Signature w/ Erika Christensen

Of the Law and Order franchises. SVU is considered especially watchable.

We are the amateur detectives who kind of investigate the vicious felonies.

These episodes are based on. These are our stories, done done.

Hello, everybody, Welcome to That's Messed Up n SVU podcast.

I'm Kara Klang.

Hi, I'm Lisa Trigger and this is a sv podcast. We talk about an episode of SVU, the true crime it's based on. We talked to someone from the episode today is a monumental moment in my life. So stay tuned for everything. Great episodes. Yeah, whatever, let's talk Cara, what's up? Even though I was in Chicago last week, I never I didn't. I didn't get to talk about that. Though I'm a white Sox fan. I went to a Cubs game.

Oh.

I had the time of my life. I've never sat this close to athletes before. We were second row behind the Cubs dugout.

How'd you get these tickets?

I opened for my friend Jared, and he's treating me like a queen. He's buying tickets. We went to the Soho cool. He's taking me out for drinks and dinners. It's you know, it's great. I don't even have to put out. I just well because for my life, you know, for doing stand up. I mean it's been like twelve years. I do go on the tour on tour by myself, and it has been an ego. I don't know, it's been wild to like host for someone because I do have to do announcements at the end of the show,

And it is hard. No matter how.

Confident and chill you are in who you are as a performer. There is a moment where I'm like, oh my god, this is humiliating. But then I'm in the so hoo cool drinking opinion Colada and I go, yeah, it's worth the announcements.

I'll say whatever you want me to fucking say.

Yeah, Like it's worth the announcements.

I'm totally fine with it. Let's go to the beach. So I think he feels guilty. And so we got to sit behind the dugout and he looked at me. He goes, I've never seen you more in your element. I didn't realize this is where you belong at a baseball game. I go, I know this is where I shine.

I wow, Oh, it.

Was so cool to see them so close. I love baseball bodies. I think they're the hottest of all the sports bodies. I loved seeing them so close hit the ball. I mean, I loved the singing. I loved it was honestly, like so fun. It was so fun. We're and but we're going to go to another We're gonna go to the cub Socks game on Sunday too. You know I said I was in Chicago. I'm just trying to protect I don't know what you guys. You know, we're we're

I listened to another podcast where they used to talk about being in the time machine. They'd be like, Okay, we're in the time machine right now because we are listen. We're not gonna lie like we recorded this a little bit earlier. We've got a lot of things going on in our lives, so this is not we're not recording this like the day of that.

It's coming to your ears.

So Lisa is going to another baseball game, and it sounds like it's gonna be awesome. I love baseball games. I was thinking about what you said about baseball players having the best bodies. Tell me what my favorite bodies right in your in your opinion? Yeah, I like like a thick like thick, thought like thick, maybe thick like in shape, but thick.

Yeah. Interesting.

Interesting, I was because I always think of baseball guys as having like a gut for some reason.

But that's probably my stereotype.

Well they get older, yeah, but yeah, I guess I'm thinking of like Babe Ruth. I don't know, but I like I was gonna say, and I don't even go to these kind of games, but I like soccer players bodies. I think they've got like they always have, like abs and like good little butts and then big ass calves and shit from kicking that ball around. Yeah, No, soccer's are not for I love the baseball I love the kind of laziness to it too, where it's like I'm gonna stand in this field and I'll hit two balls.

Yeah, Like I like that.

I also like baseball because I feel and you'll probably tell me, fuck you, I hate this, you do this, But I like that. When I go to a baseball game, I never sit in good seats like what you were at. I'm always like nosebleed. The players look like ants to me. I could just kind of talk and then when there's a big when there's a big hit, I can go ooh, you know, but like most of the time, I can just chat with my friends and drink beer and have fun.

No, And I told Jerry, I was like, hey, I'm we're going to talk, but if you want to like focus and you want me to stop talking.

Let me know.

And he goes, no, that's the whole point of being out a baseball Yeah, okay, good. I thought you were going to do.

Like I don't talk at sports games because obviously at like tennis you don't talk or like, you know, there's certain things you don't talk, but baseball. But one time I was at a baseball game with someone I didn't really want to be with, and I did turn to him and go.

You need to stop talking. I'm going to focus on the game. But you know, it happens. But no, he called it was like an outdoor picnic whatever. It was just like a fantastic day. And like one of them, like I talked to all the beer guys, like you forget Chicago is nice, Like people are really nice. So like Dorothy, like one of the workers was like, did you bring sunblock? The seats get really hot here I go.

I love the beer.

I mean my ex boyfriend played like baseball in college.

I don't know.

It is something that it brings fun out of me.

Oh wow, no, I do.

I do love watching baseball game and I would I really would love when you come back, let's go to a Dodgers game.

Oh absolutely, yeah, I've gone everywhere. I don't I just love being in the sun. But so we're hanging out at one of my favorite bars in Chicago, Old Town Alehouse.

Have you been with the.

Paintings across right by the condo. Yes, yeah, well you don't have to tell everyone. I'm sorry, Gone, it's fine. Everybody will find Lisa are threatening? Are threatening listeners that are coming to kill you?

No, everyone's really shy.

Like someone will come to me after soul cycle and be like I listened to the pot and then I'm like down to talk and they run away from me and I'm.

Like all right, like a peace.

But I my god, there was the most annoying dumb bitch at the bar yesterday and I hate her so much, and she was the most annoying person that I've ever and I want to talk shit about her.

Oh I had.

I was at a wedding while I was gone on my longer trip yes where I was with a person that I've hated for a decade plus.

And you didn't tell me what happened at the wedding.

She just I just fucking can't stand her, and I just don't, I like immediately immediately, like there was a break in between the wedding and the reception, right, So all of us are like, let's go back to the hotel, and she's like, let's go to a different hotel, and I'm like, stop, everybody's already going to this one hotel. Why are you trying to move the whole freaking plan? Like she's so annoying. And then she can tell I

I just don't like her. Do I know who this is?

You, by extension, will know who this is. I'll tell you who it is.

Okay, fantastic. Yeah, I didn't hear about that one. But the wedding looks beautiful. Oh, the wedding was beautiful.

Yeah, yeah, it was beautiful, and I wanted to tell you that. On my flight home, I watched Crazy Not Insane, that documentary that you talked about that's on HBO Max I think or a regular HBO two, and I loved it.

I was like I was wrapped. I had a baby attached to me, like praying he didn't wake up.

I had like one headphone in just like, you know, listening to this lady talk about fucking killers and it was I didn't realize it was so much about multiple personality disorder. It was so interesting. Anyway, people should watch that. It's really good.

Yeah, she's here because we talk about doctor Michael Badens so much, and you know, this girl, this woman gets no attention. I've never heard of this sociologist before this video, and it seems like, you know, I always love when people are like a laughing stock.

And then they're right, you know, like the yeah, the leo like.

Actually we're rotating the song or you know the song I actually don't even remember.

I don't remember who wrote because of an Indigo Girls song that explains it to me.

But it is wild science.

It's like everyone's like, fuck, you drink this poison. And then it's like, I guess they're right. Yeah, but it also like highlighted to me how like every single abuse or every single serial killer, like they've all been so horribly abused also.

In their past.

Pretty much like when she said evil is a religious idea that was that really stuck with me. She was like, evil is a religious concept, like these are people that are like wired wrong or something is up.

You know, evil is a religious concept that is very interesting.

Like I think what her point was, there's not a lot of people that are just upborn evil. I'm sure it's it's possible, but like it's mostly you've been horribly you've been exposed to horrible images, you've been horribly abused. Like whatever, did you ever watch Freaks and Geeks? No, that's a blind spot for me. Everybody's like, you know so and so from Freaks and Geeks, and I'm just like.

It's it's only one season. Watch it.

But there's a moment where the nerd, one of the nerd boys, finally gets to go on a date with this girl he's had a crush on for a while, and then mid date he figures out she hates like homeless people and poor people and is a full un Republican And it's this weird moment. And I had that recently, not with the dumb bitch at the bar, but I was like talking to someone and then all of a sudden, they like hate homeless people, and I was like, oh, you don't feel ashamed to say this out loud.

And then like when I when you figured out my point of view, it was like, well, you know, you just can't talk about this stuff. There's no to win, And I go, no, there's a way to win. Yeah, there's a way to not hate people that are living in with nothing, Like yeah, I don't get that. But he was like, well, some have problems, but some are just on meth. And I'm like, so if it's a veteran or someone those abused that then started doing myths,

Tents, Yeah, and then I'll take a shot. Yeah. No, Like it was wow, No.

But this girl, so she you know, when you're trying to act too cool, but you're also trying to get into our circle. So are you cooler than us or are you desperate to hang with us?

Which one is it? Because you can't act too.

Cool and then be in the corner being like so and like jumping into the conversation. And this bitch from Oklahoma started talking about how Chicago has no culture, and I actually got up and I left. I go, I'm done for the night, thank you. But that was the final straw. And it's like, you come.

To Chicago and you say Chicago has no culture just because you don't like that it's just the most insane thing.

House music. I mean, this city burnt to a crisp and was.

Built the fuck back up Michael Jordan, the bulls, food, the popatistics, canipop music, I mean, like it's insane. That's a truly, truly unhinged comment to make it and thinking she was like the Chicago Museum of Art whatever, that museum is called the Art Institute, that is one of

There's are her our friend works at the Museum of Contemporary Art doing amazing work there, Like I just couldn't believe it. And then also she kept talking about the white like, oh, you guys went to the Cubs, gave me should to a White Sox game. It's like I've been arrested at a White Sox game and kicked out of others. I've been going to White Sox games for my whole fucking life. Like, don't fucking talk to me, Like, but I try to be chill. And I was like,

Why the fuck are you telling me what I like? And why?

Like, I could not handle this girl. It was out of control, the shit that was coming out of her mouth.

I Oh, I've been like, but you know, my friend had sex with her, But.

What are you gonna do?

Like that always the way, That's always why we have to deal We always have to deal with dumb bitches.

Because they're having sex with our friends. I know.

Wait, there was one other thing she said where I was like, I what are you doing?

It was oh I said something.

I was like, oh, yeah, that crowd didn't liken me because of this or that, like and she goes, you shouldn't be so self deprecating on yourself.

I go, I'm not.

It's just like a fact, like I think I'm great.

I think I deserve to be a lot richer than I am. You obviously don't know me. I'm very confident.

I'm like, but you're allowed to say if something didn't go well or like, you know, like I'm.

A self laper. But she just was I just to sit.

From Oklahoma and tell me that Chicago has no culture.

And where do you think culture, bitch, where do you think has culture? That's really nuts, because I also don't want to shit on Oklahoma.

I'm sure there's great things there.

My friend, yeah, Marshabelski's from Oklahoma.

But oh, let's be real.

All right, we got to start because this is a long one. But sometimes you guys are like, we love a long.

App so maybe this is it. Let's get going fine, But there was another reason why I hated her.

Oh all right, so we're doing one of the scariest and like I wouldn't whatever, it's season nine, episode twelve.

I was gonna say it's the most movie like, like, I know you're not gonna want me to say this, but it's very Sunds of the Loombs. No I'm fine with that. And it is.

Yeah, there's just like a law it's but I wouldn't say it's against SVU type. It's within the SVU universe. But there's something extra spicy about this one.

Yes.

It opens up in some woods.

There's a park ranger type guy with his son, and the sun is like, man, it smells bad. And the dad's like, all right, you know, tough enough. It's just a dead animal. So he goes to scoop up this dead animal and goes, son, just hold this bag, and the man he makes a mustache look good, and then he happens upon what the smell is. And then the boy starts running directly to it, and the dad is like, no, no.

No, don't don't see it. And then there's dead bodies.

He sees the body, he faints, and then the dead body has a bullet wound straight in the middle of the forehead. The crime scene tape goes up and we're ready for an SVU episode, But then all of a sudden, chess Lake is there, and then we have Marishka.

So it's Marishka and Chester Lake.

They're walking classic walk and Talk and Marishka's in her growing pains Leo DiCaprio hair phase, and then all of a sudden they zoom in on the maggots and it's like, thanks SVI, you I needed a zoom in maggots before the credits that, like.

They never do that. It was really, really, really awful, And maggots are gross.

There is a maggot base forensic files, and so I understand the importance of maggots for evidence taking in life time of death, but I.

Don't need a zoom in.

Yeah, another reason why medical examiner is off the list for me for careers.

Yeah, I'm Melinda's, you know, scooping up these maggots. And she tells Benson while dig in with these maggots, she says, there's multiple ligature marks, bruising, electrical burns all over the body on aerial and genitals, and she's been like turned over after the death on the female.

Yeah.

And so then we get another CSU person, you know, Captain Judith, and it's wild to get both of them together that you know doesn't happen very often. So then someone asks the cause of death and the voice from a distance narrowing in says dry drowning, which I didn't even know that was a thing, and I wish it wasn't to think or I wish I didn't know about it, but dry drowning and so we're like, who's this voice, what's happening?

What? Who else is there?

It's Erica Christiansen, who played a big part of my life. I don't know if that is something that is important to You're looking at me, you have nothing, You're not even.

Like, but no, I want to hear about I want to hear about Erica Christiansen living in your life. I just I don't know her in that much except for like traffic and a couple of other things.

Traffic was a big moment. But swim fan to me, yeah, still one of my faves. I love a stalker and I was on the swim team. So to be a swimmer and have suddenly a move movie about swimming was monumental. It was like so huge and she played such a fucking villain and was nuts, and Jesse Bradford was in it from bringing On, so it was like Theseeen sensations and it was like just such a huge moment. And then I was a big Braverman fan. I love the I loved parenthood on NBC. I watched Jason Katims.

So young Erica Christensen and more adult Erica Christensen have both been there for you at various points of your life.

Yeah, she was a mom. She was like the tight end. I think she plays a tight ass a lot. And I'm here there is a tight as bun on her head, so for sure, very tight, very tight bun. She's wearing a baby blue dress shirt, which is a nightmare. I can't think of a worse thing to like office attire dress pants. I hope our thing of the past, like professionalism and how we see it is just like why did we let men come up with our work fashions?

It makes no sense?

Like what I just hate that that work fashion is so disgusting. Actually talking to our friend and her friend had to wear heels at work. It was like it was in the role women had to.

Wear heels at work. It's like it's just fresh.

That's I actually read like a really cool quote recently that I wrote down, and it's like success shouldn't be measured by like love or money, but by time.

Oh for creatives.

It was a Jeffrey Saltz, what's the art critic for the New York magazine.

He had a quote about like to be how to be a.

Successful artist, and it's like work, work, work, do this, do that, And then one of it was like see your success in terms of time, right, And I thought that was like so perfect, Like that's that's the dream of being a stand up or an artist is the time.

It's not about money. It's like people hate their jobs.

People hate Aaron's they have to do people like you know, like there everything is so scheduled, and especially if you then have a family and it's all these things, and it's like so cool to have time. Yeah, because I always think about it because I think I'm very successful, but I don't have that much money. And then I'm like, oh, but I have more time than anyone I know. And that is the best thing I could have hoped for myself.

I don't express day pants. I don't have to do it. I mean having to buy dress pants to work. It as like a p No. I had jobs like that in New York and I hated it.

Yeah, like, I don't understand why you can't be more fashion forward in a job, but either way, it's just a nightmare. And that quote, I just saw it this week and it like really like I was like, oh, yeah, I have so much time on my hands, this is heaven.

Well I also feel like, yeah, I feel like female cops and female like FBI agents are going to be like the last people to drop the dress shirts and the gray slacks, Like they're going to be doing that shit for a long time.

I feel like because that's what Olivia wears.

You know, Olivia rocks at the Olivia is fashion forward.

She's going to Zara, She's going to Jakres.

Yeah, and she's got like a little like ankle boot and stuff like, yeah, she's with some skinny jeans. She's doing You're right, she's doing different stuff. Yeah, we've got some bad fashions from Olivia over the years too.

Anyways, back to this crime scene. Sorry about my Jeffrey Saltz quotes.

I just.

So Erica Christensen type.

But and Olivia goes, excuse me, you know, we don't like new people. Olivia is not a I am. I do think Olivia was like a mean girl.

Jksh.

I know she had a lot going on as a teen, but it's like she just hates any new woman that ever shows up. But yes, she does, excuse me, and then Erica explains the scoop. She goes, if this is my guy, he puts a bag over their head and pours a bucket buckets of water on it. I thought that was waterboarding, but maybe dry drowning is waterboarding.

I don't know it is.

I think it's the same thing. I think it's just that drowning is when that you kill them. Waterboarding is just like a torture tactic, you know.

Oh God, Melinda.

Has two perfectly layered gold necklaces and she's just like, and you are like, who are you growing? I'd just run onto a crime scene? And who is Erica Christiansen? She is FBI agent Laura Cooper in the Behavioral Analysis unit. She hunts the woodsman that is her criminal and Benson goes, wait, but I haven't filed the sixty one.

How did you get here so fast?

Melinda explains that she puts something on the Emmy bulletin because the condition of the remains made her want to call the FEDS. I kept rewinding and watching this like eight times to get exactly what she posted.

It was too hard. This this is what I have.

Well, it's interesting to know. I didn't know that there was like a separate Emmy network, like where the you know what I mean. We're like the medical examiners like talk to each other, like has anyone else seen a body in this condition?

You know? Yeah, you know.

I'm sure the forensic people have like conferences like insurance agents.

You know, they all meet up and do creepy things together.

Yeah, I'm sure their parties are at like the freaky museums with shrunk heads, you know, the Museum of Death.

Yeah. Yeah.

And I just want to point out that this is FBI Agent Cooper and they just keep calling her agent Cooper.

And if you watch twin.

Peaks, it's a little it's a little reminiscent because his name is Agent Deal Cooper. And it's funny that they just call him that because I think he's one of the most famous television FBI agents. And they're both FI they're both Agent Cooper.

Go on, I wonder if that was on purpose.

So then there's also a male victim, So we have the female victim and the male victim just a bullet wound in the head, and that's not really like typical to have a male victim with this killer, so they're confused. So what we have is a tortured, dry drown body and then a shot in the head man body, and the body is dead less than twelve hours. The FBI girl Boss says, the male probably walked in on the Woodsman at work and he had to kill him and had no choice. And her badge is attached to her

Where is she like? It's such a she talks in such.

A specific way, but I don't even know what the way.

That is interesting. I don't know if I caught the accent.

But then so she says something like, you know, the Woodsman thinks he's got and then they go to the credits. So we get back from the credits and we're at the precinct and Benson lets Craigan know that there is DNA at the crime So that's good. And then Finn and Stabler are in Montreal on an extradition.

Okay, sure, Like.

It's usually there's four detectives in your unit, and like you send half of them away for this one extradition.

But what do you think really was going on?

Do you think Elliott was like making a movie and Finn had like some body count concerts or something.

Yeah, I wonder why they weren't there or they asked, Like for them both to be gone is pretty peculiar. And maybe this is a Neil Bear question if he because he would remain. Yeah, they took off because I wonder if they both had whatever. So Agent Cooper is giving a presentation to the SVU about the Woodsman. He's a sexual sadis who keeps his victims alive after abduction and then kills the body, then dumps it, then visits and poses them. And he has twenty four victims. That

This is the worst, it's the worst.

So but what's even worse is that means he might have another victim out there right now, so like, you know this dropped, there is another one that was watching this torture. So someone's out there and they have to move fast, and Benson's match. He goes, why wouldn't you tell me this sooner?

Hello?

And Erica's like, he's unpredictable, like sometimes he travels through state lines, he hunts in city, dumpson country like I'm doing the best I can.

So Craigan reveals that.

The woodsy area we saw the bodies in is in Central Park and it's not a highly populated area, so he knows his way around the park.

So that is a clue.

So the reason the man up top of the episode even went over to the area was because he got an email about a dead dog. And Huang is like, but that's not part of his signature, because giving directions to a body shows empathy or remorse, and this guy does not have that for these victims. He thinks his victims are garbage. He would not email. So we have to find out who sent this email saying that there was a dead dog to send someone to find these bodies.

She brings him to his knees, there's yell whatever.

So then he says cops come in all the time and he gives them lap dances like this is I'm not I'm not trying to do anything this is what usually happens, and that's the thing.

Like they're pissed because they're moral detectives.

But then every other cop comes and expects free dances, And then I'm like, are they getting paid.

For these free dances?

You know, like if during waitressing, if a boss's friend came in and the thing was comped, you would still get tips or you get compensated. So I'm just wondering what these strippers get for dancing for all these back Yeah.

That's a good question. Or if the cops tip even or if they're actually the most.

Violent and the worst people on earth, I bet they do not tip.

I'd be willing to wager. So I felt like I was being confusing.

But basically, Erica puts Lavander in some kind of wrestling choke cold. He goes, stop it, I'll give you a sexy dance. She goes, we don't have time. We have a live victim. So they walk into the strip club and they get a page that the waitress isn't missing anymore.

It's like, just join a softballed game. Okay.

So this guy Vest, we'll call him Vest Boy. He's wearing three layers. Once I noticed this in SVU, I can't stop noticing. But like so many people wear three layers. It's like everyone is wearing three layers. It's really hard not to see this anymore. And he has a beaded necklace on and glasses, but he didn't have dirt on him, which Erica didn't like, like how are you foraging?

And you're not dirty?

And so they do this like interrogation in the park and it's very poorn like, like it is sexual like that if this was the start of a porn I would believe it. They're just like so kind of mean to him and he I think he likes it, and they think he did it, so of course they're going to be aggressive to him. But like, I don't think he did it. I there's no fucking way. I don't

He's just like, whatever you need, ladies. Then it cuts to B.

D Wong pontificating and recording into a tape recorder everything he thinks that's happening with the Woodsman killer.

So the profile that BD Wong.

Aka Huang is thinking is white male, thirty five to fifty five, normal intelligence, but street smart. He targets strangers, depersonalizes victims, uses restraints, aggressive crime scene reflects control, and high level of comfort of environment. Bodies are dumped in the open, but in remote areas not mapped for tourists.

They're working together.

He looks older, but he says, They're like the holes in the research are because of doctor Tillman's mental deterioration and then suicide. So now we understand that this is a personal case for Agent Cooper because this doctor Tillman killed himself because he went crazy researching this case. So then we cut to another professional. We have Melinda Warner explaining what happened to the victim. So, Kate died ten days ago. Torture by waterboarding is how death happened, and

I love that. I loved it. I loved that.

Yeah, I mean, God, when will we meet Melinda? I'm about to go watch my cameo again. Okay, So then Erica responds being like, at least he didn't cut her up into pieces and he let her keep her head.

What I think she's referring to ways he's disposed of other victims, like this isn't the worst she's seen.

I guess, but I don't really know why. Yeah, but this this weird point of view.

It's like, yeah, are you telling this dead body to be grateful that her.

Head wasn't chopped off? Like I'm confused. Yeah, I'm confused.

While you're mad at Melinda for having like humanity towards the dead and these victims, and you're just like she's lucky.

No, I think she's.

What she's trying to do is say I've seen so much fucked up shit, and then like it gives Melinda the idea like, oh, this bitch doesn't deal with what I deal with every day, so maybe I'll go a little easier on her, you know.

But also it's like, actually, doctor Agent Cooper, you haven't seen this, That's the whole point. You're a behavioral person. Yeah, you analyze. So then also like shut her down in ways of I've seen worse, You've read worse, you've not been on the case, like digging in these people's bodies, Like I just don't fuck with my girl.

The thing is is that evidence is everything, and Melinda has like all the evidence.

Basically, when a body is dumped.

Like that that it's all rust with the body, So you need to shut up and listen to every single thing she's saying, Like you don't need to go oh, we get the GISTs, like no, she's gonna tell you something like tell you everything you know.

Yeah, but Melinda says sorry, which again I know.

What you agree with.

Yeah, I understand the details are a lot, but like that's her job and that's what you're there for. So John Doe was shot once, but there's no slug at like which is the leftover bullet piece? And since they were not able to find a leftover bullet piece thing, there's no way to connect the two killings, and so there's no evidence that ties them together. That was killed by the same person. So dun dund on, what's gonna happen? Uh Chester is looking at internet cafe footage. That's what

Also she needs to figure this out. But she goes.

Wild and she's like, if I knew, I would have stopped him from killing himself. Hello, he was my favorite person. You think I would have just let him go nuts slowly in mind in my own business, like I was there to fucking help.

This is a weird line to go down that if you have a mental illness or some kind of deterioration, that's just happening. There's not a specific case that's making you go nuts or making your mind deteriorate. You know.

Yeah, maybe that's like a crime show trope, but it seems like the case end up taking over certain detectives' lives and yeah, they spiral, so I mean, I don't know, but she says like he was my mentor and I didn't see it coming. And I'm sure she has a lot of guilts like she is.

An agent and a behavioral analysis and like didn't see it coming. Pick up on this right, They cut to Chester Lake and he makes a puzzled, confused face when she says that statement.

But we don't know much, but there is a confused face. And then Daddy Craigan Waltz is in and he's like, there's a problem. We found the Woodsman, which how is that a problem?

Right? And people are like where, what?

What?

And he goes in the morgue.

What the DNA sample CSU found matches the John Doe they found, so he's dead. So the dead male body at the crime scene is the Woodsman killer, which is awesome because this evil piece of.

Shit is dead.

But it's bad because they think that there's another live victim and now he's dead and they can't get any information about anybody. Yeah, Erica takes a deep breath. I'm assuming there was a commercial right here. So then we see a photo of the Woodsman. He's wearing a park Ranger style hat. His name is Larry Moore and he looks like he would be on CBS Survivor. I can't tell you why, but if you watch Survivor and you saw this photo.

You know exactly what I'm saying.

So he's a non commissioned park ranger but also a cop maintenance ranger.

I'm confused. I'm confused so much in this episode, like I don't know, And I kept rewinding and rewriting, and I was like, how, I don't know?

Was he a cop?

Is he a park ranger? Is he a maintenance mountain ranger cop? Like, I don't fucking know. Maybe I'm assuming that if he's non commissioned park ranger, that he's like a park ranger, but like you have to actually get like licensed and ship to be a park ranger. So maybe he's more just like a maintenance ranger where he just like you know, does just for sure.

But then why did Craigan say that he was a former cop or a cop? Like That's what I kept not understanding. I kept watching and I was just like, what is happening? But you know, yeah, you are totally right on with the maintenance thing, like he opened and closed the park in the season, Like when the season opened and closed, he picked up trash. Okay, so yeah, they're just gabbing trying to figure it out. But how did nobody hear the torture, so she goes, well, maybe

You're the one.

Yeah, like such a men in black like amazing moment, Like that is just so cool. Obviously you obviously need special skills, but also the FBI is watching all of our grades, all of our skills. So Benson says, oh my god, I think I got something and it's a key and hopefully it's to the murder room. And then there's one photo in the whole room and it says Aunt Helen nineteen eighty. So they go to visit Aunt Helen she's gardening. She has full glass bangs flowers, marble galore,

Cooper said, yeah, don't you want the airline points?

Okay, So Cooper says, he gets off on the screaming and the sheer terror, so it needs to be a place where they can really scream.

He's a sadist and this is just so.

Scary, like to think someone wants this is the scariest. So Benson goes, well, this key is to a storage facility and that might give him a lot of freedom, like someplace that's dead at night and busy in the daytime, and then he could go there at night. But there's so many places in the city, like what is it? And then Benson finds the receipt for Augusta Cruises what the fuck is that the phone number is no longer registered?

In compos Yeah.

So then Benson is told to stand back and she takes my dad's approach and it is like, I'd rather ask for forgiveness than permission.

Hell, yes, so she goes.

So then we hear torture like it's bad, and like the set designer did a really good job, Like maybe we should look into what they're up to because this torture chamber, it seems very realistic.

It's so scary. It's a really scary murder drip drops also, there are drip drops, like I said before.

A sure sign you're about to find like a murder den.

Wait what remember in another episode we did, I was like there when there's the sound of like drip drip drip, Yeah, like you always know you're about to see something really creepy.

Yeah, there's tubes and hooks and metal and chains and sounds of screaming and like it's just really scary. And then the sounds of the torture are coming from a TV though, and it shows a video of a woman in a tub being tortured and screaming, and there is that version of the tub in the torture chamber, and it's empty right now. So that video is to terrorize a victim, so there's got be a victim. And so they're slowly walking and looking at all these machines and it is really scary.

And I have a personal story to add to this.

So this is obviously horrific, like when you think about the worst things that can happen to you in the fear, it's like, I don't want to get kidnapped and tortured like that is the thing, like so many different crimes. It's like to be changed to a thing knowing you'll never escape torture. Watch it's I can't think of anything worse.

I saw like rainbow, like I saw God right, I.

Saw outer space and like the existence of like family, Like it really was an amazing moment.

My body felt great, and we're all going in one at a time. And then our friend.

Dave is reacting weird and we don't know why, but he's not telling us because he's a good drug taker, so he's not going to like say anything bad that happened and fuck up someone else's high. So he's just standing in the bathtub smoking cigarettes outside the window. And

Oh my god.

And so the good thing with DMT is it is only like ten to fifteen minutes, but for ten fifteen minutes he was in his brain chained to a table and couldn't escape.

Wow, And do you think.

That that's like something that is in your mind that like obviously right, Like isn't that the drugs just bringing something that's deep in your subconscious to the surface?

Right? Yeah.

Our theory was like, our friend David is like kind of a golden Retriever in a way. He's like a happy, go lucky, positive, chill dude who's not really bothered. So maybe the universe needed to instill fear in him or something like I don't know, like I have no idea, but it is the worst thing I can imagine, and I guess the best way to imagine.

It is on a drug trip, because it's not real.

But yeah, but he's done DMT since and loved it, so okay, well wow.

I'm glad he was able to give it another shot. Well because we were like having the time of our lives. He was so generous. It was such a short high. That's it is, and it feels awesome.

And then we all did it again, but all at once, and then I would open my eyes and people were like it was like it was awesome if you get DMT.

Fuck. Yeah.

So there's like piles of VHS tapes and it's just like really scary in there, and Chester says that there's nobody in here, but thank god, there's better detectives in the room. So Benson opens like this metal container that's under the torture taber and there's a girl in there.

Which is like very reminiscent by the way of slaves. When like there's that push pressure like thing under the bed, you know, it's like not everything is what it seems.

Yeah, she's in braun underwear. She's she's scared and she's screaming through the tape, like shuffling, twitching, screaming. Her hands are black, so like maybe frozen or something like for us to buy a torture electroc I don't know what it is, but she's injured, and Erica keeps screaming on educated suggestions. She was like move her, remove the tape, and Benson's like, go away.

We cannot move her.

She might have a spinal injury, and we cannot rip the tape off without a solution or a skin will rip. Like you are not good at this, Shut the fuck up, and then Cooper goes and grabs some torture knife and.

Starts heading towards the girl. What what was she thinking? What was she thinking? Fucking nuts? So the girl of course goes insane and Benson's like what are you doing? And then Erica does this movement of like what do you want me to do?

Like arms in the air, and it's like, don't take a torture scalpel to a torture victim.

How about what were you gonna do? Cut her mouth open?

Like fuck god ough these behavior experts, they know nothing. So the girls are in the hospital and Benson and Eric are talking shop like how long has this victim been there? The girl so the victim is in critical condition. The docs says what happened to her? And they respond everything So unfortunately, she's too weak for surgery. So even like they can't even help her. She like, they can't perform the surgery she needs because she's too weak for surgery.

And then this is like a scene they only do.

They don't do this very often, but it's a powerful scene where Benson and Erica they get to work and they take pictures of all the injuries and it's just like really brutal, and then they fingerprint her black and purple fingers and it's just it's a lot. Benson explains, like we need to find her family and find out who she is because if she's not gonna make it,

This is not what I'm used to.

I don't deal with victims, and so it just proves the point that how important the Special Victims Unit really is. So we're back at the station with Kragan and Lake and you know, not a dynamic duo. We're like, what is happening? The where are the other detectives? But basically Jersey is playing hardball with the evidence, and it's like, what.

Why wouldn't you want what?

I don't understand playing big dick games when it comes to torture and evidence.

Like, oh is Jersey where the Augusta Cruzes was?

Oh?

Okay, got it?

And it's like, just why are we playing jurisdiction games when it's like full torture chambers. It's so angering and it wouldn't be so angry if we didn't know this happens all the time in real life, right, So basically Chester is just one track mine.

He's like, we got to see who sent the email. We got to see who sent the email?

And he says, taru enhance the footage, which we know is not a thing that happens in real life.

No real but boom baby, who is it?

He sees who it is. It's Agent Cooper. Agent Cooper sent the email. She is found on the security cam footage in a baseball cap leaving the internet cafe.

It's like, you're a fucking FBI agent and a baseball.

Cap does not hide your identity? Like I can't believe that she just didn't know that she would be caught on like multiple CCTV cameras that are like all over the sea the city.

Yeah, she's an idiot.

Maybe she didn't realize like, yeah, you knew they were going to try to find who sent the email.

Yeah, it was bad.

Benson comes into Craigen's office novakas they're waiting, and they tell Benson about the Internet cafe scoop and Benson is like there must be a reason, like that's not her, that's not her, And Benson goes, you don't know her and no backs like neither do you, Like we just met her a few days ago, be real girl. During the talk, Craigan gets a call that Amy Doe died, which, like hammers home, what like Erica did is bad because if she just sent this email found the body, it wouldn't be that bad.

But because of her not being.

Up front right away, you know, we could have saved Amy Doe. Yeah, so Erica is now an interrogation and Benson walks in and you know, we're about to have an amazing scene. Benson does have like a weird gold clasp right underneath her titties on her shirt.

Did you notice it? It was like I did not a bell, but like right.

Under her boobs there was just like a gemstone silver clasp and it's very real.

Housewives of OC Early Seasons does like to see that?

Yeah, Benson says she's waiting for an FBI officer to like come, kind of like a union wrap, I would guess, and Erica goes, no, I know what's up.

I don't care, I pass, I don't just talk to me.

Yeah, so she said, hey, so did you send an email to the parks department about the dead dog? And she responds, how do you want me to respond to that? And Benson goes, well, I'd love for you to say no, but you can't. CanYa Burn, She's like, wow, must be so many confessions in this room, trying to free the soul of a burden. And Benson says do you sleep at night? And she goes, I sleep fine, And then

She doesn't know that.

So then Benson shows Agent Cooper the photo of her leaving the cafe, and she tears up a little bit and says, stop pretending you're on my side.

I know there's a search warrant on my apartment right now.

We're not friends, and it's like, you know the warrant process, but you didn't know you'd be caught on every single camera lead in a cafe. So we're at Agent Cooper's apartment and there's a csu tech and Chester Lake and Chester's in a leather jacket and he's looking for a trophy. He knows, he knows there's a trophy this person would want to look at it. He goes as soon as they wake up and go to bed. He wants it.

His personality for sure.

And he's like, where's the evidence. Where's the evidence? He lays down in her bed and he sees it and in a spice rack where all the spices are like in test tubes. In one of them there's the bullet casing. So Chester Lake comes through, Come through, Mama. So then back at the precinct, the FBI like headperson like one of the protectors comes and they're having a back and forth and Benson implies she's fucking that she's fucked her

Okay.

But then Chester walks into the interrogation room. I guess there was no traffic that day in Manhattan, and he shows up with the test tube.

Baby.

He shows up with the trophy in a plastic bag and goes got it.

And Benson is upset about this.

You know, she thought she really bonded with like this, carrying other powerful female detective that it's so hungry for the job and for justice. So she's pretty betrayed in many ways. But Benson handcuffs her and takes her away, and then her lawyer is Cleo Conrad, fantastic. The head cops are marching in the precinct in between court scenes, and Novak's wearing three layers again.

I will never be able to not see this.

So we have a woman I don't think i've ever there's a woman eighty a Lydia Ramos for the people, and she says, all the charges are dropped and let's go drink pina coladas, Honey.

What is happening?

And the judges are free to go, and I don't understand what's happening, And then we cut back in the head cops are like filling Kragan in and they're like, listen, the DA is arguing with the cops, and no vacuum people are protecting her.

It's just like a fucking conniption fit. But basically, high up governments are letting her go. And it's like but also they're worried because it's like, what jury's ever even going to find her guilty? She killed a fucking statist who has twenty four victims America loves a rogue FBI agent for justice, so it's like, why even do this?

And the head caught Marshall guy is like, don't you have anything?

We need a final piece of evidence where she confesses or there's no charges, and Benson wants her to walk though Benson's like, who cares, Yeah, she.

Did it, like, let her go.

I'm on the whoever pulled the strings to let her go.

I'm fine with it.

I'm confused why the bullet casing isn't enough evidence though, but maybe they need the gun. I have no idea, but she wants to let her go. She yeah, she wants a brunch friend. Like she's like, no, this is my new best friend. You can't take her away from me. So Craigan and Novak are fighting against her, and so is Huang too, Like what is going to happen? They're all fighting and Huang's like, she's not going to confess. So profile the profiler, she staged the crime scene and

She right away when.

Asked about the gun, is like, what is this about my girl, Lauren Cooper?

Yeah?

I gave the gun to Lauren as a keep skate, as a keepsake because I don't like having guns in the house. And they keep trying to get information out of her, and she goes, I'm not giving a statement, I'm not cooperating. I love Lauren, so go fuck yourself. And she's not gonna lie, but she's not gonna help put her away, so godspeed, get the fuck out of here, keep it moving. Benson's like, oh, we need a hurry up because obviously she's calling her right now and like

So finally ballistics, right, Yeah, there's like a full ballistics report.

Well, yeah, that's what the case. Ballistics are the casings about the bullets.

Yeah, but it's also like the striations that come out of the gun and stuff. But yeah, I took forensics chemistry in college.

So did you really?

I know?

Two things? Yeah, what else do you know? Nothing? Sublimination of fingerprints? We did that.

We did a sublimination thing where you use this gas to make fingerprints show up on soda cans.

I can't believe you've never met in our personal friendship or on the show that you took up forensic psychology class when we've been doing this podcast for months.

Do you know what?

I don't know why I haven't brought it up. And it was really hard. It was a lot harder that I thought it was going to be that class.

That's how I felt about food science, really hard pectans. Yeah, I was like, I thought this was a nutrition like I don't know what. I don't need to know how molecule's form chicken, I know.

I was like, are we just going to watch CSI And no, it was like a lot harder and involved experiments.

Well, see if.

You can find any of your old information, okay, any old notebooks this is to say information.

Hopefully the listeners will let you know how pissed they are.

Hopefully there's pissed, as I am never mentioned it I.

Think it was sophomore year. Anyway, go on, are you calling your own self old? Did you just read yourself?

So Benson and Lake enter the apartment and listen, baby girl, Erica, she's sitting, she's ready, She's at a desk with her hair pulled tight, pulled back forever, she'll never change. And then on the desk, clean ass desk, there's a badge and a gun on the table.

Yeah.

So Benson asks, where is Tilman's gun? And she says, in many pieces all over the city.

Which I love. Why has no one else gotten rid of a weapon like this?

Yeah?

There, I don't know, I've never seen it. Thought of that before.

Because of this episode, I thought, if I ever, like you know, when I'm constantly planning a crime in my head, I'm like, I would leave evidence in pieces all over the city, like if I had something.

Yeah, I just can't believe it, but it's like the best way, Yes, stick one thing over here, over here, over here, I mean the city is busy, Like, you probably can't do this in you know, a tiny town in Iowa.

But New York.

He can hide a gun everywhere. I bet you can do it in eye one. My bad Okay, everyone could hide their murder weapons. You can hide a gun too.

She said she didn't need it anymore. She's like, listen, I'm going to jail. Are you happy?

And Benson goes, no, I would have been happy collaring the son of a bitch with you that killed twenty four women. I thought we were friends.

Yeah, but that wouldn't have satisfied her at all, Like she needed to kill this guy for herself.

So, but Benson's great at police work.

She takes the gun from the desk, hands it to Chester so they feel safe.

Cooper's like, okay, stop.

Doing this game, like you know you want to kill all these assholes, and Benson goes, no, I have too much to lose and we lost a victim, and Cooper goes, I did everything I could to save her. Even after she put the gun to like the woodsman's head, she didn't give up, and like she tried and he wouldn't give anything up. So she killed his dumbass and then sent the email to help find her. She goes, you have to believe me, you have to believe me. But to me, it's like if she just said, listen, there

I think, well, I don't know.

I think because of the way that she shot him in the back of the head, flushed to the head, it's like clear that she executed him and she couldn't really she couldn't really claim self defense.

I don't know.

I don't know, but yeah, like it seems like that would have been the best thing to do.

Be like I tried. He came at me, I shot him, you know. Yeah.

Benson says, listen, I can't condone what you did, but I understand it. Twenty four women are dead, so the DA is going to go easy on you, and Cooper responds, I'm sorry, I can't, and Benson says, just take the deal, and Cooper goes no, because those who fight monsters should make damn sure they don't become one. Quickly gun from behind her back, she kills herself, shoots herself in the fucking head.

It's so fuck This scene is so crazy and fucked up.

And Benson fully crime screens.

This is a very intense performance, Like I I want to know everything about this scene. They really bring the best out of each other. But yeah, I've never seen Benson. I have, but Benson really is emotional here. It's a stellar performance. She walks away, she's breathing really hard, she's crying and is so upset, and I think there's even more deepness to it because she really thought that, like this was going to be her girl, you know.

A best friend forever.

Yeah, and saw a lot of herself in it and probably also is like, am I going to become a monster? And we see, you know, pieces of that when she's beating the shit out of William Lewis.

Even though he deserves everything that happens to him. But anyways, YadA YadA, yah.

Yeah, So Cooper's dead, Benson's crying. Lake just looks back and is just like, oh geez, Like he looks at the blood like he's dexter, like he's really him in the blood.

Have a moment.

There's a caution tape montage. Benson is sad, there's a stretcher. Melinda walks in to console her and take evidence, and then Benson has shook as hell and it zooms in on her like in this Backstreet Boys style pose on the ground, like she's about to sing a love song. And if you know the Backstreet Boys music video catalog, you know exactly what I'm talking about. If you know you know, yeah, yeah, and then it's Dick Wolf.

Oh my gosh, that's scene though, that scene like Lake, it's just like it's such a quiet scene of just them talking and then suddenly Lake is like gone, and like it's like and like it's so fast, and Olivia's scream is like the editor, I have to give the editor props there because it just goes so fast and and oh well, I also wonder how much she had to practice taking the gun out from behind her back so faster if that.

Was a body double or something. But emotion that's like pretty hard too.

So that's that. Yeah, well it's not getting any better.

I got to tell you what the real crime, So stick around and we'll be back to try traumatize you, all right. So yeah, not like you ever really need a trigger warning, but this episode is this episode, sorry, this episode of real life is very very graphic and fucked up. So if you don't want to hear about it, maybe you want to fast forward, skip around, have your hand ready on that forward thirty button.

Whatever.

Okay, So this episode, as listed on some websites, is kind of based on two crimes, but like the first one's very not important. Like, so I'm just going to really quickly tell you about one very tenuously connected crime is the case of Todd Alan Reid, who was known

And received three terms of life.

And there's really not that much in common except the nicknames, and like the dumping in a park is similar, I guess.

And then I did think one interesting thing.

About this crime that I thought you would like to Lisa, is that one of the ways that he was caught was a female cop went undercover as a sex worker to draw him out. And we always love to see it, you know, yes, an a fun little you know, one of the things we talked about on Jensen and holes is that we love an undercover female cop. So the more closely linked case is the case of David Parker Ray, who is known as the Toy Box Killer. And this is a very very scary person no surprise. Ray had

In his teenage years.

His sister would find these stato masochistic drawings that he did, as well as pornographic photographs of bondage and stuff like that which is not in and of itself like something that denotes a serial killer. But I think all combine these things contributed to a very very disturbed person. Ray was married and divorced four times and had two children, including a daughter named Jesse and we will find out more about her later. Ray was living in Truther Consequences,

It's in New Mexico.

He was working as a mechanic and a park ranger. Very well, I want to know who named like that's not even a name. Those are just two things.

I don't know.

I don't know why it's called Truther Consequences, but it's like it's on a list of interesting town names or whatever.

For the US.

Ray had a truck trailer that he outfitted as a torture chamber. He soundproofed it and set it up with a ton of devices used for sexual torture, and he called it his toy box. So this is disturbing. But some of the things found inside the toy box were whips, chains, pulleys, straps, clamps, legs, spreader bars, surgical blades, electric shock machines, saws, sex toys, syringes, and detailed diagrams showing ways of inflicting pain, as well

Oh, this is like.

How sometimes there's a mirror in the delivery room so you can like see yourself giving birth. And I don't know who would want to do that.

That's so funny.

That's where your brain wather' be, like, you know, sometimes it's fine, there were a mirror on top of your bed in a hotel room.

I went to giving birth.

Yeah, nature's torture, the closest Yeah, the closest form of torture that's happened to me.

And this is so so fucked up.

But he had this wooden contraption he would put his victims in that would bend him them over and immobilize them so that he could rape them.

And he would have and it said, and have other friends rape them and have dogs rape them.

It says as well, I'm so like horrified by this.

It's like they so he had friends come to the torture chamber and think nothing of it.

I think it's people that like you'll find out I'll tell you in a second. But he had a mail accomplice at one point got it so that man was probably helping too, and I don't know. Yeah, I think that it's possible. He had friends that were like, oh, this is a sex worker. He's paying her for this or something like that. I have no idea she's screaming in torture like that. Yeah, no, it's beyond fucked it's

When he was.

Eventually captured, authorities found his journal where he kept meticulous records detailing the victims that he had abducted.

And what he had done to them.

And there were dozens of entries, but there were no names, only dates and the numbers of times he tortured the victims and like what he did. Basically, he would kidnap five to six women a year, hold them captive for around three to four months. He often had accomplices, such as women he was dating and even his own.

Daughter, Jesse.

She was one of his accomplices that would help him actually lure victims. He also had an accomplice named Dennis Roy Yancy, so when he was finished with a victim, he would either kill them or drug them with barbituates to induce amnesia, and then just like abandon them on the side of the road. So in one of the tape recordings of him that they found, he is telling one of his victims that the drugs are sodium pentathol

They had the same name, which is creepy.

Cindy Hendy showed up and shocked Cynthia with a cattle prod and that's when they got her into the car, drove her to this trailer, this toy box, where she was tasered, drug blindfolded, and chained to a bed. Then he played his instruction tape, which is his voice saying, quote unquote, Okay, bitch, we both know what you've been brought here for. I'm going to use you for a sex slave, and it's going to be painful as hell. That's the way I want it to be.

End quote. So so scary.

Three days later, she waited until Ray had gone to work, and then she found the keys. The keys were just like left on a table that she could reach, and she unlocked her chains. Out why she sounds like, well, she was there with Cindy. Cindy Hendy, this girlfriend was supposed to be watching her, so I don't know if he paid attention to where he left the keys, because he's like, oh, I've got someone watching her.

I don't know. It seems nuts.

Maybe she figured out a way to like move a table closer when Cindy wasn't watching. I don't know, but she noticed Vigil trying to escape, and a fight ensued. Hendy tried to stab She broke a lamp over Cynthia Vigil's head, and she stabbed her with an ice pick, but then Vigil got the ice pick back from her and stabbed her in the neck with an ice pick.

Fucking yeah, and she escaped.

She escaped completely naked, wearing only the iron slave collar and padlocked chains that were like around her, and she ran to the road looking for help, which she got from a nearby homeowner who took her in, comforted her, called the police, and her escape obviously led officials to the trailer and instigated the capture of Ray and his accomplices. Police stopped Ray and Hendy, they found them. Ray was taken to jail, and after the publicity surrounding the arrest,

Ray had a.

Video that they found when they searched his place of a woman named Kelly Garrett, which dated from nineteen ninety six.

This is nuts.

Garrett was found alive in Colorado after police identified a tattoo on her ankle. She testified that she'd gotten too a fight with her husband and decided to spend the night playing pool with friends. When she's out playing pool, she meets Jesse Ray's daughter, who knew Garrett. They meet up, then she takes her to the Blue Water Saloon and true her consequences, then drugs the beer she's drinking, and Garrett remembers walking out to the parking lot and suffered

And that happened to nineteen ninety six.

Which was three years before Vigil was abducted, and who knows how many girls in between. It's just like, when the story is so crazy, wouldn't that be reason to be like, oh, no, one could make this up, Like I the fuck everybody? Yeah, it's so Yeah, it's infuriating, and Jesus, I don't know why there wouldn't be at least an investigation. But I mean maybe because I'm not trying to play devil's advocate for the cops at all.

Yeah, I don't know.

Yeah, if someone is drugged or they're on drugs, it does not negate what happens to me there is nurse. Yeah, I just don't think there's any sort of excuse or reasoning for a cop not to investigate an active like.

Complaint and something so fucked up like someone kept you hostage for days, Like, I just don't think.

Like, wouldn't it be better to just make sure it's fake, Like, oh, you know what, I'm gonna dot my eyes, cross my t's and make sure there's not a torture fucking trailer in my town.

Right. Oh, this bitches on drugs? Okay, what? Yeah, I guess why a lot of victims are on drugs.

I don't think like cop people are listening to us anymore. They've made it clear they're not a fan of what we say. But it's like, if you are someone that it does not see what's happening, Like, how do you listen to our podcast case after case hear how terrible police are from state to state in Canada.

We've done crimes all over and it's just like, yeah, they don't investigate.

Yeah, it's it's it's while that multiple of these women were just basically denied by the cops, not even just just one woman Kelly, Like they didn't believe Angelica Montano either, Like luckily they believed fucking Cynthia because she wandered into traffic and fucking with a slave caller on her And then there you can kind of deduce that she's telling the truth, that something.

Fucked up happened to her.

I'm sure they even talked about like maybe she liked that, yeah, and now she's just regretting it, yeah.

Because she's a sex worker. So there's like, you know, they love to deny sex workers.

There's truth.

Now aside from Cindy Hendy and the daughter Jesse. That's when they discover Dennis Yancey as an accomplice. Yancey admitted to strangling his former girlfriend Marie Parker after Ray had kidnapped and tortured her, but he claimed Ray made him

This guy is not a murderer and has not murdered people.

And they said one woman remained uncertain that her recollections of abuse were anything but nightmares until she was contacted by the FBI, and after questioning.

She remembered more and more, which is crazy.

That's kind of like what happened in uh smut, where like I kind of remember that this man raped me, but the scopolamine situation stopped them from creating new memories. So basically Ray's attacks were separated into three trials. I don't really understand why it's not clear why they separated him into the into all these trials instead of just trying him for all three at once. But for Cynthia Vigil the woman who escaped, at first there was a mistrial and then there was a retrial, and with the

I don't know. This seems like so fucking not a long time in prison for sure.

Dennis Roy Yancey was convicted of the strangulation murder of Marie Parker. He served eleven years in prison and then was released on parole.

I don't know why.

And he violated his parol and went back to serve the rest of his original scent until this year twenty twenty one. So I think Dennis Yancy is either out or about to be out. In two thousand, Cindy Hendy, who was his accomplished girlfriend, testified against him and received a sentence of thirty six years for her crimes. She was scheduled to get parole in twenty seventeen, and she actually was kept an extra two years in jail and was released in twenty nineteen after serving two years of

This is this kind of sentencing and what's going on here is what makes me so mad about the Nashawn Williams case.

Again.

You know, like we have this person who did bad things obviously stats stray, rape and like not telling me. But it's like this man strangled his girlfriend to death and got eleven years.

And then was allowed back out onto those streets. But Nashawn Williams is being held indefinitely.

Yeah, so that's why that case, Like, it's so fucked up.

This is horrifying. Yeah, this case is super super fucked up. But it's clear that the episode got like a lot of the ideas for this, like torture room of the Woodsman, from this killer, the toy box killer.

And yeah, I'm glad they didn't get their police work ideas from here because they just would have said, nah, no, thanks, well, stay fund. We do have a palette cleaning cleansing. We have an amazing guest.

I would say, a huge get I'm excited, so stay tuned.

Today's guest is a really huge moment in my life. I would say, I was really excited that we got her.

That's a clue. Yeah.

You guys, though, may know her from the movie Traffic Swim Fan, the Banger Sisters, or as Julia Braverman Graham on the show Parenthood. You can catch her coming up on the Disney Plus movie Cheaper by the Dozen coming out next year. It's a remake, but if you watch today's episode, you know her as special Agent Lauren Cooper. Please dive into our chat with the legendary Erica Christensen.

So I'm a huge parent her person. I'm a Braverman fanatic. I watched it all well, I didn't watch the last few episodes because I knew what was going to happen and I wasn't ready for it.

So I still think it and yeah, I couldn't take it. And so I just can't believe we're talking to you.

But in terms of Parenthood, you know, Mae Whitman also did an svo.

Yes, I heard about that, you know what.

I haven't seen that one either, but they I feel like mine and hers always replay at the same time, like the same night.

Maybe they're doing a Parenthood marathon. People do they do that?

Yeah, maybe they're doing like cheeky little ludge to us.

Yes, So I guess we'll start from the beginning. We're assuming this was an offer only, no auditions.

Wait, that's so funny, because yes it was.

But I have like a weird thing about that because when I audition and I get a job, then I like, I feel like I've earned it, you know, obviously they hired me for a reason, and I know what I'm doing with this character and everything, and we're good to go. And sometimes when it's an offer only. I've talked to Michael Rosenbaum about this two on his podcast, where we're like, yeah, sometimes it takes you a second to be like, wait,

I'm like cool. I'm literally like, how many years of school.

Do you have to do?

Like?

And and when I.

Got to set too, they were like, oh, yeah, you're fourteen, And I was like torn between the.

Fact that that is, I think a compliment, but also what am I? Am I right for this role? You know, like can I pull this off?

You pulled it off, you definitely did.

I remember. I remember also getting getting shit like on the first day, like are you chewing gum? And I was like no, I'm uh no, I guess I'm like nervously like cheering on my tongue.

Okay, don't do that. Okay, that actually was the character.

Choice, but that one's gonna go cool cool.

And I'm sure like the severe ponytail and the type thing got you more into character, and like the outfits too, because those are some like pulled back butns.

Yes, and the weight of like having a gun and even just a badge on my belt was different.

I was like, whoa, now your badge was so cool.

It was we talked about it because it was I've never seen a badge on an outfeel like that was like sideways, it was like slipped on in a really cool way. So, yeah, you were the only one who had a side badge. And did you know Marishka anyone from the the crew.

No, I've never met anyone.

Wow. Wow.

She was so.

Comfortable there obviously, and she knew what she was doing, so she was so stable, you know, and she I think saw me kind of having these moments of like what, okay, abandoned my character.

Note cool, I'm too young for this role. Okay, awesome, let's do this.

You know, like found me being like wow, all right, new to the show, and she just like invited me, like, oh, come to my come to my room at lunch or something, and we sat and chatted and she was so kind and so.

Just gracious about about having me there and helped me feel more comfortable. It was awesome.

You brought out really good performances in each other. It seems like, I mean, you guys really had an awesome back and forth.

Yeah, and obviously with the final the the climax of the show there it was. It was so cool and so and so emotionally charged for us.

Did you have to train how to get the gun from behind that fast or was that a double or what?

Like?

That was fast fast move?

No?

Oh, it was that was just me I think because that since that was all you were really going to see was the gun coming up, they were just like, great, just get the gun up.

Well, that whole episode honestly was very felt a little bit more like a movie than the regular, like inn a regular episode of the show. Like, I mean, I'm obsessed with Silence of the Lambs, so I draw a

Get Like how did what?

I mean, I know you said you like looked up how long it takes to like go to school to be an FBI egent and stuff like that. But like she was so intense and she's like from the foster care system and has this like hard exterior like how did you? But then also is very emotionally moved by all the torture that she's seeing, So like, how did you?

I don't know, how'd you do that? What's my question?

Good question?

I It's funny because from the moment you meet her, she's already having to put up this deceitful front, yes, but at the same time, all of her emotions are so raw and so real, and but she's like trying to be a hard ass about it, right, I felt like the deceit of her just kind of being like, I need everybody to be on my team right now, just so we can get my mission done, even though it's not exactly they think they're kind of solving one aspect of it and I'm interested in another aspect of

With me, like I actually know what the fuck I'm doing. And that was where.

Marishka actually gave me an amazing piece of advice too. You know, sometimes you know something, but it takes someone expressing it, like when they actually articulate it in words.

And you're like, yes, okay.

And it was an acting tip with regards to this character who is a person of authority. She said, you know, when we're like questioning somebody and I've got a picture like have you seen this person? I was like shaking the photo because I was getting upset, and she was like, the power is in the stillness, and I was like, of course it is okay, So just literally don't be shaking the paper in the face of this person, hold up the picture and keep it there.

And it was just like click. You know, it all makes sense.

Were you ever scared on set, Like did that torture room look as scary as it does on the show or is it really much like this is a set and I know it, or was it scary and the video playing with the girl like did it bring up any scary feelings when you would leave set or being on that set?

I don't think so.

I think it's that's the benefit of like being on a set is you can look at something that would otherwise be terrifying and just like I guess you.

Just know it's fake.

It's like, you know, can you imagine if you had seen that footage that's on SVU and it was a documentary, it'll be so traumatic.

Yeah, But just to have.

That little bit like in the back of your mind of the context of like, oh, yeah, this is a show that I love and it's clearly done by actors, and it's it's based on true stories, but it's this is not really happening right now. That was my feeling. I was like, yeah, thisiss is fucked up, but I don't know a good story.

Yeah, yeah, I have a question about that scene where like Marishka is gonna first's first confronting you sort of with like the photos of you that kind of prove that.

You're behind all of this.

You're I don't know, the character's just so like playing chess, like okay, your move, Like what are you going to ask me?

And I just like, did you guys like.

Talk about that in advance or like what the vibe was going to be because it was really intense because you guys had had this like kind of like sweet like friendship almost like where even though you're an f agent and she's a cop, she's teaching you all these ways to.

Deal with victims and stuff because you don't really do that.

And then in that scene it was kind of like she's bummed because she really liked you, so like I kind of love that scene and I was just.

Yeah, like thought that they were I feel like Olivia Benson was like, Oh, I've met my a friend. This is gonna be my bitch and the FBI and we're gonna like solve crimes together. Like that's part of the heartache I think at the.

End too, where she was just like that's me or like that, yeah, they were the same.

I don't know for real, And that's well, that's the whole that's ultimately the whole point is like, don't let this happen to you, because you live in this world and it can happen to you because when you're just too close to it.

You know.

As far as that interrogation scene, what's interesting is that they both aside from what was really happening, they both genuinely connect and had hopes for the future of this friendship. You know, had she gotten away with it, that might have just been a nice friendship. You know, she's too Benson's too smart. You can't you can't actually like be friends with somebody that's going to discover what you've done.

That was so nice.

But I think I think what's interesting is just like the arrogance.

Of all right, you caught me, but like prove it, you know, and yeah.

You know what what what really happens now? Because I did what I thought was to justify thing, and then her conscience catches up with her clearly. But like they just that just you know when somebody, when somebody first starts to get caught, and they just dig their heels in and they.

Like lie even harder.

Oh yeah, that's like yeah in real life when you watch interrogation, and yeah, they just dig in.

You're right, They just at first they are like whoa, what are you talking about? And then within the hour they're like, okay, here's how I did it.

Yeah yeah, but it's all yeah, it's like you know, as far as the chess game, right, it's like prove that you're worthy, You're you're a worthy opponent here. Yeah, I'm not just gonna give it to you, like I'm smarter than you.

You need to earn it here.

That's so true.

Yeah, because an FBI is not going to come in and be like you got me? Like she is like, all right, show me what you got, like, lay your cards.

Out on the table.

Yeah, and what do you get recognized the most from? Do people yell swim fan at you in the streets or what?

Before?

I think before Parenthood it was swim fan the most, and people would like.

Across the boards. I don't know where.

This phrasing came from, but people would be like, you're a bad girl. Okay, clearly that's that's thing with regards to Madison Bell, I guess, but cool.

Nice to meet you.

You're a bad girl. Yikes. Yeah, it does also sound like a little creepy.

Yeah, like like a come on, yeah.

I think Parenthood now would be the biggest thing.

Swim fan changed everything because now that's that, like, that's a genre.

To me.

If I see something like it, I'm like, oh, it's a swim fan moment.

Amazing.

I didn't I didn't know that until recently. At that time, all teen movies were like romantic comedies or just kind of like straight up kookie comedies like American Pie.

Yeah, and what's what's that movie with Rachel Lee Cook and Freddie Prince.

You and she's all that yeah, I can't.

Yeah, I feel like American Pie can't hardly wait. She's all that was like, it was really the vibe.

And so to change things up so dramatically and be like this is now teen movies, Territory, Smith Fan and.

A heist movie.

I actually didn't realize how out of the box they were for the time, and I'm like, I'm newly appreciating them myself.

I'm like, that's that's really cool. Yeah we did something.

Well, I have one more, really really inane question that has nothing to do with anything, but I was looking you up and I was like, oh, her Twitter is Erica Jane, And I was like, do you know about Erica Jane Girre already the housewife of Beverly Hills.

Oh no, I thought you were gonna ask me about Erica Jane the porn star.

Oh okay, Well, look there's a couple of people.

I did not know about, the real housewife of Beverly Hills.

I a, maybe you should change my handle.

Well, she's in the news right now.

She's in the news right now because she's married to a huge lawyer and he's getting busted for embezzling. All these funds from like widows and orphan children and sit and stuff, and she is being like kind of dragged into it that maybe she knew, And I was like, people are so stupid on Twitter, Like people came for Rachel Ray when they meant to come for Rachel Roy after Beyonce made that song. So I was like, I wonder if people are coming for Erica Christiansen being like.

You dumb bitch, you stole money from orphans and You're like, I'm in parenthood.

Like I was just wondering, but clearly it hasn't been a problem for you on Twitter.

I just thought it would be a fun nation with this porn star. It seems like, yeah, well listen.

I mean I don't have my notifications on, but I mean I could do it.

No, if you want to get into true crime on Hulu, there's a special on this housewife and lawyer the guy lawyer her well now ex husband. He is the lawyer that Aaron Brockovich works for. Like that's who it's based on, is this guy. And so he does these giant claim

But oh my god, that's so wild because at what point did she become complicit or was she super.

Naive or like, you know, in the when when.

The relationship started, were they young and she was just like, oh, he's or you know, she.

Was super young and she was like he's so you know, grown and self made. Man, I don't know.

That's so awful.

It's just like.

The brazenness, like you know that you're embezzling all this money and then you're like allowing your wife to go on reality television where you're going to be under a microscope. You're so confident you're not going to get caught that you're like, yeah, go parade our wealth on television. That's just like, to me, that's the audacity to the highest level that I can't even like believe.

Did you did you? Did you see the last season of Bosh.

Yes, she loves I love Bosh, thank you.

I love we love La Stories too.

Yeah, I love Bosh because it's in La. I mean I should watch La Stories. What is that?

No?

No, I just mean it as as draups like La Stories. Yeah, that's probably a thing too.

But what's the other show? There's another? Is it another David Kelly show that's set in La? Oh? Oh oh Goliath?

Oh I've never seen that.

Now that that's the whole joke of that series is like, how is it winning Emmy's when no one has ever heard of this show that is the same source material, the same writers, source.

Material as Bosh.

Wow.

You right.

Those characters are half brothers and one's a cop and one's a lawyer before Bosh becomes ultimately a private investigator. But yeah, it's just it's just cool, kind of like underbelly of Hollywood, not Hollywood the industry lore.

Yeah, Hollywood the place.

Yeah.

And yes it is on Amazon. I'm gonna watch it. You did it? Yes, yes, no, and then I'm going to be searching for La Stories for like ten days.

That was incredible, Thank you, Erica.

She was so cool and I wish you guys could have seen her. She's not aged since she was discovered, and she's so beautiful.

But yeah, an amazing interview and I love her. I want to be friends. No, life is wild.

I don't know when you think of these moments to be talking to her, it's like, really nuts.

But let's get into our post worn.

I don't know what we can say we fucking learned from this queer episode, because how many times are we going to be in a situation involving a serial?

Do you know what I learned?

Even if you escape a torture killer with bruises and marks and blood all over you, the cops still might not believe you.

Right, So I learned that.

I learned you could be fully naked and chained up and escape and the cops are like, are you sure you didn't do this to yourself?

Right?

Are you sure you didn't got too drunk at a costume party? Yeah?

I am not happy with some of the police work in this case, but I, you know, love this woman for fucking stabbing someone with an ice pick and escaping, Like women are so strong and resilient and can escape.

What else? Yeah?

I guess maybe escape rooms are more important than we thought they should rebrand instead of for fun. It's like, well, you can you survive? It's like training. Maybe I need some escape room training. I don't know what's going to happen.

Yeah, oh, I just tried to joke about escape rooms last night at my show.

Was it a fun night at the show?

Yeah?

Oh my gosh, it was really good. When I first pulled up, there was only a few people there, and I.

Was like, what happened in my show while I was away?

Now?

And then like by the end there was like seventy five people or it was great.

There was a lot of people. It was really good.

But I learned that even FBI agents think that they are too smart to be caught, Like I mean going into an internet cafe. First of all, are there still internet cafes?

Oh there's gotta be Yeah, people need to be committing crimes.

When I lived in Italy, this is how long ago it was, like there was no Wi Fi.

I had to go to an internet cafe down the street to check my fucking email every week and just respond to my family and be like what's going on. I remember I was like in a fight with one of my Italian friends. We were just corresponding over email, and I was like, gotta go check and see if she's responded, like paying money to check my email. Can you guys imagine this was? Of course, back in nineteen seventy five, life was better.

I hate being CONTs because, like you said, when I'm on my vacation mode, when I'm out and about, I'm not responding to anything, like I don't want to look, but it makes it see it's like, what the why didn't you respond to stuff?

And it's like I don't like the expectation.

That I have to I don't think anybody has that expectation of you.

Good to know I feel about you're writing back. I don't think you're dead. I think you're enjoying yourself and you'll get back to me when you get back to me.

Yeah, my cousin was her daughter's birthday, and then you know, I sent her a text and she sent me all these photos of the child and I didn't respond for days, and then I was like, oh my god, she loves polar bears. But like I did like seeing the pictures. But it's the drunk element too. When you're drunk, you're just not remembering what you responded to, what's going on?

Who's texting and speaking of drunk?

Get back to we had to stop the intro, but I want to know why you the other story about why you hate that girl?

She oh, so then she said something, so there was like another whatever whatever led to this conversation. But she goes, I'm very observant, Like I notice things, and I'm people watching all the time, and I just like get people. And in my head, it's like you think you're the

In deja vu.

We all like feel like, oh I made the right decision because of energy, Like we're all trying to be connected to the universe. But to also think that you are extra observant. While two comedians who truly communicate to strangers nightly and connect with human beings that you do not know and make them have an involuntary response, you're trying to tell me that you.

Just know about people it's like it just it was wild. Also, are you observing that I hate you?

Like she was she observing that you were like disdainful of her, Like clearly not.

Yeah.

She just kept trying to talk well because she was someone that couldn't get tickets to the show because it was sold out, but came to the bar next door anyways to get a bite of him right to get but was judging and making fun of all the people that came to the show, but still trying to hang out with him. So she was very much like, I didn't go to the show, but it's like, no, you just sat at the bar next door waiting.

For waiting for the show to let out, like a full desperado, okay, judging all these people.

And then there was just like a situation where I was like, oh, I didn't get that vibe from that person.

I felt a different thing.

And she was like, well, I'm like really observant and I just really understand people in situations. And I was like, okay, yeah, now you're I bet you can't.

I'm honestly dying for you to see her again on this trip because I want more.

I want more of this. Oh, I bet you I mean it is.

It is funny being a nop, Like you just see humanity in like a really funny way. Like that's why famous people are so fucked. People are frauds. Like we met this girl at the pool and like she didn't care and then suddenly started following me in Instagram and change the way she treated me fully, right, you know what I mean, all of a sudden it was like, oh, what's you know? And it's like, oh, but you weren't going to treat me like this until you saw check Mark.

Wait, this is what I was just going to say. Though. We forgot to mention that we're going to be in Austin. Oh yeah we are. We're going to be at Moontower. We mentioned, We've said it before.

We don't know our schedule quite yet, but just go to the moon Tower websites the Moontower Comedy Festival in Austin, Texas. It'll say when we're performing, we're both doing stand up separately. We're doing a lot that's messed up. Live show. It's going to be amazing. Please, if you don't live in Texas, tell your friends. We don't want to be We want to have people. We want to have you know, we're gonna have a great show. We want people in those seats.

But yeah, this guy I was smoking. He was something New York. He was Yeah, I own a bunch of galleries in New York. And it's like, do you Yeah, what's the name of it?

People are wild? People are wild? And yeah, I mean I'm sure I've been wild at times too. But it's just I love, you know, I love observing people. I love being judgmental and figuring stuff out. Okay, let's observe ourselves. Getting into the what would Sister Peg do segment? This is our weekly segment where we give you guys resources organizations that you can head to to learn more about what we talked about in today's episode. I don't know I didn't really feel like an organization was that like

Beautiful and next week's episode will be Mother season five, episode three, and we hope you join along watch it with us. You know, do your homework, peacock, Hulu, VPN, stick, you know the drill, go to the library. If you have to get on board and I don't know, right to us on Instagram.

We'll see you next time. Yeah, right to us. Bye. That's Messed Up as an exactly right production.

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