like the voice and like hold the two fingers up and shake your hold or whatever.
But what do you do for for like Washington, You're like, here's.
My card, hand out a dollar bill? I mean, what do you do? Yeah, Lincoln to go, here's my card, it's a penny. So also, if you have like Reagan, right, this is the eighties so it's very music video heavy, Yeah, another great voice, you could get into like weird, funny music video territory with Reagan. I just don't understand we missed all these opportunities. Anyway, I'm not going to pick on them anymore, but like, okay, if you have Reagan right.
On the screenwriter, well no, I got.
Fixed, yeah basically sorry, But like if it's Reagan, you can know all those eighties jokes. It'll be like, sir, haven't you done enough to the country? You know? Like sure, But anyway, I bring up Point.
Break timely humor exactly stands time.
So for the reason I bring up Point Break, Elizabeth because.
It came out in ninety ninety one.
Thank you, good memory. Well, we're not going to just keep talking about what a dope movie is for a full episode. I know you could, as fun as that would be. But I have this really weird cosmic coincidence for you. Right, the screenwriter who first came up with the idea in the mid to late eighties, at that same period of time, but what I would call it eighty sitada, there was someone working on the exact same idea, except for this person, they did it in reality.
Oh yeah, it wasn't like a deep impact ormageddon.
No, oh exactly beautiful. Like, let's pick the same movie different now.
I love when that happened.
It happens often the sentergy of that in Hollywood. Yeah, So, from what I can tell, the real ones in this way, the real bank robber in no way inspired the screenwriter to PenPoint Break. He was apparently not aware that this story took place. He never mentions. I looked at a bunch of a bunch of his like inspiration and interviews of like how we came up with it? Nothing right drug?
So yeah, this cat right. He starts way back in nineteen eighty Citada, and there's this bank robber in the Chicago Land area who's going around robbing banks wearing halloween masks of presidents nice and he's wearing Timely won so he's wearing Reagan. Okay, right, he gets it right. This wasn't the news, but not like national news. That's why I don't think the screenwriter caught it right. But the bank robber, he gets away with it for years, and
then all of a sudden he just stops. He just lays low for years, and then in March of nineteen ninety he gets back in the game. No way, Yeah, just before the movie, the ex president bank robber is back in business. Except he wasn't called that because instead the newspapers of the Chicago Land area they called this man the flesh mask Bandit.
The flesh masked band. Yes, that's not easy to get your mouth around.
Oh my god. No. And also first I kept thinking that you should be the flesh mask bandit. Yeah, and that way you get rid of that whole weird ed past tense flesh masks. Yeah.
Yeah.
Anyway we're trying to mask into a verb.
You just call it the masked bandit.
Yeah, because the flesh mask is important, because bandits the flesh daddy. So, Elizabeth, if you were going to start robbing banks, right, what would be your ideal bank robber.
Name the skin bandits.
I don't want to be the I think the one eyed Jack.
Bandit, the one eyed Jack band Yeah.
You see, my calling card would be a literal playing card. I would just leave a one eyed Jack. That way, the FBI would know it was me, precious, right, and they'd be like, ah, the one eyed Jack bandit. Again.
I would just get like fully sunburned and then go in and peel the.
Sunburns DNA everywhere.
People would be like, it's so gross. They get away from me.
On me and the skin.
Here's the thing, it's not my skin, it's Elmer's glue. Oh so thinks.
And then there's no DNA on it. There's touch DNA, but we're going to pretend like that doesn't exist. Okay, So I'm just pulling off sheets of what they think is my skin and they're like, the skin band that's here, and I throw it on the counter and everyone steps back. Of course, yeah, like nobody response, nobody moved, nobody get hurt, give me all your money at you, or I'll throw my skin at you.
And they're like, oh, skin band it, come on.
That's so grossic book bankrupt, like a Dick Tracy level. It's good. I kind of pictured you as like having like a the name like the dog pack Robber, because you roll with the pack of dogs.
That'd be pretty cool.
Yeah, everyone's distracted. They're petting the dogs, all.
So cute, and then the dogs they all play along like oh, we're so cute. And then when I snap.
My finger there they take all the money.
Chewings and they take the money and then we run.
I was picturing Elizabeth as it's like, you know, we had the pretty Pants bandit, which was really horribly named. Would you be like the December shirt bandit like something else out.
I would wear a December shirt with my dog pack. I would have a rotisserie chicken in my mouth, and much like.
The dogs, you wouldn't be able to get it out. Maybe trying.
No, you can't a whole rotisserie chicken.
Yeah, sure, and then I not like a quarter dark, It's the whole thing, the whole thing. And then I got fake skin coming off the picture.
It's so good the dogs would be happy.
I'm going to be famous.
Nineteen nineties, the Fleshbacks, mask bandit. I can't even say it. It got back into business across the country. Bank robberies were up all across the country because we able to talk about in La being the bank robbery capital of the world's.
Like seventies, eighties, I guess into the early nineties.
Yeah, the nineties is really what it is like popping off.
You know what happened in ninety one, what happened on to break came out?
That's it takes place in La. It's about a bank robbery. Do you know why bank robberies is picked up in the early nineties. The real reason, George Herbert Walker kind of kind of the real reason is kind of wonky. It was deregulation, bank deregulation. When the banks were deregulated Agains Chicago, for instance, they were able to pass a law that allowed the banks previously could only have two branches in the city. Now they could have, you know,
as many as thirty. So suddenly now in the suburbs, all these small suburban banks, lightly guarded near easy access to the freeways for all those suburban.
Commuters, a post savings and loan issue.
Uh yeah, exactly, bank's like eighty seven. Yeah, so this is likely early ninety so they did do all the bank regulation and deregulation, right and then so now we have this crop up all about these little tiny suburban banks. Yeah, bank robbers noticed that this is really close to freeways. It's easy is there in leafy residential neighborhoods and a quiet on like a Tuesday at ten.
Am, mushrooms after the rains.
Exactly, they become prime targets.
Right.
So the bank robbers, you know, typically we think them being these like glamorous guys. Back in the day. They had great nicknames, baby Face Nelson, pretty Boy, Floyd Skin. Classic criminals like my man John Dilidger didn't even need any he'ment exactly. Now, this is back when the FBI first made its name as g men. Right now, can you guess how many bank robberies there were in one year?
I'll take a year nineteen thirty four. Take a guess how many bank robberies there were in nineteen thirty four, at the peak of bank robbery era seven million, eighty six A right, that was a little off, Yeah, just a little bit. Now that's not just the Midwest, that was the entire country. See to see Shining Sea eighty six. Now take a guest for nineteen ninety how many bank robberies were there ce two Shining Sea eighty seven, five
and forty two. Oh yeah. Now, as one little writer noted from the Chicago Tribune, to be a bank robber in the nineties was a very odd choice as a criminal, because, to quote from the Tribune, quote, bank robbery is a ridiculous crime he is to commit in the nineteen nineties, Even apart from the cartoonish get up you have to wear to avoid identification from omnipresent video cameras in the first place, bank robbers aren't celebrities anymore, possibly because of
the nickname crisis. Even the man with the false faced disguise, who is believed responsible for sixteen Northwest suburban robberies, including the one Thursday in Streamwood, has done no better than the flesh mask Bandit hardly a handle to sees the popular imagination. Secondly, the hall just ain't what it used to be. Willie Sutton, your boy Elizabeth, who rob banks from the nineteen twenties to the nineteen fifties, did so, he said, and I quote because that's where the money is.
But in this era of computer finance and plastic transactions, banks and tellers simply don't have much cash on hand anymore.
He's like a hipster bank robbery gatekeeper exactly.
It used to be so cool, but now too many people are doing it.
It's lame. So that's where we're at in the early nineties. When my man the flesh mask bandit makes is emergence. There's re emergence. Yeah, so let's take a little break. We'll come back and we'll get into more bank robbery.
Let's do it.
Keep your skin on, all right, and we're back now as we were talking about before baby Face Nelson in the heyday of the thirties, right, how this changed to the nineties. The other big thing that I didn't really get tuned to was if you rob a bank, right thanks to the baby Face Nelson era, the FBI we get involved because it became a national crime, but that would be more like for kidnapping. The reason it became a national crime was because the money was federally insured.
So boom, Now they're getting on every bank robbery. Right, So then if you add in the penalty if you get caught. Right, Let's say you rob a bank with a computer, right, people bobby bop it and then you get popped.
Oh you hack it?
Yeah? Right, you hack it? Yes, with the key.
Here's the correct and it's called hacken.
So when you're when you when you're hacking and scraping cash, right, you, Let's say you get tried for bank fraud or whatever you get charged with, right, most like you get sent to a white collar federal facility for like eighteen months. Right now, Let's say you walk into a bank and you rob it, right, you've got a gun or a bomb or some threat of death on you. You're looking at least five years in.
A federal pat a weapon.
Yeah, but that's that's not the little security con. You're most likely you're not gonna be hanging out with Wall Street bankers, right, You're gonna be hanging out with hard people, right, But you know you don't need to listen to me on that. Listen to France's Keating, chairman of the Security Management Committee of the American Bankers Association.
Oh he sounds like a barrel fun Oh.
We got funded parties. Keating said, don't use a gun, use a pencil. If you forge a check and walk out with ten thousand dollars, society still thinks you deserve only a slap on the wrist. But people keep robbing banks because there's still a certain romance to it. They think they can go in and walk out with a million dollars. So the point being is that, Okay, I don't know if he's in relation to Charles Keating of
the savings some loan scandal. I wonder I do, right, But at the point being that banks they're kind of prized by society and not because everybody's money is in there. I don't know why it is that it's if you rob with the pencil, you get like a slap on the wrist and like kind of like encouraged to do it again. Ultimately, because you think about the price you're making. Until you get seven million dollars in eighteen months, wouldn't you do that again?
Well, right, but if I if you rob it with a pencil, if you forge a check, no one is traumatized. But if you've got the point weapons, it's human trauma.
That's the money, that's the difference in the amount of money. I say, yeah, I'm with you. I was.
Any time that you're you know, traumatizing or possibly injuring or killing a person, that's what ups the ante on it.
So just even the traumatizing. Ye I'm not saying you're not hurting them, but just the scaring.
Well yeah, and it is. It's very upsetting thing. And then there's also the potential for death. Yeah, so there's no potential for death when you're forging a check, unless like you run out of the bank and you trip and you fall on the pencil, it goes into your temple.
You're just like, what about downstream effects?
Right?
You know what if people like you anyway, doesn't mean So back to the flesh Mask bandit, Right, at the time, he was not alone. There were a bunch of other oddly named bank robbing colleagues in the Chicago Land area. Oh yeah. For instance, there was the pot Bellied Bandit. Yeah, Chicago police to call him a stout Man, a waddling thief has successfully robbed about six banks, right, so yeah, then he would show up in the most like Chicago
way possible. I guess you could just kind of waddle up to the teller, hand her a wrinkled paper bag from a fast food restaurant, and you tell her to fill up the bag with cash, right.
Like he's really like a trim guy wearing a fake tummy.
That would be smart, Yeah, and then like.
Just just pregnancy it up with like the fast food bag.
Look at me, I'm a potbelly, and they that's all they remember, just.
A painted pot belly. Just lets his shirt lift up a little bit so you really get a good look at it. So there are also the bank robbers who didn't earn nicknames Elizabeth, like John Wortman. Yeah, he was sitting in his car outside the bank. He put on his surgical mask, and he pulled on his knit hat, and then apparently he lost his nerve because he pulled it all back off. And then he waited a little bit and he hyped himself up, and he pulled on his surgical mask, he pulled on his knit cap, and
then he pulled that back off. And then then he hiped himself up, being okad, I gotta do this, and he pulled on his surgical mask, he pulled on his knad hat before he walked into the bank. Someone saw him doing this. It called nine to one one. The cops arrived. They watched him do this, They approached the car. They eventually arrest him before he even set foot in
the bank. Apparently intentional bank robbery. I don't quite get how this lays out, but that's enough evidence for them that got him on bank robbery charges, right there was How about this guy the cross country runner, This dude, he should have had a nickname. He would have if he gotten like he probably got a pretty cool nickname if he got away with.
It, even make it into the bank.
He did make it into the bank, but he did not get away with his first robbery. Right, Yeah, so William Burzawa, he walked into a bank in the Chicago Land area and he robbed it and he fled on foot. But see that was his plan. Cross country runner that he was. He was, Yeah, he's not a long distance runner of those cops. Right, he takes off running, but he did not anticipate there'd be multiple cops coming from different angles, so he just.
Like in cars.
Yeah, so four officers just basically run him down and ten minutes later there he is.
Buildiness, he's going in the distance, Yeah, exactly, He's.
Not going with speed. So the big hidden factor beside the deregulation of banks, right, that led to small branches being he was easier to rob There was also a recession in the nineteen ninety nineteen ninety one time, so people are losing their jobs. You also have just immediate need, right, so people had hard reasons. Ron Hosco, acting supervisor of the FBI's Violent Crime Task Course and Robbery Division at that time, he saw the economic drivers and he was like,
that's really a big push. He said, and I quote there are people who may have lost their jobs. They see a bank, a big institution with all the money, they think they can outsmart the law once or twice. To them, it's just a crime of opportunity. It's not planned. So that was like I think most of the people I just mentioned, right, So at this point the FBI is getting their clearance rate on robberies, what do you
think it is catching the robbers? Not that good? Seventy five percent and had gone up from two thirds to seventy five. Yeah, so there's improving, right. So those are pretty mean odds to play if you're playing the FBI or this bank like a casino. But bank robbers lined up all through the nineties to beat those lean ods like one in four chance. I'm taking it. Enter the Flesh Mask Bandit or should I say the flesh Mask Bandits?
Oh plural?
Yeah?
Who gave them this name? The tops? The press?
The press? Yeah, yeah, because.
I expect better from them.
They had it right there in the original reporting. They talked about how he's wearing a halloween mask. You could call him the Halloween Mask bandit. He's wearing a halloween mask that looks like an ex president. You can call them the ex president bandit.
President.
You call them the Dead President band to get hip hop about it. But no, what do they do there? Flesh mask brandish because like one person said, he was wearing a fleshy mask. Another person said he was wearing a mask. Was flesh color to the flesh Mask Bandit anyway, So dude's name, I'll just telly, Yeah, John T. Hunter. That's our man of the John Hunter. Yeah, but not John the Hunter, Elizabeth the tea is I don't know what the he stands for. We'll just say Tiberia though, like, okay,
there you go, John the Hunter. So, John the Hunter. He was in the Chicago Land area in the seventies and the eighties. He gets married, has a son. Nineteen eighty six, opens an electronics wholesale parts company. Right, he names it a Universal Flash Controls. Really inspired, all right, but it was right for the time, or maybe a little bit too late. Anyway, the business closed in nineteen eighty nine, and just after three years of being a business.
Perhaps it was the economic downturn following the October nineteenth, nineteen eighty seven financial crash. AKA, yes, that could be. That would be a probably a big factor. Anyway, Black Monday probably changed his life. That craters the economy hurts businesses like Universal Flash Controls. He decides to even with the banks.
Oh, so he's going to become a dancer and call himself John the Hunter.
There you go. That would be a good way to get even with the banks if the banks were John's Yeah, at strip clubs.
Now.
At the same time, he had a son who just left college Loyola University, graduates in nineteen eighty eight with a degree in business administration. Smart kid. Right after college, he becomes a CPA. That's a public accountant. As you know, his boss said, John Junior was quote the typical stereotype of an accountant. Oh so he was quote quiet, well dressed, mild mannered, meticulous.
Mild manner.
Yah. Dude gets married in nineteen ninety one, a June wedding, same year that point break came out, Elizabeth.
Is that the year?
Keep yea nineteen ninety one. Yeah, so by April ninety two he's divorced. Yeah that's oh no, Yeah, that's about when he decided to go into the family business. So it turns out John the Hunter the Elder was a bank robber, and he'd rob two banks in nineteen eighty five. Right then things went a little quiet until March of nineteen ninety, as I told you, when all of a sudden, his electronics supply parts company has shut her. Yeah, he
gets back in the game and he's good. Right between March nineteen ninety and August nineteen ninety one, he successfully rubbed seventeen banks. Wow, yeah, is Chicago try being reported on August twenty first, nineteen ninety one, the flesh Mask Bandit strikes again for the ninth time in seventeen months. The gun wielding man with the flesh colored Halloween mask has left his mark on a Northwest suburban bank. The story is at nine thirty am, the flesh Mask band
It walks into a suburban bank. He walks past a row of five teller windows, and they got five tellers in each of the wind there's a teller in each of the windows. Elizabeth, this is back when all the windows were staffed. Yeah. Right, So the flesh mask Mandy walks he quote pointed a blue steel handgun at each and directed them to put money into the final bag he was carrying.
So he had to stay on way back and then pointed in each five or did he.
Go no, one window a window, pointing the gun like loaded up, goes to the next one, loaded up. I don't know why they're waiting.
I remember five. I'm in the back. I'm not there anymore.
I remember big two.
If I'm quick, you know, yeah, five, I'm in the back.
Only three numbers. Police recording, Police Sergeant Robert Duffy. He went down the line and he hit each teller at gunpoint. So I don't know, I don't know how this played out. Why they're waiting anyway, dude walks out with twenty grand. The bank employees they watched the flesh Mask Bandit hop into a late model American car. The car was later found by police abandoned a few blocks aways, something like that.
But we'll get into the cars in a second. The FBI get called in, right, they tell the Chicago Tribune all they knew about the Flesh Mask Bandit at the time. FBI spokesman Bob Long said, he demands money from tellers, flees the bank, and in several instances, gets into a stolen car and then dumps it. And he's always wearing this mask. So about the mask, all right? Descriptions varied, Elizabeth flesh good good guess. Some of eyewitnesses said it
was Ronald Reagan. Others said it was Richard Nixon, but then, far more strangely still, others said it was then President George Bush, the elder, This is George tu Walker Bush. Now the eyewitnesses agreed.
It's just a mask the whole time.
Why witnesses agreed that the mask was quote opaque flesh colored mask that obscures the face that gets repeated over and over.
Report he might have my mask.
Yeah mask. Well, let's just say there will be confirmation in this story about masks. So the Chicago newspaper notes that the local record holder for banks robbering in the area was this man, James w. Oliver aka the loop Bandit loop band Yeah. I think he wrote the Chicago Loop, the train.
Lanyards or something.
He'd robbed seven banks back in eighty seven, right, the flesh mask banded. He easily doubled his total and then some. So now the Chicago newspapers were like, whh we got a guy, we got a goer number. Yeah. So the FBI's spokesman, they were like, wait a minute. On the national level, the record was thirty three banks, right, and that was pulled off by an unnamed East Coast bank rubber and all the reports were caught. They would know, they wouldn't name the guy they caught him, but they're like,
he got thirty three. I'm like, who is it? Which guy? So I gotta go cross reference and find the guy who's exactly thirty three? Yeah, anyway, I couldn't find it. But they is making him up. I think they just wanted to remind Chicago that they are the second city and they will always beat the second city to the East Coast.
I mean, don't you think it's like you shouldn't be putting out these goals for people.
That's my point. That's a competitive person. I'm like, I can break up.
I can do thirty three.
So by November, the flesh Mask Bandit, he's back at it, Elizabeth. He walks out of a bank in a neighborhood called Stream. What's the report we heard earlier? Twenty three thousand dollars of the bank's money. No one gets hurt. I don't know about trauma. I have to admit you're right about that. Hi witness is report the flesh Mask Bandit fled in a light blue four door Chevy. I'm like Ford or Chevy sounds rocking to this time, Hie Witness has offered
a more exacting description. They said that the robber was six foot three, he weighed about two hundred and forty pounds, and he was a white man. His hair was brown, and this was noted because his hair was sticking out from his President Ronald Reagan mask. Very clearly a President Ronald megnum. So now we get an identifier someone's actually paying attention.
Yeah.
FBI agent Richard Eggleston did not confirm though, that it was indeed President Reagan, because he's like, I haven't seen the tape, so he's like, I won't confirm, So there's still debate, some debate, but he did add that it was the same he's used in other robberies, and the bank robber wore quote a flesh colored mask and opaque Halloween type mask you can see through, but which distorts the facial characteristics, so you really can't see what the
individual looks like. So it's kind of like a clear like see through plastic masks, masks from the eighties.
Yes, son, Yeah, exactly need one.
Another good reason is it would be difficult to get a very good description of the flesh mask. Banded is the obvious one. As one Chicago cop said, I quote, when you look down the barrel of a gun, the gun is all you see. So I'm thinking.
That's actually Ronald Reagan wearing one of those clear masks.
And he's just looking for kicks.
And everyone thinks, God, that looks like Ronald Reagan. But it's so creepy like, and then he does a fake voice. He's like, you know, it's a genius, Darren.
I love it. I'm thinking, Reagan, where was he in eighty seven?
I would like to know.
So at this point, though, Okay, now we're in November of ninety one.
What happened in nineteen ninety one? What point break came out?
Get out of time?
Yeah? Seriously?
Huh Well, I interestingly that you mentioned that. This is yes, keep it in mind. So at this point he's not gone more than a full season without pulling a bank job. Every three months, at least he's robbing a bank, right. He took off the month of July the copy they noted that, and then time he want it, I want a vacation, you know, go and hang up with the kids. Yeah, from April to October he robbed at least one bank
every month in the Chicago Land area. Right then boom, February of ninety two, walks into a bank in Rockford, as in the Rockford Peaches pulls off his eighteenth successful bank robbery in a row. And then he continued this run through the rest of ninety two, like he's the Chicago Bulls. Till December of ninety two. That's when the
FBI investigators noticed a new wrinkle in the crime. As the Chicago Tribune reports on December tenth, nineteen ninety two, Apparently even bank robbers but believe imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. Now what did the Tribune mean by this, Elizabeth Well, proof of that came Wednesday morning, when a Wheeling bank was robbed by a man authorities believe has joined forces with the infamous Flesh Mask Bandit and has patterned his robberies after his new found partner's methods, even
down to using his trademark mask. Now there were two of them, eliab.
And were they there at the same time? Well, otherwise it's a copycat.
Yes, there's just one guy.
We're working together.
Well, apparently he's working fast to catch up, because he gets credited before robberies of his own, before the FBI acknowledges he even exists. Right back to my man, Bob Long, FBI spokesman. Now he has an accomplice, a partner. This guy does the exact same things. Everything is exactly the same, except this guy is shorter.
Why do they say it's a partner? I say it's a copycat, Well they figured out right.
I'm with you, it seems like it's a copycat. Technically it is a.
Copy driving that same light blue Chevy.
He modeled everything, even down to the late model Chevy or GM brand car. So at this point, the og flesh Mask band has successfully pulled off twenty five bank jobs. His accomplice is understudy, if you will call it that, he's pulled off four more of his own. Right, So if he piled their crimes together, they've now pulled off twenty nine bank jobs. They only need five more to break the record.
Elizabeth Sun Spoilerli.
Yes, the new flesh mask band it was estimated to be five foot eight. He preferred to drive an Olds to a Chevy because you know, but keeping a GM because it's Chicago. Now, he was spotted in an Oldmobile Delta eighty eight. My dad have one of those nice ride, right this stolen ride he ditches it. The car was located later. Now, at this point, the FBI has to admit to the press that there were now two flesh mask bandits. And if I were in the Chicago press, I would have had to ask the g men, do
you think they share the same president mask. Oh yeah, which is me weird. But then the FBI would have rolled its eyes and they would have told me that sometimes the two flesh mask bandits did indeed work together. So obviously there'd have to be two president's mask Which ones? Is it? Like Reagann but and Nixon? Like what are we talking about? Because you know they were like kind of competitive and they're like, come on, what kind of questions are they?
President? Vice president?
So a good call, yeah, trying to get the incumbent in there. So the FBI has done the legwork. They figured out the two flesh mask band it's their new mo. They they'd wear similar outfits, the president masks. They'd both drive stolen cars made by GM. The two would arrive together in separate cars. One man would rob the bank, then he'd walk out to his getaway car. The second president would then follow the getaway car and act as a roadblock in case the cops gave chase.
I thought you were going to say, the second guy would then go in after and hit him again.
No, that would be great least expected.
So the new one was working, though he starts working on his own alone. They switched up their m O again. So they only do this for a little bit, and perhaps it was a training period. Here's your training wheel, son.
Because mentorment situation.
Yeah, like Princess Bribe a dread Pirate Roberts where there's the overlapper and he's like, you beat the dread pirate Roberts, then we'll get a new crew. Anyway, the flesh mask banded. They keep at it and now it's the younger one, the shorter one, doing all the robbing. And Elizabeth, you were right. It was a father and son, John T. Hunter the elder and John T. Hunter the younger. Wow, so let's take a little break here, we get back. I will tell you how it all goes wrong.
It's the family that crimes together, all.
Right, Elizabeth, Yes, it's nineteen ninety three, now you're ready for it. Yes, crazy year, I love it. You know what's gonna happen with the flesh mask bandits? No, they made the record thirty five banks in seven years. They took it to the house early or Chicago Pride, what ut slap and I Five's and Michael Jordan totally yeah. Anyway, I don't I don't know if they're considered breaking the record because the FBI is really hard about like parsing out.
They only will give them credit for thirty three banks even though they have thirty five, and then all the numbers line up. They're like, oh, I don't know, I don't know.
Why they are they fix why they hold.
In Chicago down. But anyway, they did it, Elizabeth, just like Hammer and Hank, Aaron cal Ripkin Junior, Joe Imaggio, they went the distance it so. April twenty eight, nineteen ninety three, Chicago Tribune reported that quote, the flesh Mask Bandit and his accomplice eluded authorities for seven years, pulling off thirty five bank hest in seven states, seven states. The father and son now they're working in Wisconsin, Michigan, Minnesota, Iowa, Ohio,
and Indiana. Wow, yeah, right, thirty fifth robbery occurred in Toledo, Ohio.
They're putting some miles on that eighty eight that.
Holds me eighty eight. So the delta keeps rolling, right, that delta eight ads good. So it's now official. They're about to end their run. I'll just I'll cut to the checks. Because after their thirty fifth successful bank robbery in a row, the flesh mask bandits get busted. Yeah. With each bank they rob, the FBI learned more and more about them, right, the g men. They work up this very accurate profile. The FBI field agents. They start to know that here's their mo. They have flesh mass bandits.
They always strike between nine thirty am and ten thirty am, always.
The beginning of the day, exactly.
People are in a lull. They've done what they've opened up, and now that the first customers are gone, they got like that little pause. And always on Thursday or Friday, always in a suburban area. Pair was mad loyal to GM cars, Yeah, proper so they always told GM cars for night a tour nineteen seventy eight to nineteen eighty eight. And they always use those as air getaway whips. No Tauruses, no, no Dodge k cars. No. They brought guns, never used them.
Their guns might not even be loaded. We don't know. It turns out all that though, it was accurate, the FBI's profile spot on. They did all of that.
Right, Well, it's not really a profile. Those are just observations.
Whatever, you know, That's what that's what the FBI called it. I'm quoting them, Melissa, But it wasn't their profile that becomes their undoing. Instead it was what dumb luck? That's right, they get brought down by dumb luck. No bothering sound the wildly successful for seven years they rob banks, never get greedy, never hurt anyone. They just did what they did. They pulled money. It was going so good. How did they get caught? What would be the dumb story? The ridiculous of this neess.
It's usually like greed too when they try and do too much.
Well, came down to basically a pain in the neck innocent bystander, one of them busy bodies. Yeah, yep, in one of your people, yes, and a license plate oh yeah. Right. So, around three thirty AM on a Thursday morning, right before they're gonna go rob a bank. Later that day, apparently a call comes into the Tippy Canoe County Sheriff's Department. Yeah, exactly. The call reports suspicious activity going down in an apartment complex parking lock. So an officer responds to the call,
Deputy Sheriff Richard L. Walker, Right, so, Dick Walker. He arrives on the scene. The off spies a man huddled low behind a car. He's busy. This man he's attempting to steal the license plate, so the headlights of the cop car catch his attention. Though the young man scampers off. He bounds over to a Toyota cameray, hops in the camera and it speeds off. This is their first mistake. I'm just saying dumbing against Toyota, fine car maker, but
they had been sticking with GM. They brought their own pattern. And then the deputy sheriff right, he sees the car the camera speed off. Well, Elizabeth, remember, let me just tell you about this. I'd like you to close your eyes. Yes, as a close I'd like you to picture it. It's
the small hours of the morning. The quiet is shattered by the sound of a Toyota camray's speeding engine and squealing tires as it tears out of an apartment complex parking the camera, followed close fo by the throaty roar of a well maintained patrol car engine. And you, Elizabeth, are behind the wheel of a second patrol car, second on the scene and now engaged in a high speed pursuit. Nice, Elizabeth, you are Deputy done. Based on your time in the London Flying Skull, you were able to get a job
in Tippy Canoe County right away. So it's your second week on the job, and now you're racing through the dark at ninety miles an hour. You and Deputy Walker pursue the Toyota Camry for about six miles. It's a heavy chase. Then Deputy Dick Walker's patrol car draws closer. He gets within about one hundred feet of the camera. That's when you spot a man as he slides out of the passenger side window. The man has a long barreled gun. He levels it at you in Deputy Walker's
patrol car and then boom wow. The man hanging out the shotgun window gets busy with his scatter gun. He fires three times. He hits both Deputy Walker's car and your car. One bolt shatters Deputy Walker's windshield. Your car gets hit twice. One of your car tires is shot out. The camera speeds off. Brake lights so flash, and the car pulls to a sliding stop on the side of the road. You're confused, Deputy Dick Walker's confused. You both roll to a stop a safe distance. Your car has
been shot twice. One wheel nut is sagging. The Camray idols though in the dark, you and Deputy Walker call for backup. You wait, watching the camera, worried the man with a shotgun might just get out and start shooting again. The night is still and quiet. The peace, though, is broken when the camera speeds up again. Your patrol car is done, so you're out of this high speech chase, Elizabeth.
After your initial encounter with the father and son bandits, the other officers did join the pursuit from all these different county roads they're closing in. Fifteen minutes later, one of the cars they see the camera and another six miles away. The camry kills its headlights and disappears into the darkness because they realize, oh, they can't see us on these farm roads, so they're now running like thunder
road lights out. An hour later, sometime around four point thirty am, a deputy spots the camera gives chase again. This time, man riding a shotgun slides out of the window just like last time, takes amen boom. He fires that long barrel weapon and the deputy recalled later, I saw a muscle flashes coming from the vehicle. Now one of the slugs tears through the cars metal skin and frame.
Hits the officer lodges in the deputy's left calf. All right, he feels this like a stinging and a buzzin in his left Six shots were fired in total at him. He only gets hit once. The camera again slipped away in that fast disappearing dark. Just before the dawn. They're running out of darkness, Elizabeth, things are starting to turn purple the camera. He gets seen again, parked beside a barn. Officers called in for backup. Other officers respond once again.
Now we're getting multiple counties. The chase begins all over again. This time though one officer decides he or she I don't know, has had enough. They pilot their patrol cruiser right into the camera at high speed, and the cop car broadsides the cameray just takes them off the road.
Crown Vick, full of anger.
Exactly, just folds the camera around the front end chases over. Father John T. Hunters captured after he tries to make a run for it. He's run down by several cop cars and is promptly arrested. The younger man, the son, John the Hunter Junior, He also fled the camera. He makes it to the woods, disappears into the shadow and shade of the trees gone. The deputies. They go on. They searched the camera, Elizabeth, what do you think they
found the camera? They did find the camera. Underneath all of that was the camera, but inside of the camera were guns, mass lots of guns, three handguns, two rifles, two shotguns, about five hundred rounds ammo. They also found a map of local banks with notes on their security like stars of like this one's good. And then there was also you know, since there were the flesh mask bandits,
there should be some evidence, right, yeh, cops. They find masks, several masks like it's your closet opake latex masks.
Right.
One of the masks is a Michael Doucoccus mask.
Get out here? Did they put the giant homet on?
It's probably my favorite part of the story for Michael Doucoccus.
Masks, obscure mask if you had it today, totally like people, who are you? Michael?
Getting robbed by Reagan is one thing, but if a bank robber came in nineteen ninety three with a Michael Ducaccas mask, I would laugh them out of the bank and they'd be like you gotta be joking, man, Come on, they pull a gun.
I'm like, come on, man, is a Howard Dean mass Later.
Who So back to the sun, John the Hunter Junior, or the Younger if you prefer. He was still on the run, right, So he's in the woods. Cops bring out a small fleet of helicopters. They go, all right, we'll cover the woods from above. Choppers are outfitted with thermal imaging devices. They're bound to catch this boy. They're just military tech and stuff. Right after a day of searching, though, the choppers they get grounded because they ain't found nothing.
Squat did the squat no signs of John the Hunter Younger? Right, One FBI agent told the press at the time, these guys are no dummies. They're good. So meanwhile, on foot, they have twenty officers going through these woods, four different law enforcement agencies. They're continuing. They basically a five square miles search at this point, a manhunt and no luck. But given enough time, this lone flesh mask bandit out there by himself in the woods, Elizabeth. He grows scared
and more importantly, he grows hungry. John johns Yeah, little John Junior. He walks out of the woods and he walks over to a McDonald's at five point thirty in the morning. He's like, on a Friday.
Morning, have you started serving lunch yet?
And he's like, are you guys open? And they're not open. So he phoned the police and he told them where to find him.
He was just like, that's it. I'm starving. All I wanted was, yeah, I.
Didn't get my m so can you guys pick me up and maybe take me to McDonald's.
Over you ever, I've been that defeated and hungry where you're just like, I give up on life. I am so hungry and I'm so frustrated. You know what, arrest me call I'll call. The other night, I was like, I want to eat dinner, and I was so tired and I was so hungry.
Just went out in the road and said, just arrest me.
Somebody laid down and then a squirrel.
Came over and brought me a hammurger.
One of your buddies.
That's great.
Nice. Well, the FBI, they were stoked, right, and they caught him because he calls him up, arranges his own arrest. Right, they go and they pick him up, but they had to acknowledge too the Chicago Press that this is just a case of pure dumb luck, and they said, just a matter of chances, someone called nine to one one to report the license plate theft.
Good for them, right, yeah, exactly for the busy buddy.
Little shot the Chicago p D. The town. So, the FBI estimated that the father and son bandit team stole about a half million dollars in their multi year multi state bank robbery spreef million. Yeah. They were just grabbing like twenty grand here, twenty three grand there, eighteen grand around. Yeah, basically whatever they get off of the they didn't. They never hit a vault, so they always had small amounts.
Yeah.
Anyway, the bigger reason why it took so long for them to get caught was once they pulled on their Ronald Reagan masks, they didn't pull them off until they were safe back in their hideout. They were committed to the bit. Elizabeth Wow. Yeah, once they were Reagan, they stayed right.
Yeah. They were in character exactly like.
The little Dustin Hoffman's robbing you choices. So, one of John the Hunter Junior's neighbors, a man named Brian Frack, he told reporters. He was surprised to learn that his neighbor was one of the flesh masked bandits. Track said, and I quote, I don't know where he worked. We always thought he was going to the health club with the duffel bag he carried, so his father health nut, John the Hunter the elder. He also had neighbors who
clocked him right. One neighbor, Marcos Garcia. He told the press that the elder flesh mass band it was also a quiet man who kept it himself, and then neighbors always assumed he was retired. Right. Occasionally he would dramatically change his appearance, though.
So as Garci hair like Ronald Reagan.
No exactly, as Garcia recalled, he had gray hair around Christmas and he dyed his hair black.
He did, yeah, yeah, just die.
One for the Gipper. So once the father and son they get caught, the FBI and the DJ and they threw all the laws out of Elizabeth. The father and sons bands they get charged with sixty six count indictment. That's a lot. And at the time, John the Elder was fifty five, John the Younger was twenty eight. The pairent they get charged with thirty three bank robberies. Once again, that guy's like, we're not giving you the record like fun exactly. So between nineteen ninety nineteen ninety three they
wouldn't throw in the other ones. I guess. Prosecutors relied on quote a day calendar with handwritten notations corresponding to the dates and amounts taken in du Caucus robberies committed from January nineteen ninety three to the present.
Wait is it with this note taking people?
I know, right, I mean, either come up with a code or like use invisible ink or.
Something something like this whole like maybe commit some stuff to memory. I don't know the accus robberies though, that sounds like a John Grishop's style novel you'd buy in the airport in to Caucus robberies. So in court, the defenders they never spoke more than a one word answer. Yep, nope,
that's all they're saying. Right on the defense side, the father and son bandits, they had defense attorney Edwin J. Bells Now that's with a Z and his defense strategy was based on the argument that the gunfight with the police was never serious. You know, come on, there's joshing around or has he put it, there was not an intent to kill, but an intent to scare these officers. They're trying to keep these cops at bay. So look, that's your lawyer, and that's his argument. You are going to jail.
Attorney j Bells so.
Mean, seemingly aware of the fact that they were losing the case. Late in all the legal wrangling of the court, the father, John the Hunter of the Elder, he finally said more than one word and he decided he'd speak up and try to save his son. He testified that his son wasn't even in the camera and then instead it was his friend, Frank Wilson. Yeah, he was in the car with me. So Frank Wilson is Frank Wilson
my buddy. You don't know him. He's from Canada. So Hunter the Elder, right, he testified when the officer chased Wilson, my son got out of the car and ran across the street. So he's going with it, right. Prosecutors laughing at this, like literally mocking him in court about this this last minute hail Mary's legal strategy. He's calling the friend fictitious. Frank. He's like, look, we've heard enough about fictitious Frank. Oh yeah, and he told the jury you
have to discount all the evidence to believe him. What you have here is a classic example of a dad trying to protect his son. So you'll forget about fictitious Frank. The trial concludes, Elizabeth, the jury deliberates. What do you think was their verdict?
Not guilty?
Guilty mostly John the Hunter the Elder he gets found guilty on two counts of attempted murder and twelve other fellon accounts of the bank robbering and so forth. For his son, John the Hunter the Younger, the jury was a little less certain. They couldn't place him in the car. Apparently it worked the course exactly, but he's only He gets convicted on charges of accepting stolen property for the license plate theft. They could only get it.
Introduce doubt, yep.
John the Hunter the Elder gets sent ten to eighty years in prison. He's fifty five. He ain't never seen sunshine again, all right? His son, John the Hunter the Younger was sentenced to just three years in prison for his involvement. Wow, and with that, their record setting run was over and done.
Do you think he feels guilt that his dad's doing well. His dad started it.
Ye, his dad tried to make the move.
I think he yeah, he was just maybe his dad was forcing him to do it.
There you go. That's the end of the flesh masked bandits. Elizabeth, what's our ridiculous takeaway here?
Oh?
Man?
You know, if you're gonna use a mask, use a really obscure.
One, obscure mass, obscure mass, like like, what what are we talking?
Are like if they're like, oh, there was a Reagan mask and then people are looking around for other car drivers with Reagan masksh.
I'd be wearing like a Marcel do shomp mask. Yes, yes, a Hochi min mask. Like what are we talking?
Air Well, I'm thinking like a Boutros Buttros golly mas?
Can I get like an e I mean yeah, sures Butros Collie ye, yes? Or Secretary General that's Weinberger mash.
That's good, um Pete bootage edge keep it modern.
Yeah, Ralph, Yeah, so you know Ross Perot.
Mask with withe like with the ears coming out with the pointy big wi.
Yes.
I'm just saying like, go go deep into the into the archives, but you're not particularly recognizable.
Sarn that's my ridiculous take it there you go.
Well, thank you for not asking, because I don't have one for you, so we're even. Hey, pretty, can you mellow out this vibe with a talk?
Yeah?
Hit me, I got just the thing.
Oh my god, I I have something ridiculous.
I think is going to take two to three talkbacks. It's from Weird History one oh one and a book by John Richard Stevens. I'm going to read a portion to you. At one famous trial in France in fifteen twenty two, some rats were charged with felonious eating and one timely destroying the province's barley crop, and so were ordered to appear in.
Court part two.
When they failed to show, the rats attorney argued that the summons was too specific. He insisted that all the rats in the diocese should be summoned, that the summonses should be read from the pulpits of all the parishes in the area. The court agreed, and another hearing was scheduled.
When the rats again failed to appear, The defense attorney explained that the rats really did want to come to court, but were afraid to leave their holes and make their long journey because of the vigilance of the plaintiff's cats. He added that the rats would appear if the plaintiffs posted bonds under heavy penalties that the cats would not
molest his clients. The judges thought this was fair, but the plaintiffs refused to be responsible for the behavior of their cats, so the case was adjourned without setting a date for another hearing, which in effect ended the case in the rats favor. The attorney, named Bartholomew Chousina went on to become a famous French lawyer. That is ridiculous.
Also, but there's this like surreal quality where I feel like we're in high school and the teacher asked her to read from the book and we're all.
Sitting there and getting really confused. This is amazing. Thank you so much.
Yeah, thank you. That was great.
Well.
As always, can find this hat ridiculous crime on the social media's. We have the website ridiculous crime dot com. Hit it up. It's a fun ride. We also love you talkbacks obviously, so please share them. Go to the iHeart app downloaded, speak in to it and the emails if you like a ridiculous crime at gmail dot com. As always typed Dear Elizabeth and there you go. So Hey, we'll be back next Crime. Thank you for listening.
Hey.
Ridico's Crime is hosted by Elizabeth Dutton and Zarin Burnett, produced and edited by Dave head On. Straight Mask Go On, Crooked Exit, Stage left with the cash Gone took it. Houston Research is by MRSA. I don't like masks, Brown and Andrea me either, unless it's like an opera mask song Sharpened Tears. Our theme song is by Thomas with a half a face Iron, the other half water looking like alien science, Lee and Travis but the other side of keep Loube with the pens Oil Dutton. The host
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