For the past three seasons of Gone South, we've covered one story per season. We tried to figure out who killed Margaret Coon. Did you tell me I'm going to kill you? I said, well, do it, bitch. Go ahead and do it. We delved into the violent world of the Dixie Mafia. I'm an outlaw and I was a thief, but I'm far from being the psychotic nutcase that I've been made out to be. And we tracked a serial killer in Laredo, Texas. Just turn around, please. Turn around.
Now, Gone South is back for a fourth season. But this time, we're doing things a little differently. So, in Gone South Season 4, We'll be bringing you new stories every week with no end in sight. I'm Jed Lipinski. Welcome back to Gone South, an Odyssey original podcast. Listen and follow now on the free Odyssey app or wherever you get your podcasts for new episodes every week.
It's Minnesota and today we're talking about Johan Jack Untervega. Now, if you guys watched the last podcast, then you know that this has a connection to the Cecil Hotel. I know. I know this is my first time doing it. It's very professional. Thank you very much.
the podcasts are like connected there's like a storyline oh is this like a season one okay i won't get ahead of myself so we're talking about the vienna strangler today this is a serial killer i mean the cecil hotel is known for housing serial killers whether it's credible or not such as richard
ramirez the night stalker but in this situation jack unto vegar actually stayed there a hundred percent a serial killer stayed at the cecil hotel now he is not just any serial killer he's a very strange one so he is actually from austria and
Most of his victims are Austrian women, but he did come to LA. He stayed at the CISO hotel. He went on ride alongs with the LAPD and killed three women in Los Angeles on his little vacation. He said, listen, I need a vacation from killing in Austria. And he came.
came to LA and killed more and then went back. They call them the Vienna Strangler, the poet of death, author, journalist, poet, children's book writer, playwright, kidnapper, assaulter, rapist, murderer, and a prison inmate on the motherfucking side.
philanthropist advocate activist yeah it's just a lot like he was doing the most and at first i thought i wanted to tell this story in chronological order like you would do with most serial killer cases because you're like okay like what's going on with his childhood but i don't want to
I don't want to do that necessarily because here's where it gets interesting. We're going to start with his first prison experience. Now imagine you're in Austria. How many experience has he had? He's had like one and a half and I say a half because. you'll understand later so he's in prison in Austria now in Austria during this time they were just kind of going through a lot like they were having different political parties changing powers and it was just it was intense so he's in prison so
All these Austrian elites, they're sitting around having some tea, having some coffee. I don't know what they drink. I'm like water. And so they're sitting there and they're talking about, did you hear? Did you hear? Did you read that on the newspaper? There is this man in prison who has been convicted, charged and.
Convicted for murdering an 18-year-old girl. And he's been writing these short stories. He writes these poems. He actually even wrote a bunch of children's books. And all of these moms all across Austria were reading these children's books to their kid at nighttime.
To be like, hey, let me help you go to sleep by reading this serial killer's children's book. Now, obviously, he wrote it in a way that wasn't like, hey, I'm going to tell you the story of Ted Bundy while you go to sleep. It was, you know, it's very like straight up like a children's book, right? But people were just getting really...
why are people buying that exactly so these austrian elite they're like you know it's kind of crazy it seems like he has like the gift of words did you know did you know when he actually went to prison like let's say like 10 years ago he was completely uneducated he was barely And he taught himself how to read and write behind those prison walls. And he's writing all of these amazing...
Oh, my gosh, isn't this amazing? That is what the upper elite in Austria were saying about him. And a lot of people pointed out that it probably has to do with the fact that, you know, when you think of like a novelist or someone writing a book, what do you think? And I don't know if it's biased because I live. LA, but I think of someone who is sitting at Starbucks.
who is sitting at Coffee Bean. Yeah, like on the train. Yeah. And then I would say, like, out of the 10 people, maybe half of them have a solid book, you know? And then the other half are just sitting there at Starbucks, refilling their Starbucks cup, and just looking smart.
art but you're not really writing are you sir like you know what i mean maybe it's that so a lot of people said for these austrian elite they had so much of that all of these men who like thought they had all these crazy thoughts in their head and it's like no kevin Nobody thinks that's revolutionary, right? But then here comes this guy who's convicted.
of murder and he's writing about his life it's kind of like wow is it inspirational for them it wasn't inspirational but they said it was raw it was complex it was deep dude now i think that this is a situation of i'm sure it wasn't
the shittiest writing in the world. And I'm sure it was better than anything I would have written. But I'm also sure that it probably has to do with the fact that he's a convicted murderer. So suddenly there's like weight to his words when there shouldn't be, right? And so they're reading it and everyone just kind of forgot.
that this is literally a murder that they're reading about. And he would tell his childhood stories. He would tell his adult stories and everyone fell in love with him. So much so that while he's sitting in prison serving multiple life sentences, he cannot be released. They start petitioning.
They said, listen, this guy needs to come out. This guy, Jack Unterveger. Have you heard of him? Have you heard of him? He needs to be released from prison because, wow. I mean, this guy is the poster child for prison reform. There is something about his work. He knows what he did wrong. He's not even trying to put the guilt on anyone else. He's not even trying to say, I'm an innocent man. He's just changed. So his strategy worked. Yes.
So six years into his sentence that was supposed to be a life sentence, he published a full on memoir called Purgatory or sometimes translated as Trip to Prison Report of a Guilty Man. And that was highly regarded. It was even published by highly regarded literary magazines at the time. He became an Austrian bestseller.
Yeah, an Austrian bestseller. And they saw him as a victim in all of this. They were like, you are a murderer, but you too are also a victim. Like, that's what they said about it. Victim of what? Of life. of childhood, of misfortune, of poverty. They were like, this is so deep. And the beginning of the book actually starts with him contemplating suicide. And he decides not to commit suicide in the beginning of the book because he says, listen, I just had this thought in my head.
I'm not going to kill myself because I can be saved. I can be fixed. Like imagine, imagine someone murdered someone that you love and they're saying, I can be fixed. And I bet back in the days, they probably don't have a lot of true crime podcasts. Yeah. So they're like, oh, wow, this is a human. Yeah, this person's real. You know what I mean? Yeah. Maybe there's not enough CSI back in the day to be like, ah, nah.
this guy's gonna do it again right so yeah he straight up was like listen i can be fixed and i can change and i know where i went wrong and i know why that happened right now the austrian elite they're his main fan base they're like Holy cow, they're obsessed with him. They're like, listen, he had a mom who was a sex worker. His aunt was a sex worker. She got murdered by a client. He was abused by his alcoholic grandfather, according to his memoir that he wrote. And it's just so sad.
No. So they they have the power to. That's what I'm saying. Kind of. Yes and no. So I think it was kind of a situation of a perfect storm. So they read all of these clippings. They read all of these short stories, his memoir, and then it gets even crazier. So they started putting him on TV for television readings while he was in prison.
I don't know who authorized this, who said this was okay. But I guess it's like a prison interview that you see on like, I don't know, NBC sometimes. And so he would read parts of his memoir on television and he does not look like a murderer. So he actually looks very thin, almost boyish. is how people, you know, kind of describe him. Like, not like a man.
Just kind of young looking, very meek, looks very, you know, soft, like a softy. And so everyone's like, oh my gosh, this is him authentically crying out. He's tender. We need to get him pardoned. So they start a petition. Timing is really important here because the Social Democratic Party had recently taken power and they are really into prison reform.
so they were like looking for just poster children for hey you can do something horrendous but you go into our prison system we're all about reforming you we're not here to just like lock you up we're here to change you and then have you re-enter back into society.
And this was the perfect person. I mean, he's well loved by moms, by the upper elite, by rich people, by intellectuals. I mean, how can you not get behind this? And so people just started immediately flocking to this idea. Some of them even visited. Jack. some of these people and they believed that he was in you know he was in the process of reform even these politicians went Nobel Prize winners even went to go visit him and they signed petitions so one for example is a woman by the name of
I'm going to say that wrong. I'm sorry. She's an Austrian playwright and a novelist. And she writes a lot about female sexuality, sexual abuse, battle of the sexes, you know, kind of about the principal driving forces in a relationship that she always said were. power, and aggression. Like that is what drives any relationship. And she was kind of widely known for her feminist stance on everything. She signed the petition for him to be released.
what yeah and it's gonna get weirder once you find out what he was convicted for the murder of an 18 year old girl and it was incredibly just sadistic in nature so she signed this and she was like listen that autobiography had clarity and great literary There was another man by the name of Gunter William Grass, and he was a novelist, poet, playwright, illustrator, graphic artist, sculptor, and also another Nobel Peace Prize winner, a Nobel Literary Prize winner. And he fell in love with Jack's.
work and so they all started sending letters to the president of austria and was like hey you need to pardon him he's one of us like he's good and so uh the president looked at this and was like listen I can't do that. I can't do that. Not because this is a vicious murderer, but because he has to at least serve the minimum sentence for murder, which is 15 years, and he's only served 10, so call me in five years.
So for the next five years, I mean, he just reveled in this glory. He's like, listen, I'm going to get out in five years. I already know it because, you know, even the prison governor, like I guess what you would call like. like the warden here in the US, he was saying, we will never find a prisoner so well prepared for freedom. What?
What are you saying? So he stays in prison for the next five years waiting for his release and he does more televised readings. His book Purgatory was even turned into a film and he was allowed to leave prison to go attend the premiere at the film festival. What are you saying? And everyone just kept saying, this is not the story of him being a vicious, savage, sadistic murderer. This is a story of an abandoned child, a victim, one that we have to take care of, one that we have to shelter.
He knows what he did was wrong. And so he became a celebrity. So after serving 15 years, he gets up for parole and he gets released. Even during his psychiatric evaluation, the psychiatrist said he has been completely rehabilitated. Writing was what he needed to express himself and get over those complex emotions of being abandoned as a kid. Can you imagine? They said he was abandoned as a kid. He murdered someone. All he needed to do was just write it down. Just like journal a little bit.
So I'm assuming all of these is going to bite them in the ass. Yeah. So in May 1990, he was officially released a free man. And during this time, you know, he was 24 when he went to jail. He was 39 when he came out. so not even that old he was super excited i mean now he's a celebrity he's respected he's not even treated like a felon or an inmate you know also side note i don't believe in that like i am all for prison reform this just happens to be a story where it's not good
And so he was respected. He's rich. He buys clothes, exotic cars. He bought a Rolex like the first week that he came out. Like he was doing all of it. He was making a ton of money from all of his book sales. He was on magazine covers. And this is. Yes. This is where it gets even crazier. He even got.
into politics like he didn't run for office or anything but he was heavily involved because he would give interviews about prison reform and he was like this poster child and everyone was like hey we are the democratic party and we want to push this prison reform thing and we want him at the center of it. Like we want him to talk to the people. I mean...
This is insane. It was so insane that a TV, like a television network, offered him a job as a reporter. They were like, you are so good at what you do. You have insight that a lot of other reporters wouldn't have. You know what it's like in prison. You know what prison reform.
is like i mean you'd be perfect for the job so he gets super excited and he's making all this money still in the public eye going to interview people speaking on prison reform loving it now what was his favorite topic to report on european sex workers And that was also his primary choice of victim. I don't get it. Yeah. So he would report on European sex workers and he would also murder them. Wait, so he's murdering?
As a reporter? Yeah. But nobody knows that, obviously. So he's going to go on. Oh, so he's on a murder spree. Yeah. So he's going to go on to murder like 10 more people. So he wasn't considered a serial killer when he went to prison. So there's reports that there's two murders that he committed prior to going to jail, but he has only been convicted of one.
the first time so let's get into his childhood now mind you like i said a lot of this information is from his book purgatory so you have to take it with a little grain of salt and i'm going to catch you guys up to how he got to prison so he was born in austria at the end of world war ii and this was a really rough time for austria
So this is when Germany and Austria were occupied by allied forces. So they had a ton of American soldiers all up in their business being like, hey, we won the war. So like, we're going to tell you exactly what to do. And he was born from all of this. So Austria at the time, they had women who.
getting impregnated i hate that word um who were getting pregnant with american soldiers there was about like 30 000 babies that were born this way so this is kind of difficult because once the soldiers leave they just kind of leave a lot of them still had families at home in america or whatever country
they were coming from, and they would just not be a father figure in these kids' life. They would just completely leave financially, emotionally, mentally, just physically, all of that jazz. And Johann Jack Unterveger was born in this situation. So his mom's name is Therese.
And a lot of sources claim that she was a barmaid and a waitress. And Jack claims that she was a sex worker. I mean... you know do with it what you will and his dad was jack becker an american soldier so they do it they have this baby now he leaves back to america so the dad's gone and now teresia is like how am i gonna find work like this is so difficult i'm a single mom like there's
Not a lot of jobs. This is literally right after World War II. Like, it's just not going to be the most booming economy. And we lost, right? So she's freaking out. And so she's like, okay, I'm going to do what I can to try to support this baby. So she resorts to fraud and theft and petty crime.
And she gets arrested for it while she's heavily pregnant. Now, I couldn't find a report if maybe what she stole wasn't that big of a deal or what happened. But she was released like almost immediately. So they were like, here, you're free to go. So she gives birth to Jack. And he writes that.
This is this is a really difficult time because by the time he was three years old, she was doing sex work during the first three years. I don't even know how you remember that. Exactly. Are you kidding me? Yeah. And so, you know, once he turns three, she gets arrested again. And so he sent off to. live with his dad her dad his grandpa and this grandpa was evil that's what jack says he they lived in this one bedroom cabin he's an alcoholic and he used him he used jack to steal farm animals
I don't know if like Jack was like supposed to go to the door of like a farmer and like distract them like, oh, this little young boy doesn't know directions back to his house. And like the grandpa would go and like, I don't know, steal a cow or something. But he was like, he used me. He said it was almost like being a quote slay.
under his grandpa he would just say all of these really intense things and a lot of people said that this isn't true like a lot of people who knew jack's grandpa was like okay he's a rough fellow like let's be real but anyone who lived through world war ii anyone who lived
in not like in poverty was a rough fellow but that doesn't mean that they're abusive and it doesn't mean that they're alcoholics and just like want to kill you as a grandson and people were just really upset by this but he would constantly push this narrative of i was never given enough food to eat i was always so cold why was it so cold i never had a mother figure my grandpa all he would do is bring in sex workers into our little cabin which
Did I tell you it was a one bedroom cabin? And so I just had this revolving door of just sex workers just in and out of my grandpa's home that I shared with him. And I would I would be hunched over in the little corner being like, grandpapa, when can I get another? letter it's negative three degrees outside and all i have is this tank top this crop top he made it really dramatic is what i'm trying to say okay now
My apologies if part of the story was true, but it's just really hard to believe that it was, especially because a woman came forward and she said, wait a minute, like I know Jack Unterfaker. And I was actually his step aunt. So my mom was dating Jack's grandpa. So I was like her, the grandpa's stepdaughter, daughter, right? So that would be like a step aunt, right? Yeah. And my mom like helped raise Jack.
They were married for quite some time and she helped a lot in raising Jack. So what are you talking about? Like revolving door of sex workers, you know? What are you saying? Also, he was never abusive. I mean, he's got like this rough exterior, but he's a super kind person. and he would never do anything to hurt you like what are you talking about jack but everyone was like shh
This is a good story. We don't want to hear that. So nobody listened to her. She tried so many times to tell reporters like, hey, don't believe this guy. While Jack was in prison, she came out and was like, I read this memoir. I know Jack on to vaguer. No. And everyone was like. No, no, no, no. That doesn't. No, we don't like that. Like this is this is a story about an abused child. OK, sit your ass down, lady. You're being rude.
So he just went on. Right. So he claims that and this is backed up by actual evidence that he was in and out of prison since he was really young. So he just couldn't really keep a job. He would, you know, try to pimp out women. He would sexually assault sex workers. And yeah, there was a lot of.
theft involved so by the time that he was like 24 he had over 16 different charges and so he was in and out of prison the whole time now he said during this time he met a woman he kept searching for his birth mom because he's like mommy where are you
i know it sounds so heartless but like he's so evil so that's why um he's like mommy where are you and so he's searching for his mom and he meets up with his aunt by the name of anna and he just like fell in love not in a weird way but in the way of like wow i i finally
have this is a different on yeah yeah like this is you know his real mom's like direct sister and he's like wow i finally have like someone a mother figure like someone to love me someone to take care of me and she was a sex worker and one day she didn't come home And he found out that she had been murdered by one of her clients. Now, this would be an incredibly traumatic story if it were true. But there is no evidence that his mom, Teresia, had any sisters.
so either he i mean i am assuming that he's making this up to like oh sex worker murdered because it comes into play later and she was the only one that mattered to me she was the only one that i loved um or it could be like maybe there was a woman who was like
Yeah, I'm your aunt, but I just think that's highly unlikely. And so even Theresia herself came forward and was like, yeah, I don't have any sisters, so I don't know what he's talking about. Oh, the mother came forward. Yeah, she was like, I don't have a sister.
so who is aunt anna so i mean again like i said it's kind of up in the air if either jack lied about it or he was lied to i think he was he's lying about it you know right he has more to gain exactly and so he's lying about this in his book and then he claims when i think it's also hard to lie about like oh i don't have a sister while you did have a sister yeah that's kind of you know what i mean that's what i yeah that's weird
Yeah, that's so strange. And so records show that Jack was arrested at 20 years old because he kidnapped a 16 year old girl and tried to force her into sex work. He was trying to pimp her out. So he gets arrested for pimping fraud.
Listen, if you are anxious like me, this entire phrase just makes you a little bit stressed out because like, what do you mean? Just wait and see what? Like, why do I have to wait? Why can't I just see it now? And that has usually been the traditional guidance with fertility. It's always been.
Just wait and see. Like, let's see if you could have a baby. Like, just wait and see. It just doesn't make sense. And now it especially doesn't make sense because we have tools to help us plan and track everything in our lives, whether that's wellness, you know, finances, career, school.
Why is fertility still a wait and see type of thing? And it doesn't have to be. I love modern fertility and that's kind of why it was created. It's an easy, affordable way to test your fertility hormones at home with a simple finger prick. You mail it in.
with a prepaid label and you'll get personalized results within 10 days. Traditional testing with a doctor can cost over $1,000, but Modern Fertility only costs $159 to get the same exact information. And if you guys go to modernfertility.com rotten you can get $20 off your test
Also, it's amazing because if you have HSA or FSA, you can use those dollars on modern fertility. So you get these insights on how many eggs you have, your hormone levels, and other important fertility factors. The results actually go really deep into every single hormone, what it means.
You can also talk one on one with a fertility nurse to review your results and options for your next steps. So if you guys want kids today or maybe you want it in the future, you need information to make the decision that's best for you. And it's not just a just wait and see type of thing.
so right now modern fertility is offering you guys $20 off the test when you go to modernfertility.com slash run that means your test will cost $139 instead of the hundreds or thousands it could cost at the doctor's office so get $20 off your fertility test when you go to modernfertility.com slash rotten what is that that's modernfertility.com slash rotten for the people in the back pimpin frauds yeah
He was arrested for that. So once he gets released from prison, he continues to harass and sexually assault women, particularly sex workers. And so another situation was he picked up a young woman, offered to drive her home, and instead he was like, actually, I'm going to drive to this wooded area. and he drops her off in the wooded area, drags her into the woods, sexually assaults her with a steel pipe, and masturbates while he does this.
Jeez. So he was diagnosed with two things. One of them was narcissistic personality disorder, which really makes sense in this situation, which also can go to show a lot of the times some things that will happen with people like Jack.
who do have this diagnosis, is that they will lie about things to get what they want. And I'm not saying everyone who has this diagnosis, but some, right? And Jack was one of them. So that's why it's extra intense. Now, he also showed signs of sexual sadism disorder. which you know a lot of the crimes that he commits kind of has evidence of this he likes hurting his victims while pleasuring himself he loves the power of that just
Just real nasty stuff. And so he gets arrested again. Then this time he's like, listen, I don't really like jail. So he smuggles drugs into prison and attempts to take his own life. and gets sent to the psychiatric ward. And it was a failed attempt, and eventually he gets released again. Now, it's so hard to find, you know, records of, why was he released? Like, why is he committing violent crimes against women? And they're just like, okay, like, you're good to go.
So when he's out again, this time he decides, you know what, I'm going to commit my first murder. So this took place in Switzerland. Now, the reason that he was never actually convicted of this one. So there's a woman by the name of Maritza Horvat, and she is a 25.
year old creation woman and she was a maid so she goes into the city she's spending time with her friends she's married she's like listen i work all the time other times i'm home with my husband i'm finally just like getting a girl's day enjoying herself and she was supposed to be home
night so her husband's waiting on her and waiting and she doesn't come home so he's like okay like what's going on with maritza where is she like this doesn't make any sense so he starts asking all of her friends like have you seen my wife have you seen my wife all of them say no like we don't know what's going on
next morning breaking news a group of young boys saw a body floating in the local river so they start screaming a bunch of fishermen were nearby and they heard they rush over and it was a woman's body it was maritza so she was found naked from the waist down her wrists were
with a necktie her ankles were tied together using her own stockings and she was gagged with like a first aid kit like there was um like what you would expect in a first aid kit like kind of like the sports wrap like the gauze and that was like wrapped around her there was also like the medical tape that
was wrapped around her head as seeming like she was gagged and almost strangled with it her face was bloated so it indicated that she was badly beaten before she died and the only lead that the police have they didn't have any other lead except for this freaking necktie because
All of the other things that she had on her were either her own articles of clothing or were from like a generic first aid kit. Like, how are you going to get information from this? So they take this necktie. They see that it's made in Vienna, Austria. So this was in Switzerland. But they're like, OK, this is in Vienna. austria they take it to the exact they can even locate it down to the shop who sold this tie
Wow. I guess this was before the days of fast fashion. So they're like, we can actually tell you which store sold it. So they go to that store and they say, hey, listen, who bought this tie? Like, how many people have you sold this to? And all of them are like, oh, my God, I remember that tie being sold.
That was like a month ago, so I don't really remember. Like, it was just some dude. I don't remember anything else. So they're like, what? Like, that's it? You just don't remember anything? And they're like, no, I mean, I think it was like a young dude. That's about it.
So from that point, the case just gets colder and colder and colder. Right. And the detectives are trying to work on it, but there's really no other leads. Now, during this, I mean, he's getting away with it. That was the work of Jack and he's just living his life still. And so he.
a girlfriend by the name of barbara was this ever come fest or so the detective will actually keep telling police officers hey i know that you guys have a serial killer on the loose and i think it's jack underbaker because you know this makes sense we'll get into it so he meets a girl by the name of barbara and they start dating
And they come up with this genius idea. They're like, hey, I love dating you. You love dating me. But you know what would be amazing if we had a little bit of money? And so they're like, OK, well, how do we get money? We can't get jobs. That's lame. Let's go rob your parents, Barbara.
So they're like, good idea. So they decided to drive the 90 minutes to Barbara's parents' house and they would hope that they're not home and they would break in. They would steal all the cash and all the belongings, all these valuables, and they would go sell it. And they would have all this money that they could share together as a loving couple.
so they make that one and a half hour drive to barbara's parents and they look inside and her parents are inside so she's like there's no way like they know i'm their kid like they're gonna look at me and be like are you trying to rob me like it's not even a situation of like who are these intruders and so they're like damn it
we made this 90 minute drive. Like, what do you mean? We're just going to go back home another 90 minutes in our Mercedes. Like, that doesn't make sense. That's going to be shitty. So they're looking around and that's when Barbara sees an old school friend walking home.
And her name is Margaret. So she's like, oh, my gosh, that's my old school friend. I remember her. And Jack's like, well, why don't we try to scam her? Like, why don't we try to rob her? Because I don't want to go home empty handed. Barbara's like, yeah.
totally i'm down a hundred percent so barbara the plan was that barbara was gonna lure margaret into the car she'd be like hey like i haven't seen you in so long like oh there's my friend like come like let's go like grab a bite to eat like let's go grab a drink at a bar and they would drive around they
would get her super disoriented so that she wouldn't know exactly where they were and they would rob her and just like kick her out of the car so that would give them time to flee right so they open the window and they're like my good and she's like oh my god
and she's like get in get in like let's talk like i haven't talked to you in so long she gets into the car they start driving down and they're just having small talk uh margaret says that she was just getting home from going to the bowling alley with some friends it was just very casual and that's when jack asks
Hey, do you want to go get a drink with us? Like, I'd love to get to know you. And so she's like, yeah, sounds good. So they start driving towards the bar. Now, towards the end of this, when they were about to approach the bar, that's when Jack turns around as he's driving and asks Barbara. Do you have anything else to say to your friend?
Barbara says no. And so Jack pulls over on the side of the road, grabs Margaret by her clothing and drags her to the front seat. And that's when he starts tying her up. He ties her up with Barbara's coat, like belt.
So her hands are tied. She's sitting in the front seat. She's like, what is going on? Like, I'm scared, Barbara. Like, can you tell me what's going on? Like, what is going on? And so Jack's like, give me all your money. And she's like, OK, well, here's the thing. You're not going to like this because I only have $20 on me. Like, that's it. I swear. I promise.
promise i don't have anything else why would i try to hide it from you i only have 20 and he starts yelling at her because it's a really small amount he's like you're wasting my time like do you know time is money and so she's like okay everyone calm down everyone calm down don't do anything crazy like i have
at my parents house my parents have money they always keep cash around I I can take you there I can take you we can go in and we can grab all the cash and whatever else you want and we can we can we'll just do that and so he's like okay sounds good so they drive back to Margaret's mom's place and they grab a stash of clothing and all she had in cash was $60. So then they...
bring Margaret back into the car and they start driving out of town. Now this is when Margaret knows something bad's going to happen. Cause it's kind of like, I mean, I could have just stayed there and you could have just driven away with these things. Right. And Jack just keeps telling Barbara, like we need to make her disappear because she saw.
our faces and so she's like crying and she's like no no no please like barbara please like imagine going to high school with someone and this is like the conversation you're hearing and barbara's just super chill she's like yeah sounds good
Yeah. So did they arrest Barbara later? Yeah. So they drive to a wooded area near a river and Jack demanded Margaret... undress and she kept saying no and so Jack punched her in the face and made Barbara help him undress Margaret and asked Barbara like hey do you want to come into the woods with us and she was like no i'm good and so jack grabs margaret and drags her into the woods he took a steel rod from the car
and he took her undergarments so he drags her into the woods he beat her he beat her with that steel rod and he took her bra wrapped it around her neck and strangled her so this is very interesting this is kind of like his
telltale sign is he loves to strangle women with their own articles of clothing so he goes back to the car and barbara's like well what happened and he's like listen i took care of it that's it that's all you need to know and they just like leave three weeks later hunters found her body and she
strangled with her own bra now of course investigators immediately start going crazy on this case because the knot itself was weird so i have some sources say that you know it just kind of looked like a convenient knot maybe this is the way he knots things and then other sources say oh this was cruel
The knot was made so that he could kind of tighten and loosen the grip on her neck. So it kind of goes with people saying that he is a very sadistic person. I think I know exactly which knot you're talking about. okay why it was just a very convenient knot it's you take a rope bend it in half and then you just put the other other end through the little hole
You know what I'm talking about? You can pull tighter or you can release it. Maybe that's what it is. Very convenient. So it's weird to say if it's conveniency or like that's just how he likes it or if it's to be sadistic. So I think that's where like the question is in the air. But there is not a question of this is a really unique situation. I haven't really heard of a lot of people getting like killing someone by strangling them with their own bra.
It's just really odd. And so she was found by these hunters and he still is going on with his life, acting like nothing freaking happened. So he starts hanging out with another girl by the name of Maria. So Maria and Barbara and Jack, they're all friends now. And Maria is 16.
years old they rob a jewelry store together and now they're like oh my god like what do we do we just rob this jewelry store let's flee to switzerland so they moved to switzerland and that's when they're like hey we we spent all of this money that we just like robbed this jewelry store from like what are we gonna do now
And Maria's like, you know, my parents love me. Like maybe we can write a ransom note and we can have some money dropped off at a location. We pick it up. Now we got cash. So they come up with this plan. They send a ransom note pretending like, oh, I'm holding her captive. Like you're never going to see her. You got to give.
us this money and the parents of course are like absolutely i will give you any money i want to see my daughter so they agree to pay the ransom but what they weren't told was that the police were involved so when jack and barbara go to pick up the money
The police are there and they get arrested. So immediately, Barbara, I mean, she starts singing like a canary. She's like, not only did we rob a jewelry store, not only did we fake this ransom, but like we also robbed another girl and she's missing and y'all just found her in the woods.
woods and like i just want to say i never went into the woods i didn't know he was killing her i thought he was just like i don't know doing that thing where you blindfold them turn them around like 30 times and then just like push them down and then run so they get disoriented i thought that's what he was doing but now now i know she's dead and so the police are like what so they immediately go to jack and he's like oh yeah i did do that oops
So they're like, you're arrested, dude. Now, during this time, remember Maritza's death? Maritza Horvath's the maid. Well, the investigators, all they had was the necktie. And they're just thinking, I mean, this is weird. It's similar. They're found, you know, naked or partially naked. They're found, you know, kind of tied up by clothing articles, like articles of clothing. It's just weird. And so they went to go question Jack.
same detective that was on her case went to go interview Jack in prison. And Jack's like, listen, I don't know what you're talking about. But there was multiple times where Jack lied about things like he would say, I've never even been to that town. But there's evidence that Jack Unterveger has been in that. town he was actually arrested near that town but that's not really enough evidence so they couldn't charge them for maritza's death
Only Margaret's. So he gets, you know, he's going to trial for Margaret's death and he confesses. He's like, listen, I dragged her into the woods and here's what happened. I just kept seeing my mother's face. This sex worker mother who abandoned me. Oh, evil.
right first of all that narrative is so disgusting oh she's just so evil and i kept seeing her face and so i kept beating margaret because all of this trauma being abandoned as a kid was just overcoming my body and it was like i couldn't even control myself like i wasn't even thinking it's like it's like i blacked out and i murdered her and he asked the judge to have sympathy for him because of his childhood struggles
And they did not care at all. Like the judge, the jury, they were like, nope. And they convicted him of murdering Margaret Schaefer. And he was declared insane by a psychologist. They said that he was a, and I quote, sexually sadistic psychopath with narcissistic and histrionic tendencies prone to fits of anger and rage. Yeah, that sounds about right with everything that he did. So he gets sent to prison.
for life and that's when he starts educating himself he becomes literate he becomes you know more like he's he's learning he learns how to read and write by himself he took writing classes in prison he became the editor of the prisons magazine so he actually learned all that yeah yeah so
To a degree, prison reform works. Yes, to a very slight degree if he wasn't a sexually sadistic psychopath. Yeah, he took it to the next level. Yeah. So, like, that's why I'm saying prison reform works. But, like, this situation, because he's a...
sexually sadistic psychopath with all of these tendencies it doesn't work there's no way it would work for him i don't think anything would work for this guy and so he starts writing he became the editor of the prisons magazine do prisons have magazines in the u.s i feel like they don't
Like, is it like a newspaper club, like a high school, like a newspaper team? So he's like the editor. So everyone just kept telling him in prison that he has the gift of words. And this is when he started really getting in his head. He's thinking to himself, you know what really bothered? me about being in court in front of that judge everyone's looking at me like i'm just like this stupid savage like i'm just like i'm trying to explain to them that i didn't kill her because i wanted to
I was just really bored that day and no one's listening. Like he's just really upset that he was treated like dirt in court. And so he's like, you know what? I'm going to try to change that. I don't like that. I don't like that people are looking at me like I'm this just stupid murderer. And I'm not. And so he starts writing. And now we're caught up to speed.
so he's writing all that shit people love it they petition he's out he's the poster child for prison reform and now he's even a journalist a reporter and his favorite topic to report on is european sex work you know what's going on there what's what's the dangers of
it what's the reality of it all of that jazz so at this point he has murdered at least one person we presume two and he's a free man just running around and the crazy thing is people know people know that he murdered someone i think that's the craziest part so september 1990
He goes to Prague and he's doing this like search story for the red light district there. And he's just trying to understand like what is the normal day to day? What's going on there? He takes a translator with him and all day they talk to sex workers. They talk to pimps. They are learning about the lifestyle.
about the work itself so during the time that he's there a woman goes missing her name is blanca butchkova and she it was a friday night she's out with friends to have a drink like you would do on friday nights before the pandemic and she was married she had two kids now this is again where
it kind of gets lost in translation so some sources say that she was in an open relationship with her husband some say that she was maybe having an affair some say that she was actually in sex work and her husband knew about it but either way it wouldn't be the most abnormal thing for to be talking to a man.
on a friday night so she's talking to some guys and her friends don't really think of it and her friends are like hey i'm about to leave like is that fine and she's like yeah yeah i'm just gonna go to another bar and then i'm gonna call it a night so she goes on over to another bar and that's where she meets chuck and they start chatting it up
So she never gets back home that night. And her husband, her kids, they all start worrying. And it wasn't until September 15th, 1990, there were early morning hikers and they're just enjoying like a local river walk and they're walking around.
They find the body. They find a body and they're like, what's going on? So for a really long time, nobody had any idea what happened to Blanca. Like her family had no answers. The police were like, well, I'm sure maybe she just like ran out on you guys. I mean, she's an adult. She can do whatever she wants. And that's when they're like, wait.
this might be blanca so they get to the scene she's on her back her legs are spread wide open she has gray stockings that were used to um people think that it was used to strangle her but it had been kind of like removed so it wasn't like neatly tied around her neck there were leaves over parts of her body that was naked and she had bruises and cuts all over her.
So again, they keep going back to the friends and they're like, who did you see Blanca with? Like before you guys left the bar, did anyone see her talking to someone? And all they could say was, I don't really remember. I mean, I think it was the guy in his 40s. Like maybe that was the last person, but who knows? Maybe they stopped talking. She talked to.
We don't really know. So this was Jack's first murder since he was released, and it seemed like he wasn't reformed at all, to be honest, obviously. And so during this, he gets busy. He's like, listen, I'm murdering on the side, but I still need to keep up with appearances. So he starts working on a play production called Dungeon. This was going to be the sequel to Purgatory, his memoir about himself. So he's like, I'm going to do this play.
It's going to be amazing. And I'm going to tour Europe for this play. And it's just going to be my big break. Like, I'm going to break out. Even the Americans are going to be like, we want this in fucking Hollywood, on Broadway. He was excited. But then he found out no one was really talking about it. Nobody was.
gave a fork now they were like listen give us something new like stop talking about your childhood like we're kind of over it now now that like what we wanted from you is out and it's done like give us something new and so there was not enough financial success there was not enough just
praise and he was super pissed that not everyone was like licking his toes he that's what he was expecting everyone to just eat this up like they did his you know autobiographies so he starts heading to graz austria and this is where more sex workers go missing um
There was Brynhaldi Masser. She was reported missing. And this one was weird. So a lot of the police in Graz, like sex work is highly regulated there. So they knew most of the sex workers. It's not like they were hiding it like you would do in the States. They were registered. People knew who they were. So it's technically more safe.
So Brunhilde, she had been a sex worker for the past 10 years. I mean, she was really loved by the community, by friends, by family. She had, you know, this big circle of people who loved her. And she knew most of the clients in Graz, like most of the Johns in Graz. The day that she goes missing, everyone's like, oh, yeah, I remember. She was like talking to a local taxi driver. But I think he drove away. And that was about it. So then two months later, she was found dead in the woods.
And she was naked from the waist down. She was strangled and her own stockings were wrapped around her neck and she was badly beat. Jewelry is a weird thing, okay? I used to work in the jewelry industry before... Whatever I'm doing now.
And I just have to say, sometimes you want to keep up with the trends. Like you see all these people layering these gold necklaces or maybe they have gold stacking rings and you're like, oh, I want that. But if you get it from a cheap place, you're like, ah, I know that this quality is really, really bad. It's going to turn my finger green.
I'm never going to wear it again. And you'll just put it in the corner or you're like, I don't want to spend a bajillion dollars on jewelry. I have the solution for you. I have been wearing Ana Luisa pieces for like two years now. It's amazing. They have an assortment of necklaces.
Searings, rings, bracelets, really everything that you need. The best part is they're carbon neutral. They offset 100% of their carbon emissions, starting with the sourcing of their raw materials, all the way to the disposal of their pieces. They also have limited batches.
they have the highest production standards while eliminating excessive waste. Maybe you're on the other spectrum and you're like, well, tell me about the quality. They have amazing quality, like truly amazing. They have lasting pieces that are crafted with care from the best noble metals. They offer a three.
365 day warranty to replace or refund any piece that doesn't meet your expectations and they have really fair prices so jewelry starts at just $39 there's no crazy luxury markup the pieces are amazing for you or for a gift I actually started with
friendship bracelets with my good friend with Ana Luisa. And here's my new favorite piece from them. It's called nugget. Yes, nugget. It's a gold necklace and it's the cutest little shape of a nugget. So if you have ever called your significant other, my little nugget, or maybe you're like, Hey, I love chicken.
nuggets and so do you. I think that this is such a cute little gift and it's only $75 and it's a hundred percent made from recycled sterling silver. It feels good on the neck. It doesn't feel like it's going to snap if I tug at it. It's also plated in 14 carat. Gold. Go treat yourself or your loved ones with a unique gift and get 10% off at analuisa.com slash rotten. I absolutely recommend them. They're a great brand and they make beautiful, sustainable jewelry. So go check out analuisa.com.
slash rotten. So then more and more people start showing up, like more and more bodies of women were showing up in the woods. And a lot of them were in the sex work industry and nobody knew who was doing this. I mean, it's very clear as day that it was one or maybe two people doing it, but it wasn't.
Like, oh, this is very separate from this incident and this murder is separate from this one. This was all connected. I mean, just the way that they were found either naked or partially naked, strangled by an article of clothing with some things missing. I mean, it's just.
clear as day like we've got a serial killer on our hands so everyone's getting stressed out they kept calling him the vienna woods strangler the vienna woods killer the vienna killer the vienna strangler all of that right they're just trying to get a handle what's his name what are we going to call him and so people are freaking out but One person who wasn't was the detective on Maritza's case. Do you remember him? From decades ago. Before he was even convicted of his first murder of Margaret.
Yes. And he went to go talk to Jack and he was lying, but he had no evidence. So he couldn't even charge him. This is supposedly, you know, Jack's first murder in the history of his life. Right. So the detectives, I mean, he was he was dead on. He was like, listen. This sounds too similar To the way that I found Maritza So he's saying All of these new murders Yeah He had a feeling He's like this is Jack's work Yeah
He's like, it's got to be. It's got to be. And so he's trying to talk to people about it and no one's listening to him, especially because Jack is just living his life. It's not like Jack just fell off the radar and people are like, oh, maybe it is like, where did he even go? Right.
But like at this point, Dungeon, his play had failed, but he started a new one called Scream of Fear. And that was a play about AIDS because he had lost a lot of friends in prison about it. And he wanted to bring awareness to it. So like. fuck it's like okay that one's like good but like i still hate you jack and like no
So, yeah, it premiered in Vienna and he traveled to a bunch of other places to tour it. Now, there's no indication that this was as big of a failure as Dungeon, but there's no indication that it was highly regarded either. So it kind of like fell in the middle, I think. And this is when around this time, as you. traveling more sex workers disappear now there was one woman by the name of alfreda now her situation is interesting because
There was a difference. Something he did was different. He didn't just kill her and leave her in the woods and strangle her. He actually called her parents and taunted her about the fact that Alfredo was a sex worker. Now, this is where it gets even scarier. Her parents have an unlisted number. So like in phone books, you can't find their family's number. So that probably means that he forced her to tell them their number before strangling her to death.
So there's not really a reason why he did this. A lot of people suspect that his violence towards women increases with more failures he has in his professional life. So maybe, you know, Scream of Fear wasn't doing well. So he decided. to take it out on women and became even more sadistic. So that's kind of what people speculate.
the telephone was invented back in the day but he doesn't do that for his future murders that's where it gets weird so then more sex workers go missing i mean it's just like at this point all the police are getting really stressed out but another thing is that you're dealing with a lot of different police jurisdictions it's not all in the same town yeah
Now, at this point, collectively, the whole country of Austria was kind of getting stressed out. Like they're like, what's going on? Why are these women showing up in the woods? Is there something going on with our sex work industry? Because we're trying to make it highly regulated to make it safe. But. Is that just backfiring? Like what's going on? And so Jack's like, listen, I can be helpful. I can go and I can interview these scared sex workers at the red light district. And like.
I hate the fact that I'm like saying sex workers five million times today. Sorry. I can go interview these women at the red light district about these crimes because I'm a journalist. So he starts writing about the very disappearances and murders that he's committing. In eight months, he killed seven women. But nobody knew. Nobody knew.
So, I mean, in eight months, he killed seven women. But a lot of the times their bodies weren't found until way later. Or, you know, it was just like this whole thing. So people are still stressed. And a lot of people claim that he was Austria's first serial killer. And now I don't know.
This is factually correct. But it just seemed like it hadn't really developed in a way that they were like, oh, this is a serial killer. We know the exact protocols for this. Like we know exactly how to profile them. It just wasn't that advanced because people didn't have serial killers in Austria to the extent that maybe. America did at the time.
And so, again, the detective that was investigating Maritza's murder, the very first murder that Jack is suspected of doing, he's retired at this point. And this was 18 years ago. Like, this was a long time ago. But he keeps going to all of these police departments and he's saying, listen, this is just too.
similar to the way maritza and margaret were found and i'm telling you it's got to be jack undervaker and he even called the homicide division in vienna and they were just saying like there's no way like that doesn't make any sense like you're kind of crazy dude like i guess it you're bored you're you're retired now but you need to get a job like you need to like find a life like get out of here and he's like no
I'm certain that this is him. And they're like, all right, old man, like stop giving us trouble. They hang up on him. Now around this time, a man walks in to the police headquarters in Vienna and he says, listen, I'd like to talk to the chief of police.
And so the chief comes out and he says, yeah, which what do you want? He says, listen, I'm a journalist and I'm working on the story about the sex worker slayings is what he called it. And I just want to get some information. So at first, the chief was kind of like skeptical because he's like, I don't want to give out.
too much information to the press. But then this man, this reporter, shared this really touching story about how his aunt was a sex worker who was murdered. And he was like, damn, like...
tough luck like yeah i get it like i can see why this is an emotional case for you like i can see it so they sit down together and he's like man you look so familiar have i seen you anywhere and he's like not thinking too deep into it but he just gives them the evidence of there's no hard evidence that we found at the crime
scenes it's probably because the time of the murder versus the time that we find the bodies is different so there's you know any evidence that could have been there is probably not there is tainted now so i mean we're just kind of confused like that's what they're saying like we're just kind of in over our heads right now And he's like, okay, well, thanks so much. So then the reporter goes home.
So the police chief doesn't think anything of it, and he goes home. So the police chief doesn't even know that's Jack. Yeah, he just looks familiar. But does he know who Jack is? Yes. Because the other detectives keep calling. Uh-huh. And so he goes home, and he sees that same reporter.
or on TV talking about the news that he gave him, which is fine. Like he knew he was going to talk about it. That's what reporters do. And his wife is sitting there and he's like, oh my God, it's that guy. And he's like, what guy? And she's like, that guy, the prison reform guy. What? The one who... He, like, murdered an 18-year-old girl, but he, like, wrote books and he's, like, changed now. Yeah. That's the guy. I remember him from the news.
And so he's, like, confused. Like, so for some reason, he didn't know during this interview, like, it didn't click that Jack Unterveger was him. Like, he just looked familiar, but I guess he wasn't that into Jack Unterveger. What a police chief that has no idea about... your job is to connect these pieces and he's like oh cool sounds good wife you know what they say behind every dude is a much smarter woman you're watching a lot of tv huh
He's like, wait a minute. So he starts just watching all of Jack's little reportings on TV. And he's like, you know what? something about him is kind of giving me an icky feeling and what the detectives calls. I'm going to, I'm going to surveil him. So he puts a team up to surveillance Jack for a couple of days and they come back and they report.
he's totally just like a boring ass dude like he goes to coffee shops now and he like sits there and like pretends to be writing in like a journal all like deep and shit and like there's always girls around him like he's just a normal dude so he's like oh okay fine never mind so he knew that's jack yeah so at that point he like got surveillance on him you know and he was like oh
He's totally fine. OK, fine. And he just like goes back to looking for the Vienna wood strangler. And that's when Jack comes back to the police chief and he says, what's up, chief? I've got something to tell you. So I'm going to be traveling to Los Angeles. And I was wondering if you have any contacts at the L.A.
pd because i'd love to do some ride-alongs so my entire thing there is i'm gonna go and i'm gonna write a story on sex work in los angeles and it's gonna be like a whole thing maybe you know stay at the cecil hotel have you heard of that one he didn't say that but you know what i mean and so he's like
yeah, sorry, don't have any, you know, leads, but like, good luck. And so he's like, okay, bye. So he arrives at LAX with a dream and his cardigan. Party in the US, I had to take that one. He's looking at me like, I know that from somewhere. Where do I know that? It's the land of fame excess, you know?
party in the usa all right so he checks into the cecil hotel and now some people speculate that maybe he had a fascination with the night stalker and the reason that people speculate this is the same reason that people think that richard ramirez definitively stayed at the cecil
hotel which is someone said that he did so a night clerk said that richard ramirez stayed on the 14th floor and with this situation someone said that um he requested the same room that richard ramirez stayed in so i'm not entirely sure if that's why he went
It could be also because it was super close to Skid Row where there was a lot of like underground sex work because it's not legal in Los Angeles, right? So it could be that reason or it could be the reason that it's cheap. Have you thought of what happens if you stick all the cereal? killer into one room yes like do they all just like do do the most gruesome just became dominant of the situation
I don't know. Because they're all fucking sick to their minds. You know what I mean? It's got to be like the smartest. I don't think it's the most gruesome, but it's got it because I feel like there's like two types of serial killers. There's the ones that get away with it purely, purely because the police.
are kind of shitty with catching them. And they're not necessarily the smartest and they're not even trying not to get caught. And then you have the other side where they're very either charming or maybe they have high IQs and they try to be smart with it or they're like BTK and they're like family. men right so i wonder like what do those two groups with what would they do i guess we'll find out when we go to hell so see y'all there
If I get there first, I'll send a postcard. Yeah. So I don't know if that's why he went there, but he starts doing a bunch of stuff. So again, I don't know why he went to Los Angeles. There's lots of reports. So the first thing that he did is he goes to meet with a bunch of people.
to find his dad he goes into the austrian community in los angeles and he's like hey like i'm austrian help someone out so he really go for the looking for his father type situation yeah so he did have a brief but that's not really
his real intention it doesn't seem like it or maybe it's like one of those trips that's like five birds one stone right so he's like i'm trying to look for my dad like i don't even know where to start so they offer their help and you know they start looking and looking and they tell him hey i don't know how to tell you this but i don't
really know where your dad is like nobody knows who your dad is i couldn't find any contacts who would have that type of information so i don't know what to tell you jack becker jack jack becker how many jack becker is i know yeah so i mean yeah so they were just like i don't know what to tell you and also that was like a while ago and so they're like we can't help you so he's like okay that's fine he like takes la tours
Like, you know, those buses and shit like he was doing all of that. So like at the same time, I'm like, I don't know if he's sad. What's going on? So Shannon Exley was the first murder in Los Angeles. She was a sex worker. Her clientele was mainly truck drivers near Skid Row.
drives up and he had he had asked like how much so she gets into the car now this is around the time that she would just um most of the customers they would just drive over to like a warehouse parking lot and that's where everything would go down and the transaction would be done i guess i don't know
how to explain it sorry and um but this time it was different he kept driving towards boil heights which is like a different city like a different part of la and she's like um this is really far and he didn't think anything of it he was just like it's fine like i just want to get like a very intimate place obviously i'll pay
you for your time blah blah blah blah and the next day her body was found in a parking lot she was almost entirely naked her bra was wrapped tightly around her neck and this was his first victim in los angeles After this happens, he starts getting ride alongs. A call came and they were like, hey, the LAPD, they agreed to give you a ride along to give you, you know, something to talk about with that Austrian PD, like with the Austrian newspapers. Maybe little Austria needs to know.
how the big boys do it in the LAPD. Like they were just like, yeah, we'll totally give you a ride along. So he goes on a four hour ride along. Just like looking around. I mean, they primarily stayed in the downtown area. There's a picture of him with a sergeant. from the LAPD.
Wow. He like took notes. He like took pictures all over downtown LA. It's a lot. It's a lot. Then he would go out of the car and he would interview sex workers and pimps in the area and try to get a good story. And then, you know, this is like his plan. So the next day he goes on another ride along.
And that's when he picks up afterwards. Afterwards, he gets in his own car. No LAPD involved. And he picks up a woman by the name of Irene Rodriguez. And she, too, was a sex worker. And this is really sad because she had only been in L.A. for two months at the time. She just.
came from el paso texas and she had become addicted to heroin which is why she was you know in sex work so he drives her again to boil heights and they park in a secluded area and she too was found strangled with her own bra the next day So a few days later
jack untofager he drives to malibu now i don't know how he got this address but there was an address for an austrian filmmaker and jack goes to his house like straight up imagine like just being a filmmaker and someone's knocking on your door like hey i've got a good film idea like he was really pissed like this
This filmmaker was like, what is your deal? This person was actually living in a super private area. Madonna allegedly lived across the street from him. So you're talking about like the rich elite of Malibu. And he gets this knock on the door. He opens it and it's Jack Unterveger. And he's like, who the four guard?
are you how do you even know where i live and he's like listen i don't mean to bother you but i've got a major hit in austria you know i wrote this book called purgatory while i was in prison and people loved it it was like a film there did really well I'm thinking you could turn it into a Hollywood hit movie. I'm talking Marvel Avengers style. I'm talking, oof, you're going to make big money. And this Austrian filmmaker, I mean, imagine how many times a day.
these filmmakers get an idea and they say oh you gonna make big boy money so he's like listen i don't know what you're talking about i'm already pissed off that you found my address and you thought it was okay to like show up at my house like leave and he's like no no you need to listen so he's like
super adamant so he's like okay you know what sit down let me listen to your stupid ass story so he sits down with the austrian filmmaker and he tells them this whole story and the filmmaker says you know you know you're right you're right like i'm totally gonna look into it you know it's it's a good one i'm gonna totally read your book first
And I'm just going to look into it like it's going to be amazing. Now, he was really only saying that so that Jack would leave. Like, you know, you're like, yeah, totally. Like, I'll follow up on it, you know?
And Jack knew that he's like, I feel like you're not going to look into it. And he's like, no, what are you talking about? That sounds amazing. Of course, I'm going to look into it. And so Jack leaves and he gets into the car and he's driving from Malibu back to downtown L.A., which I'm sure is like a five hour.
drive I'm kidding but not really because LA traffic and while he's sitting in traffic he's getting angrier and angrier and angrier he's like what do you mean that would be the best Hollywood movie this this guy doesn't know anything and that's when he's driving down sunset
boulevard and he sees sherry long so she was 26 and um she was actually she came to la to make it in hollywood but she kind of became friends with like the wrong group she became addicted to drugs and now she was in sex work and he picks her up and he's like listen on a drive back to Malibu. So he drives 30 miles back to Malibu, and she was found eight days later in the mountains, naked with a bra wrapped tightly around her neck.
Now, by this point, LAPD had no leads. They knew it was all the same person. But Jack Unterweger was back in Austria. Wow. So they're like, who the fork did this? Now, this is only like six years after Richard Ramirez was caught, so I'm sure they were quaking in their boots, too.
So Jack leaves Los Angeles and he's super upset. Like, first of all, he didn't really get a good enough story for all of the sex work in LA because he was really busy doing other things. He couldn't find his dad. Nobody wanted to turn his book into a Hollywood movie. It just was like a shit show. So he goes back home and he starts doing.
more interviews like he's just trying to get press time it seems like he's unraveling he's like does anyone else want to hear about my my book purgatory and everyone's like bro give it a rest that's like old news do you got a new book or something if not bye get out of here And at this point, people were getting really upset with him because it's just like, oh, Jesus, like, you know, when someone's milking it too much, it's like, we get it.
You're saying that right now to me. I know. So they're like, we get it. And now Charlotte, which was his step on, she was getting increasingly mad because for so many years she had heard this crazy narrative about her stepdad being just like this evil person.
person jack's grandpa right and so she decided that she was going to confront him one day so she sees jack hanging out with a bunch of girls at a cafe and she's just enraged her like her anger is just boiling so she sees him she confronts him she runs up to him And it's like, why would you tell all of these lies? Blah, blah, blah. And he looks at all the women and is like, I don't even know this girl.
And she's like, oh, yeah, you don't know me. And she pulls out an envelope and she's like, these are pictures of you and me and you and your grandfather that you wrote about. Like, this is you. And so all the girls are like, oof. That is you. And so he looks embarrassed and he laughs it off and he says, here, let me tell you something. And he leans in, he grabs her and whispers, be quiet or something could happen to you. So she leaves and she's like, what?
so she's like i mean i already know that he was convicted of killing someone and i am confident that this guy's evil and he's a liar he's probably gonna do it again so i'm not gonna mess with it so she just kind of shuts up now during this time a journalist was getting involved because he found the parallel
of the vienna wood strangler and margaret's death just too similar and he's like listen this little reporter running around i mean it just it's he started researching it as if is this jack unto wager or a copycat like that's kind of his vibe he's like is this someone trying to be
jack unto baker like what's going on or is he inspired by jack unto baker and so while jack was in la he did a ton of research he wrote an article that was published and he was talking about the vienna wood strangler and pretty much pointed all of the fingers at jack without
saying it was jack like pretty much like hey isn't it a weird coinketing i'm not saying it's him but allegedly you know what i mean like all those words so jack is getting nervous everyone around jack is like oh i can see that i can see how it's so similar and so he goes to the
police station jack goes back to the police station try to fish around he's like i'm back from la it was amazing so what's going on with the vienna wood strangler so the chief at this point had already put jack under surveillance for the second time when he got back from
because he was just like something weird's going on right and he was just trying to tell him listen you are a suspect i'm not gonna lie to you but we've got over a hundred men on the list of suspects so i mean we're just gonna eliminate you i know it's not you all you need to do is just bring in um some alibi for these specific dates, yeah?
Go home, get some alibis and come back to me. So Jack goes, he comes back and he says, OK, well, on these days I was here and I was there. And then he just starts breaking down at the police station, crying. And he says, there's no way I would ever commit another murder because prison was crazy. I would never go back.
to prison i would never put myself in a situation where i would have to go back to prison you've got to believe me instead of like yeah we believe you and they look at his alibi and it was just all weird like he was like lying he said that he was working in vienna but he couldn't exactly pinpoint where he was who he talked to like nobody else could confirm that he was in vienna at the time that the
grass murders happened so it just it was all sorts of weird he also lied he said that he didn't have a driver's license so it's not like he could drive from vienna to grass like quickly or something of that sort but they knew that he had a driver's license so they're like you just got your driver's license last week i'm not gonna do another song reference sorry i'll stop driver's license the song
okay so the captain is like this is a straight up lie we've been tailing you and we know that you have a driver's license like why would you even lie about that like why would you lie and say you don't have a driver's license we could even look that up what are you saying and so they think if they he would lie to the police chief about something like this, they need to investigate more.
So as they're investigating, Jack just continues to live his life. He starts writing more stories, tries to get more famous, dating more girls. So one in particular was a woman by the name of Bianca Marac, and she was 18 years old. So she's living with her parents, and her mom is incredibly controlling.
she's like listen i want to leave i want to start my own life like i don't want to be under my parents control anymore and jack was like perfect because i've got this spare bedroom that you can stay in and she's like okay sounds good so within three weeks of knowing him she moves in with him and that's when he becomes increasingly dominant
controlling just locked her up in the house gave her a list of chores that she had to do and never let her out of the house now he would constantly tell her money is tight around here money is tight and so he said can i can bianca can you do me just one favor She's like, what? I have this friend that I know that runs this company. It's called Upscale Escort Company. But you could just be like a waitress there. And she's like, what company?
upscale escort company just be a waitress so she's like i mean i guess i could be like a hostess yeah like let me apply so she does an interview and that's when the person is like oh this is upscale escort company you're trying to be an escort Like a sex worker, no? And she's like, no, I was trying to be a waitress.
a waitress where we just work with escorts so she's like what the fork so she goes to jack she's super pissed she's like i'm leaving you like i'm going back home because i can't believe that you were trying to pit me out like what's wrong with you like why would you even do this and he's like no baby no like i'll never do it again And so she's like, okay, fine.
So they stay together. She's still living with him. And one month into living together, he proposes to her. So I don't necessarily know what the motive in this proposal was, whether it was love, whether he just like wanted to tie her down. Probably control, right? Control her. Yeah. is just out of the blue, right? So she accepts.
And she's like happily engaged. She starts working as a bartender. And I think maybe his plan was to eventually pimp her out. But during this time, the police are amping up their investigation. They're going around showing pictures of Jack to a lot of women in sex work. And all of them are IDing. them as a guy who they have seen all of these missing women talk to before they're like that's the guy one of these women said that
That guy tried to kidnap me like that guy. I got into his car and he was like, I'm just going to drive into the woods. And I was like, not with what's going on these days. And she was like, let me out. And he was like, no. And it was just like this whole ordeal. So the press find out that the police are investigating Jack Unterweger and they are blowing it up. And they start asking Jack for comments and he decides that he needs to leave Austria. So he flees to Switzerland with Bianca.
And the more that he's doing this and the more that they're investigating, the more the police realize this is probably Jack. So this is a huge task force. You have the Vienna task force. You had the grass task force. You also had the detective that was working on Maritza's case.
There was just a lot of people involved. Now, there were tons of issues with the arrest warrant, but eventually they got one and the press got wind of it. And they said, you cannot release this information. And they said, we won't. We won't. But immediately the next day on the stands on the newspapers were murder.
series arrest warrant for Jack Unterveger oh my god so by the time that they go to arrest Jack Unterveger he's already gone they broke into his apartment they found a shotgun a switchblade these are two items that he can't have because he's on parole
role so he's not allowed to own these they found inside of his bmw a hair that he found of a woman they sent it in for testing and it did match to be one of the victims they found three pairs of handcuffs they found receipts and pictures of him with the lapd
that's never a good look just like posing next to the sergeant of lapd um a brown leather jacket a red scarf later they would do testing on the leather jacket and the red scarf and the fibers matched fibers that were on heidi marie a victim of his when she past.
So all of this was making sense. Now, when they saw those pictures of him with LAPD, they were like, why don't we just like give them a call? So they call LAPD and they asked, hey, by any chance, do you guys have any unsolved murders over there that a woman was, you know, if they were. in the sex work industry. They were strangled with articles of their own clothing. And they were like, yes, we do have three sex workers who were strangled by their own bras. So they were like, huh.
so during this time the couple they're fleeing they go from switzerland to france to spain i don't know why this just sounds so like i know i know i can't glamorize it but like these countries always sound so fancy whereas here it's like then they went to florida Bye.
anyways so they they get on a plane to new york they're like we need to flee the country we need to get out of europe like this is too close we need to go all the way to a different continent so they leave they get on a plane to new york and then from new york they get to miami they go to florida
so I guess it always ends in Florida so they land February 16th and Jack gets Bianca a job as a go-go dancer at a club so she's working she's making money and he's just obsessed with the case he's like looking for more information like oh my god are they gonna try to catch me do they know I'm in miami right and this is where it all unravels honestly i do think that in miami he would not have gotten caught
Unless he did these stupid things. So he starts getting upset with the way that the police are telling the story. They're saying, listen, he was never reformed. That little scumbag. Was his mom even a sex worker? What's wrong with this dude? They're just saying some nasty shit. And he's like, well. well, what about my story? What about me? What about what I have to say?
yeah do people not want to listen to me talk and so he gets really mad so he starts writing letters to austria like public radio stations just like claiming that he's innocent and this is the police trying to get after him this is the other political party trying to say that prison reform
doesn't work he's coming up with all these conspiracy theories so he calls up one of his friends who worked for a magazine called success i think something like that and she said listen i would love to run an exclusive story on you while you're on the run and we will pay you ten thousand dollars for the
exclusivity to the rights of your little fleeing story and he's like this is amazing uh okay yeah like how are you gonna send me the money they're like obviously we could wire it to you and he's like okay let me give you my bank information a part of that bank information was the u.s bank In Miami, Florida. And they immediately gave it to the police.
So Miami, Florida, they get the Miami PD involved and they go and they arrest him because they literally went straight to the bank. So he's waiting outside while Bianca went inside to withdraw the $10,000 in cash. And so they had US Marshals all undercover wearing like plain clothes outside. And he was sitting out there and he's like, oh, this is weird. Why does everyone?
Why is everyone weird? Like, it feels like I'm in like a parallel universe. Nobody's going into the bank. They're just all kind of glancing at me, reading newspapers, all weird. So he starts looking around. Bianca comes out with the cash and he just yells, run! And she has no idea. what he's saying so she's like what and he was already booking it so he's running in the opposite direction running down the street squad cars come they block both of them they arrest both
And now he's being extradited back to Austria. Narcissist personality is what got him. That's what I'm saying. He could have totally like laid it low in Miami, Florida. I really don't think that. I mean, maybe he would have gotten caught, but definitely not this easily. Yeah.
So he gets extradited to Vienna and in May 1992 is his trial. He was on the run for only three months and he comes up with this plan to get him out of jail. He's like, I don't like jail. I hate jail. I hate prison. So he sneaks in a razor and he cuts open a vein on his arm.
And he gets sent to a hospital for it. Now, a lot of people don't have sympathy for this because it was people say it was strategically cut. So I guess there is a way that you strategically cut it where you don't die, but you lose lots of blood. If that makes sense. Or it looks like it's a lot of blood. I'm not entirely sure. Right. And so, yeah, it didn't work. They were like, yeah, we know what you're doing. They bandage him up and they sent him back to prison.
So trial starts in two years. So he's just sitting in prison for these two years. Now Austria is very interesting because you can be tried for other crimes committed in other countries. I don't know if it's still like this, but in 1992, that was kind of like the whole thing, right? So the murders in Prague and Los Angeles.
like they had fbi and lapd fly to austria to testify wow yeah this is an international case yeah and so jack's whole defense you guessed it preppy killer defense a celebrity i don't need to hire sex workers i'm rich i'm famous i get sex anytime i want it why would i ever rape or murder someone when i'm rich
Where's the logic in that? So many people use that. And I'm like, you have no brain cells. He even bragged about how he slept with 150 different women in the past two years. He's like, why would I need to murder people? I have everything you'd want. Fame. Sex? Women? Money? A Rolex?
Yeah, there were a lot of women supporters. There were some women who were weeping in the court, they said. They were, you know, saying this man, this is a political agenda that's happening. Like, this is unfair. This is my Jack Antevega, my darling. So after two months, he was convicted of nine of the 11 murders and he was sentenced to several life sentences. But that would never get carried out because the next morning he hung himself in prison.
he took the string of his pants and he tied it into knots that were very similar to the knots that were found on the woman and he hung himself from like a coat hook which i'm also like why is there a coat hook they're like prisoners get your coats I don't know. There was a coat hook and he hung himself and the press called it his best murder yet. Sounds weird. I think this is a situation of rich people are weird.
I don't know what else to say. This could have all been avoided if these upper elites didn't have to get so obsessed over. Wow. The literary potential. Like, fine. If he's got potential, you can write books from prison. Yeah. Write some more books then, Jacko. You don't have to make him come out of prison. Yeah. And he stayed at the Cecil, allegedly in the same room as Richard Ramirez, who allegedly stayed at the Cecil. That hotel has been through some shit.
Let me know what are your thoughts on this case. And I know it's a little bit confusing because the sources on this one are really just weird. Either it's not in English or it's by Jack. So I hope you guys enjoyed and I'll see you guys on Wednesday. Bye!