37 - Liminal Space

This week on My Favorite Murder, Karen and Georgia discuss the murder of Peru's Ruth Thalia Sayas after her appearance on a game show, as well as the murderous reign of sweet little old lady Dorothea Puente in Sacramento, CA.

 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:15):
Let's settle in.

Speaker 2 (00:17):
How do I look from this angle? It's very odd,
it's weird. Right, we switch seats tonight. I think it's
good for the liminal space. Creative upset? Whoa you know
about that? No, there's this thing I care. I talked
about it. Oh maybe on the other podcast that I
have seven. I'm sorry, Oh I didn't tell you. We

(00:39):
haven't discussed that. So let's cut.

Speaker 1 (00:42):
Cut, can we cut?

Speaker 2 (00:45):
There's a thing they call it's the space that you
get into when you're unsure or you're upset, or like
right after something shocking happens or whatever it's. They call
it liminal space. And when you're in that place, your
brain is working like a peak at top performance. So
that's why, like when they it's good if you're a

(01:07):
creative person. If you get too comfortable in anything or
feel too secure, it's bad because then you can't, like
the thoughts don't come the right way. But if you,
you know, like get into a thing like that's why
like sometimes in stand up when you're on stage, like
you know you're going to open with a couple jokes,
but then you go into something new and weird because
you can come up with something you didn't even know

(01:28):
you were thinking of.

Speaker 1 (01:29):
That's cool.

Speaker 3 (01:29):
So as you're saying, stop going to the same cafe
for me every day and ordering two scrambled eggs in
a side of fruit and an Americano every single fucking
day in my life.

Speaker 2 (01:37):
Well, I mean, are you writing somewhere near there or like, yes,
yeah I would, Or you could order something different or
go to a different cafe. Just do something that will
make you uncomfortable so that your brain works differently. I
love it, getting it, getting out of a pattern. Okay,
And that's what this is right now, Georgia. Is this

(01:58):
of you and I looking at each other from a
totally different perspective.

Speaker 1 (02:02):
Yeah, which just different couches wwitch couches everyone.

Speaker 2 (02:04):
Yeah, it's not that big a deal.

Speaker 3 (02:06):
Actually, it is, like from the very beginning, that's how
we've done it.

Speaker 2 (02:09):
So this is neat, I mean, episode thirty seven, it's
going to be all about like the brand new thing. Also,
now we're talking about the Bible, so open your there's
so much in the Bible there really is.

Speaker 1 (02:22):
We should do a biblical episode.

Speaker 2 (02:24):
That would be that would be so boring, that would
just put me back to like fucking grammar and high
schools like these stories.

Speaker 1 (02:33):
Again, read my story at you, Sue. The whole story
is going to be.

Speaker 2 (02:37):
In caps, like the anger is none in all of
San Francis Grammar School.

Speaker 1 (02:41):
Totally.

Speaker 3 (02:42):
Okay, this is our first so I was thinking that
this is our first episode back from the last episode
was a live episode.

Speaker 1 (02:48):
Yes, which is fine, so awesome. It went really well.
It was.

Speaker 2 (02:53):
It went well which on I can now tell you
that I'm surprised, Yeah, because I was like, who the
fuck knows what this is gonna be? Like you and
I sitting here talking about stuff. We know what that
with that amounts to. But like having people react in
real time and whether or not they were going to

(03:14):
I mean, obviously if they were there, they were slightly
on board.

Speaker 3 (03:17):
Yeah, but those people I'm not worried about. It's like,
does it translate to like, I'm not gonna be totally honest,
I don't fucking listen to live episodes of podcasts. No,
I don't either, No way, I'm like that. That doesn't
that doesn't translate I'm not going to do that. I
don't want to hear you like pointing out things and
talking about them, right.

Speaker 2 (03:33):
Or yeah, or just having a whole experience without me,
because in these it feels like when I listen to podcasts,
I'm like, I'm there too. Yeah, that's the whole fun
of it. I think, Yeah, so yes, I But I
also I was just nervous, and I kind of was like,
I don't know.

Speaker 3 (03:50):
I was nervous about me because you've never seen me
on stage before.

Speaker 2 (03:55):
No, I'm too much of a narcissist to be nervous
about you. I mean, let's I was like, you're on
your own six sink er swhim. I gotta get mine,
you know what?

Speaker 1 (04:05):
I think?

Speaker 3 (04:06):
What if we added Dave Anthony permanently to the podcast?

Speaker 2 (04:10):
Well we probably shouldn't talk about this right now, but Dave.
I did a show with Dave Anthony the other night,
and he was like, I think we should start doing
like every three months. Oh my god, we all we
all do all our podcasts together.

Speaker 1 (04:23):
That was like, that was great.

Speaker 2 (04:25):
And also that was my sister's suggestion. I swear to god,
she's batting a thousand. She was like, Dave was so
funny on your show.

Speaker 3 (04:33):
I don't think I eat a lot to the doll up.
I just like laughing at whatever the fuck Garrett's said.

Speaker 2 (04:37):
I do, though you do. But here's the thing. It's
learning to elbow your way to comedy. Conversation takes a
takes a while.

Speaker 1 (04:47):
That's scary.

Speaker 2 (04:48):
It's scary. And also it's that thing of like, well,
am I going to stop? This is the thing I'm
gonna say? Going to be worth it? To stop totally.
It's a really hard thing to do.

Speaker 3 (04:57):
Interrupting people, especially people who are like, like fucking legit
comedians that have been doing this for years and years
is not my thing.

Speaker 2 (05:06):
It's well. And also if you do it and it's
like a like a half tepped response, it makes you
never want to say anything.

Speaker 1 (05:12):
Yeah, like a stupid idiot. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (05:13):
When people would laugh when I said something, I wanted
to go hug and eat each and every.

Speaker 1 (05:17):
One of them so much.

Speaker 2 (05:19):
You guys won't understand how this is for me. But
you did great. It didn't seem like you were having
a hard time.

Speaker 1 (05:25):
I had a lot of fun. I just don't say
fuck it once you're in the moment exactly.

Speaker 2 (05:29):
Well, and it's for fun. Those guys love you. Dave
thinks you're fucking hilarious.

Speaker 1 (05:34):
That's so nice. Yeah, And I never say that to
my face, but I appreciate you.

Speaker 2 (05:37):
No, No, he can't. Okay, he's got emotional problems.

Speaker 3 (05:39):
Everyone go the doll Up Live, their Last fun where
guests on it. So if you really fucking love the
live episode, yeah, that's how.

Speaker 2 (05:48):
We warmed it up. That's how we heated it up.
That's nice. Yeah, So the live episode and that was awesome.
It was super fun. And also we get to meet
a bunch of people, which is very cool. Afterwards, which
I have to say, I went backstage because I was like,
I don't want to meet people, like I don't I
don't think I'll be good at it. I don't like
the idea of it. And then I was standing back

(06:09):
there and said, you were already talking to somebody And
then I'm like what am I doing? Like that's not allowed.
And then the second I walked out, whoever the first
person I was to talk to, I was just like, Hey,
what's going on? And they were so regular normal. It
wasn't like I had to do anything. It was just
like having a nice conversation with a person that was happy.

Speaker 3 (06:26):
I've had years and years of experience of like talking
to strangers because Ali and I do the like cocktail
like food thing and you go to these like cocktail
parties and food parties and you get to fucking just
talk to people and it's scary and hard, but the
more you do it, the more you're just used to
it and it's not a big deal.

Speaker 1 (06:42):
Yeah, especially strangers. But what was I gonna say. I
don't know. I guess this would be a good Oh.

Speaker 3 (06:48):
And the episode before that was the Jambinet episode, so
it wasn't like a regular format, that's right. So this
is like the first time we've done a regular format,
Like we're back for a long time.

Speaker 2 (06:57):
Yeah, from camp, it's been that's right. My legs are
really tan.

Speaker 3 (07:03):
My legs don't tan only in my arm, and I'm
burnt on the back of my neck.

Speaker 1 (07:07):
It's weird.

Speaker 2 (07:08):
And I'm starting to wear this necklace all the time
that I never wore before.

Speaker 1 (07:11):
You know, friendship bracelet camp stuff.

Speaker 2 (07:13):
It's camp stuff.

Speaker 3 (07:14):
It's good luck when it falls off on its own,
those fucking bracelets of people.

Speaker 2 (07:18):
Fuck oh, fuck you Madonna.

Speaker 3 (07:22):
No.

Speaker 2 (07:22):
I just mean, like when you.

Speaker 3 (07:23):
Go to some party like and it's like sponsored by
a company and they're like, put this bracelet on. I
want to falls off, your wish will come true, and
I just like it's falling off when I rip it
off of my fucking arm.

Speaker 2 (07:32):
It always that's stuff. That stuff always makes me want
to go.

Speaker 1 (07:34):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (07:35):
Well, since no wishes that I can think of, like
stuff like this has ever come true, I don't need
your bracelet.

Speaker 1 (07:41):
I'm sorry, wishes are anything. I'm sorry to tell you.

Speaker 3 (07:43):
I'm sorry to tell everyone car karma and wishes are
not true. Oh god, everyone just hung up on the podcast,
Like half the women.

Speaker 1 (07:51):
Just hung up on this. Sorry. Sorry, mercury is a retrograde?
What can I say?

Speaker 2 (07:56):
Wishes aren't true? It's not actually, Oh well, there's a
at work, there's a website called is mercury and Retrograde?
And it either says yes or no, And we look
it up all the time because people are constantly making
that joke, and then we're like, wait, let's just check
and see if it.

Speaker 1 (08:10):
Really is actually no.

Speaker 2 (08:11):
Yes.

Speaker 3 (08:12):
I just almost split this drink out of the nostrils
when you said because it really is no, because someone
made that.

Speaker 1 (08:17):
And I just love that.

Speaker 3 (08:18):
That's such a great it's the best eleven people make simple, hilarious,
stupid things. Oh so, speaking of live shows. Yes, you guys,
we have two that we can plug right now.

Speaker 1 (08:29):
You guys.

Speaker 2 (08:30):
Since that first one went good, now we're going to
do more.

Speaker 3 (08:32):
Yeah, we're spreading our seed all over the country. We're
spreading our DNA all over the country.

Speaker 2 (08:38):
That's right, get ready to be impregnated, but by our
life comedy.

Speaker 3 (08:42):
Let's see the first one that I'm like, it's cool
because I feel like we should only pick places.

Speaker 1 (08:47):
We want to go to.

Speaker 2 (08:49):
Yeah, that's a good idea.

Speaker 3 (08:50):
So sorry Indianapolis and we're never I just kidding, I've
never been there, but it's amazing.

Speaker 1 (08:55):
I'm totally kidding.

Speaker 2 (08:57):
They're like, no us again, always talk shit on them.

Speaker 3 (09:01):
So the first one is that we're doing the Chicago
Podcast Festival, Yes, which I've been so excited to announce
this because I fucking love Chicago.

Speaker 2 (09:08):
And there's actually some people who knew and were like,
I'm sorry, are you doing it or not? And they
were like they were all that way on Twitter about it.
So we finally we waited. We had to wait until
it was for sure.

Speaker 1 (09:19):
Yeah, you guys, there's legal shit that we have to.

Speaker 2 (09:21):
There's oh my god. We have a team of attorneys.
They're the ones from the accidente commercials up on the
back of buses.

Speaker 3 (09:28):
They actually wait in my kitchen while we podcast, and
anytime something happens it's like legally not okay, they like
mention it, like pop.

Speaker 1 (09:33):
Their heads out.

Speaker 2 (09:34):
Yeah, and they all look exactly the same.

Speaker 1 (09:36):
Yeah, Elvis hates them. Okay.

Speaker 3 (09:38):
So Chago Podcast Festival, Saturday, November nineteenth, ten pm in
the Atheneum.

Speaker 1 (09:44):
I say that right main stage. Do you guys were
doing the main stage?

Speaker 2 (09:47):
We're main stage act.

Speaker 3 (09:48):
You know what I didn't think about at the the
La Podfast is like I'm not good at numbers. So
like I see that crowd and I'm like, oh, there's
like one hundred people here, And then you were like
there was four hundred fifty pe there and I was like, no,
there wasn't because I can't.

Speaker 1 (10:02):
Deal with it.

Speaker 3 (10:03):
Yeah, so this this place holds nine hundred and fifty
people sorrish, I'd not have told you that.

Speaker 2 (10:10):
I'm freaking out, well, I would have found out it.

Speaker 1 (10:12):
I don't.

Speaker 3 (10:13):
I feel like I should tell our guy who books us,
Joe is amazing, don't tell us the number of seats
in the auditorium because I can't fucking know exactly, or
see how many seats are empty.

Speaker 2 (10:23):
What if he's like I did book you in Indianapolis
and you're playing where the Colts play, there will be
thirty thousand people.

Speaker 1 (10:31):
What do you think the.

Speaker 3 (10:32):
Most we're ever gonna like perform in a front It
will be like in this the lifetime of this podcast,
before we both I think we.

Speaker 2 (10:38):
May have peaked at four fifty and then he's going
straight back down.

Speaker 3 (10:42):
Yeah, I can't deal with numbers. This is one hundred,
like one hundred ffty people, right.

Speaker 2 (10:47):
Nope, Well it was an intimate crowd.

Speaker 3 (10:50):
Yeah, it was a good little like it was like
one of those like cordoned off wedding reception room halls.

Speaker 2 (10:57):
It was like a very static electric carpet day this
type of room. Yeah, like banquet chairs for all. Uh so, yes,
we're Chicago. Get ready. Yes, we're excited to come and
see you.

Speaker 1 (11:11):
Oh it's some Chicago podcast festival dot org dot org.

Speaker 3 (11:15):
And then we're doing like our own This is like
the first this is the first show we actually like
put together ourselves. Yes, before we like even thought to
do live shows.

Speaker 2 (11:24):
Was the Bell House.

Speaker 1 (11:25):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (11:25):
Yeah, so we're also doing the Bellhouse in Brooklyn. On
December eleventh. Right, it's a Sunday, it's a Sunday, and
it's come and see us there. If you live in
Brooklyn and you like this and stuff like that.

Speaker 1 (11:39):
Please do.

Speaker 3 (11:40):
I don't think that the L train is going to
be shut down yet, so you can come. And if
you're from Manhattan, did you see my like my knowledge?

Speaker 1 (11:46):
Yeah? That was good.

Speaker 2 (11:47):
People that'll appeal to New Yorkers because they're gonna be like,
she's low.

Speaker 3 (11:50):
Oh, she knows her ship, she knows her ship the
Bell House ny dot com. And I think for all
our shows, we're going to have a guest, right, like yes,
either with the.

Speaker 2 (11:59):
Way we have time, like the way Dave did it,
we might.

Speaker 3 (12:02):
Have a guest in Chicago. We've been like told that
it's possible.

Speaker 2 (12:07):
Oh yeah, that's like I don't say a rad secret
surprise guest that I guarantee will make you happy.

Speaker 3 (12:13):
It's like, it's not like a comedian, it's like a
human person.

Speaker 1 (12:18):
Yes, it's not.

Speaker 2 (12:19):
It's not an alien.

Speaker 1 (12:20):
It's not a.

Speaker 3 (12:21):
Dog, not a cat. Ella's not coming. We should bring
that painting that you gave me at the We should.

Speaker 2 (12:26):
Bring it everywhere were we go. Yeah, Chicago, New York
T Shirt Report T Shirt Report.

Speaker 3 (12:36):
We have to uh yeah, T shirt Report. Sorry, you guys,
this is so much housekeeping, but it's been that. It's
the first time back. You do not apologize. God, I'm sorry.
I okay, but my favorite murder shirts dot com it's happening.
Kat Sollen, our friend who's a director, is a true
come enthusiast, fucking talented a ship person. I begged her

(12:56):
to make us send new design for our shirts and
she did it and they look freaking incredible. They look
like an old, like nineteen sixties pulp fiction book cover
and I'm so happy with them.

Speaker 2 (13:04):
And we're going cool.

Speaker 3 (13:05):
We're going to keep posting new sayings and people can
vote for what the sayings they want it to be.
Oh you know, did you see the what they voted for.
They voted for fuck politeness to be the next one.

Speaker 2 (13:15):
Nice?

Speaker 1 (13:16):
Yeah cool cool?

Speaker 2 (13:18):
Uh yeah anyways, yeah, I didn't know there was voting
going on.

Speaker 1 (13:21):
I just fucking decided one.

Speaker 2 (13:22):
Sweet, you went totally rogue.

Speaker 1 (13:24):
Sorry, what's going to pass it by you? Of course?

Speaker 2 (13:27):
I don't please, Okay, I mean, of all the things
I try to care about, vote away. I feel like
we talked about that a while ago. Yeah, but I
just didn't. I feel like I'm missing out on life.
If there was any tone in that, it was not
towards you. It was I'm spending a lot of time.
And this is not a complaint because I love my job.
But it's the kind of thing where every once in

(13:48):
a while, like I'll pick up my phone and look
at email and I'll watch you talking to all these
people where I'm just like, they fucking go fun.

Speaker 3 (13:55):
Because I'm a control of freak and just deal with like.

Speaker 2 (13:58):
I mean, just I'm very grateful for you.

Speaker 1 (14:00):
Thank you.

Speaker 3 (14:00):
You have a hard job. I can't wait to have
you for myself again. You can go get tuna fucking
melts at Cafe one on one for.

Speaker 2 (14:08):
Real, it's been so long.

Speaker 3 (14:10):
I can pick your fries out and eat all your fries.

Speaker 2 (14:14):
You can have all the fries. I can't eat fries anymore.

Speaker 1 (14:16):
Oh yeah, good.

Speaker 3 (14:17):
I can't wait until you're free again. I'm happy and
I love your job, and I'm so happy for you,
and it's great.

Speaker 1 (14:24):
I'm lying.

Speaker 3 (14:24):
I fucking want you for myself and I want my
favorite friend to be the only thing that matters in
your life.

Speaker 2 (14:28):
I mean that would be nice. It will be, but
but it's also cool because it's whatever. It's nice to
have a job that actually takes up all my time
and brain. But then it's then there's things like that.
We're just like, oh, is that what's happening? Good?

Speaker 1 (14:45):
I love that daddy has a job, but we miss daddy.

Speaker 2 (14:48):
Daddy wants to come home.

Speaker 1 (14:49):
That's what I'm saying.

Speaker 2 (14:51):
Okay, So our friend Jamie Lee has a podcast that
we were on called The Best of the Worst, and
it's on iTunes. Jamie is from Girl Coach. She's a
hilarious stand up comics and her and her husband Dan
Black do a show and it's awesome. But we this
was a while ago, so it's kind of like early

(15:11):
days of this podcast, and we all talk We talk
about John Bennet.

Speaker 3 (15:15):
Yeah, they're big true crime freaks. I know one time
Dan cornered me at a party, not cornered me, like,
talk to me at a at his own party and
was like, what do you think John Manett like? And
I was like, well, this is great because I don't
want to talk to anyone else. And then we just
talked about Jombanet for a while and then we just
did it on stage.

Speaker 1 (15:30):
It's perfect for parties.

Speaker 2 (15:33):
Yeah, so they have they record this show and it
was super fun. And uh, there's also other great people
on it. Heather McDonald who is from Chelsea Lately, and
Ster Povitsky's on it, I believe all Margaret Show and
Margaret's on it right. Hey, so that's a really good episode.

(15:53):
So go listen to that.

Speaker 1 (15:54):
Yeah that's the worst.

Speaker 3 (15:55):
And hey, let's take a quick pee break and then
get started.

Speaker 2 (16:00):
Great is it?

Speaker 3 (16:04):
Oh?

Speaker 1 (16:05):
Okay? Should we talk? No, not toast roses, not almonds,
not roses.

Speaker 2 (16:11):
Can you see the Virgin Mary?

Speaker 1 (16:13):
Yeah, she's right? Okay? Can we record real quick? Okay?
I keep are you okay? I keep smelling maple syrup.

Speaker 3 (16:24):
I took a nap, I woke up and I can't
stop smelling maple syrup.

Speaker 2 (16:27):
Oh.

Speaker 1 (16:27):
I mean it's great, but it's freaking me out a
little bit.

Speaker 2 (16:30):
Should we look up what that means online?

Speaker 1 (16:32):
Yeah? What did I eat today?

Speaker 2 (16:36):
Maple syrup?

Speaker 1 (16:37):
Is that?

Speaker 3 (16:37):
Like?

Speaker 2 (16:41):
I wonder if that's like a medicine thing? Are you
taking medicine?

Speaker 1 (16:44):
That's word that you say that?

Speaker 3 (16:45):
Because I went to an acupuncturist today for my back bullshit,
And she gave me some herbs, but they tasted like
dirt and cowshit. Yeah, so I don't think that that
smells like maple syrup.

Speaker 2 (16:57):
I need to tell you. Oh what, oh what.

Speaker 1 (17:00):
Do you up to? Oh no, what is it? You're dying.

Speaker 2 (17:04):
The first thing I put in smelling ma and it
says smelling maple syrup immediately your rangel And this is
the first thing that came up. Maple syrup. Urine disease
is a rare inherited metabolic disorder. The body cannot break
down certain amino acids, and individuals who have the disease
produce urine that has a decisish.

Speaker 1 (17:26):
That's not it. That's absolutely not it.

Speaker 2 (17:28):
You're not smelling your own maple syrup, peach.

Speaker 1 (17:31):
It's not pum.

Speaker 2 (17:34):
Yeah. Then there's like cities that have smelled like it.
The fuck someone sweat smells like it.

Speaker 1 (17:40):
Oh, I wish that were true.

Speaker 2 (17:41):
Have you had Chinese food, because there's Fenu Greek, which
is found in Chinese food.

Speaker 1 (17:47):
Oh, that's probably where the herbs are from. Chinese medicine.

Speaker 2 (17:49):
Oh maybe fen You Greek is in there.

Speaker 1 (17:51):
Oh that's totally it.

Speaker 2 (17:53):
Oh that's so cool.

Speaker 1 (17:54):
Uh.

Speaker 2 (17:57):
Also they say it's a symptom of diabetes. But that's
if you smell like it, not if you smell it.
If you have sweet breath, it smells like maple.

Speaker 3 (18:05):
I absolutely don't have sweet pea smell, or sweet breath smell,
or sweet sweat smell.

Speaker 1 (18:10):
It's street.

Speaker 2 (18:11):
On Reddit, it says why don't. This is just came
up as why do my wife's hands always smell like
maple syrup? Does she work at Denny's.

Speaker 3 (18:21):
Let's put it together. Your contract so awful? Why does
it always smell like artificial maple syrup?

Speaker 2 (18:27):
Everything is smell like, not smell Okay, well oo, Yahoo answers,
which always is a good animation and some good crazy
like people who English is not their mother tongue. Why
do I keep smelling maple syrup? Oh? This person says,
smelling and craving maple syrup. Here's the best answer. Sometimes
we smell weird things. I smell booger sometimes if I

(18:50):
have sinus issues, smelling vomit is weird. This is the
best answer. On Yahoo as no.

Speaker 1 (18:55):
No, no, no, no, no.

Speaker 2 (18:56):
This is this is why I love the Internet. This
is the best of the Internet. Chicken soup smells and
tastes like vomit to me.

Speaker 3 (19:04):
Oh my god, this has been weird fucking Corner with
Karen and Georgia, where we talk about our weird al mon.

Speaker 2 (19:09):
Someone said, any chance you're pregnant? No, that's what the
second one says, are you fucking kidding me? But it
doesn't have any up votes in it has one down vote?

Speaker 1 (19:18):
Am I pregnant? Guys? There's no way.

Speaker 3 (19:22):
I'm a barren fucking landscape of sadness and cactus and
fucking tumbleweed in my womb.

Speaker 1 (19:28):
Oh you want to.

Speaker 2 (19:29):
Feel a little snake, baby, it's a little round of sites.
This isn't mine.

Speaker 1 (19:36):
I'm terrified of these things. That's been weird Corner with
Karen and Georgia.

Speaker 2 (19:41):
It's been the whole podcast.

Speaker 1 (19:43):
All right.

Speaker 2 (19:45):
Well, now that we got that settled to you, and
now you just have seven extra fears.

Speaker 1 (19:50):
Yeah. Perfect.

Speaker 2 (19:53):
So let's see who went first four episodes ago.

Speaker 3 (19:56):
Oh my god, I want to say, I don't ca
you want to go first?

Speaker 1 (20:00):
You want me to go first?

Speaker 2 (20:02):
Uh, whatever you want, it's your choice.

Speaker 1 (20:05):
Okay, I'm gonna go Okay. Is that rude?

Speaker 2 (20:08):
No?

Speaker 1 (20:10):
All right?

Speaker 3 (20:12):
So this one actually speaking of cat'sul one, who made
our shirts sign She sent this to me and I
had never heard of it, and it's oh nice, pretty bananas. Okay,
all right, So we start with nineteen year old Ruth
Talia Sias Sayas.

Speaker 1 (20:29):
Let me start. We start with nineteen year old Ruth
Talia Sayas.

Speaker 3 (20:32):
She was raised on the outskirts of the capital in
a working class area of Peru, so outside of the
working class area of Peru. And she was studying at
a local university and she lived with her family like
normal girl, cute girl, regular, nineteen year old. On Saturday
July twelfth, twenty twelve, she was the very first contestant

(20:56):
on the new reality show that was like a quiz
show called l a valor de la verdad, which is
translated to the value of the truth.

Speaker 1 (21:07):
You knew that.

Speaker 2 (21:08):
I just wanted to guess because I've never taken Spanish
and I know what means.

Speaker 3 (21:15):
So it's a new quiz reality quiz show that's just
come to Peru. The show's premise is that a contestant
is asked a series of personal questions like during an
interview a private interview with a production company on the
producers varying seriousness. The questions and they're hooked up to
a fucking polygraph.

Speaker 1 (21:34):
Okay.

Speaker 3 (21:35):
So the contestant is later asked the same questions but
in front of a crazy studio audience, and it's like,
what's that the money show?

Speaker 1 (21:45):
Do you want to be a millionaire?

Speaker 2 (21:47):
Who wants to be million?

Speaker 3 (21:47):
Yeah, it's like that kind of seriousness level with lights
and shit. So they're given their questions again and their
answers are voted like buy the polygraph whether they're.

Speaker 1 (22:01):
True or not.

Speaker 3 (22:02):
Okay, So for each truthful response that they give, they
win money. If they lie according to the polygraph test,
they lose all the money they made. So they can
keep going with questions and if they're correct and they
are not lying about them, they win money. And the
questions get more and more personal as the show goes on,

(22:24):
and the contestant has the option of calling it off
after each answer. So they've only won a certain amount,
they can be like and they've answered like some really
personal questions, they get them done. So she's a very
first contestant on this show, this little nineteen year old
university student, and she went on because she wanted to
open a salon and she had already saved a ton

(22:45):
of money, but she needed the money from the show
to bring her closer to buying that salon. And she
was like, okay, making a spectacle of herself to get
the money. So every contestant gets to bring on our
house to bring on three guests to the show who
are like sitting there being interviewed and filmed the whole
time she's answering these personal questions. So she brings her parents.

(23:08):
It's Liencio and Vilma, and they're like sweet baby angels.
I watched I watched it, and the dad said that
he was afraid of what I might learn about my
daughter ooh when he was introduced. But they were all jovial.
They were all like, you know, this is gonna be fun.

Speaker 1 (23:25):
We're going to win some money.

Speaker 3 (23:26):
No one thought it'd be that insane because they thought
their daughter was like a normal human bean, I mean,
you know. The third guest was her boyfriend, Brian Leva.
He was a twenty year old cab driver. He was
raised down the road for a move Talia and he'd
stuttered since an old boyfriend of his mother had pushed
him down the stairs when he was only eight, So

(23:49):
he's just like this normal dude, but he had a stutter.
The host says, you seem nervous. What are you so
nervous about? And he said that she may have cheated
on me. And he was like a very stoneface and
like and clearly nervous through the whole show. So here
are the questions.

Speaker 1 (24:04):
Some of the questions.

Speaker 3 (24:04):
She was asked, have you ever skipped school without your
mother's knowledge? If you found one thousand souls, which you
return them souls, it's.

Speaker 1 (24:14):
Like, oh my money.

Speaker 2 (24:15):
Yeah, So she revealed that she had a thousand wandering
souls to their homes.

Speaker 1 (24:22):
She revealed she had a nose job.

Speaker 3 (24:24):
And that she didn't like her body, and that she
wished she was white, and that she was only with
her boyfriend Brian until someone better came along. The one
that was there, the cab driver yeah, the stutter yeah,
And that she was ashamed of her parents' manners, and
that she didn't actually work at a call center like
they thought.

Speaker 1 (24:43):
She danced at a nightclub.

Speaker 2 (24:44):
Oh shit, here we go, here we go.

Speaker 3 (24:47):
So the mom is begging her to stop, and at
one point Brian says, I don't want to hear anymore.
The boyfriend, so Okay, we're at question number eighteen, and
she had won at this point with this question, she
would have won the equivalent of fifteen thousand US dollars,

(25:07):
which is almost ten months wages. Wait, no, no, no, I'm sorry.
She could have won up to fifteen thousand US dollars.
At that point, she had won five three hundred dollars,
which was almost ten months wages in lima, with this question,
she'll win this. The question number eighteen was have you
ever accepted money for sex? And she answers yes, and

(25:31):
the polygraph confirmed that it was true. And she says,
just twice. We needed money. We were in a bad situation.
It hasn't happened since and it won't happen again. And
her parents are like crying and like clearly shaken badly.
It's fucked up, man, she said. So at that point,

(25:51):
she's like, I'm done. I'm not going to win up
to fifteen thousand US dollars. I can't do this anymore.
I mean, I wonder what the other questions were off
that was like, that was the one that was only fifteen.

Speaker 1 (26:01):
Or five thousand dollars? Yeah, what were the other questions?
Who knows?

Speaker 3 (26:05):
She says at the end, my mother, my father, my brother,
and sister are the most beautiful things in the world
to me. I love them all with all my heart. Brian,
forgive me for making you go through this. And as
the credit roll, she goes down on her knees before
them and begs them for forgiveness her parents.

Speaker 1 (26:21):
What the fuck?

Speaker 2 (26:23):
Yeah kind of game show is this?

Speaker 1 (26:25):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (26:27):
So the show finally aired on Saturday, July twelfth, huge
fucking hit, Like becomes number one, and she becomes like
kind of a celebrity in that world, but not like
in a good way.

Speaker 1 (26:38):
She's just like talked about all the time.

Speaker 3 (26:40):
And Brian, her boyfriend, becomes a public fool and the
Peru in Peru, like machoism is such a big thing,
and he was humiliating from all these people, and people
people in the small town recognize him and kind of
humiliate him, and he's like fucking broken and sorry.

Speaker 2 (26:57):
But did she get any of that money? Yeah?

Speaker 1 (27:00):
Yeah, okay, she got all of that.

Speaker 2 (27:01):
She won what she like, she at least got.

Speaker 3 (27:03):
She stopped, so she stopped after that true question. Okay,
so she was she wasn't lying about having had money
had sex for money, So she stopped at basically our
equivalent of fifty three hundred dollars. So he's being follow
around by like by the media and being asked all

(27:24):
these questions. Someone asked him how he felt about making
being made a fool, and he said, I'm ashamed all
the things I learned on that show.

Speaker 1 (27:33):
How would you feel?

Speaker 3 (27:34):
And the newsperson said, but they say that if you
love someone, you can forgive them, and he says, depends
on what they did, the things she said that day,
I can't forgive. But then in other interviews he says
that it had all been a setup, that he and
Ruth Tellia had broken up months before the taping, and
she had asked him to pretend to be her boyfriend
on TV and that she'd share the money with him,

(27:56):
and he hadn't given her any of the money. So
it sounds like he's making the shit up to make itself.
Sounds a little bit better, right, because he's so fucking humiliated.

Speaker 2 (28:03):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (28:04):
Eight weeks after the premiere of the show, on September eleventh,
twenty twelve, Ruth Talia disappears. Uh so crazy media circus.
All them news programs covered it in Lima, but one
of the hosts called her the prostitute of elve Lord
de la Verdad like she was known as like a whore,

(28:27):
and nobody cared about it because of that, and their
parents had to like a beg to get media attention
and get this covered and to try to find their daughter.
Eleven days after the disappearance, police find a body of
a young woman buried in a well and covered by
rocks and concrete on a piece of land on the
outskirts of Lima, and the land belongs to Brian's uncle.

Speaker 1 (28:52):
So later that day, oh my god, it's so fucked up,
and there's video of this.

Speaker 3 (28:56):
So the media and the mother, sorry, the father and
the sister are at the site where they're excavating trying
to figure out if it's their sister and daughter, and
the dad is on the phone on his cell phone
like crying and it's awful, and it turns out that
it is her, and he's just like losing it and

(29:16):
if you're sensitive, you shouldn't watch him break the fuck down.
Then a reporter and her cameraman go to the home
where Vilma, the mother is sitting vigil with some of
her friends and doesn't yet know that it was her
daughter that was found, and the reporter says she gave
her her condolences and realized she didn't know about it,

(29:38):
and then the reporter said, man, they found your girl.
So this fucking reporter told her, which is so ugly.
So Brian's brought in for questioning and he confesses. He
says that he called Ruth Talia as she was leaving
school and they made plans to meet up. He says,
I waited for her by the bridge. She got into

(29:58):
my motor taxi and I said, let's go have some wine.
She says, okay, and they went to his house, his
apartment that he rented, and they had sex and afterwards
they started to fight, and she says, she tells me,
I don't know what I'm going, what I'm doing with
a poor motor taxi driver. And he says that's when

(30:19):
I grabbed her by the throat, and that he admitted
that he choked her for thirty seconds or more, and
he says, I thought she had passed out. I listened
to her heart, I didn't hear anything. I grabbed her
and shook her but nothing. I got scared and during
the trial, Brian's lawyer tried to pin the blame on
the TV show, saying that they had humiliated him, and

(30:42):
so Beto Ortiz, who's one of the most famous television
journalists there, they called him to testify. So it was
later found that the majority of his confession was false.
And there was a witness who was a young boy
from the neighborhood and he said that the night she
disa period, Brian had paid him fifty souls to let

(31:03):
him know when ruth Talia got off the bus, and
he said he had seen Brian another man force her
into his motor taxi. And the court determined that Brian's
accomplice was his uncle, who owned the property where her
body was found, and the motive was robbery, and they
had tried to get ruth Talia's bank security code so

(31:24):
that they can get the winnings from the show oh
for themselves, and they were both sentenced to life in prison.
So then the second season of El Valora de la
Verdad was they only had celebrity contestants because they said
they can deal with the media, which is like, how
could you even have a fucking second season? But at

(31:45):
least that's that, and the oh I wanted to say
that a lot of this information and it's really hard
to find information. I mean, there's no this isn't like
a stort I ever heard about before. So the California
Sunday Magazine by Danielle Ella el Arkhan, he wrote this
really great story about it, and that's where I got
a lot of this information, and then all over the

(32:05):
internet as well.

Speaker 2 (32:06):
That is fucking crazy. The idea, the idea that that
show continued on after the first contestant was murdered. I mean,
that's intense.

Speaker 3 (32:19):
Remember when Jenny Jones, the Jenny Jones Show that a
lot of young people won't remember. It was like one
of those like nineties talk shows like Jerry Springer had on,
Like it was like a confession episode of I'm in
Love with You And a guy brought on his friend
and told this guy that he was gay and he
was in love with him.

Speaker 1 (32:40):
Yeah, and the guy he told shot and killed him.

Speaker 2 (32:43):
Yes, I do know that story because my old boss
was one of the EPs on that show and had
to go to court.

Speaker 1 (32:52):
That was like a.

Speaker 2 (32:52):
Huge scandal at Telepictures for breaking the company for that. No,
it was horrible, and it's a kind of thing of
like what's the line. When you're producing TV, everything is
two numbers, who butts and seats, eyes on screens? How
do you do a show that's going to make people
watch it? And especially in those days of like the
early days of Spread and Jenny Jones.

Speaker 1 (33:15):
We all that shit.

Speaker 2 (33:16):
Lets you keep going with that. But also why did
they have a hit? Oh they had a hit because
it's a girl who is exposed that it wasn't hit.
That's not the baby daddy, and blah blah blah. Now
they're in a fistfight and all that shit, and like
that was the norm. So like you had, you would
They were trying to think of shows and produce shows
that were exploiting people most exploited. Well the arts ladles.

Speaker 3 (33:40):
The article I got a lot of this like basic
information from UH was really interesting. So the show that
this the article that this is from where they talk
a lot about the actual show and how much it
had to do with it and what like about reality
shows in Peru was called the contestant from California Day
magazine and so they talk a lot about that, and

(34:02):
it's just like, I mean, who who would agree to
say those things? But if you're in a poor fucking
city and you need money, I mean, you'll do anything exactly.

Speaker 2 (34:13):
It's total exploitation of people. And also that is such
an ugly version. I think there was an American version
of that show, and it wasn't on for very long.
I didn't know that because you can't. The nature of
a show like that is is scandal. So like, if
people are admitting things that no one gives a shit
about and no one wants to talk about and that

(34:34):
aren't that isn't like borderline, then you don't have a
good show.

Speaker 3 (34:38):
And they're not going to find someone who's like, no,
I've never had, never got paid for sex. Nope, I
work in this place. You know they find the most.

Speaker 2 (34:46):
Yes, they are only going to have people on there
that are going to tell them what they want here
and and more so. Yeah, the one of the weirdest
things that I ever experienced in working in television is
there is this very strange subset of peace people. And
if you work in casting in like any kind of
reality version of television, you know there are people who

(35:07):
try to get on every single show and they're not.
It's like if it's a show about couples, they'll submit
for that if it's a show about, you know, whatever
the fuck it is, they want to they want to
be on.

Speaker 1 (35:18):
TVA thinking or whatever the fuck they'll do.

Speaker 2 (35:21):
Yeah, and they'll try to like they know TV well
enough to know that they have to be interesting in
certain personality types and and because it's it is a
good way to make money if you, you know, if
you're the right person.

Speaker 1 (35:35):
But obviously just get one chance.

Speaker 2 (35:37):
Yeah, you would think, but I mean these are people
that are just like, well we'll go over here, Well
we'll try to be on the Amazing Race. Well we'll
try to be on the marriage ref Well we try
to be on this. And that's what when I worked
on the second season the Marriage Reff. There is this
one tape where they were like, brought us down to
casting because they're like, you're never going to believe what
you're about to see. And it's like this weird couple
that like it's there's sexual overtones. We're like, this is

(36:00):
they don't know that this is inappropriate, that like this
isn't going to get them. It's just this weird shit.
And one of the people in that casting department was like, oh, yeah,
we had them. They tried to be on whatever show
she had worked on before. And it's just like these
people that are kind of like, we know, we're kind
of interesting and kind of weirdos and that that works.

Speaker 3 (36:20):
Yeah, we're very different and we're wild and let's get
on fucking televis.

Speaker 1 (36:25):
I feel just want to get on television. Do you
see that the Real World?

Speaker 3 (36:27):
This season is like everyone thinks they're just going on
the Real World, but for each each person on the
real World, they find their like enemy and they have
to live in the house too. And it's like, this
show is interesting enough if you cast it, well, these
people are just gonna make their own fucking and I
can get.

Speaker 2 (36:45):
It back and say, because no one's watching TV anymore,
so they don't have good ratings, so it's not interesting
enough to make a ratings hit and that's all anybody
cares about. And because all of television is owned by
like four companies, yea, they have this insane grasp on
the money. Who gets the money? The story is like

(37:06):
nobody has any money, but that's actually not true. They're
making millions of dollars because even in like a depression,
people still watch TV. People still you know, advertising still works,
but it's like it's this it's really sick and crazy,
that kind of shit where you like that thing where
you're watching TV and you're just like, oh, this isn't
I don't feel like who I'm seeing is what I'm

(37:28):
really seeing.

Speaker 1 (37:28):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (37:29):
So the idea that your story is about a person
who actually did the thing real and suffered by it.

Speaker 3 (37:35):
Yeah, but she I don't know if she felt it
didn't seem like she was. I mean, I guess she
she was kind of embarrassed and stayed at home a lot,
but it's like.

Speaker 1 (37:47):
She didn't seem like she was.

Speaker 3 (37:48):
She seemed like confident about having done it for the
right reason, for the reason, which was to make her
life better, even though she like you know, tore her
family apart.

Speaker 2 (37:57):
Yeah, well you'd think that that that makes your life
way worse. Also being murdered, Yeah, I mean because that shame.
Shame is the thing people can't deal with, Oh Jesus,
shaming people, especially like you were saying, like like that
culture where men have to be men, you can't come
out and be like, h yeah, sometimes I do this,

(38:19):
which is like you know, yeah, not in a judgmental
way of that person's lifestyle, but this is like a
cultural thing of where women are supposed to be like
wives and mothers, and especially and.

Speaker 1 (38:31):
In Peru, I feel like it's you're not supposed to.

Speaker 3 (38:35):
That's not it's like so much less accepted and understood
than it is here as.

Speaker 1 (38:39):
It is here. Well crazy, crazy, right.

Speaker 2 (38:45):
I mean that's the thing too, when you were saying,
like you should you should watch it because he's all
upset or whatever. I would never watch that.

Speaker 1 (38:52):
No, it bothered me a lot.

Speaker 2 (38:53):
I never watched that because the fact that the cops
didn't keep him away from the from the cameras is upsetting.
Like his daughter, his other daughter, tries to shield his
space a couple of times, but there's nowhere to turn,
Like there's cameras on every on every single angle of
this man telling someone on the other line that they
found his daughter, like there's nowhere for him to go

(39:17):
to get.

Speaker 1 (39:17):
Out of the fucking out of the camera. That's disgusting.
It's just really sick and sad.

Speaker 3 (39:23):
And then the woman who uh told the mother in
invertently the reporter, Yeah, the reporter.

Speaker 1 (39:30):
She quit doing news after that.

Speaker 2 (39:33):
Wow, Yeah, this article of someone's life, Like to get
that story or.

Speaker 1 (39:39):
Were like go talk to her.

Speaker 3 (39:40):
Now go up to the room after she started crying
and try to get a conversation with her. And she
and there's some quotes in her from in this article.
It's like how awful she felt and that she quit.

Speaker 2 (39:49):
Yeah, oh that's yeah. Yeah, you don't want to sell
your soul for one paycheck?

Speaker 1 (39:56):
Uh huh one Byeline? Okay, you're ready for your mariner.
It's the same one. Uh yeah.

Speaker 2 (40:04):
It turns out mine is the shit. I can't think
of the what's the Howie Mandel show with all the suitcases?
What suitcase number seven?

Speaker 1 (40:18):
What's on?

Speaker 2 (40:20):
I don't think so.

Speaker 1 (40:21):
I don't think so either.

Speaker 2 (40:22):
I was going to try to make a joke about that,
but I can't remember what it's called. I can't remember
it's called. I don't care what's in the suitcase? You
know that show? What's in the suitcase?

Speaker 1 (40:30):
All right?

Speaker 2 (40:31):
So I picked my story this week. Actually, my sister
suggested this our number one fan, our newest and number
oneest fan. And she suggested it because when I was
in high school. When I graduated from high school, she
had gone to the JC for two years. So by
the time I was ready to go to college, she
was too and so we both went to Sack State,

(40:53):
which is Sacramento State University. It was precious. Uh So
we both moved to and lived in Sacramento for like
the same amount of time. And I've of course talked
a massive show about Sacramento on this podcast. Wonderful things
happen there, but not to me. And so near the

(41:15):
end of right before I moved back home with my
parents as an abject failure in my early twenties, I
lived in this house on f Street and it was
in this weird like Sacramento is weird because as you
go downtown closer to the capitol, it's like all the
old houses and they're old Victorians and stuff, and some

(41:36):
of the streets are really gorgeous, but the neighborhood itself
is really bad. And it's a very strange combination because
it doesn't look like it should be bad. But then
there's like we one night in this apartment across the street,
there was an empty lot that people would just dump
garbage in, and two homeless people got into a fight
and one of them was beating the other one with

(41:57):
a vacuum cleaner that someone had dumped in this empty lot.
Oh my God, it was like that kind of area
and it was a horrible time in my life because
I had flunked out of college. I think I worked
at like two different cafes, so I was making like
five dollars an hour, remember those days, and you like
you couldn't get any hours, so you were just like
always just scraping together money. I remember at one point

(42:20):
we would we would rent a VCR from the video story.
We did that when I was a kid too, Yeah,
because we didn't have one, but we would be like,
we I want to watch a movie. It was like
just really dark. And then it was also summertime in Sacramento,
so it's always one hundred and ten degrees, so everything's
just awful in a special way. Also, at the time,

(42:41):
the person I was a room roommates with, she she
had this friend I think she was from high school,
and together they were two of the most annoying people.
Like I'm surprised I didn't try to punch one of
them because it was like this obnoxious, like like hard

(43:01):
girl act, but like but it was like the the
Sacramento version, so there's a country element to it, and
it was really like just kind of ignorant and rude, the.

Speaker 1 (43:11):
Kind of girls that are like, I don't get along
with other.

Speaker 2 (43:12):
Girls exactly, yeah, I only guys. Or it's like, well,
then go fucking hang out with some guys and get
away from me. There was, Yeah, it was a lot
of that kind of stuff. For like they'd come home
at four in the morning from a club and like
knock on the door and be like let me in.
It was just everything was I was livid. I was
either livid or scared to death all the time. So

(43:35):
it turns out, come to find out living in this
apartment for a little while that somebody who came over
put it together and goes, don't you realize that that
is doroth Two doors down is Dorothea Puente's house.

Speaker 1 (43:49):
Who's Doronia Wendey.

Speaker 2 (43:50):
Well, Dorothia Puente's is the old lady in Sacramento that
got caught. She ran a boarding house for old people
and like handy kept people, and it turned out that
she had been murdering them, taking their social Security check,
taking it across the street to the dive bar. That

(44:12):
was so scary we never even tried to go there.

Speaker 1 (44:15):
He doesn't go to a dive bar, especially a.

Speaker 2 (44:18):
Couple of drunks like us would have been in there
in a second.

Speaker 3 (44:21):
Those dives that you're like, oh, this isn't a quaint
dive bar, this is a this is white slavery me.

Speaker 2 (44:27):
This is bad news, like serious bad news, Like it
might as well be on the docks. But somehow it's
across the street from our apartments.

Speaker 1 (44:37):
It's still there.

Speaker 2 (44:38):
I don't know. I doubt it is though, because I
bet you with the way that architecture was the probably
gentrified that whole area, I would think, but it was
like a scary it was very scary area. So so
Dorothy A Puante is basically I'll tell you. So here's
her story.

Speaker 1 (44:54):
Let's hear it.

Speaker 2 (44:56):
She had a very sad childhood. When she was ate,
her father died of tuberculosis and the next year her
mother died in a car crash. Fuck.

Speaker 1 (45:03):
Those are like two of the worst ways to die.

Speaker 2 (45:06):
So she was in an orphanage for a little while,
and then eventually she had to go live with family
members in Fresno. No, it just gets set.

Speaker 1 (45:15):
That's one of the worst places to live.

Speaker 2 (45:17):
I mean. So in nineteen forty five, when she was sixteen,
she got married for the first time, So she had
between nineteen forty six and nineteen forty eight, she had
two daughters. One she sent to live with relatives and Sacramento,
and the other one she go up for adoption. So
she was not able to deal with any kind of

(45:39):
family situation at all. And I think she definitely has
some kind of mental disorder, as you see, So I'm
sure she probably had it then being a sixteen year
old newlywed mother.

Speaker 3 (45:53):
Yeah, who I brought up in an orphanage, not good,
who had two huge traumatic experiences when she was young,
with her parents die back to back, back to back.

Speaker 2 (46:01):
So yeah, fucked that husband that married her when she
was sixteen left her and left her in nineteen forty eight,
like a couple of years later, so she started telling
people he died of cancer, So oh no, sorry, died
of a heart attack a couple of days after they
got married. So it was like even more tragic for her. Yeah,

(46:24):
So she's also in throughout this It's like she's basically
a compulsive wier.

Speaker 1 (46:28):
Yeah, and she started forging.

Speaker 2 (46:31):
Checks, which she ends up doing throughout her life. That's
kind of her forte. That's her favorite, that's her favorite crime.

Speaker 1 (46:39):
Such a weird crime.

Speaker 2 (46:40):
It's super weird. And the funny thing is that you
get caught and then you get sentenced for like a
couple of years, then you get out because it's non
violent and it's I don't know, maybe it's kind of already.
So they're like, no, all right, it's such a weird
you paid your dues.

Speaker 3 (46:53):
Like you hear about so many people who are like,
they never had a violent offense, they just forged checks,
and it's like, well, that's I would never think to
do that.

Speaker 2 (47:00):
It's still crime. I mean, yeah, you might have great
pemanship and all sure, but you're still a criminal. In
nineteen sixty, she based and then she remarried a Swede
named Axel Johansson, which fuck you know that that was
a party, Oh yeah, waiting to happen. Of course, a
violent alcoholic. They were married for fourteen years and then

(47:24):
they ended it and then eight years late or sorry.
During that marriage, two years before she got divorced, she
was arrested in a brothel. She told the cops that
she was there visiting a friend. We don't know what
is true about that. One of the articles I read
said that she ran the brothel. Fuck but it seems

(47:46):
more likely since she only she was arrested and served
ninety days. I think she was probably just there, either
visiting her friend or visiting some friends whatever you might.

Speaker 1 (48:00):
Running a brothel ain't an easy past.

Speaker 2 (48:02):
That's a big job, and you don't you don't just
bail no at the first arrest. So what she ended
up doing is going into she became a nurse's aid
and she started caring for the disabled and the elderly
and private.

Speaker 1 (48:15):
So she turned her life around.

Speaker 2 (48:17):
Well you would like to think that one of story, Yeah,
end of story. So in nineteen eighty two she did
that for a while. In nineteen eighty two, her sixty
one year old friend and business partner, Ruth Monroe, who
was living in so Dorothea, had this house on f Street.
It's this big Victorian.

Speaker 1 (48:38):
Two doors down from Karen kilt.

Speaker 2 (48:39):
Tutors, down from the future miserable home of Miserable Karen Kilgerreff.
So there was an upstairs apartment that she would rent out.
So she rented it out to Ruth Monroe, and there
were business partners, which I guess means that they were
working together taking care of old people and disabled people
in private homes, but Ruth died from an overdose of

(49:03):
codine an essida menafin, and Dorothea told the police that
Ruth was very depressed because her husband was terminally ill,
so they ruled Ruth's death a suicide. But then a
few weeks later the police had to come back because
a seventy four year old pensioner named Malcolm Mackenzie had

(49:25):
accused Dorothea of drugging and stealing from him, so he
had gone to the police and said that he had
met Dorothea at a local bar called the Zebra Club
and that they had several drinks together, which I bet
means in the fifteens. Then he invites her back to
his apartment and soon after they arrive, he gets dizzy

(49:47):
and even though he's conscious, he can't move and he
has to sit and watch as she searches his house
for valuables, takes his rare penny collection and forces the
di and ring off his finger.

Speaker 3 (50:01):
Rare pennic Can we go back to rare penny collection?
And I mean fucking cool that is?

Speaker 2 (50:05):
Yeah, you know, it was like you know, hardboard book
like this with all the years underneath the slots that
makes me happy.

Speaker 1 (50:12):
That's yat, but well.

Speaker 2 (50:14):
So she gets convicted of three charges of theft in
August eighteenth of nineteen eighty two, and she gets sentenced
to five years in jail for that.

Speaker 1 (50:24):
Wow, what happened to the rare penny collection?

Speaker 2 (50:29):
We haven't been able to trace it, so we're starting
a foundation called Find the Rarepennies dot gov dot org.
So she's in jail, okay, and she starts being pen
pals with a retiree, seventy seven year old retiree named
Everson Gilmouth, and they become friends through the mail. And

(50:54):
when she's released in nineteen eighty five after only serving
three years, he there waiting for her to pick her
up from jail in his nineteen eighty red.

Speaker 1 (51:03):
Ford pickup and everything was okay.

Speaker 2 (51:05):
And everything turned great. So soon they were making wedding
plans and they opened a joint bank account. Nope, and
they were back in her house in Sacramento. Now we're
cutting to five years later. Dorothea hires a handyman to
come and put in some wood paneling in her apartment

(51:27):
and for that work, plus he paid her an additional
eight hundred dollars. She gave him a red nineteen eighty
eight nineteen eighty Ford pickup that was in good condition,
almost totally not used, which she said had belonged to
her ex boyfriend who lived in Los Angeles.

Speaker 1 (51:44):
Yeah, where'd she get that?

Speaker 2 (51:47):
So she asks this handyman that she hires to build
her a six by three by two foot box for
her to store you know, books.

Speaker 1 (51:57):
And stuff as you do in a fucking coffin.

Speaker 2 (52:00):
Yeah, but a box that you want to store stuff in.
And then she asks them, once she fills it with
her books, I'm doing air quotes. You can't see. She says,
please take this to my storage depot, and he agrees,
and she goes with him, and then on the way

(52:20):
she has him pull over and just has him dump
it on a river bank. Yeah, at a kind of
unofficial dump site with books. It sounds unlikely, but again,
we did have an unofficial dump site across from our
apartment right where you put coffin show with boxes, yes, books,
you know, or or beat another person with a vacuum
clean whatever needs to happen. So there a lot of

(52:42):
dumping going on up in Sacramentos and Sutter County. So
they dump that. Uh, and oh, she just told him
the stuff in the in the box was junk. Well,
on January first, ten eighty six, a fisherman spots the
box and it's sitting three feet from the bank of

(53:05):
the river. So he calls the police and they open
the box and find a badly decomposed, unidentifiable, viable body
of an elderly man inside. Well, it turns out that
Dorothea was still collecting ever since Gilmouth's pension, and she
would write letters to his family explaining that he hadn't

(53:26):
contacted them because he was ill. And so he was
basically one of her first victims. Now this was now
a She was renting this apartment all the time. This
was her business, and she had forty new tenants in
the house. In the whole house. She was actually approached

(53:49):
approached by a social worker named Peggy Nickerson. She approached
the social worker and just explained to her, just so
you know, if people on fixed in comes, people on
social security, elderly people, you can they can come and
stay in my boarding house.

Speaker 1 (54:06):
Everyone's welcome. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (54:07):
Because she had the best system to offer her prices
were really low and she took quote unquote took care
of the people that work that lived there, because people
are nice. She made dinner every night, She had everybody
come down and sit at dinner together.

Speaker 1 (54:21):
You know.

Speaker 2 (54:22):
She like made sure there were people that stayed there
that were homeless or like had mental problems. She made
sure they showered and clipped their nails, and she was.

Speaker 1 (54:30):
Real, like it was real. That'd be so beautiful.

Speaker 2 (54:32):
I mean, yeah, right, that's the that's the whole lure
of it is people need that kind of care, and
she's saying that she's going to be able to provide
that for them. Uh so, sorry, keep making that mistake.
So she uh. She also she was known for taking

(54:58):
tough cases, like all the social workers were like, you,
if it's a person that can't get placed anywhere, you
can take them to Dorothea's. She will take them in.
And she collected their monthly mail before they saw it.
She paid them in stipends, and then she pocketed the
rest of their like social Security check or whatever their

(55:19):
check was for expenses.

Speaker 1 (55:21):
Quote unquote yeah a fucking so.

Speaker 2 (55:23):
Parole agents would go to visit her, and she had
been ordered to stay away from the elderly and to
refrain from handling government checks. Oh my god, but no
violations were ever noted, and they think it's because she
was known in the social welfare circles as being so

(55:44):
good that they would go in and check and be like,
you can't be around old people, you can't stay away
from social Security checks. But nothing official.

Speaker 1 (55:52):
Would ever go in. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (55:54):
Well, in May of nineteen eighty eight, neighbors started complaining
of a sickly sweet smell.

Speaker 1 (55:59):
God, damn, maybe that's what's on my fingers.

Speaker 2 (56:01):
Oh it's Oh, that's right, it's the dead bodies that
you've been high.

Speaker 1 (56:04):
Maybe I'm decomposing.

Speaker 2 (56:07):
So she blamed the aroma on applications a fish emulsion
on her on her perfectly tended lawn and tended to
the point where if people walked on her lawn, she
would scream at them and swear like a sailor. So
she was very protective of her lawn and she did
a lot of gardening. So so there was a man

(56:31):
that stayed at the house and people around the neighborhood
knew him as chief. He was schizophrenic, and he was
an alcoholic, and he was homeless. He went and stayed
with Dorothea. She made him her handyman, and she cleaned
him all up and made sure that he took a
shower all the time, like, made him presentable, made him
come and eat dinner with everybody, made him take his

(56:52):
his antipsychotic medication or his meds. So she had him
digging in the basement and carting soil and rubbish away
with a wheelbarrow, and he basically there was a concrete
slab on her basement floor. He was basically digging up
the basement floor.

Speaker 1 (57:14):
What do you need it for, Sophia, he uh.

Speaker 2 (57:19):
Soon afterwards disappeared. And so when there was a second
tenant disappeared, a developmentally disabled man who had schizophrenia. When
his social worker reported him missing. His name was Alberta Montoya.

(57:39):
The police came and realized this is this, this keeps
happening here. So they were looking around and they noticed
in the backyard there was there was some ground that
was had been recently disturbed. So these investigators went to
the car, got the shovels that were in their car,

(57:59):
and they started digging and quickly turned up what looked
like shreds of cloth and beef jerky, report ew. And
so as they're trying to sell my lunch, find out
what's under there. One of the investigators said that he
thought that he hit a tree root, and so he
was whacking at it and jabbing at it with his

(58:20):
shovel and it wouldn't move. So he decides to climb
down into the hole where that they had dug up
to get to pull it out, and he wrapped his
hands around it, braced himself, started pulling, and it broke
loose and it was a leg bone out of the socket.

Speaker 3 (58:40):
They they had to suspect that at that point where
they wouldn't have been digging, right, Yes, so why are
you fucking yanking?

Speaker 2 (58:48):
But thought it was a tree root? Come on though,
like you're looking, but if it's well, but I mean
they're looking, but a tree root is the most likely
thing that's going to be there, Okay, So if I'm
sure that they'd done so like that before, and it's like, yeah,
I mean, that would be there twenty percent of the time,
but most of the time it's that. And also I
think when bodies that aren't that are buried just straight

(59:11):
into the ground, they turned black and brown, so it
would have probably looked like a tree root too. So
then they start digging up her whole backyard and oh,
she came out when he was down in the hole
and he had this bone. She came out and when
they turned around, they were like, we just found a

(59:33):
human bone. She did, they said they she did this
thing where she slapped her hands on her face, like
really over the top and in like trying to act
like she was surprised, and they immediately were like, there's
something going on, Like that's the weirdest, like straight up.

Speaker 1 (59:50):
Home alone style.

Speaker 2 (59:51):
Home alone style exactly.

Speaker 1 (59:52):
That's where they got that from.

Speaker 2 (59:54):
And apparently neighbors said that she always talked about wanting
to be an actress and planning on moving Los Angeles.

Speaker 1 (01:00:00):
She's a bad actress.

Speaker 2 (01:00:02):
Yeah, yeah, she needed to take some classes. So this
body that they eventually dug up was a woman named
Leona Carpenter who was seventy eight years old and one
of her very Dorothya's very first victims that stayed in
that house. They basically had the corner's office, came in

(01:00:23):
with heavy machinery and a whole work crew and just
started and forensic anthropologists and started digging up this entire backyard.
And that I've seen the news footage that's basically taken
from the angle of because they couldn't get in. Yeah,
so it's basically taken from our back porch. Oh shit,

(01:00:43):
I mean not literally, I don't know because it was
nineteen eighty eight, but they they shot it over the fence,
and you see these cops walking around and it's just
like the You see a lot of sheets and like
the when they put out the string and the steaks. Yeah,
you know, like this will be the next area.

Speaker 1 (01:01:01):
Oh my god, it's so crazy to see it.

Speaker 2 (01:01:03):
So since Dorothea Puentez wasn't immediately plent to a singular,
wasn't immediately a suspect what she I mean, like they
didn't when they were doing that first digging. It wasn't
like keep her right there. Yeah, So she said she
was going to go get a cup of coffee at
the hotel up the street while they were doing that,
and then she fucking high tails it to laws An.

Speaker 1 (01:01:23):
Well now they know it's you, dude.

Speaker 2 (01:01:25):
Yeah, but she, I mean she left, so she thought
she was out of there. Yeah, and she and she
didn't think they were onto her the way that they were.
So when she gets to Los Angeles, she goes to
a bar and she starts making friends with an old
pensioner is sitting at the bar. She introduced herself as
I think it was Donna Johansson. Well bar, do we

(01:01:47):
know it didn't? Oh god, I wish it did. The
articles I read didn't say. It's got to be something
that we know, something divy pick maybe the frolic room.

Speaker 1 (01:01:57):
Frolic room for That's exactly what I was thinking. Yeah. Uh.

Speaker 2 (01:02:01):
But luckily this old penchion nerd probably been sitting at
the bar watching the news. A bunch for her from
the news and called the cop. So they got her
down in LA and brought her back up. Eventually, seven
bodies were found buried in her backyard.

Speaker 1 (01:02:20):
Wow.

Speaker 2 (01:02:22):
She was charged with a total of nine murders because
they uh, they traced back the apparent the apparent suicide
of her old Ruth he Row and then.

Speaker 1 (01:02:39):
Uh, the other.

Speaker 2 (01:02:40):
Guy, the other the missing guy chief.

Speaker 1 (01:02:43):
Oh man.

Speaker 3 (01:02:44):
Do you think that grand the grandpa the frolic room
got a reward?

Speaker 2 (01:02:48):
I don't know, but he did. Here's what's interesting. When
detectives were in that backyard, they realized that they were
only blocks away from the home of serial killer more Solomon,
where they had dug up from that house a bunch
of dead bodies in nineteen eighty seven.

Speaker 1 (01:03:08):
Was he I don't know him.

Speaker 2 (01:03:10):
I have never heard of him either. Whoa and Sacramento.
I just got to say, I mean, like I've talked
about it, I've complained about it, but like I must
be a little bit right because we've already had I
think four serial killers from Sacramento on this show a lot.

Speaker 1 (01:03:28):
It's chock full of murders.

Speaker 2 (01:03:29):
It's nutso so basically at the end of the day.
She went to trial in February nineteen ninety three. She
was convicted of three murders, sentenced to two life sentences,
received life without the possibility of parole. She went to

(01:03:51):
chow Chilla, the ladies facility. She always said that all
those people died of natural causess and she just buried
them there, and that she herself, at age eighty two
March twenty seventh, twenty eleven, died of natural causes in prison.

Speaker 1 (01:04:10):
Wow.

Speaker 2 (01:04:11):
Yeah, that's our girl, girl, Dorothea, that's our hometown girl.
She would take their checks, walk across the street to
that dive bar and get her money. The cash checks
at dive bars, they cash checks. It they're so certain
bars are so divy. They will cash your social Security
check for you.

Speaker 3 (01:04:29):
So like they're like second Friday of every month is
like cute. You got to get a couple of bartenders
on staff.

Speaker 2 (01:04:35):
That's right because well and also it's Sacramento, like literally
the state capitol was blocks away, so they know they're
getting their money. If it's a government check, yeah, they
know that thing is good, so they don't. If it's
that little old lady that runs the boarding house, of
course they're going to do her favorite.

Speaker 1 (01:04:50):
It brings everyone over and she takes her portion, and
then she's.

Speaker 2 (01:04:53):
So nice, she's taking care of all those people inside
that building.

Speaker 1 (01:04:56):
Saying, God, what did it smell like in that fucking building? Ooh?
In that dive bar too?

Speaker 2 (01:05:01):
I mean I bet it was carpeted that house. No
the dive bar, Oh, yes, for sure, yet like dark maroon.

Speaker 1 (01:05:10):
Yeah, like thin dark, more like bowling alley carpet.

Speaker 2 (01:05:12):
I bet they had like a it was a pretty
small and they had a pool table that was too
close to one wall, so then they had to cut
a pool queue in half so you could shoot from
that side of the table.

Speaker 1 (01:05:24):
Is that what they do? I've never seen that.

Speaker 2 (01:05:25):
I've seen it in dive bar.

Speaker 1 (01:05:26):
I guess I have not been in like real dive bars.

Speaker 2 (01:05:28):
Then you gotta become a full blown alcoholic. It is
so fun.

Speaker 3 (01:05:34):
I went to one full blown like real real dive
bar in Savannah, Georgia, but like on the outskirts of it,
and I was like, oh, this isn't an charming la
dive bar. There's a Confederate flag on the wall, and yeah,
not only jew who's ever been in here?

Speaker 2 (01:05:48):
And I was just left they should have taken your
picture and put it up behind the bar.

Speaker 1 (01:05:54):
That was terrifying. Wow, yeah, that's so sad.

Speaker 2 (01:05:59):
I mean it's crazy. And when you sit when you
saw her on the news, like she was on the
news all the time, you see her picture. I totally
remember it. She looks like a cartoon of a.

Speaker 1 (01:06:08):
Little old lady.

Speaker 2 (01:06:09):
No, like not even big glasses, she's really short, gray hair,
the whole thing.

Speaker 1 (01:06:14):
You never think, how did she kill everyone? Just she
just drunk poison them or.

Speaker 2 (01:06:17):
D poison I mean I think, so wow, Yeah, man,
well it's fucked up, pretty fucked up.

Speaker 3 (01:06:27):
Okay, So now we're ending the show on We're ending
on a positive.

Speaker 1 (01:06:32):
Now, that's right.

Speaker 3 (01:06:33):
One really great thing that happened to us this past week, right, right,
So do you have yours?

Speaker 2 (01:06:40):
Do you give yours?

Speaker 1 (01:06:41):
Sure?

Speaker 3 (01:06:42):
Uh? A really great thing is that I hung out
Sunday evening with a girlfriend that I like a lot,
and we've gotten to know each other a lot, but
we like had this great deep comm Like we hang
out a lot of people together. Her name's Crystal, but
she and I sat at a bar and just fucking
talked and we're like, I'm.

Speaker 1 (01:07:00):
Not very happy, and just like we're.

Speaker 3 (01:07:02):
Very open with each other in a way that's like
hard to do find when you're an adult is someone
to like be really open with and and just you
know who understands you when you guys can get each other,
and that's that's hard to do. And we just have
this really great conversation and I've felt a lot better
after it and kind of feel like I've made a friend.

Speaker 1 (01:07:19):
Oh no, I you have for a long time. It's
kind of a deeper connection. It was nice.

Speaker 2 (01:07:24):
That's great. Yeah, that's very good. Excus it's all that matters, Yeah,
they say in human connection is really it's nothing else
makes people actually happy except for connecting with other human beings.

Speaker 1 (01:07:36):
Really. Yeah, Well, shit.

Speaker 2 (01:07:40):
I guess mine is that I don't well, I don't
know if I'm allowed to talk about that, because it's
it sucks because all I've been doing is working, so
most of mine are work based, which is a little
bit lame.

Speaker 1 (01:07:53):
But well, you know what, I'll I can kay, you're
proud of yourself?

Speaker 2 (01:07:58):
Yeah, yeah, no, yeah, I just can't. But I mean,
it's like when you have one thing to talk about
where it's people are like, hey, what's up with you?
It's like, just don't bother asking, it doesn't matter. But
there's a guy that's a guest star. I guess I
just won't say his name, and then when when the
show's actually on, I can say it. But he's on
my episode and he's so funny. It's like the most

(01:08:20):
delightful thing in the world. I mean, everybody on this
show is really good, and I'm very excited for this
show to come out because I think people are really
going to like it. But this one guy is hilarious
and he looks like the guy that I adored in
high school, so it makes it even more fun to
watch him because it's like it almost looks like a
weird nick like a mashup.

Speaker 1 (01:08:39):
Like you're rooting person already, because yes.

Speaker 2 (01:08:42):
But then on top of that, it's the kind of
thing where you can't it's like single camera, like you
can't laugh out loud when things are happening because they
need like perfect quiet, and I have to keep my
hand over my mouth. He's so funny.

Speaker 1 (01:08:54):
Oh, and that's the shit you've written too.

Speaker 2 (01:08:57):
Yeah, some of it. I mean some of it. But
but at one point I went up I had to
finally introduce myself because I was actually he was so
funny that I was nervous to I didn't want to
be like, hey, what's up by the writer or whatever.
I was just kind of like trying to stay away.
And when I finally did go up to introduce myself,
I said, I in my head, I thought I was

(01:09:17):
going to say, you know, like you're great or today
has been so great or something like that, but what
came out was you're being so funny. And the second
the last word of that sentence came out of my mouth,
I just turned and walked away. So I was just like,
hopefully I just won't have stopped it.

Speaker 1 (01:09:37):
I can't wait tell this cuts and I get to
find out who it is.

Speaker 2 (01:09:41):
Yes, I mean it's not. Some people may have seen
him before, but it's not. He's not well known.

Speaker 3 (01:09:46):
Okay, I feel like I'm not telling you in till
it airs either, you won't tell me.

Speaker 2 (01:09:50):
Yeah, well we'll keep it a huge secret until next
spring because it's a mid season replacement.

Speaker 3 (01:09:57):
Well, thanks for listening, you guys. This is Oh we
never entered what the show was?

Speaker 2 (01:10:01):
No one knows. That's too bad.

Speaker 1 (01:10:03):
This is my favorite is what the fuck with?

Speaker 2 (01:10:05):
Mark?

Speaker 1 (01:10:05):
Maren?

Speaker 2 (01:10:07):
Thanks for listening.

Speaker 1 (01:10:08):
I'm Maren.

Speaker 3 (01:10:10):
Go to Twitter, my favorite murder, Instagram, my favorite murder.
We're on Facebook, at MFM podcast, our shirts, my favorite
murder shirts, dot com everything.

Speaker 2 (01:10:22):
Thank you so much for listening and supporting and being
active involved people.

Speaker 1 (01:10:27):
We love it.

Speaker 2 (01:10:28):
It's very fun.

Speaker 1 (01:10:29):
You guys are the best and this is so great.

Speaker 2 (01:10:31):
Stay sexy.

Speaker 1 (01:10:32):
Don't get murdered, Elvis. Do you want to cookie? Cookie awesome?

Speaker 2 (01:10:41):
Yes, Yes,