Gang Mom-Fred Rosen

the unsuspecting city with drugs and violence. When a fellow gang member named Aaron Atura was suspected of snitching on Thoms's son, Bo, she mercilessly put a hit on him. Fred Rosen's Gangmum gives an inside look into the true story of a mother who would do anything, even murder, to protect her son and keep her gang empire alive. The book they were featuring this evening is Gangmum, The

Evil Mother whose gang secretly prayed on a city. With my special guest, journalist and author Fred Rosen, Welcome back to the program and thank you very much once again for appearing on this program. Fred Rosen, Well, Dan the man Zupansky, It is always my pleasure to be with you, sir Well, I would say respectfully that it's always my pleasure. And Againaradi and a lot of Sometimes Fred Rosen has been on very many times. You've often been controversial, So not with high controversy.

is they repub them. But the e books sell for like, I don't know, four ninety nine, five thirty nine, something like that, so they're really I think affordable, and then if a person wants a hard copy, they can buy a trade paperback which sells for twelve ninety nine. And it gives me an opportunity to to take a look at, you know, what I've done in the past, and at the same time to update, and it gives me perspective on stuff going forward. And so these guys are just

tremendous to work with. And as I said, they are the largest publisher of e books in North America, and they publish a lot of extremely well known authors like one of my you know, like Charles Dickens, you know, and stuff like that, you know, classic stuff and then contemporary stuff like one of my favorite novelists, William Goldman, who wrote the screenplay for Brocassidy and The Sundance Kidne is a tremendous novelist. And also of course true crime.

They're one of the few houses that really will publish true crime, which since the recession DAN there are very few that will. So it becomes very difficult when you're a fan to find stuff to read, and they're right out there doing it. And so it's you know, I don't usually extole the virtues of a publisher but these guys have been absolutely terrific. Yeah.

known it now. So these people that understand true crime a lot more in fact understand it and recognize good true crime. These people are reissuing this stuff for the true crime reader. So it's good work they.

to this stuff, hn't you know? But seriously, it they're they're they're they're they're really good about it. And uh. And I've learned a lot about about the marketing and I've learned more about marketing and promotion of books period in the year and a half i've worked with them than thirty years working with other houses. Because they're open, they work with the author, and they're very friendly with the author, and they're smart. I don't know what else

to say. And Jane Friedman, who used to be the CEO of of HarperCollins, is their CEO, so she's got a big background in this, in this you know, publishing and uh. And also the other thing that I really enjoy is they employ people from all over you know, I don't have to tell you. I mean, like, I'm not interested in talking to somebody who just from New York. Daw, I'm from New York. You know, I want to talk to somebody who's from thunder Bay, you know what I mean.

I mean, you know that's when you begin to learn.

And I'd never been to Oregon, so it was like that was interesting to me because I just have this thing dan where I want to get to all fifty states. So this was another one I could not boss. And I went there and I got you know, I got really lucky because I set up the interviews in advance and I got very friendly with Jim Chad, who is the detective on the case, and we just hit it off and he was kind enough to open up literally his life to me. I mean, you know, we had

dinner together. He took me to his house. He was just, you know, he just showed so much hospitality that I'm which I certainly wasn't used to come from New York and I'm being honest, and and so he opened up to me. And I wrote this book. I mean, I wrote this article and then I just said, you know, this could be an interesting book, and I basically spun it off and I decided to do it as a book, and luckily it was bought by a publisher and I

was able to do it. And that gave me the space to really develop all of the the the the themes and the characters in the book. And it, you know, it's what got me. What got me was the fact that I'd never heard of of of uh except for West Side Story, which is mentioned in the book. I wasn't familiar with gangs of Caucasian middle class kids, you know, I just you know, I didn't. I didn't get it. And and that's the thing that got me about the book was that the I five Carter, the the the

the UH. You've got people going up and down that card on that coast, just like you have people on this coast coming up and down, uh what do you call it, you know, the interstate over here, And so that allowed for the influence of gangs, specifically from Los Angeles to come up there more in the sense almost

the publicity. And then of course when Mary Thompson got involved, that was you know, she was able to sort of take from here and there and put all this stuff together and and she winds up as this, as this anti gang activist. And had it not been for this detective Jim Mchad, she would have gotten away with it. She would have gotten away with murder.

she had been essentially gang raped by them. And what happens is the authorities then bring charges against these individuals and it isn't until the trial that it becomes clear that she's actually doing this stuff willingly and she wants

the attention. And what gets so interesting is that her sister, Judy, testifies against her a trial and she says, my sister just wants to be She wants to be on the Johnny Carson Show, which is what people used to call it back in the day, though it was the Tonight Show starring Johnny Carson, just like it's the Tonight Show starring Jimmy Fallon, etc. Etc. Point being Mary was just into the attention, and that is indicative of her personality

of what she wanted out of life, you know. And I guess there are certain people who want to get fame in any way, shape or form, and they don't care who they're going to step over or whatever. And I don't want people to misunderstand what I'm saying here, which is this, of course, women are abused by men, and there have been many instances of gang rape and

where the men are not prosecuted or not convicted. This is one tenth of one percent of where somebody of a woman making it up and she did it for her own reasons, but it doesn't come together dan until much much later when she winds up out in the Pacific Northwest, and then everybody start the cops start putting it together and they realize what kind of an individual they're dealing with.

leave town, So she leaves town. Of course, he's got to reinvent herself if she knows what she's gonna say about herself, right, But there is quite a report based on this allegation, and like you say that they lose the case. So there's a good report that later Jim Mashad lead reads and is again very indicative of the character of the woman. So Jim Mashad read that with great interest, much much later. So now, like you say,

she's ruading up to Eugene, Oregon and reinvented herself. Tell us how she becomes this anti gang activist and tell us about her son Bo.

in gangs and Mary at this point Hern is now Mary Thompson. She winds up as somebody who starts educating herself on gangs, and she then promotes herself to the media as an anti gang activist, and the local newspapers begin to call her gang Mom because she becomes like a mom to these individuals, the kids that are and we're talking about white, lower middle class, middle class kids, boys and girls who aspire to the gang lifestyle. And she winds up doing various interviews and so forth with

the media and as a result, it mushrooms. And the next thing you know, she gets in tight with a couple of dudes at the Eugene Police Department and she's giving like anti gangs nars in schools and so forth. And while this is happening, her son is going in and out of trouble. But at the same time, she is forming very strong I would say, very strong roots within the community, so that nobody would suspect that, you know, she's a bad guy or bad girl. Nobody would suspect that.

But she makes a couple of mistakes along the way that come back and haunt her.

the time, you know what I mean. It's not like one of those It's not like, you know, like Beacon of Death, where you know, this guy's a serial killer and his wife is unaware of it, but it's you know, because she's sleeping with him all the time. It's that's not the case because when she winds up becoming really popular and when she is actually doing some other things that we'll get to by that time, she's not involved

with with any man in particular. So it isn't like there was a major tip off her something like that. Plus an important aspect here is that she is a con woman of the first order. She's the best eye he has ever seen, best I've ever seen. And at the same time she has a very very close relationship with her son. But she doesn't provide the kind of role model that you know that we hope parents would. It's the other way around. She's not teaching this kid

proper values. It's it's it's just completely the opposite, and this will eventually lead to a lot of grief for a lot of people.

involved with this African American gang. Duh, you know, I mean, you know, if you base these are these are these are kids, you could have sold them the Brooklyn Bridge for five bucks. They were pretty damned. But also they were very ignorant and and they you know, they were very sheltered in many ways and is and but but every kid wants to belong, every kid wants to be

a part of something, especially when they've had problems. So she was smart enough to prey on kids who've had problems and who she could manipulate to do her will. And she not only does that with kids that aren't related to her, she does it with both Flynn, who's who's her son? And so she can this is then that's and and what she basically does is she's a

very good study band. She studies gang culture. She knows all about gang colors, the gang initiation and so forth and so on, and so she implements this this system of acceptance in this community. And she's doing this while she you know, at night, while by day. And I don't think we're giving anything away here because it says it on the cover. Uh, she's she's she's acting as a gang activist. So you've got that, You've got two

things going on. You've got the con woman who is telling the public and the cops that she's an anti gangy activist, as well as on idea the parents, parents of these kids into she you know, into her confidence game. And then at night she's got these kids that are showing up at her house and you know, they think, like she's she's she's it, man, you know, she's you know, she's like, you know, I guess I just remembered back in the thirties, there was a woman who ran a gang.

Her name was mob Barker, and she was a very famous outlaw. And that's exactly how I would describe Mary Thompson. She's an outlaw. She's really an outlook.

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expect stuff like this to happen. But she made the mistake of being within within Jim Mashad's turf, the detective, and again without Mashad, I don't think we're having this conversation quite frankly, because he's the one who finally breaks it open. And in true crime, as you know, you gotta have you got to have somebody who is the effective per se who does break it open and somebody, you know, and that's the individual that we as the reader,

we follow them, our emotions go towards them. And Jim was happened to be the guy, and you know, and and not you know, but but anyway, so she was really able to manipulate these kids. And again, I think that if this was a situation where these were individuals were in the twenties, for example, I don't think wreck Again, I don't think that we're having this conversation. It's the fact that they were vulnerable. And these kids, many of

them were kids who had problems. You know, they came from homes with problems, and you know, as you go, you know, as you get a little bit more experience, you find that there's a lot of these people out there. You know. It sort of reminds me as we're talking. I mean, Dickens mind this area quite well. And uh and and I'll you know, in the play and the book it's based on. You know, it's funny. I hadn't even thought about that until just now. But she's basically Fagan,

That's what she is. She's Fagan.

relationship and I really care about her. And what happened here was that Aaron i Toura was part Native American and one of the tribes from the Pacific Northwest, and he was a good kid, and Aaron had gotten into a little bit of trouble, but nothing major. And what happened was Mary Thompson approached Janice Iitura about getting Aaron involved in her anti gang activities, and Aaron was against this stuff. He was not he didn't like gang and he was a kid with a lot in front of

him and he was a very good looking boy. He was six feet four about two twenty, terrific athletes, smart kid. I mean, his kid was gonna he was going to set the world on fire. He was going to do real well. And what happened was he got involved with the anti gang activities, not knowing of course, that he

had literally gone into the spider's web. With apologies to Peter Parker and you got that one, right, yeah, okay, okay, And anyway, and what happens is, at one point, Mary gets the bright idea that actually it's not bright and brilliant using Aaron as Bo's protector because Bo keeps getting in trouble. So the idea is to use Aaron as his essentially his bodyguard. It's almost like the old film My Bodyguard. Uh. And what happens is he winds up going well, Aaron goes to a local the place with

Bo in Eugenie. So whenever Bo is you going to get in trouble, Aaron's there to help him avoid it. But what what what? What Aaron doesn't realize is that what Mary really has him doing is making sure that her son doesn't get involved in anything by day because he can't control himself by night it's a whole different story. By that time, Bo's doing, you know, his thing with with with with the gang that Mary has put together

in Eugene. And at the meanwhile, Aaron is home with his with his with his mother and his family and his girlfriend and so so that's how he gets But he's never part of the gang by any means. He doesn't even know about the gang. He just he's just a kid who who who thinks he's helping out individuals in the community because he has a social conscience and being a Native American, he he understands how tough it

can be for individuals. He really understands how tough it can be for individuals who have a couple of strikes against them. And so he just stays with Mary, and he trusts Mary implicitly as well as Janice the mother. The mother really trusts trusts May. Janice trusts Mary implicitly, and so again it sort of proves the point about how these individuals, these bad guys and bad girls, and they're confidence people literally and figuratively.

h on his belly, but it's not too bad. And at that point, the cops are called, and you know, somebody calls nine to one to one, and the next thing you know, Bo is arrested and he'd already been on probation for something else, but now he's arrested for assault. And that puts Aaron right in the middle because Mary doesn't want him testifying against her son because she knows that if Aaron testifies, her son's going to go back into the juvenile lock up. Aaron is torn. He doesn't

Bo's a friend of his. Mary is a friend of his, His mother is friends with Mary. What is he going to do? And at the same time, the pops are looking at Aaron as well being involved in this situation. So Aaron has to make a decision about what he's going to do and that going to lead to tragedy.

What you're doing is you're saying that there's an individual out there on the street who almost kills somebody and you so so really, she's basically saying, or a son, Well, Aaron, if you protect bo, what happens next? What happens if if he goes out and tries to kill somebody? How are you going to feel? She's trying to teach her son values. And and Aaron really listened to his mom about it, and he was told he was still torn. He didn't know who likes the idea of testifying against

a friend or somebody you think is a friend. See that's the operative word, think is a friend. At this point, Janice doesn't understand that Mary isn't and neither of course does Aaron. And so it's really a question of it's not just a question of Aaron's self survival. It's more it's a question of what happens next. It's a question of of of of I don't know if the Golden rule applies here, Dan, but it's certainly a question of

are we are we going to allow somebody? Are you going to allow somebody Aaron to get to go free who tried to kill another human being? Or are you going to do the right thing? And it's a it's a question that I mean, I've had to answer that question in my work, and it's a hard question and it's just but it's especially hard for a teenager certainly. But Aaron I Turr was a very mature young man and so he made the right decision for himself. But again he didn't know what he was dealing with.

So now with Aaron Nutura not taking the wrap for bow and basically you say, it comes down to in the end too, he said, listen, I'm not Bo's a scumbag, and I ain't going to jail for the scumbag.

and Crazy Joe Brown. So tell us about this little group of teenagers that hang around and what is the talk when Mary Thompson realizes that it looks like Aaron Atura, despite being friends with everybody, is going to spill the beans and testify and bo will go back to prison. What is she actually saying to these people? What's the tone of the conversation.

kind of an individual we're talking about. And what Mary does is she tells these people, these kids, that that if Aaron is not taken care of, then he's going to testify against both and both's going to go back to jail. Now this gets back to this woman's charismatic personality,

how she can manipulate them to do murder. I mean, you know, I mean, you know, I'm sitting here and I'm I'm like, I'm shaking my head because the only way that you can do that with anybody is if the individuals involved have not been taught the right way at home. That's my personal opinion, and they feel in some way, and you know, sure there's environmental influences and so somebody, you know, you want to be part of something bigger than yourself. For most of us, that means

our country. For these kids, it means their gang. Their gang was their country. And I can I tell you one thing, Dan, as you know, I realized Larry Martin, Well, we talk about crazy Crazy Joe, and there's Jim El'stad and Lisa Fentest and Larry Martin is assumonym. And you know, when you're writing, I know how it is when you

do it. But you know, I'm writing books and I'm going to use a pseudonym because I want to keep somebody, you know, keep their anonymity if they if they haven't you know, certainly if they haven't been charged and not around the periphery. And I really I just remembered, you know, you know why I used Larry Martin. Why, oh boy, when I uh, there was a uh maybe some people remember a serial called that was on television. H Commando Cody,

Commando Cody Sky Marshall of the Universe. Well when they did the second serial, they changed his name from Commando Cody to Larry Martin. So I just said, oh man, I'll use Larry Martin, you know, I because I can't, Hey, Dan, I can't use superhero names anymore because they're making movies out of them. You know, I can't. What am I goay do to say Tony Stark. That's not gonna work.

But seriously, so I'll just get back to this and you know which is that she Mary Thompson uses her force of personality to convince these kids to go out and to commit murder. And she says, hey, if you don't take care of this, both's going to jail. And she makes it clear that she wants this kid dead, she wants Aaron dead, and that they will be in in in her highest esteem, in her highest esteem. And

again it goes back, you know, and that's it. I think that's a good point in that we're dealing with individuals will obviously don't have a lot of self esteem. He Aaron did. Aaron had a lot of self esteem. I mean he he was you know, I have no doubt as I've been looking through this again, he really would have been a leader of his people, maybe even a leader of this country. But unfortunately he got con just like everybody else. So Mary conn's these individuals into committee a murder.

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the sort of the gang mentality. She also said, well, just for the heck of it, I think maybe he poisoned my dog Lars, and I think maybe he's having sex with kids. So she just tried to throw everything in that she possibly could to convince these people. And she had I guess, somebody that she was interested in, and they didn't seem to come through. So she finally found somebody else. And so tell us what happens? What is Aaron doing? What are is everybody else doing? How

who knows what? And so set that scene for us.

But anyway, what's happening here is that is that Aaron is living in a small house with his brothers and sisters and his mom, and they like in many places, you know, wherever you go. You know, they they took the garage and they made it into a bedroom. You know. I mean, everybody's seen that, I think, you know, I mean you know, I mean you know I've seen it. Uh, you know. And I don't mean to imply that everybody

is living in a house. Okay, I don't mean that, but I'm saying that we've we've seen that if you get a little experience. So anyway, Aaron is in bed one night with his girlfriend and he's sleeping, and he's sleeping. He's not thinking about anything, you know, he's just sleeping. And meanwhile, what's happening is outside. The two individuals that decide to do this hit to make Mary Thompson happy,

Elstad and Brown. They go over to the house a little bit earlier in the evening and they see lights are on and they say, well, this is not a good time to do it. And then they come over later on and it's like, oh, I don't know, around midnight and the house is in such it's not facing the street, it's like between other houses. So they come

and what they do is they steal in. They open the door, they get into the garage and they see the kid in bed, and they have their weapon with them, and Jim Elstad fires one shot and Aaronis is on his side, you know, sleeping, and the bullet goes in and comes out in the front and at that point, at that point, shortly thereafter, the girlfriend awakens and is It's actually very similar to what happens to Abraham Lincoln Lucky.

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from the front of his head. The bullet goes all the way through and comes out, and that it's shocking. I don't you know, it's just a shocking scene. And at that point it's you know, amazingly, it's amazing. It's very similar to Lincoln. You know, Lincoln survived for about it was about twelve hours because he had a strong constitution. Aaron was the same way he survives. But what happens is his mom wants to go to the hospital with him, and she still doesn't know it's a bullet wound. She

still thinks, you know, he's hit in the head. And the cops did their job. They did a very good job because anytime somebody who is killed, or i'm sorry, anytime somebody is assaulted and it's in somebody's house, the first thing you do is look at the family. And they needed to do a paraffin test to make sure that she didn't have any gunpower residue with her and her kids. So that's the first thing that they do until and then she's finally allowed to go to the hospital.

And meanwhile, the two bad guys, they don't they don't run very far that one of them lives, like across the street. You know, they just run across the street, and nobody knows what the heck is going down. I mean, it's just like boom, boom, that's it. You know, one shot, that's it, and and they go across the street, and then you know, other things will happen, of course, but the police certainly don't know what's going on at this point.

And then she's like the first one that they're going to contact to say, Oh, do you know anything about this? Can you tell us? You know what's going on here? I mean, you can't come up with a better cover than this. I mean it's brilliant. Yeah, it's brilliant. And so they start looking at at you know, they start questioning her and and you know, and and then you know and that you know, and then they go from point A to point be and so forth and so on.

But what what what? What nobody knows is that the detective that becomes the primary on the case, Jim Machad, he knows her from another incident previous to this, and that essentially is what destroys her con because Jim Machad had dealt with her previously and on something else, So he immediately when he sees that she's involved his intent to go up and he starts thinking, wait a second,

what's going on here? And then it becomes a question of dog and police pursuit and and and and and you know, and bringing these you know, taking a closer look at the individuals involved in the gang activity in Egype, which of course is going to lead back to her.

it down. He's looking at resumes and then he was looking wait a minute, field investigator for the Josephine County Police Department. Okay, and then he just and Mary, just for the record, is like five foot eight, one hundred and sixty pounds, kind of stocky woman. He says, listen, and you were a drug informant, not a field investigator, and heavily in the drug trade there. And he said he's lying. And he said, well, how about this. Can't state it, can't state it called, can't state you weren't

over there. Their line can't states lying, So kent state sign So Jim that basically had a really good idea of the kind of character even in the face of factual information, she would still try to lie her way out of it, deny her way out of it. But yet he knew the character of this woman. So you also described tell us the scene where they meet each other again, and that just and you do capture that that it must have been a very very satisfying scene and an event for Jim. Shot.

that introduces them, and she doesn't blank. Really, I mean, she is a cold blooded killer, and so he and he of course is he's getting a kick out of this, there's no question, because you know, he knows he's after the right person. And so it's so when it finally comes about, he's hoping that when she realizes that he knows her and that he knows is that she's she's

a liar in the past. He's hoping, like the other cops do, that she's going to make some mistakes and say this and that and so forth and so on that will implicate her. But she's she's as stone She is as stone cold a murderer as any that I have ever written about. She is stone cold. She is as bad as any serial killer. And uh, and so so while he gets a certain amount of pleasure, and I don't blame her, you know, cat and mouse game,

Jim really understands what he's up against. He really understands he's against He's going up against the real pro especially from their previous interaction where she said she went to Kent State University, and and then she she claims she went to a community college afterwards to take some course on bookkeeping. And then, like you point out, she just

said they were all lying. You know that, you know when she checks all these these references and they don't check out, and so he's hoping that she's going to fold in some way. But it doesn't happen. It doesn't happen. I mean, she is just stone cold and stone cold.

tapped Aaron gang speak for killed. And so she she doesn't have any compunction about about informing on these these members. They are members of her of her secret gang, and they're the ones who who commit this crime. And the idea, of course, is that if she informs on them, then she figures that hey, you know, they'll get them and the cop be satisfied, free, my son is free, and she can continue to do what she's doing. That's that's

the uh, that's what she that's her rationale. And again she has no conscience whatsoever about doing any of this. Why should she have any conscience, you know, she doesn't have any conscience. So she just says, hey, man, I'm just gonna you know, she just makes a decision, you know, uh self preservation, I'm going to inform on them. She doesn't have any values. And that's what she does. She

just informs and says they've done it. And then on the basis of that and the other evidence they put together, they could take these dudes into custody.

wired and for potential conversations. And what I was thinking too is before that, when she talks about the deflection about these two guys doing it, what happens when these two guys are arrested? And again true true to her plan, what do these two guys say when they are arrested?

so much at this point that they're accepted. It's more like their celebrities, their celebrities within their their their limited world, and they you know, they're they're they're more than happy to, uh, could take the fall, because again it's it's it's you know, this is you know, they think like, you know, they're they're they're hot shots. They think that they're you know, they think that they're major gangsters, and so they're they're

more than happy to take the fall. And I think they also know that as juveniles, there's only so far that the state can go in charging them. You know, you're not dealing with a situation where you've got capital punishment and it wouldn't make any any difference anyway. Well, actually, I was just gonna say it wouldn't make a difference because capital punishment for juveniles was not ruled down in the United States until a millennium. But they're not dealing

with that in this particular state. You know, the best you know that they could could have gotten supposedly, you know, they could have gotten life, but that's not certainly that's they're not thinking about that. All they're thinking about is, Hey, you know, I'm popular. Uh, you know, I'm real popular. In fact, I'm sort of thinking about it right now, and I'm thinking to myself, Man, these kids were a little bit more educated, they might have tried selling their story.

I've seen this plenty of times. Bad guys are you know, captured and they want to sell their story to the movies, you know. But as far as they're concerned, hey man, we're popular, you know, and these are boys, so they figured that it'll make them real popular with the girls. You know. They're not thinking about bill, I'm going to go to you know, I'm going to go to prison. I'm going to be some dude's bitch. They're not thinking

about it that way. They're thinking about it, well, you know what, maybe I said for a couple of years and I get out and now I'm even more popular than ever before. Again, no conscience, no conscience. Mary was very smart in picking people close to be part of the gang that really don't have a conscience. And in these two individuals she picked down Well.

of being prosecuted for anything. Yet would explain some things like you can explain about the gun and the story she told police and the idea that they came. They came to her and told her, but somehow she didn't believe it. So tell us about this the pimple tale.

blank range, like six feet. And I actually went down to the river where this occurred. And as I and I was thinking about it. For some reason, it's it's stayed in my mind. Dan, you know, it's like I went. I they do it at night. I did it during

the day obviously. But she takes this truck and she drives down this you know, obscure road to this river and there's rapids, you know, and she and what happens is she stops the car and Elstad gets out of the car and he takes the bullets out of the gun and he goes over to the banks of the river and he throws the bullets in and he throws the gun in. But this is a kid that is not going to be drafted by any major league team. He has allows the arm. So what happens is the

bullets don't go very far. Neither does the gun. I mean, this part is really amazing. When you think about it, that they could even recover this stuff, and they will eventually refer the gun in a certain way that I describe in the book, and at least one of the bullets, which of course helps with the forensics. But I remember when I was standing by the banks of that river and I was looking up and down the river, you know what I mean, and looking and seeing, and it's

a very isolated place. And you know, Mary knew what she was doing. Man, she really knew what she was doing, because this was it's not like it's you know, New York, you know, like where I come from, the Hudson River, you know, where there's people all over the joint. It's isolated.

You know, we're out in the country someplace. But they don't count on the fact that that they're not counting on the current, what the current is when the bullets are thrown in, and when the gun is thrown in, they just figure it's going to sink to the bottom and melt you know, melt in and so forth. Doesn't

quite work out that way, you know. But I got to tell you when I was standing there, you know, and looking out, you know, it's amazing what you'll think about you know, what you think about you years later when you're working on a case. And it was it was very isolated, but I got a vibe from the place. You know. It was one of those places that you know, you wouldn't want. It was isolated. You wouldn't go there at night unless you were an idiot, you wouldn't go there.

So they she picked very very well a place to get rid of the weapons of the weapon rather and the and the bullets, and you know, and she she thought, and the dead guys thought that it was going to work out in their favor. What they didn't understand was how currents work. And they didn't understand that, you know, the possibility that there could be chance that they could

recover any of these material. And the most important thing is they didn't understand that they that they were up against a cop that wasn't going to give up.

her at the funeral. What happens at the funeral?

And Mary doesn't show up. But a short time later she does show up at Janice's house and she makes a big mistake and that will come back and haunt her. But at this point, what's happening is that Mary makes all kinds of excuses for not showing up to Janice and she says, oh, you know, I'm your friend, and blah blah blah blah blah, blah, but it. Janice is

not having any of it. And the thing is, if I'm a ad, which is Janice's daughter, Maya feels, oh my god, tremendous guilt because what happens is Lisa Centris, who is the one of the members of the gang. She is the button woman, a phrase that I got from Actually the phrase would be button man. I think the only place I've ever seen it was The Godfather. But basically, she confirms that Aaron's home the night that

they go to get him. But Maya takes the phone call where she asks for Aaron, and Maya says, well, he's in the next room or something like that, you can't get him. And she feels a tremendous amount of guilt. And this poor girl, the sister, has a suicide attempt

because she feels this tremendous guilt. And I think, you know, that's one the thing that came across to me Dan, which was that the damage that these killers can do to families is not just obviously the individual they kill or the parents, but it's also the siblings and other relatives who are around that individual, and the fallout is just tremendous, you know, I always say that murder ripples

through generations. Murder ripples through generations. We see this time and time again, and so the damage that Mary Thompson caused and her son bo will ripple through the Itura family in years to come. That's unfortunately the way it is. Can it be mediated in some way through therapy, medication, Yes, but there's still damage. There's still damage. And if there's one thing that's come across to me Dan in writing true crime, that's what's come across to me. You know

what I mean? How you know people who are involved, the relatives to friends and and I'm all I can also talk about this personally. I've had four people close to me who've been murdered. Four, Okay, and it's terrible, terrible, but you know, the only thing that any of us can do, and I'm sure there are some individuals that are listening to our show tonight who have been in

this situation. The only thing that we can do is to continue on and certainly try to get justice for the individual who's killed, but also live our lives in such a way that we honor the individuals that have died.

How do they get to the point where machad Rick Rayner leaves the guy that was real sympathetic and thought she was great, he's gone somehow. But how does michad get her into a situation in a position that she is forced to put a wire on her phone? Before we get into the almost fantastic, almost somewhat comical, almost some of it, the conversations that were recorded by this wire warrant, Well.

Hoover Cripts led by Mary Thompson. And he's and the only way and the only way to find this out is to put a secret wire on them. And I'll tell you this is like textbook stuff. I mean, it's like what they did was they established a listening post someplace in downtown Eugene. They didn't do it at the police department because they were concerned that not Rick Rayner, it could have been you know, and I don't We don't need to imply in any way that Rick Rayner

said anything to her or anything. That's that's not the point. The point is, it's just that you're going after a murderer and you need you need privacy in order to establish the wire and you know, set the wire up and at the same time have a listening post. And so what they do is that's exactly what they do. They set up a listening post in downtown Eugene or

upcount whatever you want to call it. And at the same time, at the same time they they have Mary's phone wire and that and and that leads to really some unbelievable stuff because what what Michad is trying to do is not only get evidence to get her for the murder of Aaron, but also to try to bust what they suspect is a gang that she's running secretly

at night. So they they were able to get the wire, and that was what what was quite interesting, by the way, which was for me anyway, which was it's not so easy to get wired. You know, you got to go through a court order, you know. And I'm sure it's the same where you know, wherever you go, you know, be it Australia, England, Canada, France, whoever it might be. Obviously in Russia they'll do anything they want to do.

Uh now I'm gonna get putin coming coming up to me, right and but but but seriously, it's very interesting because they Jim has to Jim and Shott has to go before the judge give them this warrant, said, this is why I want to do this, and so forth and so on. Judge has to say yes, because obviously people's civil liberties are at stake, and so they get the warrant they place the wire and Mary does at this

point doesn't know the wire is on. And they established a listening post and they start listening and they hear Quie a bit.

court and she's psychopathic and she's against the wall. Tell us a little bit about the trial dynamic, but tell us about how the I guess the scene where jimhad they have enough information, enough evidence so that they make the arrest on Mary Thompson.

the wire? And they make a decision that if a human life is at stake, they they'll compromise the wire. So when this kid Flarn gets these guns, I think they're from Lisa, you know, he's going to sell them someplace or use these He's gonna use them, He's going to use them for like hold ups and so forth. At that point, the cops close in and Bow leaves

them on a merry chase across of the city. And as it happens, they have the wire tap going and Mary is listening in rather an individual, another individual who's part of the gang, calls her up and says, oh, I'm listening to the police scanner and they're going after boat. So here we got a situation where the cops are listening to Mary, who's talking to a guy who's listening to a police scanner, telling her that they're going after her son, and all she wants is for him to

come home. That's all she wants, and so that he both leads them on a marry chase across the city and it isn't until they actually get him, and it takes quite some time to do that, that they finally close in on Mary and she is arrested for uh, for plotting, or rather actually she's she's essentially arrested for plotting Aaron's murder, though that's not technically what she's charged with.

That's what's interesting to me, because they don't charge it with first degree murder, I think is she's actually charged with third degree. But they throw the book at her aggravated, aggravated, Yeah, and yeah, and they throw the book at her. And then Mahad, you know, he's doing the best that he can, working with the prosecutor Steve Skelton. And by the way, the hardest thing I'm writing this thing, and I'm going to prosecutor Steve Skelton. All I kept thinking is Red Skelton,

you know, the famous commun meeting. And so Machad is in a situation where now after you know, sure, he gets a lot a pleasure out of arrest, and Mary, you know, she done it. But it's now up to the prosecutor to put her away. And again, this is not the most serious crime. The idea is, you know, and of course Mary is going to say, well, I didn't do anything, or the other guy done it, you know, and that's basically you know, she uses the other guy defense.

And you know, Michad is there all the time at the trial because he's really invested. That's that's the thing I found out about him. He's he's it's quite interesting because he's invested emotionally. You know, he's invested emotionally. I don't see that too often, you know, I'm about you know, anybody else. You know, he does this work, but this was a guy you know who and who you know, he really was invested emotionally in this and and bringing this woman down. I mean, he got it. You know,

he understood what was going down here. So you know, there's a trial and it's it's it's a dramatic trial because she's claiming, you know, she didn't have any knowledge or about what was going on, and her attorney did the best that he could to show that she was innocent. And certainly and you know, as you read it, Lea spy read it. You realize the system works sometimes, you know, I always say this, Dain, I always say the system works if you work it. This is this is that

kind of a situation. The system worked because they worked it. They did it by the numbers. And what impresses me is the fact that not only were they diligent about it, but they didn't violate anybody's civil rights. I mean, that's all you hear about today, you know, it's all you hear about. But this is not that kind of situation.

These people, the police, the prosecutors, they worked within the law because they were doing the right thing, and I think that's the reason why they got the result that they did.

that case. But in this which was interesting is that they used those people with the wire taps and use that psychology against them, but also realized that these people were there were kids that were They certainly were not innocent, but there weren't criminal charges. They didn't drag these guys through the courts and say, listen, give you a deal and give you thirty years if you you know, you rat out on your friends. So they really stuck to

the people that were the gunman and his associate. But Michead wanted Mary, and Mary had to take the stand because so much evidence against her and so many witnesses, good witnesses like Cameron Slave came forward and said, yeah, I knew they were going to do it. The gun was passed around. She said, this gun is going to solve our problem, you know. So there was a lot of stuff. There was a lot of stuff on the wiretap.

She slipped up other people. She didn't realize that a couple of the statements were incriminating, so they didn't have to resort to that plea agreement, which would have give her a slap on the wrist. And like you say, you described the trial, was it eight hours later or something, they came back. What was the what did they give her as a sentence?

who had evidence they did it the right way. They actually appealed to their consciences. And I think as as as we're talking about it right now, I think that's why there was a conviction. Because the defense could not come back and say, well, you made a deal with Cameron Slade, you made a deal with least oftentious, so whatever it might be, you know, you may deal with angel El said. They couldn't come back and say that

they were doing every you know, everything above board. And I think it has a lot to do with this particular state, Oregon, you know, again, and there are some states that I feel do things more above board quite frankly than others. And in the Pacific Northwest, those people in Washington State in Oregon, they you know, the record shows that that the that they do things above board doesn't mean, you know, you're not going to have situations where,

you know, with the cops do something wrong. But I would say the preponderance of cases, and certainly in this one, that they do the right thing. And as a result of getting of having these individuals testify and contradict Mary's testimony that she knew exactly what was going on, she set the whole thing up. That's why the jury came back with a guilty verdict, and that's why the judge pronounced her guilty. And I'm sorry the judge pronounced sentences life.

He didn't have to do that. You know, he had a discretion, but he didn't, you know, he went with what the jury said because that was the preponderance of evidence, certainly beyond a reasonable doubt.

that had turned into this you know, media or pardon me, anti gang activist within truth is just the.

any civil rights. You know, he's the direct antithesis of the kind of of of cops that you see so much in the news today who seemed to violate individuals civil rights, at least in the United States, which you see a lot of. This is a different kind of guy. This is a guy who who who was raised with a strong sense of right and wrong, but was not going to violate anybody's civil rights. He was going to

do this fair and square. And as I get more experience, I find that not to be necessarily the norm, you know what I mean. And it's you know, it's not necessarily the norm to have a detective that will be so into doing the right thing. I want to believe all detectives will do this, but I don't. But realistically that's not the case. There are too many instances where laws of civil rights have violated, too many instances where cops abuse individuals in order to get confessions. This is

not the case. We're talking about a guy who upheld the law, and I might add had a sense of humor. And I will also say he mixes a mean martini. Yeah, go ahead, I'm sorry, No, go ahead. No, he was just kind enough. You know, you made dinner, and you know he mixed the martini. And I'm not a Marchini guy, you know, but he was kind enough to do this.

And again, you don't find people, you know what I mean, like they opened themselves up and you know, especially to a reporter, I mean, you don't see too much of this stuff today, Dan, you know.

heard how he was doing it. So it was a martini, and he had just married his girlfriend and so he for once it wasn't you know, the police officer that was totally consumed by the job in a very very negative way. It's I'm sure it's I'm sure it's had its effect. But in this book anyway, in this scene that you describe it, it's Jim with his girlfriend enjoying

life with a martini. So very very fitting and dramatic scene at the end of the book to a very very again not really a happy ending, but again just you really portray Jim a shot as this kind of very very interesting character, a little bit sarcastic and so great Yeah, great writing, Fred and capturing this and thank you very much for coming on and talking about it.

We're going to have you back on August thirty. First, I believe talking about your next book, So just tell us a quick plug for that and how people might want to get a hold of you Facebook, and just tell us of the Open Road contact as well.

Graham Bell and the Race to say James Garfield. And I prove in this book that James Garfield was not killed by Charles Gattau, as history says that it was somebody else that killed them. And the books has the forward is written by President's great great grandson Ank Garfield.

And we can talk about it. But Hunk is available also to come on and talk about it, and it was quite It was quite an investigation, I have to tell you, to go back over one hundred years and having to write three different presidential assassination scenes and there's

a reason for it. It was really quite something and it is quite Frankly, I think it's the best thing I've ever written, and I never said anything like that, but you know, I felt the responsibility as I always do, to the victim's family, and in this case it was Hank and I did the best that I could, and I hope people like the book.