Witness Protection: Facts and Fiction

For some people, Witness Protection sounds like a dream come true: the government whisks you away, allowing you to start a new life completely separate from your past. But, as it turns out, there's more to this conspiracy than you might imagine. In today's episode, Ben, Matt and Noel explore the ins and outs of Witness Protection.

They don't want you to read our book.: https://static.macmillan.com/static/fib/stuff-you-should-read/

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
learn the stuff they don't want you to know. A
production of iHeartRadio. Hello, welcome back to the show. My

(00:25):
name is Matt, my name is Noel. They called me Ben.
We're joined as always with our superproducer Paul Mission controlled decond.
Most importantly, you are you. You are here, and that
makes this the stuff they don't want you to know.
Interesting way to get into this. Have you guys ever
been driving somewhere and you see an exit on the

(00:48):
interstate and you think, what if I just went here instead,
especially if it has a fun name, you know, like Weed, California,
or you know, Cairo, Georgia. Yeah. I almost get off
at Beaver Ruin every time I pass that exit. That
sounds like for something I don't I can't imagine what,

(01:10):
but yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm always partial to little known,
like I love tourist traps, and I'm always partial to
you know, something that advertises itself not as the first
best of a thing, but like the second or fourth best,
where it's like the fourth biggest frying pan in the

(01:30):
East Coast then I'm like, I'm in, I'll go. I
appreciate the modesty. I'm much more inclined to believe that
than the best, because there can only be one best.
So it seems like, you know, New York's best cup
of coffee or whatever is like at every little diner,
but third best, I'd be more inclined to believe there's
some stats backing that up. You're welcome. Folks were doing

(01:50):
some free marketing for you and guarantee it will work
as long as we are not held responsible for the
consequences of your decision. And speaking like this is a
thing that happens to a lot of people. We all
at some point start imagining our lives as they would
be if a few decisions were different, or if we

(02:10):
went somewhere else. Did you turned left instead of turned right?
That's why in fiction the ideas of multiverses are so popular,
because we always think about the possibilities of living another life.
And if you have ever dreamed of starting over, this
is the episode for you. This is the second or
fourth best episode for you. There we get to make

(02:32):
it sound realistic. Yeah, we're talking about a real life
series of government supported conspiracies. Not theories, real genuine conspiracies,
paid for by your tax dollars. This is wit sec
or witness security, otherwise known as witness protection. Here are
the facts. So we've talked about the federal Witness Protection

(02:55):
program a good bit recently in an earlier Listener mail
segment on the hack that took place targeting the US Marshals.
It's a program but you probably are aware of too
from like mob movies and the like. It's intended for
crucial witnesses who have a valuable testimony to contribute to,

(03:18):
you know, trials, and typically folks that would be seen
as being in immediate danger as a result of the
testimony that they're making. Usually because it targets some dangerous people. Yeah,
former mafia, cartel, gang members, anyone who is in a
tight knit group who is becoming a turn coode essentially

(03:39):
against their group. Also terrorists, hey, both domestic and foreign,
no matter where you live. And this would be like
after the trial probably right, I mean, like you know,
because of retribution, not necessarily protecting against witness tampering. That
would be more of like a custodial thing that would
happen during the course of the drop This is more

(04:01):
of a permanent kind of solution, right, This is permanent,
and it starts before the testimony because the entire point, Yeah,
the entire point is to try to keep you know, Johnny,
last name or whatever alive so that they can get
their testimony on record. And you know a lot of

(04:21):
times yeah there, the Marshals are trying to get in
front of groups that have a high level of sophistication,
an established track record of witness tampering up to and
including murder. These aren't the folks who've just bribed someone.
They might offer you a bribe, but if they decide
it's more effective, slash cheaper to kill you, they will

(04:42):
do so without compunction, and they'll sleep just fine at night,
no question. Thanks for the clarification. And before we jump forward, guys,
I just want to make one quick note on the
Marshall's hack. That hack, at least according to the Marshals,
did not affect this witness protection program at all, right,
because it's kind of firewalled, right, It's how did you

(05:04):
describe it, Matt, It's like a cottage on a compound.
So the hack did compromise information, but as far as
we know, not the information pertaining to whit SEC participants.
They hit the cottage instead of the big house, right yeah,
that's yeah, yeah yeah. And look, honestly, fellow conspiracy realist,

(05:25):
something like whit SEC has existed for a long, long,
long long time. I mean, think of the man in
the iron mask mask probably wasn't actually iron. Whatever we're
fun at parties. Think of Operation Paperclip. You know, when
the Allied forces, the US, at least in Paperclip, spirited
away Nazi scientists. They made a cost benefit analysis and said,

(05:49):
these folks are more valuable to us in a lab
than in a prison or in the chair or I
guess they were hanging people anyway. Throughout the span of
modern civilization, parties funny parties, the authorities of any given
power structure have often been willing to bend the rules
if you have something of value to offer, and witnessed

(06:12):
security as a program, the modern version of it. It
really came about as a bunch of individual cases that
began in the early nineteen sixties with mob investigations, Right yeah,
the Rico cases that have all become movies at this
point or limited series, like all of them. Rico, I

(06:35):
know that guy, Yes, the worst. Good dude, Good dude,
Good dude knows a lot of people this This originally
starts with something called the Organized Crime and Racketeering Section
of the Department of Justice the DOJ, and they were
led by Robert F. Kennedy, who you may recognize for
some earlier episodes and in the Lady in a Polka

(06:58):
Dot dress, okay, and the Lady in a Polka address. Yes,
and one guy named Gerald shr was part of the team.
Gerald Shu passed away in twenty twenty, but he is
most well known as the man who would go on
to create the modern witness Security program. So saying, hey,
we're doing all this protection in these individual cases, let's

(07:20):
set a precedent, right, Let's try to get some standards
in here so that the left hand knows what the
right is doing when it needs to. And they've done
a lot. Thousands of people have been in the Witness
Protection program, some of whom might be tuning into today's episode.
If you are amongst I mean, if you're one of

(07:42):
those people, good luck, stay safe, don't do any crimes,
don't do any crimes, don't write an email to us.
We don't care what your new name is. We'll get
into that later. Don't don't don't, don't, don't jaywalk, don't
be late on your library books. You know what I mean?
Stay out with quote to quote the old Josh Clark

(08:04):
YouTube series. Just don't be dumb, don't be done. Yeah,
there you go, But it's not that's easier said than done,
because we'll get into dumb. Yeah. Oh boy. Um. But
when if I think about the when you think about
the numbers, right, Ben, you found some numbers for us here.
Over seven thousand, five hundred people since nineteen seventy have

(08:27):
been placed into this program. And that's individuals who need
to be protected. But what many people, including myself, forget,
is that this also includes immediate family members often not always,
but often often, Yeah, the spouse, the kids, because you
know you, the Marshall Service tried to draw a line

(08:52):
and say, look, we don't want to have to be
the people who come tell this. You know, four year
old your mom disappeared, or to protect the four year
old at all times because the mom went into a
witness protection right, So now what do you do with
a four year old? So targeting the four year old
or targeting the immediate family would be a real easy

(09:15):
way to draw the target person out of witness protection
into the light, you know, to then be dealt with.
And so in a way, this is government supported pseudo
side thinking of one's death. And when you have the
help of Uncle Sam, it's a lot easier to do

(09:36):
some things than it would be if you were an
independent actor. Right now, three different US organizations manage aspects
of this program. This does not count any off the
books kind of CIA paperclip style relocations, which absolutely do
happen in the United States and abroad. We're talking about

(09:58):
the we're talking about the official stuff. I know, conspiracies
in conspiracies. Did you hear that unknown person just talk
to us I did in that clip. No, no, you're
not having a stroke. That was That was an accidental
rollover AD on my bus that came out on my speakers. Okay,

(10:19):
rollover ads uh, rollover at you know who sees a
rollover AD and says I'm gonna buy that? Sure? Yeah, yeah,
thank you for invading my, my, my, my ears with
that noise. It's the new version of the door to
door salesman. Yeah, right, bust in your front door into
your study or wherever you keep your computer and like, hey,

(10:43):
oh you're reading about witness protection. Why not buy a
Dyson vacuum cleaner, right, like stuff like that. You have
an extra four thousand dollars, right? Is that how much
they are? I don't know. They're insane and I yeah,
dison Z Yeah, well I'm not sponsored by them, but
I say go for the shark instead of the Dison.
It works sharks as well, and they're a good bit

(11:05):
less expensive. And also, I think it's so funny that
whenever you buy a thing like that, that's when you
start getting the flood of ads for the same thing.
You won't We've always commiserated about that on the show,
but it still happens to me. I don't know why
they haven't sused that out yet, right, this guy just
what's the example? Oh, this guy bought a toilet. He
must want six more. Maybe he'll treat himself. You know,

(11:27):
this guy likes to poop. You know, I could understand.
You buy a toilet, you start getting served with ads
for bidats or toilet accessories, you know, like a like
a putting green, which I saw a big lots the
other day, toilet suicide, faking your death shout out to

(11:48):
Playing Dead by Elizabeth Greenwood. That's probably the best book
written on the subject. Faking your death on your own disappearing.
It's increasingly difficult in the age of ubiquitous surveillance and
social media and so on, but it is still possible.
The reason most people get caught is because they either

(12:10):
contact people from their old life or they try to
profit in some way. So if you just ghost and
you don't touch any possible money, any insurance claims or whatever,
your chances are getting way are much higher. If you
go with a marshal service and you're in wit SEC,

(12:31):
then according to them, you have one hundred percent chance
of being safe, so long as you follow their rules,
which we'll get into. That's a covey. It's like that
number one cup of coffee, little Suss. It's kind of
like that exactly. It's kind of like if we were

(12:51):
going to make up a tricky statistic and we said,
nobody in a submarine has died in a car crash
while on the submarine, Like, of course, of course they haven't,
you know, but but yeah, everything is perfect and just
so like things definitely are all the time, then no

(13:13):
one will ever die in the witness protection. Let's talk
about one of the wrinkles here when we're talking about
the Marshal Service and what they do for this witness
protection program. They provide the basic things we've talked about, right, security,
They watch out for your health. Right, they do all
kinds of stuff when it comes to just protecting you
if you're not already in prison. Because some of these

(13:36):
witnesses that come forward are incarcerated before they go and
need to take the stand, right, So what happens to them?
Do you just change their name and put them in
a different prison system somewhere they're they're they're under the
Federal Bureau of Prisons, the Bureau of Prisons are BOP.
They look after the incarcerated witnesses and the marshals. So

(14:00):
the Marshals and BOP, they're like the boots on the ground,
the general in this case, the one who's sending them
to the trenches. That's something called the Office of Enforcement
Operations under the Department of Justice, the OEO, because we
love an acronym. I hope they do it right. Like
all three of us just clocked that. You probably clocked

(14:22):
that listening at home. I think Matt, you were doing
the Wizard of Oz. I was doing Jugo love most
day of the time, which when many will remember featured
in the Jay and Silent Bob movie Oeo Eyo, and
they still all work together, which is a nice little
thematic metaphor here. So the Oeo has now the sound

(14:45):
keys in my head. They are the ones who make
the call as to who gets admitted and what happens
to them afterwards, and a lot of things can happen
to them. It's complicated. So their main thing is you
can get into whit sec if your life is in
danger because of the testimony that you will give in

(15:07):
the future, and you have to definitely be giving that
testimony against traffickers, terrorists, mafia, other major criminals, and they
will erase your old identity, they'll put you in a
city where you're not likely to be recognized. They'll give
you a new name and a new life, and they'll
do the same for your immediate family members. But not

(15:28):
everybody can get in. It's actually it's not as tough
as successfully pleading insanity in court, but it's it's pretty rare,
right because there's a lot of crime. A really great
film about sort of you know, where the impetus for
the action of the film is somebody being in witness protection.
Unless I'm completely mistaken. Is a David Cronenberg film called

(15:49):
The History of Violence, where it's about a gentleman played
by Vigo Morden said, who, like you know, runs a
diner and the small time and the folks come and
roll into town. I can't remember if he was in
whit sec or if he just sort of did it himself,
but it's still the same scenario, you know, where the
bad guys find out and then there's a rumble in
the streets and yeah, yeah, was he infiltrating the thieves

(16:12):
in law like the Russian correct? But I can't remember exactly. Yeah, No,
you're right, he wasn't with he definitely was in whit Sec.
You're absolutely right then, Yeah, really great movie. Different for Croninburg.
Most people know him for like body horror, gross out stuff,
but this is very much just a solid crime thriller, excellent,
excellent picture. Yeah, a lot of great stuff in there

(16:35):
about the Russian criminal underground. Uh and and and actually
an interesting emphasis on the cultural phenomenon of tattoos in
that organization. It's very true. Oh, man, there's there's also
Eastern promises, which which was the tattoo one. I think
so there are there's some crossover betwe because there was

(16:59):
all so Russian, you know stuff in A History of Violence.
Two really good movies. Guys. All right, I want to
talk about something we talked about. The high number seven thousand,
five hundred people since nineteen seventy have gone into this
that is nowhere near the number of high value witnesses
that have given testimony in the United States. Is that

(17:22):
because of the criteria is so strict or why why
isn't that number higher? Well, it seems to me there
must be something, some metric or something that has to
be hit for that. What do we call it OEO
for them to look at an individual and say, okay,
we need to protect you. Yeah, there's a rubric. I
mean it's the government. So there's a lot of bureaucracy.

(17:44):
There's a paperwork here. The US Attorney General's Office has
the finals say so on who gets in, and their
requirements are pretty specific. Without getting two into the weeds
of the legal ease, any fence that involves organized crime
or racketeering makes you eligible. Drug trafficking offenses as described

(18:07):
in titled twenty one of the US Code, which most
people wouldn't know offhand, any other felony for which a
witness may provide testimony quote that may subject the witness
to retaliation by violence or threats of violence. And then
any state level offense that's similar to the federal stuff.

(18:28):
And then another one's basically a vibe check. I mean,
they're never going to say it that way, but it's like,
how do they feel about you know, well, because potentially
somebody could be or would be a part of a
criminal organization in order to have testimony to give, right,
Not not always, but I would say often, probably somebody

(18:48):
had a hand in whatever bad business was going down.
So I guess you have to trust that that person
isn't going to just move on to a different city
with a different name and then continue to do the
same thing right back to stamp fraud, because this process
is labor intensive and expensive. Yeah, and you don't want

(19:09):
that guy to go right back to sell in loose
cigarettes out in the hullaballoo, Montana, which is hopefully a
city I just made up. That's an exit that I've
always considered. Yeah, Yeah, it's weird that that signs in Atlanta.
It's just like hullaballoo Montana. This many hundreds of miles.
Maybe we'll take that exit one day, but for now

(19:31):
we want you know. Those are the basics. They seem
pretty clear cut. But how does joining up with whit
sec actually work? How does Uncle Sam set you up
with a brand new life. We're going to take the
exit for a brief stop with our sponsors, and then
we'll be right back on the road. All right, whatever,

(19:58):
here's where it gets still. I love that you're referencing
Eastern promises in History of Violence. They're two amazing films,
and I know that we all love crime films. We
all love that in our fiction. But this is not
like in the movies. Well, I mean, because they're getting
something from you, So they have to ensure the quality

(20:22):
of your testimony and and check and double check and
make sure that you know that it's gonna hold water
or sand or whatever material is appropriate for this analogy
before they'll give you that level of attention. Because like
we like, we're gonna see it's a big deal. It's
a no turning back kind of situation. So they gotta

(20:42):
a make sure that you're serious and that you have
serious information to share that we'll hold up in court.
And then they start going forward with the rest of
the process, which isn't isn't entirely unlike what we see
in the movie, but it's also a little more minutia
based and boring. You know, the actual process every person,

(21:03):
like every person that goes through. Imagine the expenses associated
with that one person to be processed. Now, imagine that
person has a family, a spouse and two kids, like
the line items on that budget. That's gonna it's gonna
cost to you know, protect this person in their family.
You got you gotta be sure this is a person
we need to protect. That's gonna get expensive real fast.

(21:27):
Because when you think about like for example, in like
a show like Better called Saul, where you have criminals
that are doing this through an underground version of this,
like a service that someone provides that's obviously fraud and
like totally illegal, you know, but this has all the
same hallmarks, but it's recognized by the government. So in
order to cover their butts legally, gotta be a ton

(21:49):
of paperwork to make sure that they don't get their
cover blown. But also that they are recognized, you know,
and then that essentially you are tricking other agencies because
you would want someone applying for a driver's license and
then all of a sudden a regg flag gets thrown
up and their covers blown. So it's something that has
to be done on a systematic level. Yeah, and there

(22:10):
are weak links in the chain of secrecy. There almost
always are. The thing is, first, a lot of people
apply and don't pass MUSTER. They don't make the cut
because either there again, as we know, intelligence is perishable, right,
so it might not matter there might be another alternative

(22:31):
to having someone in the wit SEC program. But also
they have to evaluate the credible the credibility of the
threats against you. And because a lot of these people
are have a criminal background, Uncle Sam will also ask
themselves what risk you may pose to a new community
if you get relocated. This is where you see comedic

(22:55):
versions of the witness protection trope, right, And that last
part might sound odd, but again it's not uncommon for
folks and witness protection or witness security to have a
criminal past. So if you're the authorities, you're the OEO,
and you know someone has a likelihood of changing their
name but still committing crimes that really complicates things. You

(23:17):
don't want Max Powers, astronaut with a secret suddenly get
busted yet again for stealing dirigibles, you know what I mean?
Like people, that's a very specific crime. They will look
at you know, they'll look at the track record there. Well,
I would imagine too, like you know, they they would
probably treat civilians differently than say, serious members of crime

(23:37):
organizations who are essentially being bargained with or this is
a bargaining chip, you know, like they are maybe perhaps
they are negotiating down their sentence or whatever it might be. Like,
is it worth it to us to protect you when
you're the one that's put yourself in harm's way in
the first place? And if and with those cases, it

(23:58):
would be more about protecting their and tell and their
testimony maybe a little more so than protecting that person's hide.
Oh and what if the person you're you're going to
give testimony against is already an FBI informant? Huh? The
high level person that happens sometimes wheels within wheels, like

(24:19):
in at What's the movie the scorsesean movie with Jack
Nicholson Departed, The Departed and the slight spoiler for a
fifteen year old movie. It does turn out that the
main bad guy in that has been dodging all of
this stuff for so long because he is a high
level FBI informant. And the dildo scene was completely improvised.

(24:40):
The one in the movie there did a coffee spip.
It's true, obvious, improvised. That's why. That's why Matt Damon's
character looks so surprised, or one of those characters looks
so surprised. That's a true story. All right, it doesn't
matter for this. It doesn't matter for this matter. Point.
The point is the after assuming you pass muster right,
you have valuable information. You also are not going to

(25:04):
be huge risk if you get started over with a
new life and you're you know, they call you nil
wobnet or something. It's been bulling backwards then, got it. Yeah,
But the if they if you pass those two things,
then they give you an interview. The Marshal Service will
interview you and prosecutors and whatever law enforcement agency has

(25:29):
come to them to request your protection, and then you
have to give them the application, their threat assessment, and
then after that interview they recommend whether or not you
should be in what sec they tell the OEO, hey,
green light, yellow light whatever. And at that point, at
any point actually along the way, OEO can pull the

(25:50):
plug on the whole operation. They can just change their mind.
So you have to play nice and for maybe the
second to last time in your life, for the penultimate
time in your life, you have to be completely honest.
Do not try to hide stuff, no matter how small
you think it is. And the last time that you
will have to be honest for the rest of your

(26:11):
life is in court, is when you give that testimony.
And if they do the cost benefit analysis, they're really
asking how does the value of what you have to
bring to the table, How does that stack up to
the potential danger you might bring to the community, not
by your actions necessarily, but simply by your presence. What

(26:32):
if you get found out? You know, like that scene
in all those horrible horror movies where someone says, hang on,
doctor Alucard, alu Card, it's Dracula backwards. You know what
I mean, doctor, Yeah, exactly exactly. He sucks. I know this.

(26:57):
It's it's a wild week for us, folks. We got
a lot going on. But okay, there's a hassle for everyone, right,
And this only starts the process, because, like we're saying,
the idea is to grant total anonymity. They want you
to blend in. They want to put you in a
place where you won't stick out and you won't be recognized.
And at first that doesn't sound very difficult unless you're

(27:20):
a high profile public figure. There are thousands of cities
where people move to and from every day. What's one more?
You know, That's how it sounds. But they're not playing around,
like as soon as you are signed up, you're whisked away,
just like just like breaking Bad or better call Saul
Spoilers when the vacuum cleaner guy shows up with the van,

(27:44):
right and you just have to hop in. That's the
point of no return right there. Yeah. Yeah, they take
you to a safe house or to some safe holding location.
They're necessarily vague about that and everything they say publicly,
and then they try to coordinate multiple government agencies in
absolute secrecy to set up your new life. And they

(28:05):
have a huge double standard here. It's a necessary one,
but I just want to point it's it's a huge
double standard. They want the public to forget all about you.
As close as possible. They want you to have never existed,
but they want to remember any and everything you've done.
They actually pay way more attention to you than the
average member of John Q Public. Oh yeah, So wherever

(28:27):
you're going, whether it's the temporary safe house or your
brand new location, you can guarantee the folks that are
helping you out along this process are going to give
a nice little tip of the hat and heads up
to the local law enforcement agencies that you're going to
be working with in the future. You won't be working
with them, but you know, and it's not like they're

(28:49):
going to leak all the information that they're trying to
keep secret, right, They're just going to say, hey, heads up,
here's a new guy in town. He's kind of known
for this thing, so just keep an eye out his
new name. Don't say anything about the old name, but
just you know, check him out and keep this guy
away from the town blimp, especially the case. Yeah, he's

(29:10):
he's got a he's got an airship thing. So is
that like the town bicycle? Is that is that like
a you know, not an euphemism, like a good like
going back to the joke about stealing original it was
a fat joke. We don't do but that is Oh,
that's tremendously hurtful. That feels like a middle schooler made

(29:31):
it up. They're the best with insults. I always thought
Blimpies was kind of a gross name for a sub
sandwich chain, too. Blimpy. Yeah, it feels like some kind
of like children's show mascot to me. Yeah, yeah, there
we go. So so yeah, true story, BLIMPI was involved

(29:51):
with al Qaeda? Stop, no, no, no, they weren't. Blimpy's best.
It's not involved in alkay right, where blimpis really come from?
Do you guys know what the sandwich store's name was before? All? Right, whatever,
we're not we're not saying Blimpie is a member of
what is called Yeah, that's it. So the marshals do

(30:18):
give local law a heads up, and the marshals can
also impose pretty much any caveats they want on a
participant in witness protection. That means random drug and alcohol testing.
They can also keep an eye on your finances. And
there's one thing a lot of folks might not think
about until the rubber hits the road. The marshals are

(30:40):
not going to pay off any of your pre existing
debt doesn't matter if you like, if you're in deep
with Maddie both hands at at you know, for some
horse races, or you got a car and recommended no, no,
don't play dangerous. Yeah yeah, even with just the one hand.
We can never tell you how he got his name day.

(31:01):
But uh, you know they're not going to pay off
your student loans before you enter the program. You have
to pay off any existing debts if you have to
have it, though I don't understand, and like, if you're disappearing,
then technically you would be disappearing for all intents and
purposes for those debts. So if they want you bad enough,
surely you've got some bargaining power there, right, One would

(31:23):
one would think they bend the rules because some of
this stuff does fall into a gray area or wait
for it, liminal space. But how do you come up
with sixty grand for your student loan if you have
to go into witness protection all of a sudden, right,
it doesn't make sense? I mean, I mean, I mean,
I don't know. I know this is all like the
sort of like boilerplate stuff here, but there have to
be situations where the exceptions are made. I assume so.

(31:47):
But it's also very difficult for members of the public
to get the inside scoop on that sort of stuff,
especially because it can be good, reasily sensitive. Yeah, and
and it can transparency can result in the failure of
the program, by which we mean the people will get murdered.
But you also have to provide child custody documents. You

(32:10):
have to prove those kids are yours if they go
with you into wit SEC. You can't just say like, okay,
I will join the program as long as I can
take my roomy. You know, what's a weird, what's a sleazy? Oh?
Snake bite? As long as I can take my boy
snake bite with me. He's just solid And they're like, well,

(32:32):
is he your family member? He's my brother dog in
every way that counts. If snake bite doesn't go, I
don't go right a package deal the government and they
also won't pay for plastic surgery. They used to now
they have in the past a couple times, but they

(32:53):
now they will totally help you find a surgeon who
can keep their mouth shut, but they're not going to
put tax dollars toward it, so you have to pay
for it. But they will. They will recommend someone for you.
And so there's a lot of stuff they won't do,
but there is stuff they will do. They will help
you try to. They will find at least one reasonable
job opportunity. If that doesn't work out, that's okay, but

(33:16):
you have to keep looking for a job on your own.
They want you to be as self sufficient as possible
as soon as possible. They'll help you find a house,
a place to live, maybe an apartment. I imagine, Ben,
you'd have a handler of some kind that's sort of
checking in on you, maybe physically, but yeah, in some way,
shape or form. Definitely, definitely in the lead up to

(33:37):
going to court. Definitely, until you get settled in. It
actually calms down a bit if you are able to
tow the line and you know, not go back into
the life or crime. They'll also give you some subsistence payments.
This is pretty controversial. This is something on average of
like sixty thousand dollars a year, which is a pretty

(34:00):
decent salary, you know. Yeah, plus a job. Come on,
let's do this, let's get it. Witness protection program guys,
that sounds great. So they also give you a course
all the new identity paperwork you need. We're talking social
security numbers, birth certificate, driver's license, phishing license, tote and

(34:24):
chit for a new boy scouts, I guess and h
this is interesting. I didn't know this. They also arrange
for counseling. Should you so choose psychiatrists social workers? I
think that's really cool actually, especially for the kids. Right, yeah,
oh yeah, your new name is Timmy now right? Like

(34:45):
what why? And speaking of weak links, I mean no
shape or anything, but I mean at school, you make
a buddy and it's like I got a secret. I mean,
one last thing as long as we're talking about the
cool stuff, and you are raising a great point about
the weak links here. We were texting our group chat

(35:07):
before we recorded, like going into some of this episode
and the big question, who gets to choose your new name? Yeah?
Wouldn't there be maybe a pool of available identities that
are already kind of pre pre done or am I
am I moviefying this again? Just wondering, Uh, yeah, I

(35:29):
moviefied it a little bit of myself and some old
sketch comedy. But the cool thing is in real life,
witnesses can choose their own names. Now they do get
some pointers. The guy created the program, Gerald Sure, He
also wrote a book all about witness protection and he
talks about this. I'd like to be Neil's Barnes. If

(35:51):
that's agreeable. That's pretty great. Yeah, let's talk about that
book that Sure wrote is titled wit sec w I
t SEC Colin Inside the Federal Witness Protection Program. And
this dude just he's gout. He lays it out for you.
Here's some things you should do when considering changing your name. Yeah,

(36:11):
keep your current initials or same first name if possible. So,
Matt Frederick, I had a pitch, how about what do
you think about Mike Ferikon. It's so on the nose,
it feels real right, like you wouldn't purposely choose that.
It's pretty good. I wanted to go with Michael goldenschlager
but I guess that's fine. No, that's great too, that's

(36:34):
great too, Michael goldenschlager Stein. Yeah, okay, Michael Goldenschlagerberg. Sure,
can I still be Niels Barnes totally? Unless you want
to go with Nate Bobbin's. That's wow. Goodness to consider.
These are terrible, These are terrible, examples, probably due to

(36:55):
sleep deprivation. Ben, you mentioned improv. I mean that also
is if you notice shows like Curb Your Enthusiasm, most
of the characters have their real first names because it
just makes it easier for the improv I guess you
know what I mean. That's a good point too. And
also it's very easy to slip up if if you

(37:18):
have a name that is like think about it. For
the majority of these people, they have instinctual, primal response
now to hearing their name. It has been ingrained in
them for decades. So things can get Things can go
sideways really quick. If you're a mat or a Knoll

(37:40):
and all of a sudden, now you're tobias, you you
will have tells. People will be able to see you process.
Oh that's my fake name, right, yeah. Well, and plus
you can't ever take off your gene shorts ever again. No,
you're an ever nude. That's another one of their copiats
your joy, it's I mean, I have a friend who's

(38:02):
who's a musician, who often likes me to refer to
them by their stage name, and I screw that up
all the time because I know you're talking about you here.
I refuse every time on purpose. I hope you know that. Yeah,
you say I have. I struggle with it myself. You all,

(38:26):
you all probably know this personal better than I do.
But yes, confirming the story protecting the names, these name
changes do go through the court system, just like any
other name change. The records are sealed, which hopefully is helpful.
But that's I would argue, that's another weak link. Local
law enforcement can be corrupted. This is not a ding

(38:47):
on anybody, but it happens. Was it in Dragnet the
TV show? Or they say the names have been changed
to protect the innocence? I always love I always love
that line. It's very intense, but similar similar Do I
love that in anything? You know what I mean? I
would love that in a Blimpie's commercial. You know we
are We're bad. I gotta find out though, blimp Yeah, yeah, no,

(39:10):
look at we gotta get some people on the case there.
I think it's just blimpy, by the way, I don't
think it was there's it's not plural or possessive. It's
just blimpy. Yeah, blimpy restaurants, substances. It's still around. Looks
like they've rebranded a little bit. Yeah, it's America's subshop.
See it once again, suspect, Who are you to say

(39:30):
that you are America's subshop? And then there's blimp E,
which is totally different, right, oh right, so I know what, right,
you're the You've got a book coming out on the difference,
I believe, right. So, so, yeah, we see the week leaks,

(39:50):
but we also see a tremendous opportunity right to bring
justice to very dangerous people in the organizations. And now
to the brass tacks. Do they let you choose the neighborhood?
Do I get to do I get to choose? Because
for me and my family, I want a nice place, right,
I want I want to kind of posh place. It'd

(40:12):
be cool if there was a good view. That seems
like a premium service right there, though, you know you
got to pay extra for that, going to Brooklyn to
hang out with what's his name? We just talked about
old Charlie. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, mcgodigall. Yeah. Uh, Now
that sounds like a fake name, but anyway, it's literally
a character in the Harry Potter movies, right, uh and

(40:35):
uh and an FBI agent. You got turned but you're
not You're probably not going to go to a super
nice neighborhood because super nice neighborhoods tend to be insular,
and rich people also tend in general to stick out
in this country, especially nowadays. The point is to blend in.
You're going to have a life that would not be enviable,

(40:59):
and the service will give you twenty four hour protection
when you're in a high threat area all the basically
all the time leading up to court appearances, and if
it goes well, you make it to court, then you're
still in the program. But getting to court is the
most tricky part of the whole thing. Guys, do you

(41:19):
think there is a position within this witness security protection
matrix that goes in undercover and like checks up or
tests the people who are currently under protection. Like you
just go to a bar, you follow somebody who's in protection.
You watch that they go to a neighborhood bar every

(41:40):
Wednesday evening or something. You go sit at the bar
once or twice every couple of whatever, and just like
sit down and start up a little chat and see
what you can get out of them. On purpose, we
can create Can I do it? And then you also
pay me sixty thousand dollars plus whatever that salary is.
Please witness security theory. I want to do. That would

(42:03):
sound so much fun. Yeah, I think you'd have to
be careful of entrapment too. No, it's just a it's
just a little test. It's just like a hey, and
at the end of the conversation you just go, Mike,
you's call them by their real name, just quietly at
the bar. Well, like, what if you just call it
by your fake by the fake name, and then try

(42:25):
to get into casual stranger level conversation about their life
and their background. Yeah, you still considered doc saying if
you blow someone's witness protection cover or is there there
must be a whole other name, it's worse. Yeah, is
it worse? It's super Yeah. No, it's like it's the
equivalent of stomping on a kid's macaroni picture. The marshals

(42:50):
are not going to take well to it. And like,
can you imagine someone applying for witness protection because they've
they've been implicated in blow it up past witness protection cases.
That's that's a tall milkshake. Bad look bad look. Yeah,
they don't love it. But okay, so this guy, sure
he describes all the weird stuff they do to get

(43:13):
witnesses to court safely. They smuggle people in mail trucks,
they fly them in in helicopters. They even snuck some
dudes on to court via fishing boats. In one instance
he relates in his book, and armored car was sent
with a full police escort as a decoy to get
this this mob guy who had turned Joseph Barboza into court.

(43:37):
And so while they had this huge spectacle, this production
of armored cars and police escorts, there's nobody really in
the armored car. They snuck Joseph Barboza in through a
side door at the courthouse. They just sushered him in.
And even if you are no longer in the program,
you can still be given protection if you're a test

(44:00):
find for you know, in the case for which you
entered the program. And at that point you might be saying, wait,
people get out of witness protection. We'll get to that
in a second, but maybe first we take a break
and come back with some good news. Does this program work?

(44:22):
And we're back, And when we left, we asked the
question does the witness Security program work? Well? According to
the folks who make it, happen, Yes, sir, at least
it's pretty They are pretty good numbers. Yeah, So, according
to the Marshall's Service, since nineteen seventy, the program has
achieved an overall conviction rate of eighty nine sounds pretty

(44:44):
pretty solid as a result of protected witness testimony, and
more than ten thousand criminals have been put away as
a result been received convictions. And you have to think
the reason why that works is because there is a
witness protection program. Though that eighty nine percent conviction rate
and that number of criminals wouldn't be going to jail

(45:06):
because people would be terrified to give testimony against an
organization internally unless there was a program like this. There's
still terrified even though the program exists, but it's at
least there. And I think at this point too, we
have to mention We've talked about it before, and I
know it can be controversial for some folks, but it's
just the reality. The US justice system has huge problems,

(45:29):
massive inequality, a lot of dirty things happening that are
against the letter and spirit of the law. Everyone agrees
it's far from perfect. That is a known that is given.
The wealthy in this country have an entirely different set
of laws most times, right, But we have to keep
in mind the folks who are being targeted and the

(45:52):
folks who are the ultimate end goal of witness protection programs.
These are bad dudes. They're pretty dangerous, and we don't
say that lightly. And they also typically are going to
have a surprising amount of reach, a high level of sophistication.
If they have info on a witness, it will not

(46:13):
hesitate to act on it, often through their own through
their own proxies. We're talking about something close to a
shadow organization that tries to match what the Marshal Service does.
There's a there's an underground game of cat and mouse
that can play out, and the American public does not

(46:35):
know about it. So that sounds a little dark. Let's see,
let's let's let's stay on that though. Let's see, it's
kind of let's stay kind of dark. Why would you
find witness security controversial? Let's say we're voters and we
have a bone to pick with witness protection as a concept.

(46:56):
Why wouldn't we like it? Well, I mean, your potential
hooking a criminal up right, If this is somebody who's
inside the organization, as we keep mentioning and they're just
you know, turning on the people who are also in
the organization. Uh, they're probably not a great person who
maybe did some horrible things, and you're going to give
them sixty grand a year and protect them and also

(47:19):
get them a job. I don't be thinking, Yeah, you
might be thinking like, hey, I've lived in this town
forever and most of us make under forty thousand dollars
and are not criminals. So why are why are we
paying for this guy who definitely killed some folks to

(47:39):
get to get a cushy job, a nice house, and
sixty grand a year. The taxes, I always forget about
the taxes. Oh right, crap, it's got up, yep. But
it's just no, just the concept that we're all dishing
out for the other folks. Well, that's fine. This is
a look this program is. It's a drop in the

(48:01):
bucket compared to a lot of other major programs that
we're also paid. Sure. Yeah, how much your income goes
to pay for sidewinder missiles things like that? Yeah, because
you don't get it. You don't get a little form
and your taxes that check off where you want the
money to go, and we don't even get to play
with the missiles. Seem fair. No, they get mad at

(48:21):
you just for going to the fence. It's weird. Very
if we make some weird looking balloons, we shoot them
up really high, maybe we could get to play with
a missile at least in a secondhand way. Yes, yeah,
I support this idea. Yes I love I'm adding that
to my list of billionaire pranks. That's great. So the

(48:42):
Marshall Service Uncle Sam in general, they're aware of this
controversy and they get it, you know what I mean.
And a lot of individuals who make witness security work
have probably had their own ethical quandaries, right, like they
have probably had some dark knights of the soul about
the concept of greater good. Right are we letting an

(49:02):
evil person go in order to combat a greater evil?
And that's a tough question to answer. And that's not
a ding on the people who are involved with these programs.
That's just saying we understand the conundrums and dilemmas that
could arise. Because the marshals are sensitive. They want you
self sufficient asap, like you need to be at least

(49:26):
aggressively seeking a job, or they're cutting you off. And
when they cut you off, when they turn off the
faucet for that subsistence that sixty thousand dollars a year,
they'll tell you, hey, why don't you just a role
in public assistance? Wow? Yeah, So they don't want to play.
And the most important rule is you gotta uphold the conspiracy.

(49:49):
This is where everybody goes wrong when they try to ghost.
You cannot contact your former associates, your family members. In
the age of social media. That means no more dopamine
rushes from from your your look at me casino of choice. Right,
no Instagram, no Twitter, no TikTok, no Facebook, no more comments. Sorry,

(50:11):
but no more phone calls either, Matt to your old
friends at all, No WhatsApp, no telegram. Wow, I like that, Matt. Matt,
You're like Robert de Niro and heat. Yeah, I'm gonna
go to the I'm gonna go to the pond and
just be uh. And of course you can't go back
to your old town or any place you hung out.

(50:31):
They're just gonna have to wonder what happened to you.
And we talked about this, the success rate. The Marshall
Service phrases this and really kind of I don't know.
I think it's a sinister, nuanced way to phrase the
success of their program. Yeah, they say, quote, no witness

(50:52):
who has followed these rules has ever been killed. If
you follow it, you're gonna be okay. Otherwise, what are
we gonna do? Sort of like avoiding your warranty, you know,
on a piece of equipment if you like, if if
you try to fix it yourself, and you did, you
do the thing where you open it up and mess around,

(51:13):
We can't help you. We no longer cover you, and
we do not claim you. No one in a submarine
has died in a car accident while in the submarine,
you know what, Like, it's just a tricky way to
frame it. No one dies at Disney World, the situation,
Oh yeah, good luck, Mike louden Schlager or whatever I

(51:34):
said before Golden schlager stein, thank you something else. There
was another one at the end. What was it, Golden
Schluger stein Bergen, Golden schlager stein Bergen. Yes, and your
children will hate you when they learned that they didn't
have to write the entirety of that name in school,
you know what I mean. I always felt bad for

(51:55):
the kids with really long names. Well, it's speaking of
your children hating you. I'm sorry this is a little
out of order here, are going back to mething we
said earlier. Kids freak out and go through crazy you know,
phases for nothing and not to mention if you like,
uproot them from their school and moved to another town,
let alone change their name, and and they never get

(52:15):
to see their friends or family ever again. Can you imagine? Yeah,
I can imagine being a huge problem and very difficult,
very difficult rubicon to cross. So we'd have to talk
with professionals to see how they navigate that, especially when
children are on social media, expected to be on social

(52:36):
media at an increasingly early age. So once you're settled in,
let's say, yea, all of this goes well, you're following
the rules, your kids, your loved ones that are with you.
You're fine. You have a new job you work at
you know, the home depot or the Lows or you,
I don't know, you have an office job something like that,

(52:58):
and you are now living some version of the American dream.
The good news is, after after all the hullabaloo passes,
you only have to check in with the government once
a year. Uh. After after the hullabaloo Montana moment passes, you,
you do have to check in with him if you

(53:20):
have a big life change, if you want to move,
if you commit any kind of crime, they are going
to know about it before maybe before you do. And
any government agency that wants to contact you about anything
having to do with your old life from the very
top to the very bottom, they have to go through

(53:40):
the Department of Justice, through the OEO or the marshals.
And that can irritate some people. Some people want to
go out, which is why one in five of them
commit crimes again and get in trouble. You mean go
out like out on the town, or you mean like
just escape that life both okay, Yeah, escape the boordomand

(54:05):
or just fall back on some things that you know
how to do, and you know you can make a
little more money doing that. Maybe potentially I want to
feel alive again. Let's do an old fashioned grift. Yeah,
but seventeen percent is not bad, right, especially if you
think about people who are incarcerated and then the recidivism
rate after getting out of prison. Yeah, only and that's

(54:28):
that's about forty recidivism rate only about sixty percent of
paroled criminals managed to stay out of trouble. And again
I want to go back to some of the systemic
problems there. Do powerful forces conspire to keep the prisons
of this country or revolving door, Yes, one hundred percent.

(54:50):
It's it can be very difficult to get out of
that cycle. That's why a common saying in the US
prison system is it's easy to get in, it's hard
to get out. But like we alluded, like you're mentioning
Noel Matt, you can also just quit witness protection if
you want, you can just go. And if you leave,

(55:12):
the marshals will still keep tabs on you for the
rest of your life because they need to be able
to locate you at any time for any reason. And
again they say, if you follow the rules, they have
one hundred percent success rate. But other countries have witness
protection too, lots of countries and their independent organizations. Unfortunately,

(55:32):
not everyone is as successful as the US, and in
some cases, I'm thinking of Italy in particular, their operations
have been compromised, so your mileage may vary. But knowing
all this, the question is this for us, this for
you listening with us, would you join Witness Security. Would

(55:52):
you join Witness Protection? Yes, I think we came up
with a good name, so you adjoined it. Yeah, I
would change my name though, I want to be Crystal Pemberton.
Who okay, okay, CP, all right, I like it doesn't
really call it the initials rule though I don't care.

(56:14):
My name is Crystal. That's so Crystal of you bro
still with a K or with a C? Oh probably
a C? Okay, fair enough, classic Crystal cry sda definitely
definitely Okay. You're not gonna style on the name. Nope,
Pemberton just says you imagine, Uh are you are people
gonna call you Chris? Yes, okay, Oh that's interesting. Okay,

(56:40):
that that adds it. I'm gonna build this whole my
D and D stuff. It's gonna be awesome, fantastic. What
about you know, would you join Witness Protection? Well? Yeah,
as as opposed to the alternative of being tortured and murdered, Yeah,
it's a freaking lootly. I mean, it seems like it's
a rock and a hard place kind of joy. Nobody
wants to join Witness Protection program, but if you know,

(57:04):
given the alternative, I think it's probably a pretty pretty good.
Good bet rolling the dice there rather than just fending
for yourself. And I stand by uh Neil's barnes. I
think it's good. Please, yeah, I think it's good. Thank God.
How about you been no comment? So yeah, the Marshals

(57:29):
Service said, start a new life by doing a podcast
about conspiracies. Well you kind of just fell into it,
ben hold on, hold on, Oh no, boy, we got
I like that you're saying it's a bet though, because
that's the question you're betting against yourself. Could you participate

(57:49):
in an ongoing conspiracy every day, every hour, every minute
for the rest of your life? What do you think? Folks? Uh?
Let us know again, As as Matt said so beautifully
at the top here, if you are actively a witness protection,
don't write to us, no, we got your back, call us,

(58:10):
don't email us, because we we also want you to
be safe and anything we can do to help in
that regard probably falls under the category of not being
in contact. Correct that sounds cold, But but if you're not.
But if you're not a witness protection, we'd love to

(58:32):
hear what your thoughts. So I find us on the internet,
so somewhere, Yeah, you can if you have the Internet,
if they even lay What about the Internet? We didn't
really talk about that, right, Like do they filter your Internet?
Do they somehow limit your ability to do normal outreach
Internet type stuff? Do they closely monitor your social What

(58:54):
about social media? Do people in Witness protection have social media?
Not really? We also also we didn't mention maybe we'll
get to this in the future, but we didn't have
time to mention a side effect of increasing Witness security
folks who are associated with terrorist groups and are often

(59:14):
in the country illegally. That's another thing that's really controversial
to some people because now is that functioning as a
backdoor to something like citizenship. A lot of people find
that a lot of people object strongly to that. But
let us know your thoughts. On social media, you know
that's right. You can find us a conspiracy stuff on Twitter, YouTube,

(59:36):
and Facebook where we have our Facebook group. Here's where
it gets crazy. On Instagram and TikTok we are conspiracy
stuff show. But wait, there's more. If you have a
phone and you would like to use it to use
your mouth to talk to us, call one eight three
three stdwy t K and leave a message. You've got
three minutes. Give yourself a cool nickname. We don't care

(59:57):
what it is as long as it's not your government
name or your wit SEC name. Again, don't call us.
If you're in the program, let us know if we
can use your name and voice on the air. If
you would like to not use your mouth and voice,
why not instead use your hands and phone or computer
to email us. We are conspiracy at iHeartRadio dot com.

(01:00:36):
Stuff they don't want you to know is a production
of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.