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You are now listening to True Murder The most shocking killers in true crime history and the authors that have written about them Gaesy, Bundy, Dahmer, The Nightstalker DTK. Every week another fascinating author talking about the most shocking and infamous killers in true crime history. True Murder with your host, journalist and author Dan Zufanski. Good evening for readers of
true crime sagas like tinsel Town and Little Demon. In the City of Light comes a chilling account of a murder that captivated the United States in the nineteen twenties. Twelve year old Marian Parker was kidnapped from her Los Angeles school by an unknown assailant on December fifteenth, nineteen twenty seven. Her body appeared days later, delivered to her father by the killer, who fled with the ransom money. When William Hickman was hunted down in charge with the killing,
he admitted to all of it in terrifying detail. But that was only the start. Hickman's insanity plea was the first of its kind in the history of California, and the nature of the crime led to a media frenzy unlike any the country had ever seen. His lawyers argued that their client lived in a fantasy world, inspired by movies and unable to tell right from wrong. The movie industry scrambled to protect its exploding popularity and profits from
runous publicity. Outside the court room, the country craved every awful detail, and the media happily fed that hunger as scandals threatened the proceedings. From the start, the death of a young girl grew into a referendum on the state of America at the birth of mass media culture. David Wilson, a private investigator for over thirty years, captures the maelstrom of Marion Parker's death in vivid detail, from the crime itself to the manhunt that followed, from the unprecedented trial
to its aftermath. Wilson draws readers into the birth of the celebrity criminal.
The book that we're featuring this evening is Not Just Evil. With my special guest journalist and author David Wilson. Welcome to the program, and thank you very much for agreeing to this interview.
David Wilson, Well, thank you for inviting me. I really enjoyed the opportunity to talk about the books and talk about a little bit too about the implications of the case. Okay, leave up to the reader, but for me, there's some personal opinions about the significance of the case and why it's important to kind of take a look at it in retrospect and see how it's influenced everything from that point on.
It tell our audience how you came to be the writer of this book. Tell us what made you be in a position to want to do this book and that this was important to you.
Yes, that's a good question. The case was originally brought to my attention by my brother, who was a film major at USC. He actually went to school but at the same time as Ron Howard, and he fancied himself as a bit of a film historian, and he ran into this story back then, and we got to talking about it, and he gathered some of the documents have supported and I had written some other books, and he asked me if i'd be interested that. To be honest with you, I jumped at because it was really a
compelling story done. You'd done a fair share of the research and convinced me that it was an important milestone in the history of justice system in America.
Yeah, it certainly is. Now let's get to the time, because you do provide this incredible, again vivid picture and portrayal of what the time was like and again in nineteen twenty seven. We think many things are different, but so many things are very very similar. Oddly enough, So let's talk about where Perry Parker and Geraldine Parker and Marion Parker lived sort of an affluent little community here
in around Los Angeles. So tell us about this little community they lived in, what it was really like, and what it was considered, and just a little bit about the Parker family and what mister Parker did he worked it.
So go ahead, No, I was just gonna say, interesting enough, I grew up fairly close to that same area, and in the late twenties, I think Los Angeles was still a bit more rural than we imagine. There were still farms and ranches in the city which are now long gone, obviously, and there was kind of the seats of what I would call a community catering towards a workforce. So they were starting the concept of track homes and bedroom communities
with the particular neighborhood. But this half was probably an upscale, upper middle class neighborhood that it was probably unique at the time because it was built at the time of the story, where most of the I think most of the upper middle class neighborhoods throughout the rest of the country we're older and you know, tended to be more brownstone and more stable. This was a miller community built
for specifically a targeted audience. So then you know, it was kind of sold on the idea that it was safe and that it was people of similar background, and it was. It was kind of the American agreement at the time in some ways.
Now Perry Parker, mister Parker worked at the First National Bank.
He did excuse me, go ahead, go ahead. No, I was just to say you were the banker was also well known too, because the part of the interest in the story is that a lot of the players and characters and figures who had a role in the case actually knew him personally. So he was a well known banker, He was respected, took his job seriously. There was no hint of any bad behavior on his partner in terms of the way he conducted himself as a banker, and
he was just he seemed to be well liked. I mean, everybody who counted him during the investigation in Trialhoo had known him before, had nothing but positive things to say about it.
Yes, we'll talk about those again. Bizarre almost strange connections with an ext door neighbors being that, you know, so we'll talk about that at that time. So now let's let's go to December fifteenth. They're in this community, they're affluent, they're in the safest part of this community. It is a safe time relatively, because of the crime that we're going to describe was unprecedented at that time. It shocked the entire nation, if not a lot of the world.
So December fifteenth, nineteen twenty seven, and mister Parker gets a call from Naomi Britain, which is the school secretary, and she calls to ask to see if the family would want to have Marian's twin sister, the twelve year old Marion that we mentioned in the beginning. Her twin sister to come home as well, and then tell us what mister Parker deduces from speaking to Naomi Britain in short order.
And that's just well. To give it a little context, the school was calling because someone had come back come by the school to pick up Marrying Parker, to take her to the hospital because supposedly her father was in an automobile accident. And it was your father who picked up the phone, and he obviously was not at the hospital. He had not been in an accident, and he had not authorized anybody to go to the school to pick him up his daughter, and so he was immediately concerned.
Stress realized something was wrong, and the school realized that they had made a significant monder. I'd have to say nowadays the chances of a stranger taking him a kid out of school was probably non existence, and at the time it was a little more part it was the part it was more likely around that time, but even and they had the rules and restrictions on who could take a student out of the school, and for some
of those rules were not really followed closely. Out of the principal who should have authorized the release was not available, and the secretary kind of made a decision based on her belief and the credibility of the story, and so she went with William Hickman, who had come and claimed to be George Foss I think that was a ales few years at the time, and said that he was going to take marry It to the hospital that pcaus
her father had requested. And I think perhaps it's not clear if he knew she had a twin sister or not, but he certainly only asked for the one doomic.
To be fair to the secretary. Because then this is part of it, because it came quite controversial shortly after or immediately after, is that this guy had the fantastic ruse. He was well dressed, right, he had this dailius, But he also had uh. He had offered to say, oh, I work with He knew enough where mister Parker works, so he said, I work at the First National Bank with mister Parker, if you would like to call them and verify my identity. So he was good enough to
bluff and nobody took him up on that. So, to be fair, that's an unusual rule that might even work today.
That's a good yeah, that's a good point. And he knew some of he tells us. In fact, he had worked for Parker uh several years earlier and knew the routine him for his work, new personal details about the man's life, so it was not like he was making up a story. He had some information to work with, which made him even more convincing.
I think, now, let's get to this phone call that he gets about, and he deduces what happens with his daughter in that she's been kidnapped by this man, and so they're scrambling to find out. He contacts police. Obviously, tell us what happens next and what he does, and what is the police reaction. It's interesting to say that they immediately, of course, think he may be a suspect. So tell us how police proceed with this kidnapping as far as they know.
Well, the kidnapper obviously told Parker not to contact the police. That's kind of a common thing and kidnapping cases, it rarely happens that way, but that's certainly a common request. And the police had the drop off spot under surveillance and for the first meeting and apparently saw them notice them, felt something was.
Wrong and.
Didn't follow up with the exchange, which made the father really upset, and he got more and more upset about that. The police became more and more suspicious of him, and the whole thing got off the kind of shaky start would say.
Now there's ways I he's communicating. There's the phone call, they put a tap on the phone, but he's also using telegraphs, and then he's also then sending packages. So right, the second one he talks about using this common theme he uses use good judgment, interferious, dangerous, and this progresses as time goes on, because there's this more than the two communications. Now now he tells them, don't get how the police involves. So what does mister Parker do, What
does he ask the police to do? And what did the police do in response to his request?
Well, he insisted on this on the second drop off, that you go alone, and that he'd be allowed to make the exchange without them watching him, so that he didn't run the risk of a second failure at the exchange, and the police agreed to his terms at that point.
Now the terms are fifteen hundred dollars US seventy five twenty dollars gold certificates. That's just one of the stipulations, right, right, yes, and let go ahead. And he always talks about this death close to death, mister Parker, and trust and so he says, and it's always if you interfere, so.
Right, you know. From a psychological point of view, I think he was laying the foundation to deflect his own guilt and blame. And to him it becomes clear as the chase unfolds, which is clear in many cases. I did a lot of work doing criminal defense work, and criminals to commit, especially serious currents, have a tendency to scapego, others, blame, others, do everything except to take responsibility for their own involvements.
So it seems to me in his behavior he was kind of, at least unconsciously laying that foundation.
Now with the the first communication, he realizes that the police have been notified. So he's angry, he says. So he indicates that in the correspondence. But what he gets in the correspondence as well is a note from Marion Parker just to add to mister Parker's torment. So does she essentially say in that little note.
Listen, remind me of the details. She was asking for her father to cooperate, you know. And the odd part of it is is and maybe Irope I'm not jumping to the editor. But in the course of her being kidnapped, she and she and the kidnapper went to the movies, you know, So she was either very frightened or not frightened at all. It's not really clear from the evidence is available why she was, so let's say compliant with
his request. But she definitely wrote her father and definitely asked him to cooperate.
And there's another note as well where she where she obviously is privy to the conversation where the kidnapper is upset and says to her father I saw you or or you know, dad, you got to cooperate or I'll be he'll kill me. So it seems pretty authentic in terms of the feature.
Yeah, I believe she wrote. No, it's absolutely and in his account later he claims to have killed her in a fit of anger and that it was not his intention. So yes, obviously, before she was killed, she was anxious to be released and certainly was making the fleet, certainly was adding to the stress her father was seating him mean, he was taught between the police and the need to accommodate the kidnapp her and and he was a wealthy man, so the money wasn't prohibitive or excessive. It was easily
available to him. So I'm sure he wanted to just follow the instructions. Getting open. We're going to move on. Now.
You have this heartbreaking scene in here, and all of this in the very beginning. Is mind blowing is that the police, Lucas and Raymond, actually believe again the prime suspect is mister Parker. Somehow, I don't know how they justify that, rationalize that. But at the same time, at the end, he says, please, I can't you know this man's going to kill my daughter. I want to just pay the ransom, and they think, I don't think that's a good idea. And yet they still think Parker is
still main suspect. So what does he do? We alluded to it in the introduction, but we have to go into detail because this is one of the most unique crimes murders scenarios that I've ever read, and I mean I've read a lot, and this is nineteen twenty seven. So to explain the shock of the nation, we have to talk about what the father is. He's he's warned by this kidnapper but he is determined, doesn't care about the money. What happens, what is what is his instructions?
And what does he do take us through that?
Well, he tells me, obviously, to come along. They meet on a street there the house and and uh, the father has parked, and then the Hickman comes towards him and comes parallel to him, and he asked about his daughter's condition. From from the from the father's perspective, it looks like his daughter is in the passenger seat with the car. And so they make the exchange of the money. And then uh, hickman pulls down the street and tells the father to wait before he comes and picks up
his daughter. Is that the part you were talking about? Yeah? Yeah, and uh, and so in that short interim, Hickman takes his daughter out of the car. His daughter is dead at that point. His daughter has been badly mutilated in the sense that her limbs and legs have been removed, her eyelids have been sown, and she's got a hat down over her forehead so she's hard to see. And she was essentially propped up with a heavy overcoat and made to look like she was still alive. So when
her father comes and discovers the condition she's in. I mean, he's obviously devastated and goes back and tells the police that his daughter is dead. And I have to say, the police at that point we're not real sympathetic, and they also it kind of increased their suspicion of him at that.
Incredible Now you write another again, amazing aspect of this again it's it's nineteen twenty seven. Be surprised. The next day on the front pages are photographs of the crime sceness. And we just talked about disarticulated arms at the elbows, legs at the knees, a twelve year old with her eyes sewn open so that he could fool her when they rode by in the car that she might still be alive. This ghoul, I know. These are the stories the next day. These are the photos on the front
pages of the newspapers in California. And further along, what did the police do now and what's their direction?
Well? Yeah, listen, in those days, it was common for police photographers actually to be freelanced. They didn't have the kind of CSI in its that we see on TV nowadays. And you know, the current photographers sometimes doubled as journalists photographers, but clearly somebody from within the investigation gave the photographer access to the pictures. It's very likely that there was
a bribe involved. And no, it was kind of the beginning of the outrage around being sensitive certainly to crimes against minors, being sensitive to the kinds of photographs that were released, and you know, it kind of clearly raised the issue of what information could, would and should be released to the public. And in fact that issue became more pronounced as the same pictures were actually used in the newsreels. That became a significant issue nationally action.
When you talk about newsreels, to let the audience know that what these were. Where there was two feature films and then there was a cartoon, and then there was newsreels, which was the news of the day. As gory as it was, this was unprecedented graphic detail. And this became controversial as well. Not everybody thought that was fit for the theaters and the family, did they Well, yeah.
It actually was more significantly than some of the theater owners refused to show them, I mean flat outs that
were not going to show this. The studios got a little nervous about the fact that the sendo owners should have that kind of power to decide what they would and wouldn't show, and the issue over whether it was appropriate well all the way to Congress and really kind of generated what then was an effort at censorship and what's called the Hayes Commission, which was a group to determine what could and couldn't be showing them theaters and to also make a kind of extensive list of what
subjects were and weren't appropriate for films.
You took about Louis B. Mayor, famous film pioneer, and at the time too, it was just it was still no sound for films, so the silent films, and you also talk about just the time that it was. At this time was the heroics of Charles Limberg flying from from New York to Paris, the first telephone call from
New York to London. So you talk about the times, and you also talk about how Mayor really was looking at You cite Canada, so tell us really what he looked at and what he saw this case as representing. To talk about his he was a staunch anti anti censorship person, so tell us what he saw in the in the Canadian rulings and what potentially he could see from the backlash from these new newsreels and this case.
Right, yes, listen, there's a number of issues that converged for him in particularly in Hollywood in general. There was a fire in a movie theater in Canada. There were I can't remember the exact number, but it was I think it was a couple of hundred kids learned at that and there was serious concern and Canada and serious pressure to make going to the movies illegal for children. You know that represents then and now a big percentage of the movie going.
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Sure Bubbly and also, you know, it was also the time that talking movies hadn't been out yet, but Hollywood was moving in that direction, and Meyers saw that as a potential big push in the market and a significant shift. And his real concern about the case didn't happen until after Hicking was arrested and who claimed he was insane by virtue of being addicted to movies. That just sent
Hollywood in a tizzy. You know, they just that that was the last thing they wanted, because the debate over whether children should be allowed to see movies was in full sling, and also the issue of censorship, which was really triggered by his case and whether or not they should show the griwsome pictures that were a part of the newsreel. I mean, for his case to have triggered that debate and for him to have claimed to have been insane by virtue of an addiction to movies was
just too close to home, so to speak. So the need to really demonize the suspect in the case was a priority for Hollywood. Now, you know, it's easy to demonize him, was he was obviously a person who had serious mental if you did awful things, but the question that raises for me, and it's some goes on. Is it the job of the media to second guess the outcome of a trial and really try and pose their
perception of the case on the public. I think we've seen this almost unrelentlessly since then, and my personal opinion is that's not always been a good thing.
Now let's get back to the crime scene. We have the media response, we've jumped a little bit ahead, but police still don't have their suspect, mister Hickman whatsoever. So how do they possibly find out nineteen twenty seven? Right police work? What happens?
Well, it's interesting. There's you know, we're all familiar with the term dragnet from the TV series, but dragnet was actually a police tactic that was invented by the LA Police Department, Specifically Chief Davis came up with the idea. But a dragnet was is if you had a crime committee in a particular part of the city, you literally sent every available police officer into that part of the city to knock on every door and talk to every
person who was remotely possible of committing crime. And there was no real regard for probable cause or legal connection to the crime. They literally would interview everybody and if anybody was even remotely suspicious, they would bring them into the police station and hold them until the person could
verify their alibi until the time of the crime. So that whole process of just scooping up large numbers of people and shifting through them was called a dragnet, and they certainly initiated a very intense dragnet, obviously because of the heneousness of the crime, and then the process of doing that. They actually interviewed Hickman without realizing he was the suspect, and part of the dragnet process was to fingerprint everybody, you know, and again with little or no
probable cause. So at the time Hickman was that he was first interviewed, he was fingerprinted, and he's Hitman started the panic, so he stole a car to leave the city, and it was really almost blind luck. You know, fingerprint files now are computerized, so you kind of stick a fingerprint in the computer and you wait until it sorts
of the files. It is a relatively click process. But in those days you had to you had with the fingerprint experts who could analyze what they're called the worlds and swirls on a fingerprint, and there were certain general categories of worlds and swirls, and they were kind of
organized based on those general categories. But within a general category there could be a thousand samples, and the only way you could match a fingerprint was to literally check by hand and by eyeball every fingerprints you had on a record against the fingerprints you were trying to identify sottifically. It was a slow and laborious process that could take
days in the weeks. But one of the detectives involved in the case felt that because the car was stolen near the crime scene, that there was a chance that the car that was stolen by the kidnapper, and he took a fingerprint car and relatively quickly matched it to the suspect, at which point they went back to re interview him. He had left in the in another stolen car, and they found evidence of the crime at his apartment, so that identified him very quickly and early on as the primary assessment.
Now, this is part of the controversy for throughout this whole book and throughout the whole trial is the confessions. And so right away he starts talking and what does he say in that first confession, and who was the first conficient confession too?
Well, he uh backed up a little bit. He steals at least as I recall two cars, I think maybe three. But he also picks up hitchhackers, thinking that that would give him a cover. He's driving a loan, he'll be
too obvious a suspect, so he picks up hitchhikers. Two hitchhikers called the police in Pendleton Argument say that they were given a ride by someone they thought with suspicions is someone that they thought matched the description of the suspect, and they gave the description of the car the chief police. So he staked out the only road through town, saw
the car. The car didn't have California plates. He pulls car over anyway, When Hickman opens the door, his gun falls out of his lap on to the ground, and he gives his first kind of center my confession at that point by indicating that yeah, you got me, you know, I mean, he definitely gave evidence of the guilty conscience.
But when he goes into the police station, you know, in nineteen twenty nine, critinal investigation wasn't very sophisticated and in Pendleton, organ the chief of police was the chief and the only patrolman in the entire police force, and I'm sure had no experience at all with a homicide investigation,
so this was all kinds of news. And he also had a very hostile environment that the citizens of the city were ready to lynch the guy, and he was trying to appease them and also do what he thought was his duty as a police officer and a homicide
detective investigator the whole thing. So he brought a reporter in and Hickman confesses to the reporter, which is, you know, beyond inappropriate, really absurd, And it was confessed to the reporter obviously without being read any kind of rights, even though Miranda rights were not effective of things, but you still need to guarantee an englandman and the the contestion was given circumstances that could be used in court, which talking to a reporter was not that circumstances. So the
reporter didn't even take notes. He wrote his impressions of the confession by memory and when he got back to his office, So it was far from what I would call it defenditive confession. But during that confession, Pickman tried to deflect the crime to someone else, who he said freshured him into going along with it, and the confession was immediately printed in the local newspapers. So the district attorney in Los Angeles was less than pleased with how
the arrest and the interrogations were handled. With that.
Now, as you write, they decide to go on to transport him, and during that transport ride, they have numerous people there, including the district attorney, and they want to get a confession from when they're confident that he will give it to them, that he will give them details. So does he give it to him? What does he give him? What does he do? Does he give authorities?
He gives He gives actually two confessions. His first one, it's fairly straightforward. There's some indication that he was pressured with strets to give the confession, which in those days would have been normal, I have to say. And then he needed the district attorney wanted a motive, which is actually not required in the perfect case, but he wanted one to kind of lock the case in. And so
he made a second confession. I mean, I didn't say it specifically the more, but the implication was the threats got more intense, and that's kind of a if you're going to make that allegation, historically, you need a little more evidence than the most available. But he certainly didn't have any defense. Jorney didn't have anybody that was advocating for him. He didn't have anybody that was advising him.
And he was alone on train and a long train ride with three detectives, the chief of police in the district attorney. That hasn't been a bit intimidating for anybody, let alone a young man who had just submitted the crime and who was clearly grappling with his own mental health issues.
And this is the time they find out, because I thought there was only way to find out is that they actually went to the movies together. He's got that victim, as you mentioned, Yes, yes, So how does he explain how he how does he explain how he got her to be able to do that?
Though well, he claims that he was treating her nicely. Also, he had the self reception of himself as a being religious. He considered himself a Christian gentleman, and he in fact, I mean, the story gets real bizarre at this point he asked for the fifteen hundred dollars because that was the amount of tuition for him to go to Bible schools. So they've become a minister. So in a sense, you'd
ave us call the doctor Jekyl mister ha Hide. There was the persona of the good religious boy raised in Kansas, who had good manners and good home training and wanted to act politely and proper around people, and then the vicious criminal who came unglued and committed mutilation on the body of the victim. I mean real broad dichotomy there,
which actually is not that uncommon among sociopaths. Such a pass have no real conscience, so they pretend to behave appropriately, but if something triggers them, there's no real filter in terms of expressing their emotions. And he seemed to be certainly struggling with that ken dition.
What we didn't mention too, is that when you talk about the Christian gentleman, that's what he had said to mister Parker. He said, And again what I thought was a horrifying fact was the police at that time obviously leaked details that he was not about to tell police. They leaked it to the media, and he the night before, sat there for hours and hours with a supposed exchange of his daughter. And but so we when you mentioned
that Christian gentleman, that's the language he used. If you you know, I want you to give you my word as a Christian gentleman. And that was his last I guess the tipping point for him was that he was humiliated and also disobeyed so blatantly by having those facts. He thought it certainly must have come from Parker or not. He couldn't imagine any other reason why where they would get that information.
Right right, yes, yes, yes, yes. And then all it contributed to his reaction to the case. He went through a bit of an arc himself. I don't know if you want to jump ahead on that, but he seemed to recognize that he didn't have a real strong moral filter. But he also believed that his right to do whatever he wanted to do was divinely ordained, that God is considered him special, and that he had the right pretty much do whatever he wanted because he was gonna do great things.
Yes, well, let's get to the philosophy in a bit. What's also very fascinating again, we've got to get the motive part in me the media and also the public's reaction. Here now while he's on this train, doing this confession on the train, giving the motive in his again narcissistic, sociopathic mind, some rationale he's trying to convey to these to the police chief and the district attorney and the detectives.
This train stopped at every major city you write, allowing media and the public to gaze at the vehicle of justice.
It was what I would consider the ground zero for the whole idea of media circus and the purple wash,
I mean. And they took it literally to the bus stuff, and it was extreme, and it was so bad that it actually the reaction from the public were so bad that the chief started to get nervous about the safety of his prisoner and actually set up a ruse to arrive at the main station, but actually stopped before they got there and get the suspect off the train so there wouldn't be a big crown crowd and any threat to his safety.
Interesting, and you right too, that Hickman went to find a lawyer. Missus Hickman went to find a lawyer for a son. So how does she get the great Defender her very first choice was Clarence Darrow. Now he said, oh, I can't, I can't do it, you know, I can't be involved. But really, as you write, he couldn't be involved, he couldn't practice law in California. But Darrow did recommend somebody, So you write that he recommended this Jerome Walsh. So
so tell us again, this is what we mentioned. This is the very first time that an insanity defense is used in California. You also do a little bit of the background. We give that context as well. So tell us a little bit about the law just previous to that, and then this insanity defense as might be.
Yes, the I think we need to give a little background. Daryl was truly one of the great lawyers in the American jurist students, and he was famous for the Scopes monkey trial. But he had been uh, he had been excused the Jerry tampering in California and actually bribing a juror, and so he couldn't even come to California because I remember, there was a warrant for his arrest, so he had
to stay out of the state. Which is kind of an interesting kind addition because he was a social reformer and a brilliant lawyer, but obviously not above corruption at some level. But he was also committed to a social movement at the time which was in favor of eliminating the death penalty, and he picked Walsh because Walsh was
also against the death penalty, you know. And that raises an interesting question in terms of the viability of the council, because they both had an agenda of wanting to use the case to kind of publicize their cause, which I have to say is not always the best agenda for someone who's going to defend you in a criminal case. I mean, the lawyer has to be free to make decisions that ultimately support the situation of the client, not their own personal political views.
Well you may be correct there, but it's done all the time.
For yes, absolutely, and I've seen it and I've seen it work to the betterment of clients, you know. Uh. But you know, on the other side of that, he was indigent, he couldn't afford attorney. The representation he got was ultimately confident and skilled. Uh. I Just in looking over the trial strategy, I'm not convinced that the lawyers had the best strategy that have been possible for him at the time, and that was in fact criminal defense.
In defending people charged to homicide was my specialty as an investigator. So I've got some experience and expertise and entering.
But to consider the time, and to consider the potential jury, and to consider the outrage. You talk about the outrage at that time as twelve year old girl dismembers mutilated left the bank. You know, so, and everything is political, I mean the das everything he says, every press release is politically motivated and calculated to a certain degrees. So what do they do with in terms of this insanity defense? You say you don't agree on their strategy, but you
talk about the McNaughton rule. Not everybody knows that, but that clear definition of insanity in terms of distinction knowing right from wrong. So it's a pretty hard hurdle to overcome that. Somehow, you approve the onus is on you, the defense, to prove you didn't know right from wrong at the time of that crime. So how do they proceed with this didn't know right from wrong? What is their course?
Yeah? Let me let me let me back that up this a little bit. The mcnoton rule originally was established in the law in England, and England has a different system than we do. In England, there's no there's very few statutory laws of the laws are based on what's called case laws or the ruling of judges from the bench.
Does that make sense, I hope explain that prove so that thenoton rule was a case involved in someone who attempted a clinical assassination and the judge determined that he was insane, didn't know the difference between right and wrong and therefore not capable of forming intensing. Okay. In the United States, you can't be charged with any crime that's not written down as a statuette in something illegal. So the crime of murder is actually a homicide of intention,
and then there can be different forms of intention. And there's actually some variation from state to state on what constitutes a homicide and what the level of intention is. But just before Pickman was arrested, the state legislature had passed a new law defining how the mcnoton rule could be used in a murder case. So, if you go to most criminal trials, the prosecutor presents the case and then the defense tries to rebutt it based on the legislation in California at the time. The only the oh,
the only way, can you still hear me? Yes, yeah, okay, the only way. The only way you could fleet in Sandy is if you first gave a full confession to the crime, and that instead of having the prosecute to present the chase first, the defense presented their case from Sandy first, which is complete reversal of the normal criminal process. And in those days, there wasn't a big budget for preparing the defense. You know, he required expert testimony in psychiatrist and so on, as I would call. I think
they had thirty days to prepare. He had one or two interviews with a minimal number of doctors. And I just think at the very least the defense eternity attorneys could have asked for a delay and more time for preparation and put the issue insanity into a broader context. But the thing that you couldn't do, and the president that was set and which is still true, you can't have a normal homicide trial where you plead innocent, then you get convicted, and then at that point in the
proceedings you decide you're insane. You have to go into the trial with that defense from that point of view, and then the judge has to make a determination if there's sufficient evidence for an the sanity plea to allow that to proceed. And I have to say, the judge you did rule on it was very articulate and very thorough, and in fact established the precedent for that process to this day.
Now you also talk about which complicates this story as well, is that this narcissistic sociopath here in prison writes a letter right handed for his friend, but the guards find it beforehand. I want you to get the exact words that he says, but what's basically the gist of what he has said in that letter to his friend.
Well, it was actually the second time he approached the subject. He was looking for reasons, he's looking for behavior that would indicate insanity. And in fact, he had asked, I believe the reporter when he was initially arrested the same question, and that he had a he was obviously looking for.
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Reasons to sit in that category that apparently he was trying to take. I mean, that's the logical surmise from those kinds of questions.
Now you talked about what was interesting. We haven't mentioned this either, but we alluded to it was that there's a doctor Wagner, and he is the person that, if we go back, had to look at the body of this child and tell us what the coincidence is before we talk about the other friendship be Aga Keys.
Yes, the doctor was Parker's neighbor. He knew the victim, he knew the victim's daughter, he'd watched them growing up, grow up. And also, as I recall, his initial autopsy, they only had portions of the body and the the disarticulated limbs were delivered the next day in wrapped in newspapers. So, in addition to it being a gruesome autopsy, one that was probably unpresented, unprecedented for him in the sense that that was an uncommon crime and he probably never had
a similar autopsy. To actually do an autopsy and someone, you know, that wouldn't be allowed nowadays. And I'm sure it was extremely to his credit. I mean, he was able to do it. I'm sure it was extremely upsetting, and he said as much. You know. So, but you know, if you're going to present your testimony in court and it comes out if you knew the victim, that would just be hugely prejudicial towards the jury. So, you know, that would just it was one of many precedents that was set in that case.
Now, let's talk about a little bit about the main character here, and this is this Hickman. Hickman makes numerous statements, but the one he makes a statement to the jury about his great providence all his life, and this statement is read out tell us about his self importance and his idea of providence.
Yeah, providence was his language for I would describe it as for it was his language for his description of his belief that he had been touched by God, that he had been chosen God by God for special destiny, and that the support of what he called divine providence lifted him above the normal rules of society and morality and gave him a blanket permission to do whatever he needed to do to get what it was he wanted in any particular moment.
You also write about it at the time that to explain extreme criminal behavior, it was considered the result of the influence of the devil. And so then when we look at the psychiatrists at the time, they had a term, a psychiatric term dementia pray Coox right, and this is the forerunner of schizophrenia. So what I mean, even though they don't have much of a budget, he still got a couple of psychiatrists to diagnose him and to say that he has a disease that would render him insane, doesn't he?
Right? Yes, listen, that's actually a disease, even though it's no longer recognized. I've studied it a bit that the disease, it's essentially a Latin term referring to the fact that the patient believes that they're possessed by something or someone,
either spirits or right, a god or whatever. But you know, the thing that's interesting is that the definitive study of that phenomena and the psychiatrists who defined the conditions of that phenomena was Carl Jung, who was one of the founders of psychiatry, and he actually when he initially wrote it was his doctoral thesis was to define the symptoms of demetria para corint And in his doctoral thesis he
lists I think of about thirty symptoms. Twenty of those he can explain psychologically and as causing mental illness, but about ten of them he leaves unanswered and unresolved, kind of opening the door to the fact that some forms of altered consciousness can actually transcend the consciousness of the patient.
Now that's not to justify the behavior, to say that he was in fact touched by God, But even at that time, the diagnosis itself was not particularly definitive, not particularly widespread, and certainly not accepted by all psychiatrists who would be called on participant.
Now you also write and you juxtapose these to separate parts in terms of having the Hollywood, the fledging Hollywood want to counter again this story is not going away. You mentioned the newsreels. Some states won't run these newsreels.
And then there's also talk because we've mentioned in Canada where the Roman Catholic Church gets involved and starts calling and it seems so tell us what basically they say about films, which again really just seems obvious ominously like not so long ago in America, right.
Well, you know, it was actually the beginning of the debate that I'm not really sure has been resolved, and I have to say that personally, I have mixed feelings on it. There was a concern of the influence of films on the development of young Marines. I think a case can be made that that might be true, you know, but you have to juxtapose of that against the right of freedom expression, and then you of course have to juxtapose that again against the parenial guidance and who's monitoring
what their kids are doing and what they're watching. I really think that was the beginning dialogue and the conversation that's led up to some of the questioning about whether or not violent video games has influenced some of the mass killings we've seen in the last twenty years or so, and I have to say, from my experience again with murder cases, it seems to me that that influence could be there hasn't been fully studied, certainly wasn't understood, and
at the time literally terrified Hollywood and the thought that certain films would have a negative influence on child the development was seen as a serious threat to the industry.
Now back at the court case, you talk about the media being interested, in the public being interested. So this courthouse is full, and so there's more of people very, very interested in this. What is the demeanor of the defendant at this trial?
You know, he seemed more or less kind of oblivious. I don't want to say amused, but be amused if you know the difference. I mean, he was starting I believe that he was trying to project a persano being above it all, and that he probably had kind of made his peace with the fact that he was going to be convicted and execut You did, and I think
he tried to. He made a clear shift from me trying to justify what he did, to try and blame the father and to blame his circumstances, to trying to make the case that the thing that divine Providence had chose for him to do was to be kind of a role model for what not to do and how not to behave if you were a young man growing up at the time. I mean, he kind of book made some effort to transform what he did into something noble, which you know, it's kind of hard to identify with
or except. But the thing that was ironic about that is he was actually praised for what he did by Anne Ran, who wrote the book Actless Atlas Shrugged, which was kind of again a precursor for a lot of the self help books and the kind of the help help seminars and the whole life coach movement of you know, taking charge of your life. Anne Rand thought that he was the first example of what she called the fully developed, evolving male. I think I actually think she called it
a superman. But she spoke of people acting on their own impulse and that being a noble thing. So she she held press conferences where she praised Hickman and offered her support and felt that he had was someone to emulate, not someone to condemn. And it actually caused a controversy within her own movement, and I think it lost her some following but the fact that people were even entertainment at the time kind of it was one of many kind of ground zero discussions that emerged around the case
that you know, it's a certain extent remain unresolved. I don't think anybody would argue that he's a great person, but certainly the notion that self interest is to be elevated and explored is still commonly accepted in certain expressions of self help literature.
I was totally shocked. Not that I'm an expert on Ann Ran, but I couldn't see why she would have see any justification for any admiration for this guy at all, and it hurt her movement. I could understand that because I can't see the rationalization for it now. What was interesting too, is that, again, like you say, there's so
many issues involved with this. It's like a confluence of events hers and this case represents so many so much groundbreaking precedent in here as well in terms of they talked about the insanity at that time, and they called the delusional insanity, and the lawyers tried to argue that he'd inherited it from his grandmother, who had been institutionalized for fifteen years earlier, and they also cited because at that time they didn't know anything about epilepsy, so they said, well,
his first cousin is epileptic, so there was a couple cases of epilepsy. Grandfather was insane. So somehow they tried every angle at this insanity that he was delusional from the movies, but also from genetically he was insane or predisposed to insanity, didn't they argue?
Right? I've think you know, for me, having dealt with some of those cases, you can know the difference between right and wrong, and it'll be delusional and mentally ill. And I think it remains an unresolved question of whether or not we're going to treat mental illness in criminal cases which is clearly manifest but does not meet the standard of the mgnoton ual. I think that's an issue that we haven't really fully come to terms with as
a society. Now, go ahead, I'm just gonna say then that doesn't mitigate either way for or against the death penalty, but there's certainly you know, I've dealt with cases where I knew my client was not dealing with a full deck and not dealing with reality, and yet understood that they had done something wrong. That becomes a hard kind of tastes and negotiate hard to know how to proceed with it. And you know, your choices of insanity play are so limited that that doesn't really become an option.
So I think it's it's a topic that warrants for the discussion, for sure. And I'd also say that along with that, when people exhibit what I would call an odd or a parrent or deviant behavior, it becomes such a hot ticket for the media that I'm not sure that that what I call becoming a celebrity criminal speaks well for the possibility of creating justice for the defendant either.
I think that becomes increasingly difficult, especially as media becomes more easily available, more widespread, more instantaneous, and more opinionated. You know, it's again, it's another topic that this case kind of was grounds here before that I don't think it's been fully resolved.
Well, you know, you have we don't have the debate raging, I think in terms of sty but you see more and more of these cases like you you talk about, And we'll mention it again because it's interesting you talk at the end of this case, and we'll talk about it, James Egan Holmes July twentieth, twenty twelve. And why you mentioned that? Tell us why you mentioned the Holmes case. July twentieth, twenty twelve.
Oh, remind me what was that about.
Well, that's he killed twelve people at a movie theater in Aurora, Colorado.
Yes, right, yes, listen, yes, I think I think that well, and that's really gets to the heart of my perspective on the thing. I think Holmes was clearly insane. I think he knew the difference between right and wrong. And if the risk is sounding a little conspiratorial, there is some indication that he may have had some pressure and help and some people that were pushing him in the
direction of being violent. And I'm not really sure that we have the legal perspective to pursue that to the extent that it needs to be looked at addressed.
Well, what's interesting is that, uh, and this is by coincidence, sheer coincidence that January fourth, Joyce and Stephen Singular he's written a book called The Spiral Notebook and it includes the story of James Holmes. So we have he's a fine investigative journalist. So we'll get the story right. At least I know a lot more than I know I don't know anything of the story.
So well, listen, I don't want to go off too far on attention. But my mentor as an investigator was Bill Turner, who I worked with him. He was the lead investigator for Jim Garrison on the Clay Show trial on the of the assassination, and then defended Sir Hand and Arthur Bermer and James Errol Ray. There's elements of all those cases that have not come fully to light that I think a broader perspective on insanity would bring
to light. You know, for Sir Hand, we use hypnosis because Sir Hand had no memory of what happened that day. I mean he still does and he convincingly doesn't have any memory. And every time an expert, a psychiatrist was brought in to hypnotize him, rather than remember what happened, he went into a deeper trance. That's an extremely sophisticated
form of hypnosis that probably involved in arco hypnosis. And so the whole issue of the ability to manipulate people or create man sharing and candidates are to exploit insanity, I think we're barely stretching the surface on understanding that whole topic.
Well, I mean, I can't argue with that because that those are extraordinary cases. But when you are again, I don't want again, I don't want to go off on too much of a tangent because no, I.
Don't either there and I'm certainly look at implying, Yeah, I'm not lying that was the case with Hicken, but he certainly initiated the conversation absolutely well, certainly.
And the thing is, I agree with you that the conversation has to be ongoing because we're seeing you know, there's always forces at play. You always see this psychiatric industry will say, or the industry itself is pushing to include more people to have disorders, so it's a creeping
sort of mental illness. And then that, of course, then you use those many many attorneys successfully use for mitigating circumstances to say, well, this is the horrible background that my client had, but Canada has taken to another level because we never we do not adhere to the right
and wrong version, right in sanity. But also I've done a story where doctor Turcotte received six months in a institution after killing his two children, now he's just been convicted again after the outrage of a certain segment of the population and his wife being a doctor herself. He was convicted of second lead murder with exactly same evidence but six months insanity, and the premise was that he
was depressed. So you can see that this is what I don't think Americans know of that case unless they listen to this program. But I think there is that fear. Americans fear that that somebody would be put into a mental into an institution and then released some day, whereas in Canada we have that as a's it's not the exception to the rule, it is the rule. They will be released and as we see the Greyhound cannibal killer
in six years released on the streets in Canada. So I think that the because as you say, how how can you how can you discern who is mentally ill? If you if you say, well, right and wrong is just not enough.
Well listen, I think here here's my perspective on it. You raised some really good points and shape the dialogue on this issue, because it's getting to the heart of the manner. There's been an in my lifetime, there's been a huge increase in what I would call they're called spree killings, where people just randomly start shooting people. I mean,
it happens all the time. You know. In the last few years, we've attributed some of it to terrorism and political acts of violence, but there's still a lot less to people that just wake up one day and decide to start killing people. You understand. Now, that's take the issue of insanity off the tape from a minute, and take the issue of how to proceed with the court case off the table. We still need to understand why that's happening, and we need to understand why that's happening nowadays.
We need to understand why it's happening, particularly in America where many of there's many countries that just it's a non existent issue, you know, and we need to understand one of the forces that come to play that would trigger that kind of response. I mean, if it was an isolated incident, understanding that maybe we'll never know. But for it to be so painfully common, I think really raises the bar in terms of the importance of the issue.
And you know that's certainly you know, as an author, I don't like to hammer the message on people's heads but that's certainly one of the concerns I had in writing the book, and it's certainly my hope that those issues will be looked at more astutely than they have been.
Well, I certainly agree with you that the new move towards these I don't know, it's not one off, but it's the incredible amount of fame they that these killers want to gain instantly. They don't want to wait, they don't want to do twenty years and then come forward and say I killed fifty people. They have to make a big splash. So they're killing people in big numbers and to increasingly big numbers, and so and then shock value.
So it is a I think there's a confluence of things going on there, and again you're right there is. It may not be that you ban video games, but to say that violent video games have no influence on anyone is absurd. Everybody's idea of fame, and even if a person is a will say who's a loser, but they may believe they're a loser. Well, this is the way to get beyond that, because any kind of fame
is fame these days. So there's another bunch of phenomenas almost going on at the same time to not really well explained, but to somewhat explain this new phenomena of why people would resort to this in these big numbers, it looks like, and you.
Have the seeds about all that interesting enough in this particular case, you know, you have the seeds of the question of insanity and what does that look like. You have the discussion of what causes insanity, You have the discussion of what kind of insanity legitimately mitigates a sentence.
And then, I think, more importantly, and this is something that I think is rarely discussed, you have the whole issue of the birth of what I would call the celebrity criminal, and you have the birth of the paparazzi covering the celebrity criminal more from a entertainment perspective than a real effort to understand jurisprudence. And I think those are things that started back then that have gone unchecked,
that are not serving our culture wealth. Well, let me put it like that, and that a more are deliberated and conscious discussion of those issues I think is important. And also, you know, you also have the issue of what I call talking heads, are the self styled experts. You know, you have a situation where there's a lot of news shows where guilt innocence is declared before the
trial even starts. I mean, personally, I find that to be inappropriate, and I think the quickness of the news cycle, the need for celebrities, and the whole issue of properazzi. I mean, we can look the trend towards that led to the whole failure of the media to predict the outcome of the last presidential election. I mean, the whole issue goes way behind beyond criminal justice, in law and order, insanity. It's I think it's a didn't see that threats our perception of reality in some ways.
You also have the issue of the media treatment. We haven't mentioned too much, but this poor mister Parker and his wife and family. I mean, he not only was suspect, but also the treatment in the media, just the treatment period. It was like the media could care less. There was no sympathy for really for the.
Parker family, No, not at all, and I'm not sure that that's improved all that since then. But I think more significantly for me anyway, was the fact that Myers hired Edgar Rice Burroughs the creator of Tarzan to function as a reporter during the trial, and Burrows slammed the guy. I mean, there was nothing journalistic at all about his approach to the trial. It's not to say he wasn't a good writer or the Tarzan isn't a great story, but he was hired to do a hatch the job
and that's what he did, you know. And I'm not you know, I again, I'm not defending Hickman by any stretch of the imagination, but I think there's a certain amount of fairness of the treatment of suspects that we should expect. It's nothing else to keep from tainting the jury pool. I mean, my goodness, you know, if he's convicted before he select the jury, the chances of a fair trial, said rather quickly.
We haven't mentioned this, but imagine people might guess, but we might as well state because this is an important part of the trial as well. This in Sandy did defense. He had a vigorous defense. He had two good attorneys. They did good closing arguments. Asa Keys as you right, though, got famous from this. But that isn't the end of his story. And he was a friend of ours as well. It's all right, you say, just forty five minutes.
What was the verdict, Well, the verdict was guilty, and excuse me, he pleaded guilty. The verdict was to execute him. He died by hanging. The thing that there's not real strong evidence of, but it really it appeared that Miners may have made inappropriate financial contributions to Keys during the trial. It's also clear that Keys did a lot to cover up major crimes among the Hollywood elite at the time. And then he was actually convicted for taking bribes in
one of the first Ponzi schemes in California. And the irony is that he served the time in San Quentin, which is the place where Hickman was execute.
Yeah, thats an amazing fourteen year sentence.
To so yes, and you know, when he came out, he was given a job in Hollywood as a script consultant on the movies that involved the legal issues, which is really a non existent job that was further payoff or whatever he contributed to the media perception of that whole trial. But I want to say too maybe or I mean, the thing that really struck me is that Hickman's psychiatrist, the one that the defense attorney's hired really
sabotaged the case. I mean totally. Remember when Clinton was asked about the affair with Donica Lewinsky and he answered by saying, what it depends on the meaning of what is is becoming that? Yeah? Sure, Well the same thing in the Hickman drap the doctor said are you sure of your diagnosis? And the doctor said, I can't really
be sure of anything. It's like what you know? It was like, I don't want to accuse him of anything, but I have to say going there was very suspicious, unpreceded and unprecedented, and gave the jury all the opening they needed to convict him without qualification.
Was there any supporters of the idea that he was insane? And at that time, was there many supporters that he should not be put to death?
You know, I think that that issue broke down around the question of the morality of the death penalty and not the question of his guilt or innocence. Uh. He's certain it was certainly hard to except for Anne Ran, it was certainly hard to generate any kind of sympathy or support for what he did, especially the henelessness of the crime itself. He didn't he didn't help himself by talking too much, and uh.
His uh.
Appeal to divine justification, I'm sure offended a lot of people for religious reasons. So if the intention of the lawyers was to use it as a test case for ending the death penalty, it wasn't the best choice on that pint.
Now, now you say that this took quite a bit of your life, this book, I'll were you involved with this kid?
You know, let me tell you this. Two weeks ago I turned seventy. I wrote my first book when I was nineteen. I've self published about a dozen books, and you know, fifty years after writing my first book, I got picked up by a major publisher. So in the literary world they called that an overnight success. But you know, I've spent a couple of years working on the book. Once I got started and I recruited my brother got
to help me with the research. We had to kind of petition a lot of files from Sacramento where they were in archives, and you know, kind of sort through it. And I have to say, did a really good job. I think my initial draft I may have put too much emphasis on the Hollywood and the history of Hollywood, which was not really as germane to the story as I initially thought. So you know, there was some starting
out and rethinking. But you know, the thing that's exciting for me is that I've got another book already finishes to kind of a follow up. Remember did you see the movie Gangster Squad? Yes, my father was a member of Gangsters Squad and he made a deathbed confession which I believe is the true Stary. I think the Hollywood movie was kind of a cartoon, and I feel a
commitment to him who to write the true Stary. He was really a good man, He had good intentions and they got some caught up into some stuff that was kind of epic in its tragic consequences. But you know, I think there are historical moments that we can learn from. I think this was one of them. I think his story is another example of that. I'm looking forward to kind of being forward in a similar line.
Give a pentitive title for that.
Yes, it's called almost a perfect murder, uh the Mick. Uh. It's about the Samuel Roumel, who was Mickey Cohen's attorney, was murdered in front of his house. It's it is an un h solved murder in Los Angeles, and based on things my father told me, I'm able to solve the murder absolutely, and uh, scuse me, I'll go ahead. Sorry, no, I'm just saying. And again, it had huge implications for the whole issue of dealing with corruption in law enforcement,
dealing with organized crime. You know, at the time they set up the task force, the media consensus and the FBI consensus was that organized crime did not exist on a national level. And U my father, who was involved in wire tapping members of the mob, I certainly knew that it was a real phenomena. There was real bad things going on. There was real corruption with in the
police department. There was real violence that was going unchecked as a result of the corruption, and there was an effort to kind of deal with those things in a noble way that got sidetracked was safe And you know, to me, that's a very compelling story.
What was interesting, I guess in dis spookily too, is the this was six days before Christmas that this murder happened, and we're.
Talking about Hello, yeah, we were talking about tonight, aren't we. I don't know, it's closed or we may have passed the day. Yeah, but yeah, that was five days. Yeah, okay, so it's uh. I called young called that synchronisity a significant coincidence. That's certainly that, And believe me, I'm really really grateful for the opportunity to talk about it. I'm sad, but there's some nibbles at making in a movie. So I'm kind of hopeful about that too. That would be wonderful.
That's it's on my bucket list. I'm actually surprised that to an extent, the story is struck a nerve with a lot of people. I've gotten a lot of positive feedback. I thought it would be kind of a niche book with a few people to be interested and then because that's what they were into. But I have to say at this point the interest has moved beyond that. It's market to people that kind of get the social overtones that I was trying to raise in telling the story.
You have a very interesting killer though too. It really is ahead of his time in combining a lot of the things. The narcissism that we see that we think is very modern, We really see they're the idea of the movies and not the idea that to use the excuse of the movies. He actually he was an arm robber just so he could go to the movies every day for three dollars.
I think today exactly, and I think, I think that anything that encourages critical self of evaluation, both individually looking at their own lives and also how we relate to each other and how we process problems as a community. I mean anything that supports that is a worthy endeavor.
And that was certainly, if I may say so, my intention was to stimulate some dialogue on those issues, because I think if they remain unconscious, that we run the risk of not having the higher aspiration of our culture went out in the end, if that makes sense.
Certainly this book is important, like I say, because it just seems to be in the harbinger of things to come, all wrapped up in this one case. And as you say, as you, as you, as you say, with mister Holmes coming up, and this case that happened in twenty twelve, it's still in the public eye, is an indication that these issues that were there in nineteen twenty seven are still today evident in two.
And you have the issue of and I can remember the fellow that shot that Ronald Reagan wanting to impress Jodi Fossip. I was at the guy that shot John Lennon. I don't remember that, but you know, it's not a scene that hasn't reoccurred since then, you know, And it was Yeah, people hadentify with the movie figures as a justification for crimes. That's I've seen that more than once in my career.
And uh, yeah, it's a it's a it's a completely disturbing trend what we have. I mean, and not that Serial Killers wasn't a bad enough trend, this new trend is even more disturbing in that how many people you can't see it coming. It's impossible to see it coming. And then we are talking about the issues of I mean, I think there you personally could be a psychopath and be insane as well, and be paranoid schizophrenic as well.
And I think that's what we're getting. We're getting a combination of things that we haven't seen before.
And as a society, we could come to the conclusion that despite those illnesses, we want to punish people as a criminals. We can. We can make that judgment, but I think it needs to be an informed judgment. And I'm an unconscious judgment and not a judgment that uses any political, social, or economic reason for not fully examining the forces that are at plugged.
Absolutely I agree with you, and I want to thank you very much David for coming on and talking about not just evil, and we look forward to having you on in the near future with almost the perfect murder for I might want to contact you have Do you do Facebook? Do you have a Facebook page? Website?
You know? I do? I have a Facebook page, this under Dave Wilson d A ve E W I L S O N. On Facebook. You can front me there. We can talk about these issues at more at length. I'd really enjoy doing that. In fact, I've started kind of a blog on that Facebook page where I trace the history of the justicestem of America and some of the issues that the WALLD like racism, sexism, and homophobia.
I mean, there's a whole history art of how we've approached those issues legally, and I think it's worthy of studying and examination because it's really informative in some of the reasons for some of the laws that we still grapple with are less than nobles. So I think that's worth examining it as well.
Absolutely well, thank you very much, David. You have a great evening and a great holiday season and hope.
Yes, and I really really want to thank you. It was a great interview. You'd asked the right questions, the good questions. It was a great dialogue, and I was blessed by the imitation. Thank you, it was my pleasure. Thank you very much, you too. Good night.
For those the True Murder fans, I want to thank you for wrapping up the year of twenty and sixteen, and I just wanted to give you my heartfelt thank you. To all the people that listen to these programs who have listened to these programs and been supporter, contacting me with compliments and messages of support, I really really do appreciate it, and stay tuned for more True Murder in the new year. January is going to knock your socks off.
We have Steven Singular the Spiral Notebook about James Holmes, as we mentioned, Catherine Casey with her book Possessed Harold Scheckter incredible, don't miss this, depraved about HH Holmes. And then the Politics a Murder with Margot Nash And that's January and just a next year, a blockbuster year of
more fantastic authors talking about their incredible books. And I also wanted to mention thanks to the incredible True Murder fans, over forty two million downloads so far of the program, and we're well over four million listeners per month, so I want to thank you very much. Have yourself a great holidays. I'll see you back in January. Good Night, m