Thinking Sideways: Live-Ade Family Murder

under coercion from the maker of the bomb. From the studio that brought you Making a Murderer, comes a twisting, turning bank hits that will shed light up on the true story of the pizza bomber and the person who might have gotten away with master winning the entire thing. Docuseries Evil Genius is streaming now only on Netflix. Watch it today. It's Quicker Tar Glories. So it's almost time,

but we're expecting about another three people to show up. Um, yeah, so we might hold off for an extra minute or two. There you go. There they are. Yeah. You guys know Robin from the Trail went Cold Say hi everybody. Yeah, we'll set the term my mic on did they whatever I said? I'm sorry, it says here in the script witty banter. Okay, it does it actually does it does? Yeah, it says intro ourselves period, wint Witty Badger period. Yeah

like cold Oh okay, yeah, I don't know. All right, for those of you who weren't here a few minutes ago, I'm gonna show off one more time. I know, I know it looks like a UFO, but it's actually look into a sombrero. Yeah I know. Uh. Actually, all I had to do was tell her my sad story and she gave it to me. Wen't that's eat you know? Yeah, she was going to charge me, but she just gave it to me. So this is the point where you turn your ring tones off. Yeah, yeah, that would be good,

thank you. That was planned. Okay, it's three thirty crap? Should do this? Or should we just go to the bar? I mean, I guess we said we'd do it. First off, How are y'all doing? Uh? Having fun at Triumphon? Yeah? And I'm sorry. We got those recording thing situated, I believe, so it's all figured out theoretically, all right, this could

be the last episode, let's hope not already was. By the way, excuse my voice it cuts out a little bit because I was at Fuse last night and the decibel level was like about three hundred in there, and so I had to be screaming at people when I was talking to them, and I think I kind of damaged my local courts a little bit. So he was actually just screaming at people. It had nothing to do with the music. Screaming at you. But yeah, okay, well

I guess it's my job to get this thing started. Okay, all right, So you guys know maybe from last year, maybe from listening to us that we're recording this, so sorry, um so hello and welcome to Crime. We are thinking sideways the podcast, and we're gonna do a show for you tonight. We have a mystery. Um but first, I'm Devin, I'm Joe, and I'm Steve's perfect. It sounds like there's like twelve times they get people in here, so let's do that again. And I'm going to run through the

crowd with the micro let. We're not doing that. We're not doing that. I'm sorry. What are you going to talk about tonight? Let's see Golden Killer? Yeah, DNA or something, you know, I don't know. I don't know about this DNA stuff. You know. I was reading this article that we share like of our DNA with frogs so it's like a frog, That's what I'm saying. Yeah, so I'm not totally convinced about that one yet. Okay, well, scratch up another one. Yeah we did maybe an ax murder. Yeah,

and how much cool about this one? Has just happened really close to where we're sitting right now. Yeah, yeah, let's get started right so good, all right, We're going to talk about the axe murder of the aid family in March twenty four of eighteen nine seven. Our story takes place here in Tennessee. As we just mentioned, at the time, the area was called Germantown because, as you might have guessed, there are a lot of German immigrants

that lived there. The Aids were also German immigrants, and they had been living in the area for about twenty years at the time that our story takes place. Well, I mean, Jacob and a line had I should introduce you to the family, Jacob and Pauline. Jacob was the patriarch of the family. He was sixty years old at the time. His wife, Pauline was fifty years old. Also involved were two children, uh daughter named Lizzie who was

twenty and a son named Henry who was thirteen. Worth mentioning they weren't just like super old parents um for the times. For the time. They also had three adult children, but they had moved out by then. Lucky them. And that's what we called by forest shadowing. H Jacob and Pauline owned quite a large farm in what was then called Paradise Ridge but is now called Joel Town, which I believe is like sixteen miles from where we are here. I don't know if there are any right, are you

guys from? Is anybody from Tennessee there? You? Yeah? So the people that were not all right, they're farm it's said, was at least four hundred acres, which is point six square miles or one point six square kilometers, which is not nothing. I guess I don't know acres, I'm sorry, as you do. With farms. Not only was there a farmhouse, but also lots of outbuildings like barns, et cetera, and

at least one smokehouse. But to be fair, the barn is actually speculation because there are very little details about this story other than the fact that there were five rooms in the farmhouse and there was a smokehouse. That's all we really know. But there had to be a because you have to story your tools somewhere right right, I probably tool ship. Yeah. Uh. Here's the thing with farming. You probably know. It can be much more lucrative for

some people than others. And the Aids were considered very wealthy by their peer farmers. It's unclear to me if this is true or not. We've talked a lot about this. The Aids might have just been very generous with their money because they Jacob would loan money to any farmers

in the area that maybe needed some. But he was also pretty litigious, which is the correct use of that word this time, thank you reporting is that just days before the thing that you're about to learn at about, Jacob had been in court because somebody had stolen one of his hogs and he was suing them. That's not cool, Okay. So we have the a family. We have Jacob, Pauline, Lizzie,

and Henry. Also involved in what you're about to learn out is Rosa, who was a ten year old neighbor who was sleeping over um and we her dad lived in the area, but we're no it's unclear why she was sleeping at the house at the time. Her last name is reported differently every single place you read it, So it could be Morrier more Tier, Murrier Morier ear or like Moriarty or something that last one that's not true.

Yeah yeah, Joe, Okay, my turn. So now Dev has done the hard work of introducing all of our characters, like crime. Uh all, by the way, the Aids family, because you're wondering the Aig family A D E not a I D just in case you're curious. I keep wanting to call him like live cool band. You know I mean that now, So it's a D. So none of that applies. So the crime. So nobody actually saw the crime except for the guy who committed it, of course. But around nine thirty that night it was dark, of

course it was with March and Tennessee. Their closest neighbor was about half mile away and saw flames coming from their home, and so rode over on his horse to check it out. This guy's name was Justice Simpson the West. Some accounts his name was Squire Simpson. I think it was Justice the keeping simple. We're gonna call him Justin as always, Yeah, yeah, as always. Uh so just Justin got there. The whole house was already up in flames,

and he didn't see the family anywhere. So all I could think of do was go to the smokehouse and pull all the meat out of the smokehouse. And that's what he said afterwards, you know, I'm like, He's like, oh, you know, the meat was gonna be destroyed, so I thought I would save the meat. I think he was

is trying to get some free meat. I think that's yeah, the family's going up in flames, I'm gonna grab some free st We don't know, that's less give him the benefit of the Yeah, So he starts pulling meat out of the smoke causse while yelling for the family. He was thinking that maybe they were already already up in flames, or I'll say it escaped the house and they were, you know, lurking somewhere, maybe on the other side of

the house or something. He wasn't sure, but he was he was moving the meat and uh yeah, and then uh. According to one version of this story, while while our friend Justin was was there moving the meat out of the smokes, you keep saying it that way. Yeah, very uncomfortable. Okay, Okay, let me think here, all right, I just won't talk

about that anymore. Uh Uh. So he was doing his thing and apparently like an exterior an exterior wall of the house falls down and just collapse is and he was able to see inside the burning house, and so and he saw what he saw the dead bodies in there. Although to him they looked like just big bundles of clothing. He wasn't sure. So he did what any of us would do when you're you know, like like face with

a huge burning house. You know, he went and got a potato fork, which is like a pitchfork, but the times have been bent, so yeah, yeah, and so he grabs one of those and ties a long pole to it and goes and starts poking at those those big bundles. I'm not sure I would do that, but he yeah, I bet that's what he did, and uh pull folks out of a bit and then kind of hooks him and pulls him out of the house and turns out there were corpses. Yeah, I know, the dead bodies, not

just dead bodies, but headless bodies. Right now, I know that. I know. That makes it even better, doesn't it. Uh So? Uh where am I at here? And the ruining Steve's part is what you're doing. Sorry, I'm stopping all over his stuff, but I don't I don't know. I'm not so sure about this because unless the guy was like a terminator from the future, how do you do this? Because house fires are like what like nine hundred degrees right,

you know. So I'm wondering if perhaps because it turns out a rain storm kicked up that night kind of doused the flames a bit, so it might be that Justin Way didn't tell after things that kind of died down a little bit before he started poking around and they're pulling bodies out of the wreckage of the house. That's the less heroic version, that is. Yeah, I would

call it the less heroic version. Yeah, but whatever he did, I mean, you know, long story short, they did find fourheadless bodies, although some reports say too, I like four better myself, just like literally all of this is Steve. Yeah, Well, this is a problem is I. I sort of stare at the script, but I'm not really seeing it. I'm just like going off memory. So I'm going to turn

it over to Steve. It though he doesn't have anything to talk about alright, theories getting ahead, so obviously no matter whether it was two bodies or it was four bodies. Justin is freaked out. So he runs away and he goes and he gets a neighbor and says, hey, I found these dead bodies. What do we do? They then go and get Rosa's dad, who I'm he must have been just a couple of miles away, and then they

all go back to the property and mill about. I don't know what they were doing while they were waiting there. Eventually the sheriff would show up and he would start looking around. When they pulled the bodies out, they noticed that it was the Aid family, only the ones that Justin pulled out. But when the sheriff starts looking around, he finds Rosa's body, and she's a little bit different than the other because she's not as burned as badly

as everybody else. As heads right, she is missing some she is missing a hand, and it appears that she's missing the back of her head as if somebody took a swing at her and didn't get the whole thing. Yeah, which is not exactly the nicest thing in the world. And the question that I always ask on the times that we've rehearsed this and it's well before is always why why would her body be less burned than all the other ones, and so there's a lot of ideas

of why that might be. The general theory is that she must have tried to get away, and maybe she was caught outside of the house and then once the killer had killed her, tossed her back into the building with the intention of her burning up with everybody else. But she was in an area of the house that maybe didn't burn as much, and therefore she was spared the flames. But it's you know, it's hard to say because, as Devin said, there's weird reporting on this story and

it changes all over the place. There are places that said that she did have her hand. There's also places that say that her body was found in a crouching position, which, when we talked about it, yeah, with her hands over her head kind of herself, like for a dead body to be just like crouching, I think it'd fall over. And the only thing that we can come up with is maybe she was in the corner of a room, which is even scarier when you think about it, because yeah,

I don't want to think about going that way. So the original working theory was this. Someone must have come to the house around eight o'clock that night. They killed Jacob first and then chase the rest of the family into the house and would corner them in the parlor where they would be murdered. And it is believed that it is at this point while the Aid family was being killed in the parlor, if Rosa had tried to

get away, that's when she would have done it. There was speculation that she had tried to go out a window, which since most of the house was burned down. I don't don't know why where they came up with that. Yeah, that that part doesn't make a lot of sense, But as with all of the reporting, a lot of things don't make sense. Pause for a drink, Pose for a drink, I get dry mouth. If you ever notice it's a

bad thing, don't do it. See where the heck were we? Oh? Okay? Yeah, So we talked about the fact that the house had partially burned and then the fire head when put out. Of course, when they get those bodies, the heads are missing, and people have said, well, where could the heads have gone? It's likely that they did not burn up in the fire, because if the bodies didn't burn up. Heads are very moist, they're not going to burn up very easy. They don't

explode in flames like that. So no, no, this is not the zombie movie, so that does not happen. Um. And so it's thought at this point that our killer must have packed away these two or full or full intact heads, which it's kind of gotta be a lot of weight to carry. How much does it? It's ten pounds that stuff Actually, funny story. Googled it, um. And actually when I googled it, I was doing something else, and so I accidentally googled how much as a human

head cost? And you can there is a price, it turns out, or full size, full size, and that's for like the whole transplant. I couldn't find what it just it's probably um. So okay, So back to the investigation. So really there are no clues as to what happened to the family. Authorities would search around. They would arrest two black men who lived in Ashland City, which is apparently ten miles away, but their confessions would be found to not be exactly right, and probably we're coerced, and

we'll talk about that in a little bit. In theories, um. Then two other men that were local men were charged with the crime. They were sent to trial. They were acquitted because there's no evidence, so they really there was nothing who convict them with. So you know, we've kind of got a perfect crime here because well, wait, there is one witness, so we've been holding back on you. There is one single witness. It was the family's German shepherd. Yes,

I believe it or not, they had a dog. The dog saw it all, told the sheriff what had happened. The sheriff used the dog as his secret witness. I don't, I don't. It's the late eighteen nineties. I guess it was the wild West of investigations. My my best guess here is that his plan was to take the dog all around town and whoever the dog barked out must have been guilty of people got executed because it turns out that dog was a barker. So yeah, that's that's

the really weird part about the story. So really, no no witnesses, perfect crime. Yeah. The reason I think we missed this one of the reasons that most of the evidence was gone because of that rainstorm. It washed away most of the blood evidence. There were no footprints anything like that because it was a really heavy rainstormire right, help anything? Yeah, so it was kind of perfect. Actually it turned out not bad crime. Yeah, alright, well I'll

have to say perfect crime. But you know, okay, okay, it's time for theories. But first let's take a break. A bomb this is an explosive weapon that uses the exothermic reaction of an explosive material to provide an extremely sudden and violent release of energy. Detonations have like damage principally through transmitted mechanical stress, the impact and penetration of pressure driven projectiles, pressure damage, and explosion generated effects. Bombs

can be defined as vessels containing a reactive material. A baby with a full belly. Someone could really know how to wear those shorts at a large, greasy meal that will definitely sit in the pit of your stomach all day long. Well, if you want to hear about the first kind of bomb, we've got the show for you. It's Evil Genius. Evil Genius tells the story of Brian Douglas Wells, an American pizza delivery man who was killed by a remotely controlled bomb fastened to his neck under

coversion from the maker of the bomb. In two thousand three, Wells was apprehended by police for robbing a bank while the bomb was locked to his neck. Shortly thereafter, the bomb detonated and it killed him instantly. After years of mishandled investigations, Evil Genius will shed light on the true story of the pizza bomber and the person who might

have gotten away with masterminding the whole thing. From the studio that brought you, making a murder and the Keepers comes a twisting, turning bank heist that leaves a trail of bodies in one big question who was the Evil Genius behind it? The four part docuseries Evil Genius is streaming now only on Netflix because it's the bump and we're back. Okay, so theory number one. You get to hear me continue to prattle on because I have theory number one, So lucky you. The first theory is that

it was robbery. As we've established before, the Aid family was well off, or at least generous to the folks that lived in the area, and it was not an unknown fact that they actually kept a lot of money in the house. Turns out that they were known to catch several hundred dollars at any one time in their home. If you look at what a hundred dollars is worth in the late eighteen nineties to today, it's somewhere in the range of about so you're looking at five grand,

ten grand. It's kind of that's not I don't think that's enough money for me to want to murder somebody, especially. People have different standards though, but yeah, it wouldn't quite met my standard form brochering an entire family, But just just so I'm warned, Yeah, it's kind of a moving targets. Oh boy um Okay. So there were the two gentlemen from Ashland City that were originally brought in for the crime,

and they had confessed. The reason that their confessions didn't or that they didn't get charged with these crimes is their confession was that they robbed. They went in and they did this whole thing so that they could rob the family and get all the money they had. That fell apart because when they started digging through the remains of the home they found the money. Turns out that they had a roll of a hundred dollars in a tin um joe. You what what was it? Uh? What

kind of I heard it was an oyster can. Uh, so they stuck a roll a part of me like a normal was an oyster can. They just stuffed a roll and an oyster can and like put it in the pantry or something. Although you know that. The thing about it is is the original suspects maybe did do it because they find a stash of semi burned bills and say, well, they said they found the money. Obviously

they didn't. What if they did find some money, they just didn't find this particular bit of money, which makes sense. It's it's don't put all your eggs in one basket, so you have multiple things around the house with money in it. They could have, if Joe's right, found some found some money and said we've struck gold. Let's like this place up and let's get the hell out of here,

when in fact they didn't get at all. I just the reason that I have a hard time with this theory is like the beheading aspect, right, I mean, it's a lot of work, well a lot of work, but it's just it is, but like why you know, you could just stab some people and to get off with the money and not have to you know, And I mean cud of kids has off seems like really extreme. Uh, and then you know one of them was I don't know, I just it doesn't really all fit together for me.

Well you know actually that I thought about it too, and and it's it's uh, for a robbery, it seems a little extreme. But on the other hand, if you're robbing them and you want to cover that up that it was it was for robbery, it chops some heads off, and everybody thinks while psycho killer, they're not going to think about robbery so much. So maybe that's that's kind of my thinking on that it's to cover up the other crime, see what I'm saying. Yeah, but I'm really

worried about you. You come up with these answers really fastest I do. But you know, you can feel safe because I'm kind of squeamish and I don't like making big messages and spreading DNA all over the place. That DNA stuff is really getting kind of problematical for us criminal types. Yeah, well no, but it is. I mean, the thing is, it's not is if who if somebody was local that did this crime, wouldn't know that there

was at least four people in that home. Three adults and one kid into ending on whoever was over, then they're gonna know that there's a lot of people in the home. So it seems like an extreme way to go about it. Um, I know, Joe, you had one, you had one kind of side vein on this theory. Well, it's just that in those days, you know, people have bigger families. So your typical house probably had like fifteen people living in it. So that wasn't what I meant. Yeah,

that's what I'm thinking. Enough, from the killer's point view, it could be hardly anybody's at home, and so, uh, that could be one aspect to it. Well it's the other. The other idea that you when we were talking about it is erasing a debt. Yeah, that was well, you know, that is it. And that's what if if Jacob did lend money, Well, first of all, we don't know if he wasn't the local loan shark. I mean, you know, maybe he was after like breaking kneecapping people left and right.

I said, we don't really know he lands money, so did have a hog farm? We don't actually know. Oh yeah that's true. But um, but if he was lending money, it's it's there's a it's a possible thing that there was somebody out there in the community who was actually into him for say, you know, a thousand bucks or whatever.

And he's thinking it over and thinking, you know, it's gonna be a long long time before I get Jacob paid off, So why don't just go over there and kill him and light the house on fire, so the ledger that's got it all written down, it'll all get burned up in the flames, and then my dad is just magically raced kill him and his kids and cut

their heads off, you know, collateral damage. But you know, you know I would, I would probably try to find a way to you know, make sure that the whole the thing about it is is back in those days, you know, there were no cars or malls. You know, the kids were always hanging around the farm. You know, it's not like now, Yeah, that's that too, Yeah, And so you know that could have been and he just figured that, you know, hey, now's as good a time

as Danny. And maybe he didn't even realize little Rose it was gonna be there. He thought he was just gonna have to kill like four people instead of like five, you know, uh, you know, and and just one other thing I wanted to toss in here too. This is an axe murder. But you know, if he really took all the heads, we don't actually know that it was an ex murder other than rosa because he could have shot them all on the head. And the reason he chopped their heads off, it's because he wanted to take

the bullets with him. You know, that's evidence, right, Yeah, no, but you're about fifty plus years too soon for that. Yeah, yeah, I know, but you know that's that's possibility. Yeah, oh yeah, he could have been in time traveler. Yeah, I don't know's anybody here. No, when actually, like you know, ballistics evidence really came into him into like being, it seems like it was right around this time. It was like late nineteenth century, early twentieth century. Cool. Well yeah, alright, cool,

I'm gonna just take the next theory doing that. My theory is a revenge, particularly over the hog dispute um, because you remember how when I was talking twelve years ago, because I don't talk, I mentioned that a few days prior to the murder, slash fire whatever situation, that Jacob had been in court over stolen hog. That was not just a fun fact. It was for a reason. It was to pat up my theory. So this is how

this theory goes. Actually, Ed Anderson, one of the AIDS neighbors, reportedly maybe stole some of the AIDS hogs or pigs, living pork products. Ostensibly ostensibly stole some living pork products. Uh. And this is actually a theory that's out there, and it's super super frustrating to me because this is how this theory goes. Well, they were in court, um, but you know, he cooperated and everyone like the AIDS, So

I didn't do it. I heard the guy had a solid alb but they but nobody ever reports the alibi, which is again super you know, he would have been an obvious suspect though you would think, thank you, but you know, the reporting is always Well, the neighbors all really like the AIDS, so it couldn't have been any of them. I don't know. Uh. The other thing that I guess could have happened with venge would be that there could have been like an old feud um from Germany. Yeah,

from the old country. Yeah. I mean they've lived in the area for twenty years, so it would have been really old but um, I guess it's possible. Well, I mean people did. People did flee their homelands for a multitude of reasons, not just because they didn't like the local government. But they were fleeing debt. It was not an uncommon thing, so it could be that he was. I mean, we're talking about debt so far. Maybe he's made somebody made somebody else money. Twenty years. Twenty years

is a really long time. That's a lot of interest that day. Yes, that's true, And I don't want to go too far down this rabbit hole because there's really nothing to substantiate it, like at all, and there's there's additional to that. There's like no theories on who that might have been from the Old Country or anything else. And we are a little bit running out of time. Well what time is it? And Joe has a really

good theory about Matt Damon. So oh you guys are here now, Okay, Um, Actually it's kind of kind of weak, but it's good. He's been over everything this weekend. Yeah, it's an awesome theory. I don't want to say it's awesome and then have everybready been disappointed. The best theory well, you know, I mean, what if this was like an actual serial killer who did this. And I'm sure all of you guys have heard of the Midwest axvan have you? Okay? And the Midwest guy? Uh, he ranged actually all the

way from outside the Midwest he started. The first one known outside of this one was Portland, Oregon. The loose term of Midwest, I guess, yeah, yeah, I don't know when they actually settled on a definition for the bid West, so you know it might have applied then. But he ranged all the way from there, so as far as east this Monmouth, Illinois. Uh. These all took place between June nineteen eleven and June, but there was there was a lot that connected those two. I mean he had

a typical emma. Was he attack a family that lived near the railroad tracks, so like five or six blocks maybe from the railroad tracks, which led people to think he traveled by rail um usually well actually always did. The family had just an ax laying around in the yard that he would just pick up and go in and kill, which was typical of those days. That's usually how X murders operated in those days, actually, because everybody had an ax laid around in their yard. More that

than the axe murderers part. Yeah, that too, Yeah, but oh god, what else? He had a typical thing of like lighting an oil lamp, and he would take the chimney off and bend the wick ninety degrees before lighting it, which I guess was not standard operating procedure back in those days. And so and so there, and and we cover the windows usually, and so there was a lot connecting all those murders. But in this case, of course, it's hard to tell because the house burned down, so

all that evidence was destroyed. There was a very famous one that was under that. There was another one too that I think was done by the Midwest AxMan was of course, you guys have heard of Willissa, Iowa Willissa axe murders. That also. There was a lot of similarities there too, So I think, you know, but can we tie this one to it? I'm not sure. Um, Well, there were don't there were no railroad tracks nearby, um, so that kind of and he didn't usually burn the

house down, um. And of course he didn't take heads in the earth, you know, in the later murders, So that's kind of a difference. It seems like an escalation too. Yeah, the taking of the heads. Yeah, like, if if this one happened after those, I would be more willing to say that it could be connected. But taking heads and then not taking heads anymore seems like a de escalation

to me. Well, you know, um my thinking is that he took he took some souvenirs the first time out and were on for a little bit, and he started smelling bad, and he decided the whole idea was overrated, and so that's why he never did it again. That's that's kind of where I'm thinking. What do you guys think of that theory? Get your name? Yeah already, okay, one single? Yeah, alright, we're on the right track. It was kind of faint, but I'll but so, yeah, I

don't know. So I'm trying to think it's not related to the Midwest ax man. Of course, that doesn't mean it wasn't another serial killer. I mean back in those days, uh, you know, we didn't have the inner webs and national TV, national TV news networks and stuff, so we didn't you know, we didn't have Nancy Grace. No, she was not want to be born for another ten years. Just getting Nancy.

If you're listening, I love I love Nancy. Yeah, so you know, but maybe, I mean I could I could imagine maybe this guy goes out commits a psychoax killing, you know, and then maybe uh like goes into the military for a while and just goes overseas and kills for Uncle Sam or something, and eventually like it comes out of the military, goes back to wherever and then just decides, hey, you know, I'm about to do more

of this, and so that could have been it. But otherwise it's kind of hard to account for that big long gap. So we well, we what story do we talked about that? Um, it was the grim Sleeper where he was he was, you know, he was really really prolific, and then things changed in his life and his his relationship at home got better and he had a couple of kids, and he literally didn't have the time to do the killing. So you know, people were spared from the wrath that he was. And I mean, it's entirely

possible that that's what's going on with this guy. If the Unified acts murder killer theories, right, yeah, what's it? You know, who knows it could be? I mean, you don't know what's going on in this guy's life. He might have committed this crime and gone on and done something else, like murdered some other guy in apute, gone off to prison for a while, and then he gets out around nineteen eleven and decides to start killing people again. I don't know. So anyway, that's about the end of

that theory for me. Anybody else got any theories? Yes, man in the back, Well, we gotta we gotta, we gotta volunteer theory. Hey, we've got microphones by the way. Yeah, I don't know if those are two and are not a man running towards you. So I want to look at him, turn around, let him deal with it, turn around, or just turn around playing with Oh my god, look I do test one too. Guys, I don't know. Hey, what's your name? My name is Justin. Just he did it? Hey,

that's my theory is Justin did it. I like it. He's the neighbor. Maybe they didn't clean up their grass clippings and he got mad about it. Well, you know those neighbors that don't that don't weed their yards, and you've got all those little dandie lamp puff balls out there that are going to blow over into your yard. And then you got to be caught off all their heads. Yeah, yeah, Joe, and he knew that they had meat in the house and money. It was the meat, right, that's why you

did it. Well, that's why Justin did it, neighbor Justin right, think think and Justin did it? Why he was the first one that came across the bodies. That's a good point. First one on the scene does get to say what happened? Yeah? Any other anybody else? And he had all the time in the world. What are the clues do you have? This is Acam's razor. It's just the simplest explanation. And you were saying that I was doing it the entire time, So I'm gonna go with that. You're taking credit for

it makes sense. I'm not a hundred and something years old, and are you are? Can you show us proof? And uh, he didn't cut their heads off for bullets because ballistics evidence didn't come into effect until about You just googled that, didn't you. Yeah know, he knows that from the alienist. Yeah no, I think that's probably true, although you know

it could have been. He just wanted you know, he owned a forty five and he thought Wow, they're gonna have forty five caliber sized holes in their heads, so why don't I just whack their heads up until yeah, yeah, Oh suddenly everyone knows now when we asked, but when Justin asked, very good, thank you, Justin. I want to point out, yeah, for Justin, I I do want to

point out to one. The one thing to support support is theory is that Justin are not nour Justin here, but the other one actually was holding him a sharp agricultural implement in his hands when everybody saw him. You know, so there you go, case closed. Is that how that happened? I thought he dropped it and ran away. I you know, I don't know what really happened. We're just admitting we

have no idea what we're talking about. That is that is the hardest part about the story is the reporting is super super spotty, and even the reporting at the time because you can you can you know, they scan the old clippings and it varies from paper to paper to paper, and these papers are within a day or two of each other. So this story really just kind of got blurred really really fast, which is why we picked it because and nobody can prove us wrong. On

anything in this one. It's it's you know, somebody really wanted to go, like go look at courthouse records and find old police and court records and stuff. They could probably get a lot more, assuming those things haven't been lost or you know, one up in a fire or something like that. There might be more information out there. So far, nobody's been interested enough to go out there, and actually no, there has been some people that have looked into it. But it uh Rosa's dad. Apparently he

was French. That's that's somehow was determined based on her the sound of her name. But people who have gone through the records have combed through them and they've never been able to figure out exactly who he is. So we don't even know his first name, we don't even know their last name. It's just it just went off the rails that fast. So alas any other theories out there, oh we got up front here, all right, let's hear him, not see him. I don't want to see any theories

about acts murders. If the heads were missing and the bodies were burned, do we have a positive identification? Do we know that those were all the actual dead people? As I possible. Maybe the husband killed the wife and they took all the heads stide, Uh, the fact that the male body wasn't his. I don't know how the idea of the bodies. That's a good point. You know that the family could have like you know, murdered another family and then skipped skipped down to start a new life.

It was actually Rosa's dad was actually Jacob. Yeah, yeah, so that's actually good theory. I like that they certainly couldn't use DNA, could they. Yeah, we have another Yeah, so related to the heads, do we know how long it took between the neighbor showing up because it kind of seemed like he was like looting their house. Yeah, it's it's like, you know, it's customary in those days

to loot the smoke house. Yeah, I mean, like, you know he's there, he you know, goes and loots, and you have to assume if he's like going to save the meat from burning, he's also going to take that back to his place. And maybe he had like birth

and then he went and got the dad. And so I'm wondering if there was enough time that passed between the actual like when the fire went out from the storm and when they actually showed back up there and then they milled around and you know, eventually the police get there. But what if the house had actually been

scavenged by animals, because animals go for the head first. Um, but like maybe there'd been like a pack of coyotes or something and they by it took some heads and you know, dragged them off to go and have a mid morning snack, and so maybe it wasn't even an actual like beheading. They actually just it's just the coyotes came by and chewed the heads off. I mean apparently that's like common and gross. But yeah, I don't think

we know how much time. The only thing that I would say with that, and again this is like frustrating reporting, is that they seem to really it's it's like they were cut off and they think a you know, like would be a little war in early but again they were burned also, And also we don't know anything at all. Sorry everybody. Uh oh, we have another theory here. Sorry. It was both uh boy or that two boy and a girl. Yeah them was twenty and it was a daughter.

One of them was thirteen. It was a son, and then there was the ten year old neighbor who was a girl ten year old, was twenty year old male. Twenty year old twenty year old female, young boy. Yeah, she shouldn't have been there. Yeah, over there was piste off killed the law. Yeah, and then his daughter saw it and she was kill His old showed him up back at the scene and the other guy stealing meat. So he's like that guy most guilty. Hey, Joe, Yeah, Joe,

I'm certainly not as uncomfortable around you. This scares me. I kind of like the way you think my ten year old daughter was at some house was all growing up to a young boy that Adams ninth, eighteen nineties, and that stuff wasn't appropriate for her young girl to be around. They got married fourteen years old. Maybe thought she was tainted family. Yeah, an honor killing. Yeah, I don't know if honor killings were big in the back

of the day. Yeah. It is either that or evidence covering up but you know, or hey yeah, okay, Oh another theory. My theory is that it was someone who was very upset about the hogs, and perhaps they fed the heads to the hogs. Yeah, it's a good theory. Yeah, I don't know how quickly that's the last ditch effort to get in that last punch, like screw you. Yeah, yeah, yeah, we're recording, so I won't say what I Yeah, it does seem a final act of disrespect to feed the

heads to the hogs. I'm not sure how quickly a hog or a group of hawks could could munch down some human skulls. I don't I don't know. Apparently, according to TV it's really fast, really like five minutes start to finish. Seriously. Okay, well, thank you for that theory, and it's hardly possible. Yeah, toss the head to the hogs. That is rude, rude. It's all right. So we're talking

late nineteenth century, right, and we're talking missing livestock. So my thought is our favorite villain is trying to establish his identity. Oh you know who wanted oh you know. And we also know this this individual has a well established smoking habit. Yeah. That's a good point, very dangerous in a would eight nineties structure. So I'm just saying, maybe this was a warning to the family not to

look too far into the Choopy family, the good one. Yeah, I like the theory they are so maybe the aid said, you know, maybe Jacob was like, you know, like investigating Choopy and shoop Be decided you know, yeah, he had to take him out. I like that there of course like that. And there is another theory, which is aliens. Why it was? It was just why wait, do you want to go into that anymore? Bars? No, No, you're good. I think I'm good. Yeah, alright, any other theories, theories?

More series? Okay, hang on, Oh we've got like we've got time, so we got we'll wrap up the episode. Thank you all for coming. We're not going to quit this though. Do you have any other general questions? Feel free to ask, but don't do it all at once. Come on, people, all right, I'm gonna I'm gonna have it. I've got a question, said, don't Does anybody want to just come up here and sit here? And we've got

a question. We've got a question. Question. Hi, um, maybe you've answered this before, but I'm just wondering why your favorite mystery that you guys have looked into favorite mystery, we've looked into our favorite episode. We've done you know what, either however you want to respond, however you want to respond, go ahead, Yeah I do. And my answer to both of them is like City Quiet Pills. I think that's probably the best episode I'll ever do in my entire life.

I don't think so, Devin. I think you'll do better. But also I still get like emails from people who are like, well, I had this weird experience, and it's just like I don't like, I do not like what's going on at all there. So that's my answer I would say if for me, if it's a story that we've covered, it's a split between Blair Adams and Ben McDaniels, because both of those have a lot of W two T F moments in them. And are we recording anymore? Do you just I didn't say anything bad, I used

letters saying and okay, now kids gonna know what that means. Okay, I really can't make up my mind. Actually, just as you know, some of you probably know, we just a year and a half ago to the thing about the murder of Martha Moxley, and now that's back in the news, so that sort of kicks it up in my estimation

a little bit. Michael skekill was conviction was over termed by the Connecticut Supreme Court, and so that's kind of interesting that that's the story that most of these stories are done and over and you know, pretty much in the can, and this one keeps on given. So that's kind of cool. Um, And let's see what else. I mean. I kind of liked some of the boat mysteries. The Herbert Poller was one what we did in the last year and now, I don't know if you guys remember

that story. There was a triple ax murder on this sailing ship in the middle of the ocean. It's Apropos today's story. Yeah, yeah, And it's a cool story because these guys are like, you know, three people are asked to death, and so that everybody else is in the middle of nowhere, there's there's you know, they're a week

away from anywhere, and there's a murderer among them. And on top of that, besides being scared about getting killed, they're all sort of quietly pointing fingers at one another two because everybody's paranoid about getting blamed for the crime. And so I thought that was a really cool story, you know, and it's got to do with shifts and stuff like that. So I like that one. I hope you guys liked it to if you didn't listen to it. You go listen to it. You just actually heard it. Yeah,

that's pretty much. Actually it's a good points. Yeah, you're welcome. You always thought about the scripts that you use, and I just want it never sounds like you're on a script. This is what they look like. How much do you actually you do really write it all out? And then the story we just did was five and then Joe ignores it comes out I kind of all it really

does sound off the cuff. Well. So basically what we do is we'll write like an essay about the story each week if it's so, if it's your week to hope, write the essay, the essay the script, and then we have copies in front of it, and we done are in front of us while recording, and we've done research hopefully um over the last couple of weeks, and then we kind of so we all know it, but we have a reference point if we need to call any information up, and then we try to generally follow the script.

But um sometimes yeah, sometimes it goes really well and sometimes it does not go very well. Do you really rehearse it or do you know we only rehearse these live shows because we can edit the other ones. We just look worried about looking dumb in front of real people. Do you talk about do you talk about it a lot before you do the podcast, or do you want it to be fresh so you we don't Joe likes to stand around and try and talk about the story. I don't like Jojo save it, save it, yeah, because

we never remember to say it again. Yeah, it's good points, but yeah, the scripts are great, just but they're mostly there to make sure we tell the story in the right order and we don't leave anything out. But other than that, it's just like, man, you know, yeah, another question. I just wondered his life changed it all for all since you made yourselves public lusture not really a little. I'm still still fairly we're all still fairly obscure, you know. I was like, I just was it just like it

was Friday? I guess no, Thursday. Um. We were out and I was like, I think Jacob and Air and a few other people were out and this really attracted blonde has your phone? I was like, oh, I want to take a picture. I want to take a picture of you all, you know, so I'm ready to go and go step over and be photographing and she hands the camera to me and said the picture. I said, Okay,

that happened. Yeah, that happened with the captain recently. We were out like getting drinks and they're like, you know, you guys have seen what happens when he's out. And some girl was like, oh, I'm sorry, are you waiting in line? And I was like, no, we're going to get a drink. No, it's yeah, we don't get I don't get recognized. Really, it's just is like online comments to change my appearance. That's why the beard happened in hiding.

Now you count all off. It's people people do stare at me, but they were doing that before, So yeah, I think so it hasn't really changed things for me Hi him. Before the case of the Golden State Killer was solved, what was your leading theory? Um, this is this is going to disappoint every single person in this room. But I didn't really have any theories about it, um, because it wasn't a case that I really poured any time into. It's it's it's let's put it this way.

The case is ikey, it's gross. Yeah, there's not something that I don't think any of us like to sit and dwell on that. And there's a number of cases like that where there's some pretty horrendous things that happen, and sometimes for us, we're always kind of in the trenches with that stuff. And so those really big ones, it's just easier kind of set him aside, build an ice brick wall around them, and think him in the ocean and never think about it again. Because but Joe

might have some theories. Do you have some series? Uh? Not really now I have. I looked into the case a little bit and read some of the history, and my first thought was because when we look at a story, or at least when I do, I think, Okay, is this story got a really good hook to it? Is there's something really interesting about it? Because not every murder is interesting, Frankly, I hate to hate to put it that way, but they're not. And so I said, is

there something interesting? And also the next thing as well, can I cramming a really good elucidation of the entire thing in an hour or two, an hour and a half episode? And when you look at this one, oh my god, this guy was just like you know, he was prolific. I mean, for a long time, and so just going through the descriptions of his crime would have taken at least an hour and a half, and there's no time for given theories. And that's one of the

reasons I set this one aside. It's just just so big. Some of these stories are just so big that and we're not serial. You know, we were serial, you know, it would be a little easier to do. But and so if you want to fund us, so yeah, and so I never ruled it out totally. I just sort of set it aside and said, I'm not sure, set that one aside. Sorry, we're not the true crime words

everyone wants us to be. I'm sorry. I seriously have thought every now and again, I'm thinking what to do, and I'll look at oh yeah, there's that one, you know, and then and I and I did it again recently, and then all of a sudden it's solved. Okay, I crossed off the list. Glad we didn't do it, unless it turns out the police screwed up, which is also possible to that never happens, thank you ever. Hi. Hello, So this is my first time listening to you guys.

So I'm sorry if you've already entered this, but also you're awesome, Thank you, thank you. My question is what first got you guys interested in true crime? Well, I for me, it's not true crime, it's unsolved mysteries. And I think the like question mark is really enticing to me. I grew up watching the Unsolved Mysteries show and listening to Art Bell. Uh, and you know that that I

think really just kind of informed that drive. I don't know, there are some cases that we covered really really early on, um, like the tom and food and the lead mass case, and these just really bizarre things from history that just it's how do you answer that? It's just so weird? Um, And just trying to figure those things out was just really enticing to me. So, um, that's what drew me to this whole universe. I would say that works. Yeah, I'll say, I'll see, didn't do that? What's that? So?

I'm sorry, that's a cup out? You can't do that? Okay, fine, I don't know. I don't know exactly. I mean I read a lot of Sherlock Holmes and stuff like that when I was a kid, you know, and but I've never really been a true grand fanatic. My entire life but now, and then we decided to do a podcast. Sorry right contemporary It's okay, okay, uh yeah, yeah, thanks

to the questions. Uh. And then just after we started doing the podcast and and doing the mystery stuff, I got much more back into it, you know, more like when I was a kid, and so it's been very fun. I really enjoy this stuff. Turn So this is you ever have those things where you're a kid and your family does something and it drives you absolutely crazy, and then one day you realize you're doing it. My family would sit around and they would just chew the fat

about things and just keep doing it. And you know, I could play my Nintendo and I didn't want to

think about it and stopped talking. And then one day I started reading these things and going, oh, well what about and I would find myself I'm sure as these two would you just sit there for days and days and days just chewing through it and trying to come up with theories, and hours and hours and hours for me, but well, you've got short attention to spend m But I mean, that's that's really how it worked for me.

There was something hypnotic about that, you know, it's like sometimes when I'm actually doing this stuff, I can actually like, you know, most of my other compulsions, like you know, caffeine or you know whatever, nicotine, I just they just get set to the side. You know. It's like not most things don't make me overlook those things. But sometimes when I'm hot, on the tail of a hot mystery, I can even like I can stop, you know, I can even neglect some of my other things, my o,

their addictions. You're talking about your job. We all do the job too. Yeah, more questions anyone now, okay, okay, well, now alight, time for some impersonations. Okay, oh Joe, you are so sexy. Okay, any others? All right, Well, thank you everybody. Did you come and enjoy crash On? Thank you, Thank you very much. Now, hold on, guys, this has been going good, and we're recording this so we're gonna release this on the show. So we're gonna show you

how the magic of podcasting works. So bear with me. But first let's take a break. This is when we go to the bathroom. You can't go to the bathroom yet now and we're back. I know, it's amazing, it's totally amazing. It sounds different when you hear it on the podcast. That'll be a really cool ad. In the middle, there'll be some great music in there. Listeners made that for us, love that music.