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Elizabeth Dutton Zaren Damn. Glad to see you.
I am so glad to see you.
I got a question for you, Yes, sir? Do you know what's ridiculous?
I do share chocolate. It's ridiculously good.
I'm with you. You love chocolate, I mean in a ridiculous announce You know.
Do you like truffles?
Oh? Like the chocolate cover Yeah?
Not the ones that yeah, I like the ones that pigs don't find right.
So the chocolate e ones you're into that.
Whatever, Let's pretend I am have.
I got the truffles for you.
Okay.
Did you know that May second is National Truffle Day?
I did not. I did not.
We're recording this in May, yes, uh, mid mid late May, so to celebrate National Truffle Day. May second. Put that in your calendar. Let me get my pen Uller High Life, The Champagne Appears is partnering with award winning tier and entrepreneur Philip to create Miller High Life. Barshnacks Truffles, a collection of great tasting chocolate confections that toast to iconic flavors and memories made in bars everywhere. So they have what is this six flavors?
You're gonna tell me what they are?
Of course I am.
What are they? Elizabeth grilled cheese, god.
So decadent, triple cream cheese, white chocolate ganash, and a blonde chocolate shell. Lemon pepper chicken wing, an innovative fried chicken ganash infused with lemon pepper seasoning.
There's four more.
Pretzel pretzel prayleein that doesn't sound too crazy. Beer nut freshly roasted peanuts soaked in the Champagne of beers, then ground into our fragrant beer nut butter and robed in a milk chocolate shell. Buttery popcorn.
They're not even trying anymore.
No sweet potato fry.
Okay, you know that there's a company or I guess like the whole champagne industry, and Rant is currently trying to sue Miller for calling themselves the Champagne of beer. But you think about it, Champagne is kind of the Miller of wines.
One let me tell you one more thing. There is a final Boss of truffles.
I was trying to.
So both of these, both the Miller and the one I'm about to tell you about. We've been getting a lot, like a lot, a lot, a lot of this compartise is a chocolate tear and they teamed up with Velvetda to create truff Vels, the first ever chocolate cheese truffle. Now they may have a bone to pick with the Miller High Life. They got some cheese up in there, Yeah,
they did. Truff Vels brings the deliciously creamy and iconic Velveta drip to the world of compartise or like one has the accent over the at the end campartise or compart whatever. This place the chocolate company. They're gourmet luxury chocolate for whatever reason, they're slumming with Velveta. Yeah, so chocolate and Velveta. Okay, you done? No, I'm not done. Oh they're made to look like those don't look like normal truffles like shells. They look like pasta shells.
Wait, they quick pasta shells like their little like macaroni and cheese.
Did I stutter like, like you know this shell you put fancy mac fancy?
Okay, you know if.
You're fancy and you use Velveda in your macaroni and cheese. Okay, there it is.
Yeah, that qualifies hundred percent ridiculous.
That was thank you if you got a second, I got something for you always Okay. Do you know there was a once a two week long hostage crisis, complete with proof of life videos, Fax communicates release demands, a Patty her style kidnap victim, siding with the kidnappers in the wildest part Elizabeth. In the end, the kidnapping victim was put into a wood chipper. But it's okay, that's okay. The victim was a college mascot, the Stanford Tree.
Oh, I just went through such a roller coaster of emotions.
This is ridiculous Crime A podcast about absurd and outrageous capers. Heist in cons it's always ninety nine percent murder free and one ridiculous. Oh Saren, Yeah, look at that, Jenks. Okay, you are a Bay Area native.
Yes I am.
You are from Oakland, Yes I am. You have family who attended col.
Yes, I am the family shame because I didn't go to cow like everybody else.
Oh, it runs that deep.
Yeah, I went to UC Davis multiple what they call the farm school.
Yeah, actually, yeah, the the farm to caw or.
Yeah, there's a superior cal Davis say that out of insecurity.
Well, I like to imagine that you have a few thoughts and opinions about the Big Game. Oh yes, yeah, okay, Now, of course around these parts of the Bay Area, that's the annual football game between long standing rivals Cal Berkeley and Stanford. Now, what do you remember the Big Game when you were a.
Kid, Well, we always went, did you, Yeah, you witnessed. We'd walk over to the to the game growing up and then or my grandparents were Stanford fans and lived in Paloelto.
N family division, so I would go over.
A lot of times to see them on that weekend. And oh the game against your calams, like come totally like decked out in in calgear and sit there with all the fine swells for Stanford.
You did it even crazier. I thought you were going to go basically side against your cal family. You guys sit with the Stanford people. You would take your colgear.
Yes, yes, I would, I like a kid.
No, No, I don't know.
You don't know that. Yeah, you cow kids are crazy. Well, there was in the Big Game. I did a bunch of research on the Big Game because, uh, like at one time there used to be like a really big event in the Bay Area, and I was reading about how quote there was a time when the Boosters took over San Francisco on the Friday night before the game, with reports of pet bands playing from the roofs of
street cars. Oh yeah, I was like, wait, what, like, how wild is that depicture going down like Market Street? Just the street cars and people are all these drunks are shouting and screaming about cal Berkeley.
Yeah, I guess or Stanford likely.
I think there was less to do then.
Yeah, that's true. That is very true.
When I first moved to nor Call my family, the Big Game was still a big deal. Like the dads and moms of all my friends, the really pretentious ones, the ones they wanted you to know they went to Stanford and cow They would go crazy big game weekend, maybe driving around Davis with their cardinal red or they're blue and gold.
Is it blue and gold?
Right?
Yeah? Not blue and gold.
Yeah, I'm like nine years old, right, So I'm like, sorry, I've never heard of either of your schools. I'm from sec Land, none that we don't talk about any of this, But I love your Big Game.
That's it's cute.
But anyways, so to be fair, though, Cal had a good football team at one time, Like Aaron Rodgers went there, he was a quarterback Tony Gonzalez. Like and Stanford, they were also pretty good at times.
People have heard of them.
Yeah, I know, like they had good goal they have good coaching, they have had good players. But these days both teams are pretty bad. So the big game, it's not so easy to get excited when they're one and five.
I will tell you everyone I know who went to Cal, when their team is criticized, will say to a supporter of whatever other team, well, how many Nobel Laureates do you have at your college? That's how Cal rolls.
That's so Cal.
Oh man, Okay, well you know what, like, is there an element on the periodic table of elements named after.
Yeah, there's no Stanford and so yeah, good point. You got us on that.
And I got to say, growing up in Davis, they like they kind of like bass in the like radiant glow that they were once attached to Berkeley because they literally were the farm, the experimental farm for Berkeley, and then they became their own university. They're always like, yeah, we're like Cal Davis, you know, like that's so huge anyway, So it turns out that the Big Game, it used to be a big deal, and it's no longer such
a big deal, like you don't even these days. You can drive around the Bay that weekend and not even tell right. But I thought it was because the teams got bad, and that's not the case, it turns out, and when I looked into it, it was actually intentionally squelched.
The Big Game and all the antics.
And everything we used to occur when we were kids, that's all been downplayed. And the reason why is because of the story I'm going to tell you about the nineteen ninety eight Stanford Tree kidnapping.
Oh my gosh.
Yeah, that was the moment when the schools decided, you know, we need to put an end all this fun. This is not going somewhere. Well now, the thing about the Stanford Cow rivalry is it's really old, right, It goes back. But also so do their mascots. There's mascots have great stories to them. Question, do you know how the cow mascot is a bear?
Right? Did you know that the first cow bear mascots were real bears?
I did not know that.
Yes, like in nineteen thirty, the cow football team decided, you know, what the hell, and they brought out a real bear as their school's mascot for games. Up til then, they really hadn't had a mascot. They're like, let's go hard full bear. So they bring out a real life bear. The kids love it, right, So for five years they got a real bear on the sidelines. But there's a problem, you know with a real live bear, which is it's a real live bear. So they had what they called
control problems because there's a notoriously bad football fans. They find the game boring or they're mundane, and they're like, look, let me just to scratch somebody.
You know, I have a right to do that. Yeah, I support that.
No, I'm a hardcore football fans, so I have to disagree with the Bears on this. But regardless, six years later, right nineteen forty one, the school trots out a man in a bear suit as the new mascot because of all the control problems with the live bears. Right now, when I say a bear suit, I'm being really generous. Yeah, this was the new mascot was a dude wearing an oversized sweater.
And added to this, he was just a big hairy fella real.
Well kind of but a picture a pair of gold shoes specifically sized thirteen and a half, snazzy atop his head. He wore a bear head. Ok but the bear head was just a football helmet with some first stretched over it and some ears stitched on.
Right. But the kids, they loved it. They see this guy running around.
Like they said, they didn't have a lot to do that exactly.
They're like, oh man, the guy in the sweater and the bear had this is amazing. Kids are cheering him on. So he decided, you know what, I'm gonna give this guy a name. He starts calling himself Oski.
Yeah that's what they're still called.
Yes, So Oscar the Bear is born that day in nineteen whatever, thirty forty one, right September, September forty one. Okay, so legend is born Osky the Bear. Now this bear, this man in the bear suit, nobody knew who it was for fifty eight years, really kept a secret for fifty eight years. There was a whole deal, like was the pride of being Oscy was like.
The anonymity of it.
Yeah, So in nineteen ninety nine, a dude named William c Rockwell. He comes forward and he confesses that he is Oski. But he'd only done it for a few years because eventually put down the Bearhead and he went to war in World War Two. You over seas right for him, But he created such a legend that somebody else picked up the bear Head.
And they stayed anonymous.
Yes, and then they've just continued doing the tradition, I guess. And so there's even a secret society to this day that's dedicated to protecting the secret identity whoever is the current Oscar.
Wow. I did not know that.
They also safeguard the mascot itself.
Did you have a mascot in high school, like a costume that people wore.
Yeah, the Blue Devils, Yeah, but it was very small. It was just like a trident and like a hat like a lot.
We were in high school. We were the monarchs, not butterflies.
Like the Kings and queens. Lion, yeah, oh, the king yet.
And there was a really busted up old lion costume like that. It looked like it was made out of old carpet and it was just just tattered and tattered and just smelled, patches are missing, and it was short and so like you had to get a short girl at the high school. Yeah, and so one one time someone was a little tall for it. And look comfortables are showing wells. The torso she had over all.
The time, you don't rip the stand up straight.
Then had this really bootsy hood.
And my friend had a pink bunny costume he used to wear down to.
Bar sometimes because he was his own mascot.
Yeah, it's basically it a full pink bunny costume with the head and everything.
Take it off just to drink, they put it back on. It was awesome.
So anyway, anyway, yeah, back to Stanford, they also have a mascot.
Obviously it's the Stanford Tree.
So forty five miles south is Palazzo, California, home of Stanford, and the Stanford Tree now Stanford Tree came along a little bit later. It wasn't in nineteen thirty back when cal had its bear live mascot. Stanford had also a live mascot, but it was a person. It was a Native American man named Chief.
Like, oh, that's right, I remember hearing about the they used to have it as what was there.
The Stanford Indians Indian. Yeah.
Yeah.
The only good thing I can say about Chief Lightfoot is it was at least a real native American. It wasn't like some rich kid in red face. That's about the only good thing we can say about this. But starting in nineteen thirty Sam Year's Cows with the Bears, they had Chief Lightfoot out there whooping and stomping and rally and the football team and this this heat street created a tradition, also very successful, went on for decades.
Finally in the seventies of school was like.
Hey, you know what, this is kind of mad racist, Maybe we shouldn't do this. And so they're like, you know, maybe we shouldn't have like a living breathing American as like our mascot.
And you know it's not like a bear.
Yeah.
Anyway, so they're like, okay, that's the end of the Stanford Indians. So nineteen seventy two, Stanford changed its name of its school mascot to the Cardinals.
Right.
Yeah, Now this is not because you know, California is known for our red birds. We have no Cardinals, like West of the Mississippi's car to find them, right, But the Cardinal was the school's distinctive color on their logo. They're like, yeah, that's us, We're the color.
Right, So this.
Maybe like if they were the Stanford Millennial Pinks, you know, like the cal Shar Truce. Anyway, so Cardinals it was meant to be a temporary name, right, So all through the seventies they keep trying different names, the student bodies voting. Someone suggests they would be called the Sequoias, right, and
someone's like yeah, yeah, you know, for the super tall trees. Now, someone else like, what about the Griffins, And then they're like, yeah, that's the you know, the mythical lion with their wings creature, right, And someone's eventually like, yeah, Stanford Griffins.
I don't know.
So my favorite suggestion of this era was the Robber Barons, because Stanford was founded by Leland Stanford, the old railroad king Robert Baron. How great would it be of a school of rich kids and out they're rooting for the Robber Barons like maybe anyway, whatever. Eventually some kids like what about the Indians And they're like, yeah, we love that, Like they'd forgotten or us. Maybe the mood changed, I don't know. They were like yeah, let's do that again.
So eventually the eighties come around, still no mascot, and they're like, okay, well let's go with how about the Cardinals. So they go back to the original temporary name. But they decided, you know what, we can't have that, so it's unofficial. Stanford Technical has no mascot. Oh really yeah, But anyway, there's the Stanford Tree. So the Stanford Tree
is not the school's mascot. He is a member of the school's band, and as such, he travels with the band and he shows up at all of these schools athletic events, but especially the big ones like the Big Game. So to recap, we have a mystery human in a bear suit that's husky, and then we have a musical tree. These are our massot And.
Isn't their band, Like we're irreverent?
What's up?
Oh yeah, the bands are reverend Also so is the musical Yeah, they're like very tongue in cheek, Elizabeth. If they do the silly looking tree, he wears sunglasses, he's got this big goofy some mile. Basically, the Stanford Tree looks like someone's uncle managed to get a Christmas tree drunk exactly Okay, so now that we know our players, let's take a little break and I will tell you how this turns into all sorts of violence.
Oh okay, Elizabeth, Okay.
We have our bear and our musical tree.
Yes, all right, they are the avatars of this rivalry. Okay, Now, as you would imagined, these the bear and the Tree have gone at it in the past. In fact, also the fans have gone at it. But specifically here, I'll just go with a report from the Daily Cow that's
the newspaper of the cal Berkeley right. So the student paper recorded quote on February fifteenth, nineteen ninety five, during a basketball game between the Bears and the Cardinals, the two mascots wrestled each other to the Maples Pavilion floor. The fight got so vicious that Oski's head came off for a brief moment. However, the head was promptly restored and his identity remained concealed. There was a fight to keep from being known. So anyway, no one got to
see the human inside the bear skin. See, society would be happy. But meanwhile, the Stanford Tree, the human that's inside the Stanford Tree, he's well known on campus it's the exact opposite approach and is considered a position of honor to be the Stanford Tree. And this is probably
because it's extremely dangerous for the person inside. Like, there was a time in the mid nineties when Cow fans chased the tree off of the field at the end of the Big Game and they like narrowly escaped getting like you know, I don't know, treed and feathered or whatever.
Well I was always told about in the early eighties, there was a thing called the play.
Oh Yeah, the band went on the next.
Yeah that the band, the Stanford band, thought the game was.
Over and they go on the field and they get and the players ran and through the band to score. There's like just getting a tube of the tuba knocking down a guy with a trombone. It's an amazing benefootage. I highly recommend it.
Uh.
There was also another time in the eighties when the tree wasn't so lucky or sorry the nineties, when the tree wasn't so lucky. He didn't he didn't manage to get off the field before the fans got to Yeah.
Once again, I.
Returned to the daily Cow quote. At the nineteen ninety six Big Game angry cow fans once again storm Memorial Stadium field and targeted the Stanford Tree. The tree was not so lucky this time, as portions of the suit were dismantled, so they got their hands on the tree.
Was he torn limb from limb?
Wowow pretty much?
But this time, now that they've gotten a taste of the tree, it's like a predator from the zoo.
He gets a taste of blood.
The bloods.
We want more trees, pretty much.
I swear to got nineteen ninety seven Big game quote a riot which saw twenty three injuries and six arrests. Since these massacres, the Stanford Tree has not been seen on the field for the fourth quarter of any big game.
I do not remember any of this. This is crazy.
Now we get to the nineteen ninety eight Stanford Tree when he gets kidnapped. So, as you see, it's been building and building. Yeah right, Well, enter the Phoenix five. Yeah, that's what the boys called themselves. That's their group name, the Phoenix five. Now, mind you, these are not all students from Phoenix are Arizona. These are Berkeley students. And it's likely because you probably don't know this, it's from
Marvel comic books. There's something called the Phoenix Five. You see, Elizabeth, Uh, there was this group, the X Men, and five of them one time created their own subgroup called the Phoenix Five. And you know what, it doesn't matter.
So what you're saying is that these guys are dorks.
Yes, so they're dorks. Yeah, So the Tree Nabbing Group named for this subgroup of the X Men. Their individual members also had code names. So, just like in Tarantino's film Reservoir Dogs, they use color coded nicknames. So there were, but they didn't use the same ones of the film. So they had mister White, mister Black, mister Green, mister Yellow, and mister Orange. They wisely avoided the whole mister Brown
and mister pink debates. Sure so, anyway, it all makes more sense when you realize the Phoenix five were all fraternity brothers. Oh of course, yes, the end the frat Theta Kai. So one day, the fraB brothers they had opted to drive down to Stanford for as they claimed, a brotherhood activity.
I don't know what that means.
I don't know if that means they were meeting other brothers from the Stanford campus at Theta Kai, or if they were doing like, oh, it's rush week, let's do a prank. I really don't know, but in quotes Brotherhood of Activities. So what I can tell you is that the day was October seventeenth, nineteen ninety eight, the day the tree got seventeenth.
So that nineteen ninety eight.
So we're trying to remember where you were.
No, I'm thinking we're what.
Nine years after the earthquake, Yes, exactly.
I just hear October seventeen. You're like, go right to here, and then like it's just the light comes through the blinds and I huddle over, and I hear a helicopter.
Yes, a Frenchman smoking a cigarette.
I have a thousand yards stare.
On the nine year anniversary the Loma Prieta quake, the Stanford students were doing what they call Cardinal Chaos. Now Cardinal Chaos it's a big silly name for the first practice of the season for the men's and women's basketball teams.
That's literally what it is.
Anyways, So the Phoenix five they ride for Cardinal Chaos, and they mingle in with the Stanford students who don't. I guess they may have their own secret names whatever. So everyone's in there in the Maples Pavilion gym where the fight had happened two years earlier, and the Frat Bros are now officially undercover on the Stanford campus and they're like trying to cause mayhem, and they're looking at each other and they're kiki in and stands and trying
to go, we should do a prank. But they haven't disgusted at all. They haven't decided what type of prank they can do. They're imagining all the pranks they can do. They're inside of Stanford, but no opportunities present themselves, so they're like, let's leave, So Cardinal Chaos ends. They're like they walk out of the stadium or the auditory or whatever the gym.
Cardinal Chaos sounds like someone who would just like be an absolute terror in Vatican City.
Coming in with the mad Red.
So the Bros they all head back to their car in the parking lot Cardinal Chaos, and all a sudden serendipity plays a hand because the Phoenix five spot the Stanford Tree. Yes, the man inside the tree, Chris Henderson, was busy loading the Stanford Tree into the hid of his car. All right, plan is quickly hatched. Follow that tree. So the bros all hop in their car and they follow Chris Anderson. So we're in Palo Alto, California, Stanford campus.
The Phoenix five are on the prow. They follow Chris Anderson and he's the you know, the man in the tree. And they get all the way back to the Stanford band shack, now the Phoenix five park, and they sneak up close. Henderson gets out and he goes, it'side the band shack. They get up close, and what should they do? Elizabeth just rush in, knock him out, take the tree. What's the plan?
I have no idea.
Well, they realized burn it down the shack with him. It turns out they can hear music as they get closer. There's a party going on. The band shack is a rocking so don't come and knock in, right, So they decide let's hide out. Right, they can't blend in. It's too small. The band probably all knows each other. It's not be like, hey, I'm with Scott Man.
Yeah that's cool.
So are these four guys? You'd be worring. So they're like, I go, it's hide out. Let's wait. So I did a bunch of research on this, as I told you. Back in two thousand and eight, on the tenth anniversary of the kidnapping of the Stanford Tree, the Daily Cow interviewed one of the members of the Phoenix Five, and he gave us valuable insights as to how they did everything right the school paper. He's speaking of mister Orange, right, mister Orange, he was a freshman at the time, youngest
member of the prank crew. He recalled that fateful night. He remembered sneaking into the Stanford band shack. He said, the group waited to the small hours of the morning, Elizabeth, the purple hours. Right, here's mister Orange quote. Of course, there could still be passed out drunk Stanford band members inside after the party ended. I remembered lots of nerves during that time when we really couldn't be one hundred percent sure that there were no people left inside the building.
So they're just like five nerds sweating it outside.
Right there did dork on dork Vine.
Exactly four am rolls around the coast. Is finally clear. Two of the Phoenix five break into the band shack. The other three wait outside keeping watch. Back to mister howd quote it was pretty dark inside save a few neon signs, et cetera. I remember there being discussion about whether we're abandoned the whole thing.
That's how tenuous it was.
So yeah, I don't think I really thought too much about the craziness of the whole situation at the time. We were just focused on getting the job done without getting caught.
Right.
So these two dudes inside, they scramble through an old medical library. Then they find a hole in a wall. They go through a hole in the wall and they squeeze into the bandshack. They don't use like a door. They find make their own weird way. Boom, they're inside the banshack. There's nobody passed out drunk on the ground. They see the tree, they grab the tree. It's four in the morning, so they just walk out the front door. Now they don't go back out to the medical library.
I know, a hole in the wall.
They got lucky. They just purely get lucky.
So now the Phoenix five disappear with the Stanford Tree into the purple hours of dawn.
Huh gone, all right.
So now they've successfully walked out with Stanford's mascot, what do they do, Elizabeth, they go racing safely back to tow down, always with the fire. Well, luckily, mister Orenty tells us what he did.
Quote.
Even though we managed to get our hands on the tree in the very early hours of the morning, this didn't mean that there couldn't be random students walking by, cops passing by on the street, et cetera. In fact, we actually did see a cop car pass as we were planning things out behind the banshack. Oh danger, danger, Will Robinson. And anyway, their plan to get away is let's stuff the Stanford Tree into the back seat of
the car and just tear us out of here. Yeah, but they can't get five people and the Stanford tree into like whatever little car they have.
So, as mister recalled.
Quote, remember it was a nine to ten foot tall costume with a ton of material, even though it was a somewhat collapsible. I don't know about the other guys, but I more or less felt like it was a mission that we had to accomplish in the stealthiest way possible.
We were very aware that we were in hostile territory.
Oh God, take a little serious, right, So the frat Bros's side, they'd have a plan to make it right, right, So they shoved the tree in the back of the car. Two bros hop in, they drive off. Apparently I think one of their family members lives in Palo Alto, because they went to a quote safe house and then they tucked the tree right, and then they looked just be cool, right, and then they drive back and they get back to the three camp the three kids at the left on campus.
They load them in the car boom. They leave Palo Alto back to Berkeley to get another car, and then they come back, get the tree and go back to Berkeley. And then they finally managed to sneak it into the frat house and they just go into I believe mister Black's room and just shove it in the back right. Lots of shoven of this poor tree. So now they've successfully stolen the Stanford Tree.
So what do they do now?
I have no idea.
Well, based on all the prank wars and the fights and the riots has been leading up to it, they wait for the chaos to erupt, so all hell they know will break loose. First up, they decide, okay, let's let's just not tell anybody anything. They don't even tell their other frat brothers what they've done. They keep it secret. The Phoenix five hush hush, right, So they wait a week passes, right, and turns out the police decide to investigate this as a break in and robbery and they
label it as a felony. This means years in prison are going to being discussed by the police.
What's the value of the tree? Did they?
Oh?
Yeah, they get into that. I'll tell you about that in a second. So the Phoenix five they're laying low superheroes, hiding out in their secret layer or whatever. And as I told you, they told no one, right, And eventually Stanford Daily newspaper a week after the crime, they publish a feature story Stanford tree stolen, you know, And there, of course they immediately assume it's cow students who are behind the tree hate crime.
Right.
Chris Henderson, the guy inside the tree, He tells the student paper that he'd seen three or four people following him around outside the Maples Pavilion parking lot. Why is it always three to four people? Do human beings have a hard time counting past three? When it's word stress?
Were like three? I'm going everything's belonging possibly four.
I can't say, honestly, every time we hear this, it's amazing that number. It's never five to six, never two to three, it's always three to four. Anyway, guy in the tree, Chris Anderson, he tells the press he'd notice these three to four guys who'd followed him to the Stanford banchack, probably college students. And now the finger of blame is squarely pointed a cow. So the story is out there. The Phoenix five de side, let's reveal ourselves.
So they step into the limelight. Three days after the Stanford paper breaks loose, the Daily Californian prints there front page story a feature interview with the Phoenix five. The pranksters lord their people powered success over the private students of Stanford. They claimed that they liberated the tree. They said the tree had been unhappy at Stanford, and that can now that it's been at cal it's learned the value of hard work and diversity and the true spirit
of a campus. Meanwhile, the tree also has by the way pend and open letter, so there's a letter from the tree. Also in the paper. The Stanford Tree reportedly writes, quote, I'm sick of the farm. The Phoenix five have introduced me to the outside world. Now once he'd seen the outside world and col and he had opinions on the two schools, and the Trees then declared, quote cal a superior university, a Stanford an inferior one. So they're using
the tree for their propaganda. At this point, the tree also claimed that it was thankful to be free of Stanford and its snotty rich kid private school students. However, briefly and the Tree also promised that it would be back onto the Stanford sideline before the big game quote even though he knows that Stanford is full of a bunch of weenies. So for the ten year anniversary look
back the Daily Cow. They asked mister Orange why the Phoenix five decided to go down the hostage taken route as their communication with the world right.
Mister Orange said, quote.
As far as the hostage taker deal is concerned, I think there was an initial meeting where we planned all these things out, i e. The name of the group sending in the initial letter and the picture to the Daily Cow. Remember, everything happened extremely fast, and we took the tree. Nothing happened for almost an entire week until the story broke in the Stanford Daily. Then we had that quickly to demonstrate that the tree was on the
Cow campus and to dissuade others from claiming responsibility. Of course, as smart data kuys, we had to come up with the wittiest approach. We had lots of fun writ in that first letter in the persona of the tree, trying to trash Stanford in the best way possible. So now that we have this story in the student paper from Stanford and now one from Cow, the other people decided to take this very seriously. The people that I'm talking about are the police and the school administrations.
Oh so u C.
Berkeley, Channe, Robert Birdall. He comes in hot and heavy. He had obvious motives because you know, as the head of the university, he'd overseen now a few years of fights and pranks. They've grown more intense. Now he's got a riot and then this year he's got a kidnapping. Yeah,
and he's like, I'm starting to look bad, right. So he also imagined that come the big game, Stanford fans would be walking past, as you know, all the Cow fraternity roads to get to up to the stadium and that they would probably be eager to fight the bros. The bros would probably be eager to fight, and then he'd have once again an even bigger ride. Maybe somebody would get hurt or you know whatever. So he comes
out with a tersely worded statement. He called the prank quote outright theft, and the chancellor announced that the police would be brought in. He also issued an ultimatum. He told the tree nappers had until the big game to return the stolen tree or else right else, Yeah, so.
That the or else.
The Phoenix five were like, well, what would happen? So the chancellor he had an answer for that. He said that the cow mascot Osci the Bear, would be barred from the next Cow game against Oregon State. Treenappers had three days or else.
He was prepared to kidnap a mascot of his own. Darts. Yeah, anyway, the mascot theft.
This becomes news far beyond the universities, the student populations, The Bay area newspapers start reporting on it, the TV stations start reporting on it. The story gets bigger and bigger, and then it becomes national news. Eventually, Sports illustrated his writing about it. Days are passing, the deadline approaches, would the tree resurface?
Right?
So the Bay Area news teams they send cameras out to report live from the University of cow on the day of the midnight deadline.
They wait with the police department, and they waited, and they waited some more. No tree.
So instead there was a news conference broadcast live from an elementary school parking lot. Okay, and after this break, I'll tell you all about that news conference. All right, Elizabeth, I promised you a news conference.
Yes you did.
You've been waiting on baited breath an.
Elementary school parking lot. I am here for it.
You know what, rather than just discuss it, look, just close your up my picture. It it's nighttime in the Bay Area. The autumn breeze is brisk.
You are growing cold standing in an empty parking lot of an elementary school in the Oakland Hills. Elizabeth, you are a camera woman from the local Fox affiliate KTVU Channel two. You've been sent out on assignment to record a press conference with the Phoenix five. You have rigged a two camera setup for the live feed. One camera is on sticks. That's industry talk for a tripod. The second camera is a should mounted job that you plan to use for close ups and some wild coverage of
the late night press conference. There are no other media outlets.
There, just you.
The KTVU Channel two reporter five college dates guys wearing halloween masks and balaklava ski masks, and they are holding captive a ten foot tall tree costume, the Stanford Tree. That's the reason you're in this elementary school parking lot. You rack the focus and you set a clean image of mister Green, spokesman for the Phoenix five. The KTVU reporter steps into the shot. Okay, let's do one. She raises the mic into the shot and ask mister.
Green, how is the tree.
The Stanford Tree is still unharmed, and he tells the reporter how it's fine. And you can see for yourself this Phoenix five drag the Stanford Tree into the shot. The mask men promise that the tree has been treated well as you can see, and further, it would be returned to the weenies at Stanford before the big game. You try to squelch a little laugh at their jokes, but they go on as they say, truth be told, The tree may never want to return to Stanford. Now
the decene life outside the private school. The frat rose tawk a little more smack, then they laugh and they start to dance around with the Stanford Tree. You now have to swivel around to keep their shot. As the Stanford Tree and the frat roser dancing around in the parking lot, now you really can't help but smile. It's become just ridiculous. You're also getting colder by the minute. The news reporter is still trying to do a straight interview with the tree case, but it's pretty much impossible
now that the frat rows have broken into dance. It's like a real live crime musical. The reporter asked when the Phoenix five planned to return the tree to the students of Stanford. But the Phoenix five just laugh and keep dancing around with the Stanford Tree. You wonder how much of this you have to shoot before you can just load up the cameras and go because you want to go home, crawl back in bed and watch reruns in your favorite Barry a show restaurant review check please Yes.
As the cold evening.
Air chills your cheeks, you long for your pillow. The reporter gives you the signal this interview is done. You pack up as a frat Rose continue to dance around the parking lot with the tree in there stolen glee the mascot dancing with them and their wicked revelry. They're busy making memories.
They are.
Yeah, well, that proof of life video gets broadcast by k TVU around the bay. It's another outsized reaction to follow. Enter the Stanford Police. They don't see the humor in this. A man by the name of Captain Raould and Memeier steps forward, the Stanford Police Captain. He makes public comments of his own, he says, he goes to the news meeting.
He says, the Stanford tre tree is practically priceless. Remember you asked me how much. He puts a dollar amount on it.
Practically pricelessly priceless.
But if a monetary value were to be assigned to the tree, it would be worth well over one thousand.
Dollars practically price.
I know a price for most people.
One thousand dollars would not sound like very much, but it does qualify the theft as grand larceny, which makes it a felony. So the Phoenix fiver looking at real prison time. If Captain Neemeyer has anything.
To say about it is jurisdiction.
Well, the humorless cop went on to say, if you do the crime, you do the time.
You kidding.
Yes.
Meanwhile, the Barrier, newspapers, the TV stations, they continue to cover the story because now they got one with real legs and it's running. So in fact, they become a part of the story. Ransoms get raised, one by a local newspaper, another by a sporting good company. They promise if the tree is returned unharmed, they will donate fifty thousand dollars to a local Christmas tree charity.
A Christmas tree charity. Yeah, later down the air, I feel like calmless Christmas tree to get trees home.
So Lizabeth get these trees a home, if.
Only for three weeks.
Now, I think he's to give him out people who can't afford.
Christmas tree awareness.
Yeah, it's a really it's a holy Kito tie and like a little ribbon you put on the tree. Anyway, guy inside the tree, remember him, Chris Anderson. Yeah, he jumps forward again. He speaks out.
He kind of wish he was in the tree the whole time.
He's had He does too, he has had enough. He becomes really aggressive for a man who's best known as the bone structure of a tree Henderson. He releases his own statement to the press as the guy inside the tree. He mocks the tree n appers, and he tells that the phoenix five quote stop talking to a pile of fabric can show a little back bone.
So he didn't fight over the tree.
Now, the students from both campuses, you may be wondering, what did you think about this prank? Well, most of them thought it. His harm was fun. Some just wanted to it all go away. Others were like, who knows who cares? Right, They took your approach. But there was one cow student. I found a freshman on the rugby team, Teddy Miller. He admitted that he was no big fan
of Oscary calam mascot. He said, quote, I'm pretty lukewarm about him, right, But my favorite part is that he went on and he wanted to make sure that he could kind of run down the handshake of Oscy.
He said back to Teddy Miller, and he got wet hands.
I shook hands with him two or three times in my life, and every time I've had to wipe my hands on my pants.
He's shaking his hand more than once.
Yes, I'll give him another chance, so win me over. Staring it, Osky, this is your third chance? Is the last one? Three strikes?
You're out?
Bear?
Well, I mean the guy is in like a fur suit. Well, yeah, he's allowed to have sweaty hands.
Who doesn't like a moist bear? Really?
You know, I mean come on, but anyway, back to the grill again, the grill again, Elizabeth? Where were we? That's right, stolen tree. Yes, a chancellor was threatening to abduct our mascot product his own mascot to get back at school. All right, And the students, what did you think about that part of the whole mascot?
Kerfuffled? Like? Were they like?
I think the administration's being a little silly, like of anybody there being the ridiculous ones. Well, I'll tell you this much. Some of the students pointed out that this was a fifty seven year old, sweaty, clammy handed bear mascot who really gives a darn right? Right, So, like you know, Teddy Miller would be proud of these students. But anyway, setting aside all the empty threats to Oski. What about the more real threats of felonies that the
knee Myers throwing around for the students. Well that apply pressure? Would the other students come to them like, hey man, you can't making Theta Kai look bad or whatever?
Right?
Well, back to mister Orange from the Phoenix five, because he says that basically the dudes in the frat house were trying to be you know, cooler than Canna Reeves and a pretend gunfight. So, as mister Orange said, quote, in all honesty, we knew that no one had a clue who we were at the outset. We got the tree without anyone seeing us. So the whole police investigation
was a big sham. They claimed that they had stopped a car with five cow students on campus that night, but to this day, I don't know whether that actually happened or if it was just some attempt to.
Get us out into the open.
Right, because me comes forward, he's like, we're gonna check the DMV because we pulled over these students, and they're like, oh, I'll go for it.
Whatn't us?
Yeah?
Anyway, So other than the police tricks, So what did the boys parents think because you know, if they're gonna get kicked out of school or go to prison over a stolen bear. I mean, I think my parents would be mad, pissed. And I'm just saying well, mister Orange once again said quote, cooler heads prevailed now. He also said quote, I think out of the five, I was the one who felt the least amount of pressure. I was a seventeen year old freshman, not living at the house.
I was a minor in the legal sense, and not around the actual tree on a regular basis since it was being kept at the house for a while. The older guys in the group obviously felt more pressure as time went on, as more people were finding out about our involvement. So yeah, now that they got like the circle of swelling to snitch on them. So our youngest of the crew, mister Orange, he's not feeling the same pressure as the older guys, right. He wants to keep
the tree. He's like, let's run this table man. And I quote once again from him, quote, there were major discussions concerning whether to return the tree.
I was lobbing to.
Hold onto it until the big gang take it on a road trip. But the older guys in the group probably had better information on exactly how close we were to being discovered. So yeah, we never did get close to being caught, and I'm pretty sure we could have held out a little longer and done more fun things with the tree. But again, as the youngest, I wasn't in the best position to make the important decisions.
Oh Man Horn's storytelling kills me.
So at this point in the kidnapping ordeal, right, some of the tree nappers facing serious life changing penalties.
Mister Orange is like, he.
Tells, like, oh, well, I'll just leave it to him because I don't want to he tells the story, so, well, yeah, here I go. One was up for a big scholarship. Mister Yellow could have been deported, at least that was the claim. So even though I was really disappointed that the tree was returned after such a short period of time, I can understand they were coming from. So now apparently there's threats of deportation for various members of the Phoenix five.
So that's a bit of a rough one, getting kicked out of Cow because of a stolen tree. Anyway, the big game comes, So Elizabeth, is there going to be a tree?
Hmmm?
No.
On the day before Halloween, two weeks after the theft of the Stanford Tree and after the original missed ultimatum in deadline, a call comes into the UC Berkeley Chancellor's office. On the line is a representative for the Phoenix five.
He claims that he knows.
Where the Stanford Tree is, and he reports that it is fine, unharmed, and better yet, he would return it to the Chancellor's office, but on one condition. Amnesty for the thieves.
Right, yeah, total.
So the Chancellor agrees to the terms yes, and the Stanford DNAs students also agrees to the terms. Four PM, an older man described as quote older than a normal student who identified himself only as Rishard, walks into the Chancellor's office. In his hand was a plastic bag. In that plastic bag was the ten foot tall Stanford Tree. He handed over the kidnapping victim to the Chancellor's assistant. The bag gets open, the Tamford Tree is inspected. There's
indeed no damage. Oh well except for well, there was no real damage, right, it's just like, oh, it's a little bit wet, you know. They're like it's kind of smelled moldy or whatever. Right, So the it's confirmed. Richard walks off, never has to talk to anybody. UC Berkeley police sees the tree. Officers escort it back down to Stanford in a blue Ford Taurus.
Yes.
The police reported that during the trip, the Stanford tree was quote very well behaved and very cordial and polite. O.
Everyone's a cop humor exactly.
Now.
Once it's back at Stanford, the administration performed a second examination because I want to make sure they got the right tree. Can't be trying to like push no fake trees on us here. We ain't no punk over Stanford anyway. Former guy inside the tree, not the one currently, but a former one, Chris Carry. He is apparently on hand for the examination, so he later would tell the press quote,
he looks okay. He looks a little skinny, but we'll put him back on a diet of steroids and wheat grass and he should be okay for the big game.
Are you kidding?
So now for a publicity stuck Carrie tries on the tree in the office, decides it's fine, it's fits, there's no problems with it. Then another Stanford student who shows up in a quote Tree Protective Services shirt, handcuffs the Stanford tree and declares that the tree is now under his protection and walks away. The police chief Neemuyer, he also had his two cents the original joker. He says, quote that the tree was going to be secured in our evidence room, which is alarmed, and we do have
armed deputies there. So I got to say, threatening to shoot someone in order to protect a trash bag filled with the tree costumes so very American. Once the school had its tree back, Stanford administration agrees, what dropping all charges, you know, the criminal content all it's out the window.
Right.
Meanwhile, Chancellor bird All from Berkeley, he gives an interview and he says to the Daily Cow that he found the prank to be quote pretty funny in a sense, and that the Phoenix five had operated quote with a degree.
Of wit and charm end quote.
But again he reiterated that his imagined fears of riots and murders happening because of the stolen tree, and he said, you know, a prank like that could lead to real violence. Now, finally, the Phoenix five they got to have the last say. Just before they handed over the hostage tree, they faxed in a communicate that blamed quote a hostile climate for
their choice to return the tree. They added, quote, gone are the days of healthy rivalry in which students of opposing schools could pull pranks on each other in the.
Name of school spirit.
Now, later on, for the Big Game edition of The Daily Cow, the Phoenix Five were again given a platform. They said, quote, we wanted to pump up the rivalry, make it a cow spirit thing and poke fun at Stanford. With a rivalry like this, you gotta live in it. You've got to do something with it. Otherwise, why bother having it? That's a point, right, so to have the
last laugh. The next year, the nineteen ninety nine edition of The Big Game, The Daily Cow ran the story that featured a photo of the Phoenix Five.
Revealing their identities for all the world to see. And why not.
They gotten away with it and they got amnesty. Meanwhile, there was Stanford's response to this whole tree kidnapping kerfuffle. A little while after the Stanford Tree was returned, the Stanford band brought it out for the Stanford USC Game.
That's a big one.
Yeah, private school on private school, rich kids on rich kids, right, and they go out there to pump up the crowd. The band at halftime, the band wheels out a wood chipper and the Stanford Band They claimed that their fellow band member, the Stanford Tree, had been quote contaminated by its time with the public school students of UC Berkeley, and in order to purify the now soiled Stanford Tree,
they shoved this tree headfirst into the wood chipper. Boom, Stanford Tree is no more just a pile of Stanford toothpicks. But boom, all of a sudden, there's a surprise out comes a new Stanford Tree, revealed to be better and pure clean. Now, when he was asked about Stanford's choice to you know, destroy their own tree and a wood chipper, Old mister Orange had this to say, really took a liking to us after spending some time in Berkeley, and we kind of got attached to it as well, So
a slow, painful death wouldn't have been appropriate. But even though the Ferdies felt it necessary to put it through a wood chipper, I'm sure the process was a quick one and the suffering was minimal. I still don't understand why they do that to their own mascot. But nothing really surprised me as about Stanford or its students versus kids the war. That's what you missed in the late nineties while you were away. So what's our ridiculous takeaway?
I think that again, dork on dork, violence is always entertaining.
It's no Texas versus eight Mores say.
They're worried about riots. It's like, honey, take a look at what could.
Happen, Like, go down to look at Texas. What they did they called in the military.
Texas means business.
They had hunters shooting at people.
But I mean, I mean, as much as I roll my eyes at all their like dorky humor about it, I do appreciate this kind of stuff. I think it's you know, we need these kind of dramatics to keep things interesting, better that than serious problems.
And it creates a sense of community. And you know, obviously as long as no one really gets hurt, you know, I think these things are fun. And it's always once again the imagined fears that we we lose things because of what someone imagines, not because of what occurred.
Yeah, so you said that, now they squash it down.
Yeah, they play you all that, they do not.
Ever since then, they've always said because it's there have been other pranks since then, and then they've always threatened police action and legal consequences. They've they followed the hard line ever since then. So ever since bird All, Chancellor bird All put down. There's a serious stuff for bringing in the cops. It's always been that. Before that, that was not the case. It's always like you, guys.
Well, let's go over and encourage them to do it again, bring it back.
I say, we go steal it all right, there's Ridiculous Crime steals Osky, both Osky and.
The tree, and then we make them kiss.
Yes, yes, that's it.
That's all I got for it.
That's excellent.
Well, thanks for listening.
You can find us online always at ridiculous Crime on Twitter and on Instagram and on the internet at ridiculous crime dot com. You know, we got all sorts of stuff. We've got stories on the Instagram, we got posts and stuff on Twitter, and we got the talkback app on iHeart, so download that and you can send us messages. You can talk at us, yes, so yeah, there you go. Also if you want to email us ridiculous Crime at gmail dot com. We always like hearing from you. Thanks
for listening. Ridiculous Crime is hosted by Elizabeth Dutton and Zaren Burnette, produced and edited by our Man with the Chipper, Dave Kustin. Research is by Marissa the Tree, Doctor Brown and Andrea the Lawyer. Song Sharpened Tear Our theme song is by Thomas I Prefer to Smoke.
Them Trees, Lee and Travis Go Bears. Dutton.
Executive producers are Ben They should have been the Robber Barons, Bowlin and Null.
My Lawyer went to Stanford Brown, Red Cui Say It one More Times 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.