A Deadly Rendezvous

On today’s episode, Paul and Kate head to 1963 Sydney, Australia where not one but two bodies are found on the shore of a riverbank. After learning about how they’re connected, an impressive investigation spanning decades is launched to find the cause of death. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
I'm Kate Winkler Dawson.

Speaker 2 (00:05):
I'm a journalist who's spent the last twenty five years
writing about true crime.

Speaker 3 (00:09):
And I'm Paul Hols, a retired cold case investigator who's
worked some of America's most complicated cases and solve them.

Speaker 2 (00:16):
Each week, I present Paul with one of history's most
compelling true crimes.

Speaker 3 (00:21):
And I weigh in using modern forensic techniques to bring
new insights to old mysteries.

Speaker 2 (00:26):
Together, using our individual expertise, we're examining historical true crime
cases through a twenty first century lens.

Speaker 3 (00:34):
Some are solved and some are cold, very cold.

Speaker 1 (00:38):
This is Buried Bones.

Speaker 3 (01:01):
Hey, Paul, All right, Kate, how are you?

Speaker 2 (01:04):
I'm doing well. You've been in this new gig with
OFFERAM for a while now, and I think that people
might wonder what you actually do because you've said consulting
for them, and you have made this like blood oath
even though we are never in the same city, to
me that you won't leave right right, Harry Bones. Ever,
we're in this in the long haul here, but I'm

(01:25):
loaning you out, So will you let us know kind
of what is the process with OFFEROM is as cold cases?
What do you end up doing with them specifically, Well.

Speaker 3 (01:35):
You know, basically, I'm doing what I used to do
when I was active within law enforcement. I'm just now
doing it sort of from a civilian perspective, but applying
the same skill sets, experience, as expertise that I did
when I was working the cases for the Sheriff's office,
District attorney's offices out there in Contra Costa County. And

(01:55):
you know, really what I do is I talk to
law enforcement agencies. I have an approach. The way I
approach casework is something that I've learned over time as
well as learned through formal training within crime scene investigation
crime scene reconstruction. And I take a look at the
case files. You know, if law enforcement is really needing

(02:18):
some assistance in understanding what happened and where the best
evidence is in the case, I ask for the autopsy reports,
autopsy photos, crime scene reports, crime scene photos, forensic lab results,
and I start there and I assess, you know, based
on the injuries, the cause of death to the victim,

(02:41):
other things that I'm seeing at autopsy. I can then
take that information and then interpret the evidence that I
see at the crime scene, like blood patterns at the
crime scene, and I can start reconstructing the interactions between
the offender and the victim. And then this becomes informative
in terms of where where is going to be the

(03:01):
best evidence that can help solve the case. And typically
you know, of course, it's looking for evidence that the
offender has left on inside the victim at the crime scene,
et cetera. I review the lab reports that have been
done up to this point in time, and sometimes these
are cases that are from the nineteen seventies and so

(03:23):
looking at burial technology and seeing what was done, what
were the results, what needs to be redone using modern technology,
and then make recommendations, you know, in terms of this
is the best evidence that I feel is what should
be done submitted to OTHRUM in order to move forward

(03:44):
with the genealogy process. And of course I'm also talking
to these detectives and giving investigative advice, you know, and
it's not just restricted to the DNA side, It's across
the entire spectrum of investigative tactic, investigative resources. And if
genealogy results come back, you know, I provide advice to

(04:07):
the Agency of the investigators on how to proceed with
that information because there's very specific steps in terms of
how law enforcement needs to move forward in order to
hopefully identify the offender and then generate probable cost to
make an arrest.

Speaker 2 (04:24):
So these are not specifically cold cases and right.

Speaker 3 (04:27):
No, absolutely, And that's one of the if you want
to call it, misperceptions about this genealogy tools that it's
only a cold case tool, and it is. Obviously it's
been highly successful with the older cases. But if there
is an active public safety threat, let's say there's a
serial rapist on the loose, you absolutely want to use

(04:48):
this tool in order to try to catch that rapist
before he victimizes again. And so that is part of
what I will help the investigators with. You know, we
are saving lives utilizing this this genealogy process and employing
the technology that authoram can bring to the table.

Speaker 2 (05:09):
Well, I know this really flips a switch for you
because as much as you enjoy doing podcasts, you know,
and doing various things, I know you really really love
being in the field and you want to be involved
in active cases from the seventies all the way through,
and so I know that this is like a little
bit of an itch that you needed to scratch. And
so that's great. Like I said, as long as you
come back home to us, we're okay, and you said, yes, yes.

Speaker 3 (05:35):
Yes, I have committed to you. No, but it really
has you know. It's interesting is even though I've obviously
been very busy since I retired from law enforcement and
doing the True Crime podcast, doing the True Crime TV documentaries,
and I had done some consulting with law enforcement, I
will say that, you know, by taking on this formal

(05:57):
position with author it has enhanced my mood. You know.
It's like I got a little more pep in my
step because now I feel like this might sound bad,
but I feel like I'm I'm contributing again, if that
makes sense.

Speaker 2 (06:10):
Yeah. Well, and it keeps you updated, and I mean
you're gonna learn every single tiny new development in technology
because authrooms on top of it, they're the ones doing
it and developing it, right.

Speaker 3 (06:21):
Yeah, you know, it's just fascinating to see, you know,
the technology that Authorum has been using, and then they're
constantly evaluating new technologies that haven't been utilized in casework yet,
you know, so they're very progressive. It is amazing just
to see, you know, coming out of the public sector,
we're slow moving, right with new technology and everything else.

(06:43):
We're typically quite frankly twenty years behind the private sector.
And now being on the private side, yeah, there's the
sort of the public bureaucracy isn't there, and so they
can move quickly, you know, and you still have to
abide by proper science typic principles. You need to validate
new technologies, demonstrate that these technologies are something that can

(07:07):
be used in case work without harming the evidence, and
all the various types of principles that are solid within
forensic science. But it is it is fascinating to watch
the private sector and how much quicker it can move
as emerging technologies start making their way out of the

(07:29):
research the R and D side and into actually a
practical application.

Speaker 2 (07:34):
Well, we're going to need your sciencey skills, if that's
a word, sciencey skills, sciencey. We need your sciencey skills
because this is a case that I would say is
seventy percent mystery relationships, odd circumstances, and then thirty percent
I don't understand science, and you're going to have to

(07:54):
explain it to us in a very simple way. And
this is sort of like an opera type story, I think.
So I'm excited to take you back to nineteen sixty
three Australia. Let's set the scene, Okay, we are going
to jump right into it. One of I think some
of the most interesting stories that we talk about are

(08:16):
the lover's Lane stories. It seems like an endless supply
of these, and I know, we go back to Zodiac
to talk about Lover's Lane sometimes and we've covered I
feel like at least three or four of these. I
don't think any have been as mysterious as the ones
that I'm about to tell you about. But you know,
let's just talk generally real quick about Lover's Lane. You've

(08:36):
got generally two people who are vulnerable late at night,
rural area because they want privacy, and this just seems like,
you know, the perfect opportunity of a crime of opportunity.

Speaker 3 (08:48):
I guess, well, that's exactly it. These victims they've isolated themselves,
right because they want that privacy, and they're focused on
each other typicle when they're isolated, and so it's very
easy for an offender to approach them if whether they're
in a vehicle or whether they're just at a particular

(09:09):
location and to get close to where now the offender
can exhibit some sort of control through force and or
fear and then take advantage of the victims being there
and being vulnerable. So it's something that offenders purposefully seek out.
And of course there's instances where the offender just stumbles across,

(09:32):
you know, a lover's laying type of scenario, but oftentimes
the offenders have prior knowledge of the location and so
that becomes very telling in terms of, well, is this
an offender that has local knowledge? Is this an offender
that has some prior relationship with one or the other

(09:53):
of the victims that are out there, And that's just
part of the assessment in taking a look at this
type of case.

Speaker 2 (10:04):
Well, with this type of case, like I said, one
big head scratching mystery as far as I'm concerned. So
here we are New Year's Day, always an exciting morning,
eight thirty in the morning, really early nineteen sixty three,
and we're in a suburb of Sydney, Australia called Chatswood
on the banks of a river called Lane Cove River.

(10:25):
This is a lover's lane area. But it's morning time,
so probably not going to see too many lovers out
here in the open. We have two teenage boys who
are walking along the river bank. They want to collect
golf balls, and this is the easiest way to get
to a local golf course to get golf balls I
presume to sell to golfers later on, and they see

(10:46):
a man lying down in the grass. It's New Year's Day.
He probably is recovering from drinking too much. It's summer
January in Australia, so it's warm, and they just assume
that he's passed out drunk in the grass after, you know,
having a fun night the night before. We have actually
had this happen to us in Australia before. You remember

(11:08):
the man who it was a big mystery sitting up
right on the beach. People thought he was drunk, and
then the next thing we know, he slumped over and
he's dead. And then they're trying to figure out who
this guy is. And it took decades. So I feel
like we're kind of flashing back to this, except we
will find out who this man is. So we've got
these two boys who do not want trouble with a

(11:29):
guy who could be still half drunk. They go to
the golf course, they get the golf balls, they come home.
This is about an hour and a half later. He's
still there and then the boys think something is going on.
They kind of creep closer to him. He is pale,
his lips are purple, and they freak out, as I would.
They go to a kiosk, which in Australia is kind

(11:52):
of like a snack bar for us. I might not
be describing that right, but that's the closest I think
we could get. It's at a nearby park, and the
police are they get to the scene, they check his pulse.
He is dead. Okay, so now the mystery begins. So
his face is pale, his lips are purple. Is the purple?
I don't read that description all that much. We don't

(12:14):
talk about that. Is that just blood loss or what
is that?

Speaker 3 (12:17):
This sounds just like a normal dead body at this
point in time. Obviously with the lack of blood flow
and a dead body, you know, the blood settles with gravity,
you know, and this is what we call lividity. And
so if he's you know, this is where it's like, well,
I'd need to see how he was positioned, how he

(12:39):
was laying. Are the lips purple because you know, he's
somewhat face down and you've got more blood kind of
settling towards you know, the front of the face. But
then the description should be that his face is looking flushed,
with the lips looking dark. The fact that his face
is looking pale tells me he's most likely mostly face
up and this is just lack of blood flow to

(13:04):
the lips and they're no longer, you know, looking that
nice pinkish, you know color.

Speaker 2 (13:09):
Well, let me tell you this next bit of detail,
and then I'll show you a picture. Sorry, it's not
an actual picture of the victim. It is a police
officer re enacting exactly what they believe the position that
the man was found in. But it could be helpful
for you, okay. And there's also a little bit of
a map. Okay, So he is dead. They examine him further,

(13:30):
and they notice immediately that he has socks on and
he has a shirt on, but he does not have
any underwear on. Remember Lover's lane. He has a suit
jacket and he has pants, and they have both been
placed on top of him, like covering him up, so
it looks like he's wearing them, but he's not. And

(13:51):
so that's why I didn't want to show you the
photo because that's what the police officer is doing. So
do you have any questions about that? You understand he's
half naked, he's laying down, face down, and he's covered
up with a suit jacket and pants that are his.
As maybe a modesty thing, I'm not sure.

Speaker 3 (14:09):
Well, covering anytime a victim has been covered up, you know,
that's something that behaviorally is significant. In this scenario, I'm
assuming that the suit jacket is placed over him like
it looks like he's wearing it. You know, it's almost
like anatomically correct as well as the pants. You know,
this may be the offender just trying to from people,

(14:33):
you know, walking by, like the boys. You know, if
there's just a casual glance, they're just going to think,
oh that that guy is you know, he's asleep, he's
passed out, you know, just to try to further delay
the discovery of this dead body. And I think that
that's likely what's going on here. But you know, is
it a modesty thing, I don't think so. Is it

(14:55):
a taunt with the information right now? I don't think so.
I think it literally is just well I've got a
naked dead guy here. People are going to you know,
know right away that there's something wrong. I need more
time to you know, separate myself if the offenders, the
one that covered him up, separate myself from this crime scene.

(15:15):
And so try to dress a dead body is very hard.
So let's just approximate the dress by utilizing the man's
own clothes.

Speaker 2 (15:25):
Well, it fooled the teenage boys because they walked right
by him before. I don't know how closely they got
to him, but you know, if he hadn't been covered up,
they certainly would have noticed a half naked man laying there,
just wearing socks and a shirt. So let me show
you the reenactment as I would call it. Okay, you
see the police officer there.

Speaker 3 (15:42):
Yep.

Speaker 2 (15:43):
They believe this is exactly the way that this guy
was found. Gilbert Bogel is. We'll find out his name.

Speaker 3 (15:49):
Okay. So I'm looking at a photo of this man
laying face down. The photo shows his head closest to
the camera and his feet furthest away. His right arm
is up and out to the right with his hand
there has a shirt on. Head is turned to his right,

(16:14):
and he's literally just laying on his stomach, you know,
face down. Now his face being turned the way it is,
he's not you know, it's not straight down into the ground,
but turned all the way to the right. And this
is where the description I was talking about earlier related
to his face looks pale. That's because the blood, you know,

(16:38):
he's turned to his right, so the right part of
his face is high and the left part of his
face is low, and so the blood is going to
be settling down to the left side of his face,
which you can't see. So all the parts of the
face that you can see, the blood has drained out of,

(16:59):
if you will. And that that's why his face from
the position he's lying in looks pale, and his lips
also would look pale, and in all likelihood, when they
moved the victim, the left side of the face would
be more purplish looking and would have clear areas where

(17:19):
that side of his face is actually in the ground.
You know, that's where the compression of the tissue doesn't
allow this blood you know that's draining down into it
to be there. And that type of once this lividity sets,
blood will if the dead body is moved shortly after
you know, the blood is settled. The blood can repartition

(17:39):
with gravity, but after a certain point, this blood sets,
this lividity sets, And so this is where I would
be able to take a look at the lividity patterns
in a dead body and determine if that dead body
had been moved after death and after the lividity settled,
because then it's not consistent with the position of the

(18:00):
body has found.

Speaker 2 (18:01):
Well, I think this is an interesting reenactment because if
you look at those pants, they are laid perfectly out,
like I could absolutely see why the boys walked by him.
And if you look at the grass, it's flattened out.
I mean, this is not He is not in brush,
he hasn't been tossed in brush. He's open. So it
fooled these boys.

Speaker 3 (18:20):
In this approximation of how the victim was found, there's
no question that the person who is putting his suit
pants and suit coat over the victim is doing this
just to try to delay discovery of the body. Now,
you know, if this grass is representative of how trampled

(18:43):
down the grass was around the victim's body, you know
that indicates that there is probably a fair amount of
some sort of activity surrounding the victim in the victim's body,
whether that's the you were talking to, A lover's lane
is at the victim with another person and they were
at this location, and then that other person has gone,
and maybe is a victim that's at a different location,

(19:06):
or was there some sort of interaction between this dead
male and the offender. Let's say there's a fight or
a struggle in which now you have a lot of
the surrounding brush that's being trampled during that fight. Of course,
you haven't told me anything about his injuries yet, so
I can only speculate as to whether or not it

(19:26):
indicates that, you know, there was combat between the victim
and an offender.

Speaker 2 (19:30):
Right, And we'll get to injuries, and we'll get to
his partner in just a minute, and I'll show you
a map. But I have to let this unfold organically,
like the police officers would. Okay, something interesting, he has
something weird in between the suit and his shirt there.
Describe it as underfelt. It's the material that goes between

(19:53):
a floor and a carpet. Okay, so you know, I
would say a carpet pad for me, But it says
it's a square that's been laid over him. It could
be something that was found and the offender just wanted
to put something, you know, on his back. But it's
of course very clear that he was not the one
who did this because it was on his back. He
didn't cover himself up in this way. Is what the

(20:16):
investigators believe. It's weird, but they just are noting everything.

Speaker 3 (20:20):
My initial thought with that is this felt was probably
something that was either at the scene or if this
is the location in which the offender had access to,
let's say, his vehicle. You know, his initial thought is
I need to cover up this body, and so he
brings the felt out and then he gets the idea
to utilize the man's own clothing. That would be my
initial guess as to why this felt is there. You know,

(20:44):
I've got one case that I can think of in
which a woman's body had been transported in the offender's
vehicle and this foam padding had stuck to the woman's
face because of the blood, and so when the offender
pulled the body out, the woman's body out, that foam
just went with the woman and her body. And that happens,

(21:06):
you know, especially in the haste that these offenders are
trying to cover up the crime and get away. Here
right now with what I know, I don't know if
this man's body was transported from a different location and
placed here, or if this is where the man was
killed with the felt I can't say. Is that something
out of the offender's environment, or was it from the

(21:27):
crime scene and the offender just took advantage that it
was there.

Speaker 2 (21:33):
Well, let's continue on, because the police now want to
know who he was here with. They search at about
forty feet away from the man, along the river bank,
they find another body. The teenagers had not seen this body.
There's a lot going on. There's like mangroves and all
kinds of you know, vegetation. Even though it looks sort

(21:53):
of clear where the man was, she was a little
more hidden. Her dress is not fully on, it's her waist.
Her body had been covered by flattened cardboard beer boxes,
which we assume came from the area. She's on her back,
so she's laying face up, but for some reason the
investigators think that she had been covered up. Also, I'm

(22:15):
not clear why they think that, because I don't know
why she wouldn't if she wanted to pull the cardboard
over her. I don't know why she would, but they
feel like somebody else covered her up. Let me tell
you two more pieces of information and then I'll let
you loose on this. Her feet and her knees are muddy.
She had two abrasions, one on her nose and one
on her shoulder. The man and the woman's underwear. The

(22:37):
woman's underwear was off, his belt was off. They all
three are found near her. So both bears of underwear
and his belt are off, and there is also vomit
and feces near both people. And that is that so far,
I told you, head scratcher.

Speaker 3 (22:56):
The initial things that I am wanting to try to
determine is assuming that the the two dead victims work together.
I'm assuming that we're talking a lover's laane type of thing,
and then somebody comes and kills the two. Is where
was the initial contact? You know, are the is one

(23:18):
or the other victims bodies? The location of where, let's
say during life, they are engaged in let's let's say
some sort of consensual sexual encounter, and then an offender
comes up to them and one or the other, you know,
it ultimately is separated or is there a third location

(23:39):
where the offender initially contacts the victims and each of
the victims' bodies are now in two separate locations, you know,
And is the offender moving these victims' bodies to try
to hide them? I think the you know, the both victims'
bodies being covered, you know, strongly suggests that, you know,
the offender is trying to delay discovery. So that's the

(24:00):
initial thing that I would want to try to determine
and looking at this case because there could be evidence
at a completely different location than where the two victims'
bodies are discovered. Now, with the woman obviously you know,
the face up, the dress being down, you know, her
underwear is off, is there a possibility that, you know,

(24:22):
some of that could have occurred with the consensual accounter
with her partner, but it also could be the offender.
You know, this is a sexually motivated crime, And in
this particular scenario, I would always assume that there is
a sexual motivated crime with either one of the victims.
Can't say it's just the woman, you know, I've got

(24:44):
a man that's also nude from the waist down with
the woman, you know, the mud on her knees and
on her feet, you know, with the feet, is this
something that it looks like she was upright in the
mud or was stomping around in the mud? I doubt,
you know, going there with their partner, that they are
purposely going to try to go into some muddy location

(25:04):
as part of their consensual encounter. So this likely is
something that's happening later in the series of events that happened.
The abrasion to her nose, you know, that's that's a
little bit interesting from just well what does it look like,
because sometimes you can have abrasions to the nose during
like asphyxiation attempts, you know, if something is being pressed

(25:28):
against her face or during a struggle. Of course, you
know that an abrasion could easily happen, whether it's you know,
from the offender's own garments or her face is being
pressed down into the ground during a struggle. You know,
who knows what's going on there. But that's probably at
this point all I can discern without you telling me more.

Speaker 2 (25:51):
Well, I know you want to hear about the autopsy
and you know all of those results, and normally I
would say sure, Paul, but I'm going to wait because
I do I want to tell you about. I think
the dynamic between these two people is going to be important.
It's not going to take long, and then we can
get into the nitty gritty of the investigation. These are
interesting people, to say the least. So the bodies are

(26:14):
quickly identified through IDs as doctor Gilbert Boegel, he's thirty eight,
and missus Margaret Chandler, who's ten years younger. They are
married to other people. They are together, and he is
a physicist who works at a place called the Commonwealth
Scientific and Industrial Research Organization, which is CSIRO I love acronyms.

(26:38):
It's an Australian government agency that does research across a
bunch of different areas of science. Margaret had worked there
before she got married to a guy named Jeffrey and
they had two kids and one is only nine months old.
Jeffrey is a lab tech. Her husband he works there.
So now you've got three people who are connected through
this research organization. So Gilbert Bogel is this rock star physicist.

(27:05):
He's from New Zealand. He was a Rhodes scholar. He
is actually supposed to leave to work at Bell Laboratories,
in the US in just a few weeks. He, as
I said, is married. He's got four kids who the
youngest is four months old. So these are two people
who are together in lover's lane. Of course, the press

(27:25):
latches on once this all comes out, and of course
the lead is that this incredible physicist who probably has
all sorts of secrets from the government off Australia to
be able to sell whenever he wants, and it turns
into a big conspiracy. There's that angle, But there also
becomes the angle of of course you've got two married people,
and you've got a lab tech as a husband who

(27:48):
is jealous and certainly jealous that his wife is sleeping
with a physicist at their company. You know, she's having
an extra marital fair. The interesting thing is they were
in an open marriage. They're part of the subculture in
Sydney called the Sydney Push. I had never heard of
this before. From the nineteen forties to the nineteen seventies.

(28:11):
It's a movement of intellectuals like Jeffrey Boegel and academics
and journalists who would get together in Sydney's pubs and
private residences for parties and debates. But there's this free
love aspect to it, and open relationships are very acceptable,
and everybody in their circle knew that both of these

(28:31):
couples were engaged in an open relationship. Now we can
stop there, because the words open relationship to me are
a red flag when we're talking about murder. But it
really does seem like this was, you know, the kind
of relationship where it didn't bother you know, any of
these couples to switch partners.

Speaker 3 (28:50):
You've mentioned to potential investigative motives if you will, and
you know this idea that Gilbert has states or you
know whatever, and maybe he was killed for those purposes.
Now you've got what, on the surface appears to be
almost your typical lover's triangle, but that gets mitigated somewhat

(29:15):
by the culture that they're in, these open marriages. And
of course Jeffrey, the husband of Margaret, would have to
be extensively interviewed, you know, about not not only you know,
potentially his role on the homicide, but also trying to
establish you know, how accepting he is of Margaret, you know,

(29:36):
going and seeing Gilbert. But then there's you know, other
potential motive, which is your random As I mentioned, before
somebody just happened to stumble across them. You can't rule
anything out at this stage, and the investigation with the
information that we have.

Speaker 2 (29:54):
Well, let me tell you the details of what ends
up happening. This is a very new affair. I don't
even know if you if it's an open relationship. I
don't even know if you called an affair, we would say,
I guess we'll say relationship. This is a new relationship.
Margaret and Gilbert had just met ten days earlier at
a Christmas party. The night of New Year's Eve, Margaret
and Gilbert and Jeffrey, her husband, all go to a

(30:17):
party at a photographer's house who works for this research organization.
Gilbert's wife stays home because they had a little kid.
And this guest list is from the upper echelons of
this scientific community. And Margaret's husband is this lab tech
who looks at Margaret and says, this is not my scene.

(30:39):
I want to go to a different party where there
are younger people. He has been seeing someone for five
months openly. Her name's Pamela Logan. He says, Pamela is
at that party. I'm going to go over there, and Margaret,
his wife had been chatting up Gilbert, and he said,
see how things go with Gilbert. I'm going to go
meet up with Pamela and I'll see you later. And

(31:01):
of course, you know grain of salt, but this is
what everybody witnessed at this New Year's Eve party. There
was no acrimony. They kind of kissed goodbye and separated,
and you know, Jeffrey said, I'm going to go to
a less pretentious party and we have later on when
we talk about an alibi, Pamela backs him up and says, yeah,
we met up. Because the police focus on Jeffrey, there's

(31:24):
no actual evidence against him. He says, he meets up
with Pamela, and then he goes back to meet up
with his wife at the first party, and she says,
I want to stay. Gilbert's here, and he says, okay,
I'm going to go pick up Pamela from the second party.
The two of them go and pick up Jeffrey and
Margaret's kids from Margaret's house parents' house, and then Pamela

(31:48):
stays in the car, and so you know, Gilbert and Margaret.
Everybody sees them. The victims leave together from this party.
Jeffrey is with somebody. He's either at Margaret's parents' house
picking up kids, or he's with Pamela, the woman he's
sleeping with, or he's you know, at one of two
parties where there are tons of people who witness. This

(32:09):
doesn't mean anything happen. It just means like the police
are steimied at this point because the gel's husband angle
isn't really working for them. I know that was a lot, Sorry, Paul.
They're busy couples.

Speaker 3 (32:21):
Yeah, no, for sure, you know. And and of course
it's this is you know, Jeffrey's alibi, you know, And it's,
as we've discussed in prior cases, it's really trying to
assess the veracity of his alibi. Now, on the surface,
it sounds pretty good at this point in time that yeah,

(32:41):
he's his whereabouts are accounted for, and there doesn't appear
to be any emotional issues that would cause concern that
Jeffrey was having problems with Margaret and Gilbert being together.
But we're talking about a stretch of time before the victims'

(33:01):
bodies are found. So what happened from the time that
nobody can account for Jeffrey, Jeffrey's whereabouts and the time
that the victims' bodies are found. You know, Pamela has
a strong connection to Jeffrey, and is she somebody that
would be willing to lie, you know, in order to
protect him. Margaret's parents being family, you know, potentially would

(33:27):
also protect Jeffrey. But the issue there is it's their
daughter that has ended up dead, you know, so if
they're suspicious of Jeffrey, I think that they would be
more willing to say, hey, you know, there were some
other issues going on. But also we don't know after
both couples leave these groups that they're with, was there

(33:49):
any interaction between anybody, you know, Jeffrey, Margaret and Gilbert.
We're all a saiden. Things went sideways very quickly, but
we don't have any witnesses to that. You know, that's
always a possibility.

Speaker 2 (34:00):
And Jeffrey and Pamela say they went back to I
think it was Pamela's house and that was that. And
what's interesting is well, I mean, luckily for Jeffrey, people
saw him all over town off and on all night.
He apparently drove a really unusual type of car that
people It was a vintage Vauxhall which I looked up
and is pretty cool. And everybody remembered it. So he's

(34:23):
driving around all over town with this hot woman, Pamela,
and so people remember it. I'm not saying anything didn't happen.
I'm just saying that this is, you know, he seems
more solid than many of the husbands we talk about.

Speaker 3 (34:35):
Yes, of course, early on in the investigation, Jeffrey is
going to be a prime person that has to be
looked at strongly by investigators. But as the information about
Jeffreys Squareabouts comes into play and how accepting of you know,
this kind of open marriage environment or culture that they

(34:58):
are in, Jeffrey gets reduced as being a suspect. He's
not eliminated as a suspect in my mind, but most
certainly now other potential investigative avenues need to probably be
more strongly pursued than Jeffrey.

Speaker 2 (35:13):
Yeah. And one thing that I think was a red
flag for the media, not for the police, but for
the media was that when he has taken to see
his wife at the Morgue, he doesn't show very much
emotion when he sees her body. And I just think,
I mean, that's just silly to judge somebody off of
their knee jerk reaction of seeing their dead loved one

(35:35):
laying on a slab. I just I can't. I don't
think you can predict that. And he just said, what
am I supposed to do? I'm surrounded by a huge
crowd of police officers and I'm not going to break
down and cry there. But police did wonder about that
reaction too.

Speaker 3 (35:50):
No, but you know, again, everybody reacts differently, and of course,
you know, men, we have a tendency to be more
hiding our emotions, especially if we're around other men, you know,
So there's nothing about that that I would put any
weight on. You know, it be noticed, but it's like
I can I can kind of understand, you know, internally

(36:12):
he may be getting maybe breaking up, but he's not
showing it externally.

Speaker 2 (36:16):
And you know, back to the theory that doctor Bogel
was killed because of his research as a physicist in
state secrets and he's taking off for the US in
a few weeks. His colleague said, this guy didn't know anything.
This was not a state secret kind of person. He
didn't have that kind of knowledge. So the police scratched
that off their list. Now things get interesting because now

(36:41):
we have to figure out how they died. So the
medical examiner looks at their bodies and there is nothing
wrong with them. There's no defensive rooms. I mean except
for the scratch that I mentioned to you about from
Margaret and some abrasions on her knees, which could have
come from you know, in her time with Gilbert before
she died. Yeah, and frankly the scratch could have also.

(37:02):
I mean, we don't know, but there's nothing wrong with
either one of them their bodies. They're doing an autopsy
and they're looking and they're saying, there just seems like nothing.
So they think poison. And this is why it's an
interesting story. What do you think.

Speaker 3 (37:18):
No, I have to rely upon the medical examiners or
the pathologist's findings. You know, if there's no obvious cause
of death, then of course toxicology is going to be
key to try to figure out what caused them to die.
If it is a poisoning. Let's say Gilbert and Margaret
are together and then they're both starting to succumb to

(37:39):
whatever poison. This is where you could see where one
or the other ends up walking away, and that's why
the two bodies are distributed. But then the offender, they
didn't cover themselves up. The offender is there, right, you know,
so is the offender just watching waiting for them to
die if he administered or she administered a poison. I

(38:00):
don't know this. This is sounding a little goofy to me,
but of course I'm sure you're going to reveal at
some point, you know, what the toxicology results are.

Speaker 2 (38:11):
Well, it is very frustrating for everybody involved this toxicology
root that they go down. Well, first of all, they say,
well this is poison. Clearly Jeffrey poison them. I think
I don't know poor Jeffrey. I mean, he was pursued
vigorously by the police. So the toxicologist had limited resources.

(38:32):
This is sixty three, nineteen sixty three. There was somebody
who wrote a book who I'll mention later, but this
is a quote from the book, and it says that
the toxicologist, with his limited resources, was you know, looking
to see what kind of poison would have caused this.
He spent thirteen months. This was a long investigation, day
and night. He went through every possible poison looking for

(38:54):
the killing agent. He spoke to experts around the world,
the FBI, Britain, and nobody could help and it's a conundrum,
and I can describe what he did find. So if
you think somebody has been poisoned, do you really have
to do that? Do you have to Is there one
test per poison? With hundreds of you know, poisonous plants,

(39:15):
and of course like man made poisons, do you literally
have to run one hundred and to two hundred tests
to figure out what happened? There's not one catch all
that'll you know, tell you about three tests or three poisons.

Speaker 3 (39:27):
Basically, you know, most poisons are grouped into a certain
class of compounds, and so in modern toxicology we have
screening methods. So if we want to find opiates, as
an example, the screening method will see, you know, the
various types of opiates that somebody could have ingested or

(39:51):
injected in the system, and so you get this positive
for opiates. Now you can key in on using a
specif type of test methodology to identify which opiate is
in that person's system. Now, there are substances that kind
of stand alone, and yes, you need to specifically perform

(40:14):
tests for those particular substances or you won't detect them,
you know. And the problem, of course is is that
you have a limited sample to begin with, and in
nineteen sixty three, the testing methods aren't going to be
very sensitive. So every time the toxicologists is performing a test,
whether it be off of the blood or the urine

(40:35):
or tissue, vitreous humor whatever substance out of the body
was collected, they're consuming some of that sample, you know,
So you can only do so many tests. You can
at a certain point completely consume the sample and not
identify what toxin, what poison is in these victims' bodies.
So this is where, you know, I'm kind of curious

(40:56):
to see, you know, what this toxicologist did find and
is that going to be revealing as to what substance
maybe may have been used.

Speaker 2 (41:04):
Well, when the police here this could be poisoned, they
are immediately dispatched back to the crime scene. They go
to the river bank they want to see or is
there a vial, is there a bottle, or there're syringes.
We're in Australia. Where are the venomous spiders? I'm assuming
there are probably snakes everywhere. They test all the plates,
the food, scraps, cutlery, empty bottles from the party where

(41:28):
they were, Where Gilbert and Margaret were. They get help
from scientists around the world for ideas on what kind
of poisonous compound they could test for, and they start
testing for hundreds of compounds, and here's what they find.
To help guide them a little bit, the toxicologist says,
here's the weird thing. The blood appears to be a

(41:50):
purple color in both of them. The key to him
that he thinks that this purple color blood means poison,
and both of them have it. Both have purple blood.
He said that any number of poisons could have caused this.
A newspaper report says that examiners found a knotted area
near the heart on both Gilbert and Margaret that looks

(42:13):
to them like strychnine poisoning. Gilbert's got more of it,
you know, in his system, but Margaret it's easy to
miss this little knotted area negative for STRYC nine. So
that is like the physical manifestation of if this is
poison what they're saying it actually looks like in their body.
What do you think about that.

Speaker 3 (42:32):
Well, it's a physical observation, you know, and I'm not
familiar with what would turn blood purple, but it's definitely
something you know today that could be researched and see what,
you know, what various chemicals would cause that type of
color chase. We know, for example, carbon monoxide you know,

(42:56):
that turns the blood very bright red. You know, so
there's that, you know, this is not an unheard of phenomenon,
this purple color change. You know, that's where I would
be googling the hell out of that and generating a
list of possible substances that would would cause that that

(43:16):
have this type of potent effect. Assuming you know, they're
they're seen, and they're fine leaving the party that night.
You know, this whatever poison this is is fast acting.
You know, that's right right. It's not like they were
hospitalized and succumbed to you know, organ failure and all that.

(43:38):
This is something that is probably interrupting a poison that
is interrupting the nervous system, you know, preventing them from
being able to breathe or something along those lines. So
it's it is a very potent chemical that is in
their bodies for you know, basically it's one hundred percent
fatal for both you know, the two victims that were

(43:59):
exposed to it. If this is truly a poisoning.

Speaker 2 (44:02):
Well, the toxicologist makes an interesting observation. He agrees with you.
This had to have been fast acting. He said, what
he had been testing for based on like the purple color,
strych nine and that kind of stuff. He said, if
that had been slipped into their drinks at the party,
they would not have felt well enough to have sex.
And they found fresh seamen on Gilbert's jacket, which indicated

(44:26):
to them that they were having sex. So he said,
whatever happened to them happened there on the riverbank. I
don't think this was something that happened at one of
these wild parties, and it sounds like that's something that
you think is probably likely.

Speaker 3 (44:39):
Also, the covering of the bodies, I mean indicates the
offender is likely there, you know, at least after they're dead,
and is trying to hide the bodies. Now, the victims
voluntarily go to this location in order to engage in
consensual sex, you know, what is their relationship with who
the offender is? For the offen to be able to

(45:02):
apply a poison to them get them to ingest something,
is this, you know, a friendly encounter? You know, maybe
it's another person in this open marriage type of thing
that tastes coming over and saying, hey, you know, it's
now my turn with Margaret or whatever, right, and but

(45:23):
has bad intention and it's like, hey, let's have a
drink before the three of us engage in a consensual encounter.
I don't know, it is odd, but it's something where
the offenders there definitely after the victims are dead, but
may have been there prior to the victims being dead,
and somehow is administering a poison to both victims at
the scene. So that's the big mystery for me is

(45:46):
how does the offender do that?

Speaker 2 (45:48):
Yeah, it's interesting. This is you know, making all kinds
of headlines around the world, of course, and they're asking
for help from around the world to Australia's benefit here. Okay,
So they find a receipt in More's pocket for a
dog deworming tablet set of tablets she had bought from
a docs and breeder. They have several dogs, and they

(46:09):
asked the breeder would these deworming tablets hurt people if
it had been like some odd murder suicide packed using
dewarmer pills, And of course the breeders said, I would
have made them upset. I'm not sure this would have
killed them, And of course there was no evidence in
their digestive system, so they are really kind of up
shit creek at this point. The police, and while the

(46:32):
toxicologists are spending thirteen months running tests on hundreds of
different compounds based on this purple blood, the police want
to know, Okay, so they were poisoned, how did that happen?
Somebody covered them up? So they keep trying to figure out, Okay,
you know, maybe this is a different person than the killer,

(46:54):
maybe there's no killer at all. And they start looking
kind of trying to track down near dwells, and they
said that they want to look for someone who at
least knew that the couple was dead because the bodies
had been covered up. They zero in on a voyeur
named Raymond Challice, who often hangs out on Lover's Lane. Gross.
Raymond contacted the police himself and said, listen, I saw

(47:17):
these people. They were on the river bank. But he
didn't actually see them have sex, he didn't see them die,
and he listened to this. The police say, well, this
is not the guy who gave them poison, This is
not the guy who killed him. This is not the
guy who covered him up because he only has one
arm and they don't think that he could have covered

(47:37):
them up. I don't know why they, you know, dismissed
this guy, but he only has one arm, and so
they dismissed him. And plus he had come to the
police and said, I saw them, but you know, they
were alive when I saw him, and I was gone, sure,
you know.

Speaker 3 (47:50):
And in some ways he's inserting himself into the investigation,
but he also could just be, you know, a good
witness and is doing the right thing, the one arm thing,
you know. I don't know what to make of that,
you know. Right now, it's hard to assess any physical
attributes the offender has because we don't know how the

(48:10):
victims died, you know, and one armed person can easily,
you know, lay out clothing on top of a dead body,
you know, So I don't know about that, you know,
But this this one armed guy is at least able
to you know, just take in his information at face value.
Place the victims at a location at a certain time

(48:31):
and still be alive. So whatever happened to them happened
after that point in time. If the guy's telling the truth.

Speaker 2 (48:38):
Okay, let's move on to developments that I think will
probably be interesting for you. So one thing that I
had neglected to tell you oops accidentally. The police had
wanted to drag the river where they were to see
if anything had been dumped, you know, syringes, anything like that,
but they couldn't because the river was so so black

(49:00):
and murky with pollution that they could not go into
the river. It was not safe. And now comes the
most what I think people consider the most plausible cause
of death, which is they believe and this is now
stretching into two thousand and six and a book that
came out in two thousand and sixteen, the belief is

(49:24):
that it is possible that this couple had been made
sick by organic material decomposing from the pollution of the
Lane Cove River, hydrogen sulfide, that they had all the
earmarks for it, and it was a river that was
making people sick. Anytime anybody spent any time near the river,

(49:45):
it was making people physically ill. And I have a
lot of info, lots of science y off room type info.

Speaker 3 (49:52):
You know, Hydrogen sulfide or dihydrogen sulfide. Yes, that is
a noxious gas that smells like rotten eggs. Like, if
you want to go and you know, engage in consensual
sexual encounter, this is not the environment you want to
be in. I do not see Gilbert and Margaret if

(50:13):
there's a if there is a high level of dihydrogen
sulfide or hydrogen sulfide in the in the air, it's
not going to be a place where they want to be.
It's going to smell horrific. This is an open environment,
you know. So it is the theory that they are
breathing in this noxious gas or is it something that

(50:34):
the mud itself, you know, has a higher concentration and
because they're down laying on the ground during this consensual encounter,
that they are now getting a high exposure of it.
You know, I have I have questions about this, you
know that First it's like, why Gilbert and Margaret and
not other people who are going to this lover's lane.

(50:56):
Why did they end up dead and not others? You know,
maybe people are fall and ill due to the pollution. Yeah,
I mean it's definitely something that Yeah, I'm not ruling
it out, but I just I'm skeptical. It's probably the
way i'd put it at this point, and you go
back to the victim's bodies were covered, and if they
had just died from pollution, who's covering their bodies? And

(51:19):
why are they're covering the bodies? You know, that to
me tends to suggest that there's some mouthfeasance by the
person who's covering their bodies. So that's that's odd. I'm
not liking this toxic gas due to pollution theory and
that this was just an accidental death right now, you know,
unless you know some transient you know, wanders through and

(51:40):
is like, well, two dead bodies. People know, I'm here
a lot, I just want to get away, and I'm
just going to cover them up, you know, something odd
like that, which is not unheard of, But right now
I'm skeptical.

Speaker 2 (51:51):
Well, not a transient guy. A greyhound trainer.

Speaker 3 (51:55):
What like as in Greyhound the dog.

Speaker 2 (51:57):
Yep, there's a man named Eddie Teaste. He would illegally
run his dogs, the greyhound dogs that would race and
people would gamble on. He used the golf course to
run these dogs illegally. This is the same golf course
where the teenage boys would show up and get the
golf balls. He was there that night running the dogs

(52:19):
after the golf course had shut down. He is very religious.
He is very straight laced, and his son said, I
believe when my dad came back through he saw the
bodies and he covered him up because he is very religious.
He said, my dad wouldn't admit it, but everybody knows
that's what happened. And he didn't call the police because

(52:40):
he was doing something illegal, so he covered them up
out of propriety. And when he died, there was an
obituary in a greyhound trade magazine that said he was
the one who covered up the bodies. He just felt
like it was right. And I don't know if he
thought that they died of pollution or what. So isn't
that interesting you had said that and then this is

(53:01):
what this son says, that's absolutely what my dad would
have done.

Speaker 3 (53:04):
Yeah, but it's one thing to say that's what my
dad would have done. But did the dad do it?
Did this man at some point ever come forward and
say yeah, I mean running the greyhounds? You know, back
in nineteen sixty three. How much longer did this man live?
And why not just come forward and say yeah, I
did it, Yeah, I was doing that illegal thing with

(53:25):
the greyhounds. Nobody, you know, ten years later, nobody's going
to go after him for that. Why not just say yeah,
I did this, you know, with such a high profile case,
with such a mystery, I'm the one who did it,
and it would help further the investigation as opposed to
the speculation by the sun.

Speaker 2 (53:40):
Yeah. I understand what you mean. You know, the son
did not give specifics on why he felt so strongly
that this happened, how he knew that his dad would
have taken that route and he was his dad was
gone that night. I think his son just put the
pieces together. But let me give you more information, because
we do have. I would this accounts later on. There

(54:01):
are people who were there and didn't want to come
forward because they were scared also, and I can tell
you what they said. But let me do the science.
Is it okay to do the science stuff first?

Speaker 3 (54:12):
Sure, you're so frustrated.

Speaker 2 (54:16):
I can't make it easy all the time on you, Paul. Okay,
So we're back to hydrogen sulfide. So here's the history
of the Lane Cove River, which is not a place
you want to swim, at least in this time period.
So in the forties, people living near the river said,
this is an awful smell coming off of it. There's
discoloration in their bathroom hardware and paint. They said that

(54:36):
they think their children are struggling to breathe. In nineteen
forty seven, there are complaints that large numbers of dead
fish and black sand on the river banks by a
bridge are popping up, and this is where the bodies
are eventually found. So in the wake of these complaints,
that's a long time ago, but in the wake of
the complaints, in nineteen forty eight, the local commission issues

(54:57):
a study on the river. The scientist who carries ou
the investigation says he didn't feel well while he was
doing this. He said, when he was investigating, he witnessed
an explosion from the river bank with a lot of
black muck bubbling up, and he said truckloads of dead
fish came up. His study found that the river bottom
had high concentrations of hydrogen sulfate from a nearby flour

(55:19):
mill that had been dumping waste into the river for
sixty years, and in an area of the river that
was dammed right where Margaret and Gilbert were, the gas
could build up and the river bottom could suddenly release
large amounts of hydrogen sulfight, and it goes on and
on and on. But essentially this is like, it sounds

(55:41):
like the most polluted river they have found incredibly high
levels of hydrogen sulfight. And to address and then I'm
going to let you lose on this, to address what
you had said about the rotten eggs, they acknowledge this.
The scientists acknowledged this, But this is what they say.
Happens at a low concentration hydrogen Sulfit doesn't have a
smell at a concentration that can make someone sick to

(56:05):
your stomach rotten eggs, exactly what you said. But at
the very highest concentration, it smells sickly sweet, and before
you know it, it can instantly paralyze the olfactory nerve
and disrupt your ability to absorb oxygen. A person poisoned
by large concentrations the same amount that they found coming

(56:25):
from this river would panic, become disoriented, and then die.
By the way, then your blood would be discolored purple
with hydrogen sulfite, is what a more recent toxicologist had said.

Speaker 3 (56:37):
Yeah, and that does make sense to me from you know,
the different concentrations of this chemical and how it changes,
you know, the smell, because that's something when we were
heavily involved in processing drug labs early out of my career,
you know, that was something that we had to be
very cognizant of. Is that some of the these chemicals

(57:01):
that our noses would say, hey, be careful. At a
certain point you can no longer smell it, and then
you're really in danger. So I think my skepticism is
reduced for sure with what you had just described. I
am absolutely puzzled why anybody would want to go near

(57:21):
this river, you know, you know, you know, voluntarily, you know,
for a consensual encounter. It sounds like the last place
anybody would want to go.

Speaker 2 (57:34):
But what if it's the describe it as like sickly sweet,
like I don't know if that's like rolling around in
a magnolia bush or something. But it's not the rotten
egg smell, they say, it is the sweeter smell. I
don't know. And the investigators bring that up too, So
you know, as we move forward here, you know, we
know that this could have happened very quickly. In addition,

(57:56):
if you needed any more convincing, they said that they
were very close to the water level where they were found,
and sulfide hydrogen sulfide is heavier than air, so a
person someone laying down would be exposed to higher concentrations
more than a person standing up. And the air was
so still that night that the gas could have collected

(58:18):
and concentrated at a low lying area. And the exact
spot where they are found is underneath a little outcropping
where the moungroves are on the other side, and there's
kind of like a little bowl where they think the
gas could have collected. So all of this is kind
of comes out in this book in twenty sixteen by
a guy named Peter, But he's the one who kind

(58:40):
of came up with this theory to begin with, and
he came out with witnesses who are really interesting. So
and now it sounds like you are saying that you
kind of buy this pollution killed these two people potentially.
You know, there's a toxicologist that they brought over from
America in two thousand and who looked at the lab

(59:00):
reports of pathology reports and said, I think they inhaled something.
I don't think they ate anything, and I think it's
hydrogen sulfide. So I don't know that's where we are
until we hear from these witnesses.

Speaker 3 (59:11):
Yeah, you know, I, as I mentioned as you provided
sort of a foundation for the findings. Yeah, my skepticism
is now okay, I'm starting to buy into this, but
I want to hear more before I'm willing to sign
off that this is just an accidental death.

Speaker 2 (59:30):
Now, you can tell me what you think about this.
So this book comes out Peter Butt, who was also
a filmmaker. In the book, he quotes a retired psychologist
who says that in early nineteen sixty five, so this
is two years after their deaths. Two years later, a
woman who had been an eyewitness to the deaths told
him this psychologist what she saw that night, and the

(59:54):
psychologist in turn told this filmmaker. The woman who wasn't
a patient, she it was just somebody that this man
helped one night, has never come forward to authorities. So
this is not just secondhand. It's third hand information. But
you can tell me what you think about it. So,
according to the psychologist, this woman went with another woman

(01:00:17):
to the river bank in the wee hours of New
Year's Day. And the reason she hasn't come forward. Is
because the woman she went with was her girlfriend as
in partner, and this was not going to be you know,
a positive thing if anybody found out about it. And
on top of that, you know, same sex relationships were
illegal in Australia at this point, and she was from
a very Catholic family. The two women were on the

(01:00:40):
riverbank for a little bit, so I mean, now you
got another couple. It must not have smelled that bad
because you've got other people who were there for a while.
The woman who talked to the psychologist said, I left
my purse behind where they were. They were going to
walk back. They backtracked and when they got back to
the river bank there was a couple having sex, you know,
Gilbert and Mark having sex on the ground by the

(01:01:01):
river bank. The two women freaked and they hid in
the bushes. Not to be weird, but they just wanted
to get the flip in person leave and not get
caught and arrested or something or get fined. They stayed
for a little bit low on the ground and there
was a little depression where they had, you know, were
able to scoot down to kind of stay out of sight.

(01:01:23):
They had been close to the hydrogen sulfide. They were
feeling very ill, and she said that she and her
girlfriend heard the woman say, why have you stopped to
Gilbert the man having sex with her? They don't hear
the man say anything, and the woman says, keep ongoing.
Then they look and they can see her. She grabs

(01:01:44):
her throat, she makes a strangling noise, and she staggers away.
The man lurches away a little bit, and the witnesses
run to go get the person. Then take off, and
they can smell something weird, kind of rotten, kind of sweet.
So this is what they say happened. They saw the
actual deaths happen. The victims separated, you know, and the

(01:02:04):
women grab the person, took off and never looked back.
What do you think about that?

Speaker 3 (01:02:09):
What appears that the details that she's providing add up
with the bindings, you know, with the crime scene. You know,
I think part of the way that I would want
to assess her statements, just to increase confidence, is have
her take me to this location, you know, versus am
I dealing with somebody who's read the accounts and has
has constructed something. Okay, take me to the location where

(01:02:31):
did you see them having sex? You know what directions?
Did you see each one of them? You know, start
stumbling off? And if everything is adding up but she
was able to do that, then yeah, I would put
one hundred percent credibility into what she's saying. Right now.
I'm definitely thinking she she saw things. I just want
to kind of, you know, get that extra confidence and go, yep, okay,

(01:02:53):
you know I've a I've got a good witness here.

Speaker 2 (01:02:56):
Well, I will say, you know, that is the end
of this story. This is still kind of an unsolved case,
but this is the most plausible theory that has popped up.
It has all come from this guy, Peter Butt's documentary
and in his book. Jeffrey shows up in the documentary
and he said, I think this was an industrial accident
that killed my wife and Gilbert. And you know, he said,

(01:03:19):
we would have continued on. Everything would have been fine
if they had been smarter. I guess about where they
picked a lover's lane. But the people had that had
showed up to this riverbank. It just that everybody felt
really sick and nauseous. I just had no idea the
fact that they were laying down would have exposed them
so much more than these two women who were even

(01:03:40):
they said, as soon as they started crouching down, it
just felt like within a minute they could just it
just felt woozy, felt bad. So anyway, an interesting story.
I mean, there's no real conclusion to this except to say,
we have talked about poisoning stories. Remember the two little
girls who died, the sisters who died. Poisoning missies are

(01:04:01):
I think in some ways some of the most interesting
stories that we talk about. We just don't know what happened.
And all of these circumstances were so odd and what
a terrible way to die, of all the terrible ways
to die. To think about that, like, you know, it
is so unexpected, it is happening, and you're exposed.

Speaker 3 (01:04:19):
You know, it's one of those fears like you hear
about whether it be couples that are on a honeymoon
or families that go on vacation and you know, carbon
monoxide it gets them inside whatever facility they're staying in.
You know, they fall asleep and they're done. You know,
I think I'm fairly convinced with this theory. Now, would

(01:04:40):
they be able to absolutely prove it, probably not. The
level of pollution in this river. I mean the water
is described as black. You know, I have this vision.
I had to look this up. But you know that
movie From Here to Eternity, and there's that famous scene
of the couple that are you know, on the each
in the waves are coming over them as as they're kissing,

(01:05:03):
and it's like Gilbert and Margaret laying down and that
close to this crappy black water. It's it's like, you know,
I think I would have picked a different location, a
little more romantic location.

Speaker 2 (01:05:18):
Well, an interesting story, medical mysteries. I bring to you
every so often, Paul Holes to challenge you, and this
is a this is a good one.

Speaker 3 (01:05:27):
Yeah. No, I always want to I want the bad guy.
That's that's the frustrating with these these accidental desks. It's like, oh,
there's no bad guy, except if you want to blame
the various companies that were polluting the river over decades.

Speaker 2 (01:05:42):
And we will. But yes, I agree, yeah, you.

Speaker 3 (01:05:45):
Know maybe maybe you know, people could could have been
charged for that type of environmental negligence and who knows. Anyways,
fascinating case.

Speaker 2 (01:05:55):
Good well, I will bring you yet another one next week.

Speaker 3 (01:05:59):
Awesome. I'm looking forward to it.

Speaker 4 (01:06:00):
Thanks, thank you, This has been an exactly right production
for our.

Speaker 3 (01:06:08):
Sources and show notes go to Exactlyrightmedia dot com slash
Buried Bones sources.

Speaker 4 (01:06:14):
Our senior producer is Alexis Emosi.

Speaker 3 (01:06:16):
Research by Maren mcclashan, Ali Elkin, and Kate Winkler Dawson.

Speaker 2 (01:06:21):
Our mixing engineer is Ben Tolliday.

Speaker 3 (01:06:23):
Our theme song is by Tom Bryfogel.

Speaker 4 (01:06:26):
Our artwork is by Vanessa Lilac.

Speaker 3 (01:06:28):
Executive produced by Karen Kilgaroff, Georgia hard Stark, and Daniel Kramer.

Speaker 2 (01:06:33):
You can follow Buried Bones on Instagram and Facebook at
ary Bones Pod.

Speaker 3 (01:06:38):
Kate's most recent book, All That Is Wicked, a Gilded
Age story of murder and the race to decode the
criminal mind, is available now

Speaker 2 (01:06:44):
And Paul's best selling memoir Unmasked, My life Solving America's
Cold Cases is also available now