The world of serial killers is a strange one. Certain names have become so iconic over the years, with the public becoming fascinated with both them and the case that it borders on obsession. Today's case comes from that golden age of serial killers and is just one of those cases. This killer's name has become synonymous with psychology students and has given the world the chills since the late nineteen
sixties with his obsession over women's shoes and clothing. The killer's will to get exactly what he wanted only seemed to grow with each victim he collected, until finally it all came crumbling down after a kidnapping went unsuccessful. This is the bizarre and bone chilling story of the infamous Jerry Brutos, a k a. The Shoe fetish Slayer. My name's Ben.
I'm Nicole, and you're listening to Wicked and Gram.
A true crime podcast material. Audience listener, dis I think I've already made Nicole mad at me today. It doesn't take much these days, Okay.
I repeatedly have this song stuck in my head and I haven't for the last two days, which has been amazing. And you just started singing it wurst. That would piss me off. You get a mic in front of Ben and he just like you, I should record before I actually hit record, because there is always a what would you say, like show performance? I don't know.
I mean, we do a pre show with lots of that in it all the time.
Not it's that it's still not to its full extent.
Okay, okay, fair enough. Well when no one's looking, you know, singing in the shower, that's the kind of stuff that Nichol's talking about.
So but like next level.
I've done it on the show before too, you know that, right? People know my goofy singing it happened.
No I know, but thanks a lot. Well, you're gonna just have to hear me singing that song all day, so that's fine.
It's a good song. Yeah. How's it going with everyone out there? We are officially in twenty twenty five? Hopefully your new year is still going good. Hasn't you know, crashed and burned? Like some people. I've saw some social media posts where it's like, well, twenty twenty five is already fucked.
So curiously, yeah, it's.
Mostly memes, but it's still funny.
Holy Okay. Well, I mean just because it's a bad week or bad day, it doesn't mean the whole year is just done.
True, true, But it's fun. It's funny.
It is funny. Yeah.
But before we get too deep into our conversations today, I first want to thank our patreons who signed up this week over on Patreon, So shout out to Darryl do grits. I'm going with. I'm saying do grits. I think that's how you're going to pronounce your name. It's d r u g A t Z. And yeah, I'm taking it's not it's either druggets or drugates. I'm going with drugids. Okay, that's that's my thought.
Sounds good to me.
Yeah, So Darryl drugets me, you me? No, not you me?
Or do they put me?
Yeah?
They probably? Okay. I was like, what the hell did you sign up to be a patron? Was so confused.
No, not me me?
Okay, okay, yeah, who's on the first situation here?
We got Craig boy for and Samantha Shoots, So thank you very much for signing up over on Patreon. You guys are getting that exclusive behind the scenes content and of course the extra episode at the end of the month. If you sign up for you know that all inclusive or all access t here. So yeah, yeah, so shout out, thank you. You guys are incredible. If you guys want to sign up for a Patreon as well, link in the description of this podcast. But I got to talk about something else right now.
We sure do?
I got we sure do?
Oh shit, sorry, I thought we were going on in the show.
Oh yeah, that's what I was going to but then A sounded like you had some other time.
No. I was just like, let's go okay.
Okay, that's what I was going to do too, So glad we're on the same page. I want to talk about how this is going to be a two parter episode, so heads up, this is part one, and I'm not saying that this is going to be a short first part, but I am going to say the second part will be much longer, much more involved. This is a bit of a deep dive, and I wanted to split the information like fifty fifty between the episodes, but there's too
good of a spot to stop. So it's going to be heavier on part two than part one.
Yeah, okay, makes sense, So.
Probably looking at like forty percent Part one, sixty percent Part two, maybe maybe even thirty five percent Part one, and you know, yeah, I don't want to do the math in my head. I know it's small math, but I just don't want to. I haven't had enough coffee for it yet. But you know what I mean, heavier on part two.
Okay, Okay, got it.
Not to say part one isn't gonna be good, because trust me, it's good.
It's good, real good.
Yeah. So with that being said, have you ever heard of the name Jerry Brudos?
No? No, I wonder one day if you will ask me this and I will be like, yeah, I have heard of this.
Well it's funny because I've never heard of the name Jerry Brudos either. And he is a very prolific individual in the true crime scene. Like most people know of him, he is very prolific, a very big case. He though there's not a single individual who inspired Buffalo Bill of Silence of the Lambs, there are aspects to him that reportedly did inspire that character. Oh okay, so I love Silence of the Lambs. So I'm surprised I haven't heard of Jerry Brudos. But yeah, massive case very well known,
and we're doing a deep dive on it. Are you ready for this?
Yeah? I am?
Okay. Well, it all starts on a sunny afternoon in April of nineteen sixty nine, a woman by the name of Sharon Wood, a Portland State University employee, was heading to her car after she was finished her work. It was a walk that she'd made countless times before, you know, crossing the bustling campus, weaving through students, hallways, corridors, crosswalks, whatever you name it. And she's hurrying doing her thing
getting to her car. It was simply routine and everything felt normal on this day, at least it did at first. And she was making her way closer to the parking garage where she parked her car, a strange feeling began to creep over. Her thing just wasn't quite right. Sharon had planned to use a side stairwell, which she was a quieter wrote she often took, but an unshakable instinct that was nagging in the back of her head made
her change her mind. Feeling a bit off about it. Instead, she opted for the main entrance, stepping into the garage and heading towards the basement level it felt safer, but as she reached the bottom of the ramp, heavy footsteps began to echo behind her. Before she could react, a man grabbed her by the shoulder, spun her around, and immediately a gun was pointed directly at her chest, and the words don't scream or I'll kill you were spoken right to her face. She was terrified, but Sharon was
also defiant, and she screamed anyways. Her voice pierced through the air, reverberating across the stone walls or i guess, concrete walls of the parking garage. The attacker quickly shoved her to the ground and clamped his hand over her mouth quickly in an attempt to silence her. But Sharon wasn't giving up so easy. She bit down hard on the man's hand, hard enough to even taste blood in
her mouth. Holy shit, the man yelled in pain as the tables momentarily turned Infuriated and desperate to regain control over her, he grabbed a fistful of Sharon's hair and began slamming her head against the cold concrete ground. He slammed her head again and again, striking her head until Sharon's body went limp, she blacked out. The attacker, now stepping back from the situation, was panicked and realized he
couldn't risk sticking around. A car engine was rumbling nearby, growing louder and louder as it approached the scene, and without another moment's hesitation, the man fled abandoned Sharon where she lay. He scooped up his gun ran into the shadows of the parking garage. He managed to escape, but his plan fell in shambles. Sharon, though battered and unconscious, fought back fiercely enough to throw off this attack.
That's incredible. Hey, yes, so like good for her, that is, that was intense.
Right, So this is a small piece of this entire story here, but that story in itself shows fight, always fight in that situation.
No shit, holy fact, back make noise, huh.
And that's what Sharon did and honestly it saved her life.
Well. I also have to say good for her being observant too, because I feel like, if you're you're making the same walk, you know, out of work or whatever that you do daily, a lot of people would probably just be on their phone, like not really being observant of their surroundings. And stuff, but she knew and felt that something was off right away for sure.
And I will say, I mean, this is in the late sixties, this is sixty nine, so she's in.
Her cell phone to shape. But still you would probably be in your head thinking about your work. Like I don't think you would be paying super attention if you're doing this walk daily.
Probably not. And also, like you've mentioned it before, like following that gut feeling, and that's what she did. She didn't go through that side stairwell, which yeah, we don't know for sure, but most likely he was waiting there for her. She took a different route and then he came up behind her, you know, in a different way.
Eat creep. Oh that just gives you the shivers.
Now, when Sharon came to, she found herself surrounded by concerned students, with an ambulance crew arriving moments later. She was dazed, her head was pounding. I mean, after all, it was just cracked against the concrete a few times, and at first she couldn't piece together what had just happened. But as her mind cleared and she kind of began to calm down a little bit, Sharon managed to give
police a description of her attacker. It was a tall, heavy set man, likely in his thirties, with short, light colored hair. But there was one unusual detail that really stuck out. The man was wearing women's clothing.
Okay, yeah, that would probably be something you member.
For sure, yeap. Now, at the time, the significance of Sharon's encounter wasn't quite fully understood, but her description would later prove to be the first known sighting of a serial killer who had already been preying on women across Oregon. The man who attacked Sharon would become the infamous shoe fetish slayer.
Okay, okay, wow, so.
This is the first incident where he was identified reported. However you want to say it where there is evidence linking this individual a sighting, I guess is what we'll say.
I should just say, like to each their own. If he wants to wear women's clothing, that's like more than fine. But I was just you would remember that mostly he would stand out in your mind.
Oh yeah, that's a standout detail. I mean, someone has a giant scar across her face, it's a standout detail. Yeah, someone has a sleeve of tattoos, it's a standout detail. Absolutely has nothing to do against morality or being right or wrong. It's just a standout detail. You weren't a bright yellow hoodie. That's a stand out detail. I say that because I have a bright yellow.
Hoodie, So don't wear it if you're ever going to attack someone apparently noted.
Now, this killer's dark trail began over a year earlier, on January twenty sixth, nineteen sixty eight, with the disappearance of a woman by the name of Linda Slawson. Now, Linda was a nineteen year old who was going door to door in Portland suburbs selling encyclopedias. You know those encyclopedias that all those like boomers had lining their walls because they were told, hey, it's a thing to pass down and knowledge, and didn't know the Internet was a thing.
So my parents definitely had a set, so did mine.
That's what Linda was doing. She was going door to door selling those encyclopedias. Now, that night, Linda didn't come home from her job, and when her family reported her missing, police went and retraced her sales route. They too knocked on the doors and spoke with people that she would have interacted with and many of them confirmed that Linda had visited their home. But somewhere along the line they
began reporting that no, Linda didn't stop by here. Somewhere along the line, she just seemed to vanish without a trace, no witnesses, no clues, and no body. It would be months later, on November twenty eighth, in nineteen sixty eight, when another young woman, twenty three year old Jan Whitney, disappeared. Now, Jan had been driving home with our sorry driving home to Mcinnisville after celebrating holidays with family when a car
broke down near a rest stop north of Albany. Her car was later found abandoned, but Jan was nowhere to be found. Her disappearance left police baffled until this strange, anonymous letter arrived days later. The letter claimed to be from a writer who had been at the rest stop at the time of Jan being there too, and they
witnessed Jan leaving with an unknown man. Now, investigators made a public plea for the writer to come forward to get any more details from this person that they could, but this anonymous writer of the letter never came forward.
Now.
Handwriting analysis later on this letter suggests that the letter's author had actually intentionally tried to disguise their writing. So when you just write something normally, there's certain flows to how you do it, right, like oh yeah, muscle memory almost right, yeah, And there was certain things that were done that were obviously not patterns that they typically do or repeating patterns and stuff. So they're doing things specifically to hide their actual handwriting.
Thinking that maybe it's actually the person then exactly.
Okay, that's what they began to think. They're like, okay, well, if this individual's hiding their real writing, yeah, maybe this letter wasn't a concerned citizen. Maybe this letter is from the very person responsible for Jan's disappearance, basically turning this anonymous tip into a taunting kind of thing.
To have to think though, hey, is just I don't know, creepy.
It really is like to think that, oh, this helpful thing is not something that's helpful, this is a taunt. Yeah, Like that's fucked up. This guy already just has me like completely creeped out. I feel like, oh, I've said that word a few times.
I'm like, that's just the vibe of this this I don't know podcast I guess today.
Oh no, this this dude is a creepy fuck.
Okay, trust me, So I've gathered this correctly.
Trust me. You're we haven't even scratched the surface, and you're creeped. He's gonna get much worse.
Okay, cool noted.
So a few months later after that, on March twenty seventh, nineteen sixty nine, Karen Sprinker, a student at Oregon State University, had plans to meet her mother for lunch at Mayor and Frank's department storing downtown Salem. Different Salem than you're probably thinking. We're talking east versus West coast here, right, Okay, So now, witnesses saw her arrive at the rooftop parking lot, but Karen, however, never made it inside to have lunch
with her mother. When she didn't return to her door or show up for that lunch date, her worried mother called police to report her missing. They looked for her, they called around, but she was gone. Karen had vanished without a trace. Now, not long after Karen's disappearance came Sharon Wood's terrifying encounter that we talked about right at the beginning, with the same man that we already discussed. You know that one right, yep, and now thankfully she
managed to survive. Now, this encounter marked a turning point in this story, though authorities didn't quite know it yet. Now, the very next day after Sharon, the man attacked again on April twenty second, targeting fifteen year old Gloria Jean Smith near Parish Middle School in Salem. Again, not the Salem you're thinking of.
Holy shit though, that's young. Yeah, fifteen also crazy. It was just the next day, right now.
This would be his youngest targeted individual, just for reference. Okay, Now, Gloria was walking alone on some train tracks when a green car pulled up beside her. From this vehicle, a man jumped out, and the man immediately grabbed her and tried to drag her into the car, with him pointing a gun directly at her. However, Gloria noticed something something odd. The gun was clearly not a real gun. It was a cheap plastic.
Toy Ooh, that's observant right.
This realization gave her the courage to fight back. She screamed, kicked, and struggled, drawing the attention of a nearby woman who called out from her yard. Startled. The man gave up the assault jumped back into his car and sped away. For the second time in two days. His plan failed again.
He's probably just like, what the fuck, right, But I'm also shook that someone would be, you know, getting attacked like that and actually realized that the gun was fake, right. I know that's impressive.
It is, it really is. It's extremely observant, observant, especially like when you say you're getting attacked.
Well, and she's fifteen.
Yeah, so she managed to keep a level head enough, keep her her wits about her to make this observant realization that oh that's not real.
Yeah, so huh wow.
So the man, undeterred, though, struck again the very next day wow yeah, determined to get what he was after. On April twenty third, twenty two year old Linda Saley went to Portland Lloyd's Center shopping mall to pick up a birthday gift for her boyfriend. After spending time browsing for the perfect present, Linda was last seen leaving a jewelry store at around five thirty PM, somewhere between the
store and her car. She vanished. Linda's disappearance following so closely on the heat of the previous incidents finally made police suspect that they were dealing with a serial predator. The abductions seemed calculated, the victims they were diverse, but somehow they were kind of eerily connected with these patterns. Right. With no concrete evidence or leads, investigators feared the worst,
and soon their fears would tragically be confirmed. On May tenth, nineteen sixty nine, a man by the name of Sam Wallace, a fisherman, headed out for an early morning fish. He was headed to go find a good spot along the Tom, the Long Tom River. As he walked the banks, something caught his eye, a flash of white beneath the surface of the water. Curious, Sam climbed up to a tree branch to get a better look. What he saw was chilling. A body suspended just beneath the water's surface.
Oh gosh, that would just be such a chilling site.
This was the body of twenty two year old li Into Sali.
Is that that's the one that was getting what we just talked about the last one? Right?
Ah?
Yes, who was buying the present for her boyfriend?
Correct? Okay, yeah, and this was just two weeks after she had disappeared.
Okay.
Sam quickly called the police and divers soon sent were sent to recover her body, but when they entered the water, what they discovered was Linda's body was not floating, at least not to the surface. It was weighed down. It was tied down by a heavy car transmission using copper wire and nylon cord keeping it submerged, but not floating to the surface, just kind of suspended.
Oh oh my gosh, okay, holy shit. People that end up finding bodies like I just I just can't. Now. I'm thinking, like I go paddleboarding a lot, I would just like I would.
Die, right, And it's funny. Well, I mean it's not funny, but it's thinking about it. Like so many fishermen in these stories are the ones finding body. Yeah, it's like you head to the water to go fishing. Oh shit, it's a body. The last story we covered, I'm pretty sure was an oysterman heading out on the water.
Oh body, guess I'm not going fishing today, right, cool boy? Now.
The police spent the next two days dredging the river bed, scouring the mud in search for more evidence. Divers were heading down searching, searching, searching, and on the second day, one of the divers found a rusted car engine, and attached to it were the same cord and wire they found another body. It was the body of Karen Sprinker, the third woman to disappear, Her remains heavily decomposed after
six weeks in the water. Now, the gruesome details of Karen's body, though, made it clear just how horrific her fate had been. The killer had mutilated her, cutting not off, but out her breasts and stuffing the wounds with brown paper towels.
What the shit?
And the paper towels were held in place by a bra that didn't belong to her. Now, this was an unsettling clue that pointed to the killer's growing pattern and obsession.
Huh okay, so this is like some dexter shit he has like a dumping grounds.
I mean, if you put it that way, I guess sure.
And also those poor people that have to actually go and dive for these bodies like in search, that's just nightmare material. Really.
Well, imagine being diving in murky water or going through mud, so you probably have visibility like inches in front of your face, right boy. Yeah, And then you find this engine and you find twine and stuff wrapped around it and then wire and you follow it and then all of a sudden you would feel it before you saw it, and the moment.
Can we do this right now? Holy shit, this is literally like the worst nightmare for me.
Sorry, I'll stop.
Oh my gosh. Okay.
At this point, it was undeniable to the police. They were dealing with a serial killer. You're squirming in your chair.
Yeah, I'm trying to pay attention now, but I can't.
Okay. Well, the police are like, yeah, we got a serial killer. It's obvious, right, yes, And the victims shared a troubling profile. They were young, attractive women, often well dressed, and typically they were students or workers at universities in Oregon.
With this in mind, police began to stake out places where these young women would be gathering, particularly at college campuses, hoping that someone might be able to identify the killer, trying to talk to individuals, maybe saying, hey, have you seen something? Have you heard something? Do you know of anything? Right? And it wasn't long before one of the female students came forward with a crucial piece of information. She had
a story that would basically crack this case wide open. Okay, Now, On May fourteenth, nineteen sixty nine, this student from a local university reached out to police with a disturbing tip. She explained that she'd been receiving unsettling phone calls from a man who claimed to be a lonely Vietnam veteran. He reportedly asked her out on a date, and his persistence wasn't limited to her. Apparently, dozens of women at women at the university got similar calls. But his approach
was rather odd and unsettling. But shockingly, he managed to persuade a persuade a few of these women to actually go out on dates with them. Now, particularly this woman who tacted police, had actually agreed to meet the man as well. She had described him as heavy set, with light colored hair and freckles. He had piqued her curiosity by claiming he wanted to discuss psychiatric psychiatric treatments that he had learned about during his time as a patient
at Walter Reed Medical Center. Now this just so happened to tie into her academic pursuits, so she reluctantly decided to give him a chance. The date started off innocently enough. They met for lunch and coffee, and their conversation was polite, if a little bit off, but as the date wore on, things took a bit of a strange turn. At one point, the man leaned across the table, placed a hand on
her shoulder, and began massaging it. Then, in a move that left her even more uncomfortable, he asked her to pretend she was sad so he could comfort her.
Oh, whoa talk about a date gone wrong?
Right now? If that doesn't give you the dick, I don't know what.
Oh that is so just fuck. I don't even know how to describe that. That is so uncomfortable.
Remember when I said, we haven't even scratched the surface of how creepy this guy is. Yeah, here, here's a little bit more.
Okay, even Ripley just got up. She's like, oh, I just can't deal with that.
Yeah, you know, it's bad when the dog gets the dick. Now if that, though in itself, wasn't bad enough, the conversation grew even darker from there. He suddenly brought up the recent news about the bodies being discovered in the river, the victims of this suspected killer. He asked her, why would you meet a stranger like this? How would you know I wouldn't take you down there and throw you in the water with the others.
Holy shit?
Okay, Yeah, the woman was understandably terrified. She managed to end the date without further incident, and immediately reported the encounter to the authorities. Yeah, I don't know if I would have hung around for very long even either, if that was the case.
I know, I honestly don't think that there could be another like she will never have another day. That is that fucked up.
No, No, that that's about as fucked up as it gets. I'm surprised she didn't fucking smack him across the face for that, like start massage. He pretend to be sad so I can comfort you. By the way, how do you know I'm not a serial killer?
B gosh, I would be running for the goddamn hills right wow. Oh.
Regardless, though, despite the unsettling behavior during their first encounter, the man's somehow managed to secure a second date with her, or so he thought.
Oh, okay, here we go. I could hardly swallow my water after you said that, I was just like.
What your jaw dropped. And then when I said or so, he thought, then your eyes lit up it was. The emotion was amazing, so detectives working with the woman asked her to continue engaging with him on these phone calls to help their investigation. She agreed, and after a few more phone calls, they set up another meeting scheduled for May twenty fifth, nineteen sixty nine. But this time, when the man pulled up to her dorm to pick her up, he wasn't met by her. He was met by the police.
It was a scene that seemed to be pulled straight out of a Chris Hansen handbook, because yeah, he's expecting her, but police were there instead. And the officers are like, can you step out of your car and come talk to us? So they led him straight into an empty office in the dormitory for questioning. The man was identified as Jerry Brutos, a thirty year old electrician from Portland.
He was polite and cooperative during the interview, explaining that he was just a lonely man trying to find love despite having a wife and two kids at home.
What yep, Okay, yeah, okay, so what a complete asshole yep.
Now, after some questioning, the police had no hard evidence on him. I mean, sure, he's a little creepy. Maybe he's cheating on his wife, that sort of shit, But there was nothing really confirming just yet, so after a little while through the interview, eventually they let him go. The next day, however, the police decided to follow up with a visit to Jerry's home, and what they found
was a little more than suspicious. His basement garage, an unusual place in itself, was locked up tight with access trolled by an intercom system. Even his wife and kids were not allowed to enter without his permission.
Oh, I would not be okay with that. I'd find my fucking way in there, right, you had this secret little room. I'd be like, nope, I'm going in there, like we gotta know what the fuck's happening.
Yeah, that's that's a red flag and a half right there. So inside this basement garage situation, detective spotted rolls of nylon cord and as well copper wire, both that matched the ones found in the river and or. More over than that, they also found distinctive knots that were used to tie up the bodies of Linda and Karen that
matched in the garage as well. The discoveries didn't end there, investigators also noted that Jerry's mother owned a green Volkswagen car, the exact same make, model, and color of the car seen during the attempted abduction of Gloria Jean Smith just weeks earlier.
Okay, yeah, at first, christ getting real here.
Oh one hundred percent, but still trust me, we're only scratching this surface. At first, the police didn't have quite enough to arrest Jerry here, but they did have enough to secure a search warrant for his vehicles. So on May twenty seventh, detectives returned to his home and search the cars, hoping for conclusive evidence to tie him to
the murders. While nothing definitive turned up, the whole event clearly rattled Jerry because he decided to take his chances and pack his wife and kids into a into a car.
And run get the fuck out of there. Eight.
Yeah, he fled north, possibly trying to make it an attempt to hit Canada.
Oh go away. Also, like, you don't say that he's not guilty here, hey.
Oh right, yeah, if you run that, that's a sure sign that you did something fucking wrong.
Totally.
Yeah, Now, Jerry might have escaped for good. Honestly, if he had left earlier, but by this point police were keeping a close eye on him, and then they realized he was gone not too long after he took off, so they wasted no time issuing an APB for the family car, and it didn't take long for the vehicle to be pulled over just a few hours north of Portland.
Jerry was arrested on the spot and charged with attempted kidnapping. Now, this arrest and attempted kidnapping charge came thankfully from Joria sorry Gloria Jean Smith, because of her positive identification of him as the man who tried to abduct her.
Okay, and that's the fifteen year old, wasn't it? Yes? Okay.
So, as Jerry was being booked into the Salem County Jail, the guards got a glimpse into his unsettling private world and also a little bit of a glimpse on the connections on between everything. While stripping him down to change him into his prison jumpsuit, they discovered that he was wearing a pair of silky women's underwear beneath his clothing.
It was an unnerving detail that hinged at a much deeper and darker obsession as you said earlier, Hey, wearing those women's clothing whatever, where you want, No one fucking cares. But in this case, it is definitely something a little bit noteworthy. You know. It's not something that in the nineteen seventies they see too often when bringing people into the jail, I'm sure, And it's a bit of a
pattern that unfolds throughout this case. So the search of his basement meanwhile, or basement garage, I don't really understand the exact layout. I've just kind of been like, it's this garage, it's this basement. It's kind of this like limbo between the two. So I'm not sure exactly how to describe it. But this room, let's call it that. Maybe I don't know. The search of this room revealed far more than just rope and wire to be found.
With a green light to conduct a comprehensive investigation on the locked up space, police uncovered a trove of chilling evidence. The full extent of his crimes were about to come to light, and it was far worse than any of the authority figures, investigators or police could have imagined. But before we talk about that, we first need to understand
how Jerry Brudos became this infamous shoe fetish slayer. So we're going to dive into his early life because it's a psychological roller coaster that roots right down to his childhood. Born on January thirty first, nineteen thirty nine in South Dakota, Jerry Brudos was the second son in his family. His mother, Eileen, had desperately wanted a girl. She prayed for a daughter, and then when Jerry arrived instead and she was given a boy, a second son, she resented him deeply for it.
Wall She never hid her disappointment either, and Jerry grew up under the weight of her open disdain. As a form of punishment and perhaps a way to vent her frustration over his gender, Eileen would dress Jerry in girl's clothing and ridicule him for it. These experiences became formative. I became yeah formative for young Jerry, blending shame and confusion about his identity with an early fixation on femininity.
Eileen strict and judgmental views about sex and sexuality only made things worse, and he mentioned of such topics excuse me was treated with absolute disgust, and Jerry's natural curiosities or eccentric behaviors were used to excuse used as an excuse to ostracize him, branding him as the family freak.
Seriously, yes, holy shit, that's fucked up.
Oh oh yeah, trust me, it is.
Oh my gosh. Like you hear about stories of parents, like you know, damaging their children, but that is something.
Oh she did more than damage her child. She instilled something into him and we're going to talk about it here, trust me. So by the time he was just a toddler, even Jerry was already developing psychological issues.
Oh No.
At the age of five, he had an encounter that would profoundly shape the rest of his life. While wandering through a junkyard, Jerry spotted something that caught his eye, a bright red pair of open toe, high heeled shoes. They were discarded among the piles of scrap metal and junk, and for some reason, a reason that he didn't fully understand, because I mean, hey, he's only five years old. I think many adults wouldn't even understand either, But he was
captivated by these shoes laying there. He went over to them, reached down and picked them up, and he slipped them on his feet. They were many sizes too big. I mean, he's five years old and these are adult women's shoes. So they were slopping around this kid's feet as he strutted back home, excited to show off his discovery. To him, it was a harmless act of play, you know, imagination
dress up. After all, he'd been forced into women's clothes many times before by his mother, right, it wasn't foreign to him. But his parents, especially his mother, didn't seem it is just play, just imagination, just dress up. Eileen, hearing the click clack of high heeled shoes on the front porch, horrified her when she saw her son.
How would this horrify her? I am just so confused right.
Now, he's willingly doing it. She forced him to do it to ridicule him before, and now he's doing it on his own for fun. Oh jeez, I'm not saying I understand or get it. I'm just putting it in a perspective to Devil's advocacy, you know.
Yeah.
So when she saw this, she lashed out at him, berating him and demanding that he throw those shoes back in the dump where he'd found them. But Jerry just couldn't part with these shoes. So this little five year old secretly stashed them away, sneaking them back into the house, and when his mother discovered what he'd done, she confiscated the shoes and burned them right in front of him, reducing his prize possession and first real source of joy
to ash. This moment became a turning point in Jerry's young life, the inciting incident, if you will. It wasn't just about losing the shoes. It was the collision of his growing fascination with women's footwear and the cruelty of
his mother's control into her one son. Eileen poured her cruelty, her malice, and her will to dominate his life, and as a result, from that day forward, collecting women's shoes became a deeply secretive and compulsive act for Jerry, a fascination that became darkly intertwined with his resentment towards his mother and by extension, women as a whole. And this is where we're going to end Part one.
Of course, I am just so I don't even know, just like torn right now, like just so torn, I know, right because we just determined that this guy is a complete piece of shit. But then also like that is just kind of heartbreaking.
It's so heartbreaking.
I don't even know what to think right now.
So this is a classic case study for many psychology students in university, Yeah, because there is so much to fucking open and examine here. It's been researched over and over and over again. And yeah, it is dark, it's very sad, and it's very creepy. And though Jerry goes on to be a complete piece of shit the obvious, as I said, inciting incident, you look at it and it's like, well, that's not his fault, Like his mother made a monster.
Yeah, like what was his mother doing right?
All because she wanted a daughter?
Which is just so disgusting.
I know, Like I'm sorry, fucking bitch. Yeah, I've been called out on the show a few times for swearing a lot, but I don't care. Eileen is a fucking.
Well yeah period, that is I don't know. That is just like you shouldn't be having kids, I guess if you can't be like, you know, happy with just having a healthy baby or whatever you're gonna make. She basically turned him to kind of be unhealthy.
Really exactly now I understand, sure, Like a mother might want a daughter, a father might want a son, or you know, someone's looking for a specific you know, child to bear and raise. I'm looking forward to, you know, doing this with my son's sort of situation, right.
Yeah.
But but the moment that you birth something different that you expected into the world, I think all that should go out the window, and it's just like, now you're just focused on what you do get to enjoy with this child.
And I would say, normally, would you like I think there could be like small little you know, inside inside voices you're like, oh, like I wish you know, I could be doing this with my son, like you said.
But you could do that with your daughter.
Yeah, oh that is oh bad.
So yeah, Now, as I mentioned, part two is gonna be much longer than part one. Here that part one's not it's I don't know a little On the short side, I.
Can't understand how there's that much more to this. I think our minds are gonna be blown.
There is a lot to unpack, there is a lot to talk about. So yeah, part two we're gonna get much more into this deep dive of Jerry Brutos. Sorry, I don't know what I'm like my voice is weird today. I don't know. Maybe okay, maybe I just need more coffee, more beer.
Next maybe you need some water.
Maybe I do, but I can. I was gonna say, next episode, I will be drinking whiskey because we're gonna need that. At least I'm gonna need that. Oh geez, So makes your next episode. You've got a drink ready. Whether it is water, whether it is whiskey, doesn't matter. Have a cup of something that you can.
Enjoy because we got to buckle up.
Yeah, because you're gonna need something to help kind of relax you through this process for the part. So just saying that, okay.
Well, looking forward to that.
All right, Well, we'll talk to you in part two. In the meantime, if you want to check out our social links, all are in the description of this podcast and including Patreon. If you want to go ahead and give this podcast a rating, we'd greatly appreciate that five stars if I may recommend. But hey, you do you. We appreciate you being here. We are an indie podcast, produced, written, recorded all on our own. It's us and thank you for your support. It means the world. And until part
Two, stay wicked.