The Fix is In: Competition Crimes

Competition is human nature. And sometimes crime is, too. And sometimes these two come together to give us total ridiculousness. Fat bear ballot box stuffing, cheating Irish dancers, crooked fishermen — this episode has it all. And then some!

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Ridiculous crime is a production of iHeartRadio.

Speaker 2 (00:03):
Sarah, Elizabeth.

Speaker 3 (00:05):
Do you know what's ridiculous?

Speaker 2 (00:06):
I do?

Speaker 3 (00:07):
Yeah, go for it.

Speaker 2 (00:08):
Do you have a second I'd love to share it
with you. Okay, you ever injured yourself taking a selfie? No?

Speaker 3 (00:15):
I have not.

Speaker 2 (00:16):
Okay, did you know that's very common.

Speaker 3 (00:18):
Now, injuring yourself taking a selfie?

Speaker 2 (00:20):
Yes, very very common. One in ten people have injured
themselves taking a selfie.

Speaker 3 (00:25):
Now is this hurting their arms or their muscles, or
is this falling over.

Speaker 2 (00:30):
All of their musculature as well as their bones?

Speaker 3 (00:33):
Interesting?

Speaker 2 (00:33):
Anything is at risk with a selfie? In fact, did
you know it is more dangerous for a human being
to take a selfie than to go swimming with sharks?

Speaker 3 (00:42):
Oh? You're kidding me.

Speaker 2 (00:43):
More people die each year from taking selfies than from
shark attacks. Selfie sticks. No, people just they trip, they
fall over cliffs. I know I shouldn't be laughing, right,
I'm rooting for the sharks too, because hopefully fewer sharks
will be killed this way, because people are like, oh,
you don't need to be afraid of sharks. We should
start killing phones. I like that, hunting down and killing phones.

(01:07):
Sarah yes, Elizabeth.

Speaker 3 (01:08):
Do you want to know what else is ridiculous?

Speaker 2 (01:09):
I'm here for it.

Speaker 4 (01:10):
Putting a fish in a fish to win a boat.

(01:36):
This is ridiculous crime. A podcast about absurd and outrageous capers, heists,
and cons. It's always ninety nine percent murder free and ridiculous.

Speaker 3 (01:47):
You damn right, yes it is. Could you imagine if
we did the whole show.

Speaker 2 (01:51):
In NPR voices and NPR voices. I think that would
be very refreshing for some people.

Speaker 3 (01:55):
I think I could do it. I'm not sure about you.

Speaker 2 (01:57):
I might go to sleep though talking.

Speaker 3 (01:58):
Oh, I definitely would. Are you a competitive persons?

Speaker 2 (02:03):
Yes? Now, I'm very from a competitive family. I'm a
very competitive person. I don't I like to think that
I'm not one of those mean competitive people because I'm
not competing against other people. I'm only ever competing with
my show. I was taught that at a young age
and that's stuck with me. But I will get very
mad at myself for losing itself, right, it can be.
It can be unpleasant to watch me lose, But I'm

(02:24):
not mean about it. I'm just yea upset.

Speaker 3 (02:27):
I like to say that I'm not competitive, Yes, but
you are.

Speaker 4 (02:30):
Well, it's kind of like how I say, I don't
watch Yes, but I don't watch TV shows like the
smash Hit nine one one.

Speaker 3 (02:36):
I just moved from Fox to ABC, and if I
watch TV, I'm not sure.

Speaker 2 (02:39):
How I feel about Are you happy about that? If
you don't know if.

Speaker 3 (02:42):
There's going to be meddling from the mouse house? I mean,
I don't know.

Speaker 4 (02:44):
I don't know anything about it. Anyway, I say I'm
not competitive. It's almost true.

Speaker 2 (02:50):
No, it's not.

Speaker 4 (02:51):
I'm not competitive with like people in the workplace or
like other writers. Writers are competitive, oh god there and petty, yes,
And I'm not I'm happy for everyone whenever anything good happens.

Speaker 2 (03:03):
Like I tend to be an actor, and I thought
they would be really competitive. Writers are so much more
competitive and petty and also undermining. They do a lot
of stuff with like campaigns.

Speaker 4 (03:12):
To yes yes, And so that's why I kind of
like I've narrowed it down right. I don't really interact
with a lot of writers.

Speaker 2 (03:19):
True writer behavior, you realize the lesson.

Speaker 4 (03:22):
Not like socially competitive, like about status stuff like I
want everyone to see what kind of carry driver?

Speaker 3 (03:28):
Without who cares?

Speaker 2 (03:28):
I shouldn't tell people about this for a coat you're wearing.
Shut up? What is that?

Speaker 4 (03:33):
Am though competitive when it comes to things like trivia,
Yeah you are.

Speaker 3 (03:37):
I'm a beast.

Speaker 4 (03:39):
Trivia like I become a whole another person, or games
like Rummy Cube or I've seen.

Speaker 2 (03:45):
You play bar trivia where you made a table whole
table cry so and that family looked at me like
are you going to stop her? And I was like, look,
go back to your talk.

Speaker 3 (03:54):
Brings out the best and the worst.

Speaker 2 (03:56):
Yes, it does, because like I do really.

Speaker 4 (03:58):
Well in various categories, like especially if there's word puzzles.
I used to go to this one where they had
handouts and.

Speaker 2 (04:05):
Oh god, I.

Speaker 3 (04:05):
Got in the zone. And then that.

Speaker 4 (04:07):
I'm viciously competitive. My trivia team is called Steve Harvey Oswald.
You're on my trivia team.

Speaker 3 (04:14):
You know. My brother's on a team now. He is
not competitive, No, he's not, but fun I make up
for it.

Speaker 2 (04:20):
He gets a little competitive though, once you start winning.

Speaker 3 (04:23):
He doesn't want to lose. You're winning, that is true, Yeah,
and he does. He wants to hang on.

Speaker 4 (04:27):
I want to I become another person. It's totally wild.
I'm a true believer in obeying the rules. To an extent. Yes, yeah,
So like I won't check my phone for answers.

Speaker 2 (04:37):
No, no, no, not like that.

Speaker 3 (04:38):
But I do like to do little tricks that okay.

Speaker 4 (04:41):
So like I like to pretend that I'm new to
pub trivia and then I loudly whisper supposed answers to
my teammates.

Speaker 3 (04:48):
Oh yeah, and then I get all excited.

Speaker 4 (04:50):
They're in on it and so and I'm like, oh,
I know the answer, and they tell me to keep
it down that the other teams are going to hear
me saying the right answer, and it's intentionally wrong but
like feasible.

Speaker 2 (05:00):
So this is a pantomime you're pulling where you go.

Speaker 3 (05:02):
It's a long time, it's bulcarrier.

Speaker 5 (05:06):
And they're like stop, everyone's going to hear you, and
like but I know it, and then people are like,
oh crap, and like, so Traviy my brother, he's not competitive,
but like you were saying, like when it gets down
to the wire, he and I had an incident where
we brushed.

Speaker 3 (05:21):
Up against cheating.

Speaker 4 (05:23):
We were in a sudden death tiebreaker during a trivia
night on a Mexican riviera cruise. So there we are
off the coast of Portavada, winning our fourth straight trivia
night on the boat. Everyone hated us, which is we
come in and just dust them fourth straight, fourth straight.
I don't remember what the question was. I don't remember

(05:44):
what the answer was, but like we wrote on the zone. Yeah,
I was totally in the zone AutoZone. So we wrote
it down on a piece of paper and like showed
it to the to the host. He looks, and he
goes over and walks over and looks at the other
team's sheet, and like we may have heard a team
that had been eliminated mentioned the answer after we wrote
ours down after and then like we may have quickly

(06:06):
changed the answer on our paper, corrected, and then the
judge may have forgotten our answer and then come back
over to take a look aheah, and we may have won.

Speaker 3 (06:15):
The whole thing.

Speaker 2 (06:16):
Oh that's cheating.

Speaker 3 (06:17):
Yeah, and it was high stakes, Saren.

Speaker 2 (06:21):
You want to get that fifth when?

Speaker 3 (06:22):
No, do you know what the grand prize was?

Speaker 2 (06:24):
No? What was it?

Speaker 3 (06:25):
Luggage tags?

Speaker 2 (06:27):
It wasn't even luggage, it was luggage.

Speaker 4 (06:29):
My aunt was appalled by our lack of integrity.

Speaker 2 (06:32):
I'm with your aunt.

Speaker 4 (06:33):
She she called them the luggage tags of shame. You know,
because since my behavior, my love language is shame and guilt.
That's how my behaviors are motivated.

Speaker 3 (06:42):
I felt terrible.

Speaker 4 (06:44):
I wound up like taking the tags and just setting
them on a bar in the leado deck and walking away.

Speaker 2 (06:48):
Oh, I thought you're gonna throw them into the sea,
and like never was back.

Speaker 3 (06:51):
That's that's pollutions Eric.

Speaker 4 (06:54):
On a boat, like on a cruise ship, you're worried about,
like destroying the oceans. Hello, I couldn't live with my
little scam. Others though, the ones who wind up here
me talking about them.

Speaker 3 (07:05):
They went all in for me.

Speaker 4 (07:08):
Yeah, I have for you today some competition scandals.

Speaker 2 (07:12):
Nice.

Speaker 4 (07:12):
So it's not like cycling, doping or fixing college basketball
nop Okay, we're not living strong right now. These these
are as inane as cheating at trivia to win luggage tag.

Speaker 2 (07:26):
Yes, that's what I'm talking about.

Speaker 4 (07:27):
I still carry that guilt. I will never do such
a thing ever again.

Speaker 2 (07:31):
I'm going to same time I see a luggage tag.

Speaker 3 (07:33):
From now right now, it was not like me. That
wasn't me.

Speaker 2 (07:37):
What are you willing to do to get these luggage tags?
What would you do for a luggage See?

Speaker 4 (07:41):
That's what out of control. Competition does do it? I
think humans can't help but make things competitive. Yeah, you know,
taking pottery. Look, we have all these TV shows trivia.
You know what I love more than trivia competitions though.

Speaker 2 (07:55):
Baking shows. Bears?

Speaker 3 (07:58):
It was a bee. I love you do you really do?
I want to hug a bear.

Speaker 2 (08:02):
I come into HQ sometimes and you're just sitting there
watching those videos you watch where they're sitting at the streams.

Speaker 3 (08:07):
Cat my bear cam.

Speaker 2 (08:08):
There you go.

Speaker 4 (08:08):
That's my National Park in southern Alaska. They have they
have this bear camp. There are volcanoes in this park, salmon,
most importantly tons of brown bears.

Speaker 2 (08:22):
So cute.

Speaker 4 (08:23):
I want to go there someday and see them in person.

Speaker 3 (08:27):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (08:27):
So, like in the summer, they have these decks that
look over the river and the bears come out and
they loll around, they gorge on salmon. You can watch
it on the bear cam.

Speaker 3 (08:37):
As I do.

Speaker 2 (08:37):
I've looked over your shoulder.

Speaker 4 (08:38):
Yeah, you see like mamas teaching their cubs to grab
fish and like big papas just parking their RUMs in
the river rapids shoving it on there.

Speaker 3 (08:49):
Oh yeah, they're so cute.

Speaker 4 (08:51):
So anyway, Cat my They've capitalized on this love of
bears because I'm not alone, Sarah.

Speaker 2 (08:56):
No, I know there are many of you.

Speaker 3 (08:58):
And they hold they hold something called Fat Bear Week.

Speaker 2 (09:00):
Wow I heard of this is good October.

Speaker 3 (09:04):
Oh my goodness.

Speaker 4 (09:05):
So in the in October, the brown bears that Catmi
they've been like prepping for winter hibernation by just gorging
themselves on sandpors. They increase that's they increase their body
weight by like fifty percent.

Speaker 3 (09:18):
Yeah, they eat ninety pounds of food a day.

Speaker 2 (09:21):
It's amazing.

Speaker 3 (09:21):
Yeah, it's incredible.

Speaker 4 (09:23):
So the rangers, they have all the bears, you know,
tagged numbered, and like the naturalists and the rangers at
the park, they take note of the physical state of
the bears, and so they decided, like, let's get everyone
in on this.

Speaker 3 (09:34):
So they they teamed up.

Speaker 4 (09:36):
With explore dot org that's the organization that does the
bear cam, and they let people cast online votes in
kind of like a March Madness style bracket Oh okay,
to determine the bear that has like most effectively and
impressively plumped up.

Speaker 2 (09:51):
Oh the real like that that's really.

Speaker 3 (09:54):
The big boss.

Speaker 4 (09:55):
In twenty twenty three, AP News called the competition quote
Alaska's most watch popularity contest.

Speaker 3 (10:02):
So it started. They started this up back.

Speaker 2 (10:04):
In twenty is the reality TV I could watch, yes, exactly,
Bears gaining masks exactly.

Speaker 3 (10:10):
So twenty fourteen. It starts up.

Speaker 4 (10:12):
Every year, it just gets more and more popular. Cat
My park rangers they pick twelve bears out of all
of them. They post two photos of the animals, one
taken in mid July and the other one taken in
early September.

Speaker 2 (10:25):
There are a baseline photos.

Speaker 3 (10:26):
Again, it's like a before and after.

Speaker 2 (10:27):
Sure.

Speaker 4 (10:29):
In twenty twenty two, Fat Bear Week was rocked by scandal.

Speaker 6 (10:33):
How how one of the bears was cheating Organs.

Speaker 2 (10:38):
Bear performance enhancing salmon.

Speaker 3 (10:40):
The ballot had been stuffed, the ballot box.

Speaker 2 (10:42):
Stuffed like the bears wait salmon.

Speaker 3 (10:44):
In favor of a brown bear called Holly.

Speaker 2 (10:48):
Oh the voters, of course, the humans are the cheerers. Ar.

Speaker 4 (10:52):
So Holly's government name is Bear four thirty five, and
she was dusting Bear seven forty seven the semi finals seven.
But the numbers seemed hinky to the park ranger.

Speaker 2 (11:05):
It was homegirls the first numbers seven.

Speaker 4 (11:09):
Yeah, So it turns out Holly four thirty five she
jumped ahead in the in the votes because nine thousand
votes came in like pretty much all at the same
time for her, Candice Rush of Explorer dot org. She
told NPR quote, while not unheard of, it is very
uncommon for a bear to come back late in the
day like that. We ended up finding just over nine

(11:31):
thousand spam votes.

Speaker 3 (11:32):
Wow, so someone just used.

Speaker 4 (11:34):
Bots right the park. The National Park tweeted quote, like
bears stuffed their face with fish. Our ballot box too, has.

Speaker 2 (11:42):
Been stuff they practiced that.

Speaker 3 (11:47):
Sort of delighted with it. Oh my gosh.

Speaker 2 (11:49):
Quote They're gonna put that on a tote bag.

Speaker 4 (11:51):
It appears someone has decided to spam the Fat Bear
Week poll. But fortunately it is easy for us to
tell which votes are fraudulent. We have discard did the
fake votes, and today's official totals are for seven forty
seven thirty two thousand, nine hundred and forty votes for
four thirty five thirty thousand, four hundred and thirty votes. Okay,

(12:12):
so she lost by like, you know, seven thousand.

Speaker 2 (12:14):
That was a final vote.

Speaker 4 (12:16):
No, not for the for the semi final, that's for
the semi finals. So the organizers they have a slack
channel that they used to discuss the event. This is
like a chat function basically. So the messages were released
by the National Park Service under a Freedom of Information Act.

Speaker 2 (12:32):
Oh my god, we haven't quit on them totally.

Speaker 4 (12:37):
Quote maybe we shouldn't call a vote tonight. I mean,
we can't really honor the cheating. This is the discussion
going on on the slack channel. When the numbers showed
that seven forty seven had like whooped hollieh. The organizers
are amazed. Quote damn, that is a wide margin, wider
than seven forty seven's rear.

Speaker 3 (12:57):
This is this is in the slack that they're just.

Speaker 4 (13:02):
Completely amber Craft, who is the interpretation and Education program
manager at CATMAI. She wrote, quote if we say that
it was spammed, will that be what reporters are asking
about instead of staying on the interpretive message.

Speaker 2 (13:15):
Oh, She's like, let's stay on message.

Speaker 3 (13:16):
People like it's all about the bears.

Speaker 6 (13:18):
Guys, come on, let's talk about big bears, the juicy
booties she was afraid of happened CNN, Jezebel, Rolling Stone,
Bloomberg News, ABC News, NPR.

Speaker 4 (13:30):
They all reach out as they want to talk about,
you know, the chakinery so craft. She wants to keep
things on message, so she released the following statement quote.
The important thing to remember, however, is that despite which
bear wins the most votes in the Fat Bear Week competition,
they are all winners. Bears get fat to survive, and

(13:50):
the health of Catmai's ecosystem, as demonstrated by the sustained
run of salmon, clean water, and thriving flora and fauna,
enables their survival. So everyone's like, this is such a
funny story, and she's.

Speaker 2 (14:02):
Like, let me throw a blanket on all the fun.

Speaker 3 (14:07):
So why why would someone do this?

Speaker 2 (14:09):
I'd like to talk about a healthy ecology? Can we
talk from all?

Speaker 4 (14:12):
I'm glad she kept it up beat too, So why
why would someone do.

Speaker 2 (14:16):
This because they love a thick bear?

Speaker 4 (14:19):
Well, one of the staffers thought, quote in the slack,
what's this out there? Is it mean of me to
wish the spammer had a lot of money? Writing on
four thirty five?

Speaker 2 (14:28):
Oh my god, there's bear betting. I don't know, Like
you go into an Irish pub and you can bet
on a like I don't know, I.

Speaker 3 (14:34):
Bet you you could see they will be anything up less. Quote. Well, y'all, you've.

Speaker 4 (14:40):
Made it the weird corners of the internet tried to
rig the election. That's another Slack quote, and it was.

Speaker 3 (14:46):
It's a big election.

Speaker 4 (14:47):
The entire contest pulls in more than a million votes.

Speaker 2 (14:50):
Okay? Is that a million unique votes?

Speaker 3 (14:52):
I don't think so. Okay, but come on, make it
sound impressive.

Speaker 2 (14:55):
Okay, I'm just wondering.

Speaker 3 (14:56):
Quote.

Speaker 4 (14:57):
As long as we find a way to bring it
back to the bears, I'm going to count it as
a win.

Speaker 3 (15:01):
You want, Slack user, have you ever voted in this?
Of course I haven't.

Speaker 2 (15:05):
Do you vote every day?

Speaker 3 (15:06):
I don't remember you. Would you vote this last time?

Speaker 2 (15:09):
Okay? Now, would you want to go and like vote
multiple times?

Speaker 4 (15:13):
You don't vote multiple times, like for each round, I'll
vote one for the semi finals.

Speaker 2 (15:17):
You know, for bracket you're not going through your various
online personas like I also want to. I'll go this
way through I use my work account.

Speaker 4 (15:24):
And then just wondering, Well, so they uncover all this
ballot stuffing, and then the organizers they reviewed the other
matches for possible signs of tampering. Sure, and like a
dominion voting machine audit. It was discovered that the outcomes were.

Speaker 3 (15:38):
On the up and up.

Speaker 4 (15:39):
Oh wow, So that meant that Otis and Chunk who
were ousted midway through the contest, they lost on their
own merit or lack their own. And going forward, the
competition now includes a CAPSHA test to prevent bought interference.
So you have to be able to tell the computer
like where the stop which pictures have a stop light?

Speaker 3 (15:59):
Or motorcycle crosswalk as a human, I can tell you
that's not easy.

Speaker 2 (16:04):
Like I can't tell I like that fat bears and
like shoe beasts have to go through the same thing.
We need to get rid of the bots because they're
ruining it for everybody exactly.

Speaker 4 (16:13):
So, like you know, back to the competition. Voters have
more than just the before and after pictures to help
in their decisions.

Speaker 2 (16:20):
They have centerfolds like bear fans only bears.

Speaker 3 (16:27):
No, they give little bios.

Speaker 2 (16:29):
Oh okay.

Speaker 4 (16:29):
Holly was first identified by park officials in two thousand
and one, and her coat is described as quote toasted
marshmallow in color.

Speaker 2 (16:38):
Oh.

Speaker 4 (16:39):
She's raised several loaders of kids. She's a hardworking mom.

Speaker 2 (16:42):
Toasted marshmallow is an interesting choice because there's a broad spector.
It's a broad spectrum, and to me, toasted marshmallow is
closer to the black end because I liked it. Things burnt, right,
I do like I imagine to you it's more like
the coffee, and it's like, oh, I put a little
coffee cream in my coffee. So for both of these,
you can't picture.

Speaker 4 (16:57):
She's sort of blondeared to her ears. She's uniform color
like her ears are a little bit lighter.

Speaker 2 (17:03):
The former house painter in me is getting upset the
non specific use of color. Sorry, I will all back down.

Speaker 4 (17:09):
She's a hard working mom. She is such a hard
working mom. In twenty fourteen, she took on an orphan
cub and raised.

Speaker 2 (17:15):
Oh, single mom with an orphan cast.

Speaker 3 (17:17):
She deserves to win. Oh, she's a champion. She did win.

Speaker 4 (17:21):
She'd won a fat bear week twenty nineteen, and that
one she won.

Speaker 3 (17:24):
Fair and square.

Speaker 2 (17:25):
She's a thick queen. That year she was.

Speaker 4 (17:27):
Bear seven forty seven. She's a real battye bear of
seven forty seven. He doesn't have a street name, oh,
or a river name. I guess she would say, you
just call him Mike. He's just seven forty seven, like
a Travolta hobby.

Speaker 2 (17:38):
Oh, okay, that is his.

Speaker 3 (17:39):
Number, forty seven.

Speaker 2 (17:40):
They didnt give him a little theydn't get like a
little holly And okay, what's he like? Well you should
call him Sully because.

Speaker 3 (17:48):
Oh my god, you need to get a job up there.
You'd fit right in.

Speaker 2 (17:51):
I want to do that in name paints. These are
the things I want his jobs getting.

Speaker 3 (17:54):
Bears names Sully Sully forty seven.

Speaker 4 (17:57):
And he's a quote skilled in a angler who is
found fishing most often in the jacuzzi or near the
far pool of Brooks Falls fishing. He's the most dominant
bear and he was the twenty twenty Fat Bear Week champion.

Speaker 3 (18:13):
Do you know how much he weighs?

Speaker 2 (18:15):
I don't know. Eighteen hundred pounds.

Speaker 4 (18:17):
Fourteen hundred pounds. He's one of the largest brown bears
on earth.

Speaker 2 (18:21):
Yeah, I was ad thrown off because of grizzlies. I
know better. So my numbers are off.

Speaker 4 (18:25):
So there's the voting scandal. There was a recount the
eliminated hanging chads when the dust settled seven forty seven.

Speaker 2 (18:33):
The name of Bear Gore and another one. Just let
it have fun, let it let it run, Let's do
a classic come on guys throwbacks.

Speaker 3 (18:41):
So seven.

Speaker 4 (18:42):
Yes, he won the semi finals. He still had to
go to the final, of course. Yeah, and it was
there that he faced bear nine oh one O one
a quote medium small yet quickly growing adult female.

Speaker 2 (18:54):
Oh aler, not a shower.

Speaker 3 (18:57):
She's a young gu six and a half years old.
They live to be about twenty five years old.

Speaker 4 (19:01):
I was wondering, yaw five and so nine oh one
maybe you know young. But she's like down to knock
a few buck if someone comes and tries to get
into her fishing spot.

Speaker 3 (19:12):
Okay, she's super defensive. She's like locals only in her
little fishing get out the Way movie. Yeah, so he
you know, uh, seven forty seven took it.

Speaker 4 (19:22):
But like, let's keep our eyes on that upstart nine
oh one oh yeah, over the coming years, and remember
vote early enough.

Speaker 2 (19:27):
She's got a lot of competitive years up coming.

Speaker 3 (19:29):
Yes, let's take a break.

Speaker 4 (19:30):
Okay, when we come back, we're going to dance on
into another competition scandal.

Speaker 3 (19:55):
Zarin, Hi, welcome back to the competition. Dojo.

Speaker 2 (20:00):
Oh, I like what you're done with this place. What
color is that?

Speaker 3 (20:02):
That orange safety because it's toasted marshmallows.

Speaker 2 (20:06):
Okay, it's interesting color for the ceiling.

Speaker 3 (20:08):
We heard about Fat Bear Week the most wonderful time
of the year.

Speaker 2 (20:13):
I'm going to pay attention next time.

Speaker 4 (20:14):
And like bears frolicking at the Tay Bears Picnic, we
now kick and leap into a new scandal landscape.

Speaker 3 (20:21):
Irish dancing.

Speaker 2 (20:23):
Oh yes, what the Michael Flatley's going on?

Speaker 3 (20:25):
It's fantastic.

Speaker 4 (20:27):
I like when you see grown women like get tipsy
and break out into Irish dance with their pals in
the middle of the street, like outside of Barn Sanfrances.

Speaker 3 (20:34):
Now we've seen it. It's delightful.

Speaker 2 (20:36):
Yeah we're talking like top half doesn't move bottom tornado. Okay,
craziest technique.

Speaker 3 (20:44):
So good.

Speaker 2 (20:44):
I love it.

Speaker 4 (20:45):
And like the little girls who do Irish dancing have
major wig action. By the way, have you seen it all?
Like little ringlets? I am loving that for them?

Speaker 2 (20:56):
About it?

Speaker 3 (20:57):
So Irish dancing.

Speaker 4 (20:59):
It started out in parish halls and the Scottish equivalent
is the kaylee and that's super fun.

Speaker 3 (21:05):
Let's say drums and jump in.

Speaker 2 (21:06):
This starts like the daughter of drunks would get changed
thrown at their feet kind of dancing.

Speaker 4 (21:10):
Probably children of drunk dancing around like you know, love
folk music and like any activity, though, people want to
turn it into a competition of course, so you're not
just all getting out there and having a good time
dancing a better dancer. It's especially popular with what I
will kindly refer to as the Irish diaspora, like Americans

(21:32):
who claim Irish ancestry in an aggressive way. The Massachusetts
what I like to unkind they like to unkindly refer
to as leprechaun Irish. You know, it's like houses full
of shamrocks and stuff like that, not tattoo.

Speaker 2 (21:49):
You're talking about your own people. I get it listening.

Speaker 4 (21:51):
Your grandpa's are a great grandposer from Ireland this now,
but we get to this generation.

Speaker 2 (21:56):
A lot of nice cozy sweaters and.

Speaker 4 (21:57):
So you know, yeah, there's like Irish this is huge
in that community, but also there are folks with like
no Irish ancestry who get into it. It's a global phenomenon.
It's what I'm trying to tell.

Speaker 2 (22:08):
Okay, Yeah, So.

Speaker 4 (22:09):
Anyway, there's a governing body for Irish dance called a commission,
the Rinki Gualaca. I'm saying that completely wrong. It's the
CLRG or the Irish Dancing Commission.

Speaker 3 (22:21):
You sound like CLARG.

Speaker 4 (22:24):
So it was established in nineteen thirty and it has
members on five continents and I don't know what two
are left out, but I'm guessing it's Antarctica or.

Speaker 2 (22:32):
Africa probably those are the candidates. Who knows, could be Australia.
Maybe they're just like we don't deal with.

Speaker 3 (22:38):
They could be Europe.

Speaker 2 (22:39):
Oh, could be Europe. That would be wild. It's like.

Speaker 3 (22:46):
So CLRG.

Speaker 4 (22:48):
They oversee international dance tournaments called Seshiona and they hold
these qualifying competitions in the US, UK, Australia, so I
guess we have our cons there. They organized Ireland's regional
and national championships as well as the World Irish Dancing Championships.

Speaker 2 (23:07):
I was a two time champion. I know in April of.

Speaker 4 (23:09):
Twenty twenty two they had that in Belfast. Thirty five
hundred dancers showed up for this, so that's April.

Speaker 3 (23:16):
Of twenty twenty.

Speaker 2 (23:16):
We were so nervous, I know you were.

Speaker 3 (23:18):
In October of twenty twenty two all hell broke loose.

Speaker 2 (23:21):
Yes, I wasn't there that year. I quit did an ankle.

Speaker 4 (23:23):
Because like okay, as you well know, because you're a
famous Irish treat the dance competitions are judged by dance teachers,
which makes sense, but apparently those dance teachers are easily
influenced and easily bought. They're thirsty, they're dark, and totally
they'd been like whispers of bribes, favors that they would

(23:45):
do and then grants.

Speaker 3 (23:47):
Someone stepped up.

Speaker 4 (23:48):
An anonymous whistleblower steps up, hands off to the CLRG
Proof of cheating during the summer of twenty twenty two.

Speaker 2 (23:55):
Hard proof.

Speaker 4 (23:56):
Yeah, it's pretty much all text messages like stream shots.
So the dossier provided to c LRG contained text messages
that talked about like how the dance instructors are trying
to like lock in high scores for the students from
these other teachers. There were even offers of sexual favors
between a judge and a teacher.

Speaker 3 (24:16):
In exchange for a high score. Wow, I want to
hear it.

Speaker 2 (24:20):
Yes, of course, I do you know who I am?

Speaker 4 (24:24):
A judge wrote to a teacher, quote I didn't wax
for no reason, followed by laughing emojis, and then quote
half an hour's up.

Speaker 2 (24:35):
Wait what, I don't know what's happened?

Speaker 3 (24:36):
I don't know, So then the teacher answers shave now.

Speaker 2 (24:40):
And is that is that like a clock thing that
kept pointing down half an hour?

Speaker 4 (24:45):
The judge replies, quote, that was all done before I
got here, duh, And then he adds, quote no visit No.
One hundreds and two winking laughing emojis.

Speaker 2 (24:57):
I love that. Now our evidence has emojic w emojis
is part of and then winking emoji winking emoji.

Speaker 3 (25:05):
Teacher replies to no visit No.

Speaker 4 (25:07):
One hundreds quote, oh God, babe, put the a's in
the air. I promise I will be there.

Speaker 3 (25:14):
Wow.

Speaker 2 (25:15):
And all this with an Irish accent, which you got
to imagine that as well.

Speaker 4 (25:20):
In a less raunchy text exchange, a teacher sends all
his students competitor numbers to a judge and then tells
the judge where he hopes each dancer is going to
land in the results. Oh, and the teacher says, thanks
a million for anything you can do to help. So
he's like, here all my students go, and how does
the judge reply? Smiley face emoji is a reply.

Speaker 2 (25:44):
Sure.

Speaker 4 (25:44):
Later the teacher asks who's going to be judging one
of his competitors in an upcoming competition, and he gets
the list and he replies, holy duck, that's haunted by spelcheck.
That is the panel from hell. So I guess he's
spilled it right that time. And then he added quote,
I actually want to puke.

Speaker 2 (26:06):
I do too, me three I thought I wanted to hear.

Speaker 3 (26:11):
You get what you asked for.

Speaker 4 (26:13):
Then the teacher writes later to the judge, quote begging
if you were on and with a competitor's name, to
do what you can xx, so.

Speaker 2 (26:22):
Like fix it, please make it happen.

Speaker 4 (26:23):
The judge replies, not a problem, they're just outright. A
teacher on another one says she would quote really appreciate
a hand with my good you eighteen, which is under eighteen,
and the judge goes, absolutely, not a problem.

Speaker 2 (26:36):
I'd like a hand with my under eighteen.

Speaker 4 (26:40):
Then the teacher thanks him, oh xxx, thank you. Another one,
like the teacher, says she has a dancer competing soon.
Appreciate anything you can do, she says. Judge gives a
thumbs up emoji, and then the teacher responds with like
a kiss in a wink, it's just emoji's all over
a cupcake. Uh there's A teacher writes to a judge

(27:03):
saying she doesn't have her student's competitor numbers, but she
does have their names and like pictures of them in
their full costumes.

Speaker 2 (27:09):
These are kids, by the way, is that for the
judge be able to recognize you.

Speaker 3 (27:13):
Yea, because they like, don't.

Speaker 2 (27:15):
Hit man, but you just don't do a judge exactly
how this is.

Speaker 4 (27:18):
So she's like, here are all the pictures of the
kids that I want to win all the competitions. The
judge replies with a smiley winking emoji.

Speaker 3 (27:26):
So yeah, and maybe they feel like if they don't
say it out.

Speaker 2 (27:29):
Right, that's what is legally binding because it was an
emoji exactly.

Speaker 3 (27:34):
There's no court definition of this emoji.

Speaker 4 (27:37):
So a bunch of the parents and the dance instructors
they told the Irish Independent newspaper that the competitive Irish dance.

Speaker 3 (27:45):
Community is like the mafia.

Speaker 4 (27:48):
Resident There was an American teacher who said that she
was afraid to ask one of the crooked judges for
just like the slightest thing quote because once you do,
you're indebted to them for life.

Speaker 2 (27:57):
It's like the Godfather, I think the human beings. At
this point, we have three analogies. Either something is like Hitler,
slavery or the mafia or Harry Potter, like this is
the worst thing.

Speaker 3 (28:08):
This isn't It's exactly we need, We need to read more.

Speaker 4 (28:12):
So the CLRG said in a statement in July the
next year that had received the dossier and that they'd
appointed a former appeals court judge to investigate, and the
judge was given full access.

Speaker 2 (28:26):
To all of their records and all the emojis.

Speaker 4 (28:28):
Yeah, they made a statement quote, the process will no
doubt be difficult and arduous, but this grossly unethical behavior
must be eliminated from our competitions, dance schools, and governing organizations.

Speaker 2 (28:41):
We got Irish Dance to say.

Speaker 4 (28:43):
Now this is unethical. The Irish dancing message boards were
on fire, y'all. People were calling for protests and events.
They wanted CLRG to to like, yank the teachers and
judges that were named in the text.

Speaker 2 (29:00):
So yeah, you need a whole new crew.

Speaker 7 (29:01):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (29:01):
They wanted them absolutely, like you're out of here.

Speaker 2 (29:03):
You can't ban from the sport or whatever.

Speaker 3 (29:05):
Sondra Konnik, who's chairwoman of the CLRG.

Speaker 2 (29:09):
Oh, Sandy Conic, Yeah, yeah, she didn't know.

Speaker 3 (29:11):
She said she didn't know about all the fixing. Quote.
I can honestly say.

Speaker 4 (29:15):
I wasn't aware, but it is very disappointing when you
have something like that happen. You have to stamp it
out immediately. It's not just acceptable, it won't be tolerated.

Speaker 2 (29:24):
As a former two time champion of Irish dance, I
completely agree, you know, respect what we did.

Speaker 3 (29:29):
I know she was a dance teacher herself.

Speaker 2 (29:31):
Also, you don't have to stamp it out. Otherwise people go, oh,
it's okay, this is your.

Speaker 4 (29:35):
Stamp it hey, hey, just like the dancing She was
originally from Cork by the way.

Speaker 2 (29:40):
She moved Great County.

Speaker 3 (29:41):
She moved to the United.

Speaker 4 (29:42):
States thirty years ago and then set up the dance school.
So anyway, there were disciplinary hearings within the organization. Forty
four people were up against it. Quote this is what
Saunders said. All forty four will have their day in court.
The Commission is adamant that we're going to hear each
and every one of these and the respondents.

Speaker 3 (30:01):
Have the right to be heard.

Speaker 4 (30:03):
She's trying to be fair for the dance fanatics that
were found guilty, she said, quote, we're looking to punish
them if punishment is due, or if there's no punishment.
They're found not guilty, then just move on in the
normal manner.

Speaker 2 (30:15):
Now, this is not a criminal proceeding. This is just
like a cord of dance is doing this.

Speaker 3 (30:22):
Taking it to court.

Speaker 2 (30:23):
So hold on.

Speaker 4 (30:23):
So punishments, yes, right, I have to tell you. The
punishments are kind of light, like they're not going to
get whipped with the laces of the dancing shoes, not
going to get If it's really bad, the purp has
to step down from their position.

Speaker 3 (30:37):
Immediately on one, two, five, six seven.

Speaker 4 (30:42):
They wouldn't be able to run for office with the
c LRG. Oh no, And they might get a fine.

Speaker 2 (30:47):
No, one's getting like knuckles broken.

Speaker 3 (30:49):
No.

Speaker 4 (30:49):
No, for smaller offenses, they might get written up and
it would go in their permanent record.

Speaker 2 (30:54):
If this was ballet, there'd be corporal punishment. People would
be getting hit with s.

Speaker 4 (30:59):
No, they're just going to get a and then they
go ooh but teachers, Oh my god.

Speaker 2 (31:03):
They're rough nuns.

Speaker 3 (31:06):
So this thing, this didn't just taint the organization's reputation. No,
I bet not hit them in the pocketbook, is what it.

Speaker 4 (31:11):
Oh, of course, so they were like all these crazy
legal costs. People were dropping out of event event canceling.

Speaker 3 (31:19):
It added up to a million euro loss for them,
is like, don't call us a million. They lost a million.

Speaker 4 (31:26):
That's like half of their membership funds. In comparison, the
year before twenty twenty one they had a forty one
euro surplus, which you know, it's not a whole lot,
but they were they're, you know, doing really well before.
One of the cases actually made it out of their
internal investigations and was adjudicated in the High Court. Amanda Henigan.

(31:46):
She was a judge who also runs an Irish dancing
school in the UK. She took a case after she
was suspended while the disciplinary hearings proceeded, and then the
court lifted her suspension, but it ruled that CLRG could
with their hearings and she denied that she had anything
to do with it. She said quote no favoritism was
sought or provided. When she was talking about all her

(32:09):
text messages. She was a judge at the twenty nineteen
All Ireland Championships.

Speaker 2 (32:14):
And they equally went after teachers and judge.

Speaker 3 (32:17):
Both sides of it.

Speaker 4 (32:18):
And she had texted appreciate anything you can do, and
she was like, that's not I'm not trying to get
it fixed. I'm just appreciative.

Speaker 3 (32:26):
Yeah, I know.

Speaker 4 (32:27):
CLRG lifted everyone's suspension and said continuing to fight the
legal challenges would put them in a severe financial difficulty.
So it was just was costing them too much money,
so they gave up.

Speaker 2 (32:38):
We'd rather have the rumors of improprieting corruption because at
least those were still a going back, And.

Speaker 4 (32:43):
They did make some changes to try and eliminate funny
business in the future. Just like pub trivia, judges can't
use their phones or other electronics throughout the day of judging, okay,
And they don't have access to competitor phone numbers until
right before the competition, okay. And they also.

Speaker 3 (33:00):
Change the way that the judging works.

Speaker 2 (33:01):
Quote.

Speaker 4 (33:02):
Typically at large competitions, you'll have three judges. We've put
in five judges. Now we drop the highest score in
case someone gets a really off the cuff mark. We
dropped the lowest score in case somebody felt they were
being penalized severely. We take the three in the middle,
which gives a fairer playing field.

Speaker 3 (33:17):
Quote.

Speaker 4 (33:18):
I recognize the hurt that was caused to every teacher
out there, including myself. When you send your children. They
have invested so much of their time in their parents' time.
For them to find out this was going on, that's devastating.

Speaker 3 (33:28):
That's the head of the place.

Speaker 4 (33:30):
What blows me away is that this is pretty much
adults using kids to fulfill their desire for competitions.

Speaker 2 (33:36):
Sounds like everything I know about adults.

Speaker 3 (33:38):
Well, you know, it's like pageants, soccer.

Speaker 2 (33:40):
Leads, soccer, youth football, youth baseball.

Speaker 3 (33:42):
Everyone takes a two.

Speaker 2 (33:44):
I can keep going.

Speaker 3 (33:45):
Let's take a break.

Speaker 4 (33:47):
I need to listen to some ads, and you need
to answer all those texts you got from your Irish student.

Speaker 2 (33:53):
Me and Joe Biden are not looking good. They're telling us, hey,
don't call us, We'll.

Speaker 7 (33:57):
Be back in a flash.

Speaker 2 (34:17):
Hello, Hi, how you doing good?

Speaker 3 (34:19):
Good good. I'm getting ready to fight the real enemy
over here.

Speaker 2 (34:23):
Look at you. Bring it back.

Speaker 4 (34:27):
We've had cheating in competitions, you know, like stuff in
a fat bear ballot box, bribing a judge with you know,
saucy offers. I cheated in act too, Yeah, exactly, But
either way, people had their hand on the scale. The
next group of no good nicks I want to tell
you about did it kind of literally their hand on
the scale. I'm talking about fishing competition.

Speaker 2 (34:48):
Oh yes, yeah.

Speaker 4 (34:50):
I have a good friend who's pretty much like my
brother Pappy. He's honestly the best. I love him to death.
Great nickname pay Yeah, and he's my brother.

Speaker 3 (34:59):
Anyway.

Speaker 4 (35:00):
He used to do those fishing tournament things where he
had to like catch one of each of these fish
on a long list, and he'd be like down in
the Gulf of California, like off the Mendocino Coast, cruising
around like a boat or a kayak, I don't know,
checking off his catches. I loved hearing about it. It was
super cool and it was like this huge broad range.
You have a friend who's really into fishing, right.

Speaker 2 (35:18):
Yeah, My buddy Chris, he is an excellent fisherman, and
we used to every morning we were house spanners together.
We would go and fishing creeks and everything, and we
take this john boat everywhere and he is an absolute
menace on fish. Sometimes we would go and catch thirty fish.
We go it to a hole and I don't know
why I don't fish so well with other people, but

(35:39):
he is a beast. He's Serbian. They're really good fishermen, right,
So traditionally go a lot of culture, a lot of rivers,
a lot of Yeah. So he taught me a ton
about how to fish out here. Because I know deep
sea fishing and East coast fishing, I didn't know the
lakes and rivers you're used to.

Speaker 4 (35:54):
That's the thing is that, Like, that's what I'm gonna
be talking about, is like when you're pulling it, just
a ton of fish out of a lake or a river.
These fishing tournaments, right, yeah, you're like glistening rods, night reels,
fancy boats.

Speaker 3 (36:11):
YETI coolers.

Speaker 2 (36:12):
Yes, everywhere he goes us up on an Eagle lake.
People go out there and like they're waiting at whatever,
like four thirty in the morning, they sound an announcement.
Everyone goes tearing off to get to their hole.

Speaker 4 (36:22):
Well, they want to do it because they're like high
dollar payouts.

Speaker 2 (36:25):
Totally.

Speaker 3 (36:26):
They can make a lot of money.

Speaker 4 (36:27):
It's like golf, you can make cass anywhere you have
fancy boats.

Speaker 3 (36:30):
YETI coolers and high dollar payouts.

Speaker 4 (36:33):
You can have criminals and you and me and Chris
and so flim flammers at fishing tournaments.

Speaker 3 (36:40):
Have been a problem for a while.

Speaker 4 (36:42):
I bet yeah, tournament cheating was rampant in local tournaments
for just years in the sixties. There was a guy
named Ray Scott and he came up with the bass
tournament circuit and he figured that like all the trickery
would be discouraged if they charged huge entry fees that
only serious professionals could afford.

Speaker 2 (37:01):
Oh, interesting, it didn't help. That's not going to work.

Speaker 3 (37:04):
No, cheaters find a way they could.

Speaker 2 (37:06):
They could cooborate their money and go, we'll get one
cheater in there.

Speaker 4 (37:08):
Well and if if it's worth it, the stakes anyway.
So there was l Row McNeil in nineteen eighty three.
He tried to rig a fishing tournament in Texas and
he had a pretty good con He went to Florida
and he bought an enormous black bass, just massive, and
he had this errated water tank fitted into his truck

(37:28):
and then he drove the fish to his house in Louisiana.

Speaker 2 (37:31):
I think where you're going with this? Yeah.

Speaker 4 (37:33):
He picks up his co conspirator, his buddy, this angler
named Terry Isam.

Speaker 3 (37:38):
Terry gets in the.

Speaker 2 (37:38):
Truck like Terry is like it's a religion, Like, oh,
I'm a.

Speaker 4 (37:41):
Practitioner, I s a m Terry is is is We'll
call it so Terry Terry. He had signed up to
be in the road Runner Bass Tournament in Tyler, Texas.

Speaker 2 (37:55):
Oh, Tyler, Texas.

Speaker 3 (37:56):
Yes, so he and l Row, They Terry and l Row.

Speaker 4 (37:59):
They're in the truck with the tank in the back
with a fish bobbing around in it. They get to
the tournament. He you know, Terry's out there, you know he, oh,
look at this thing, and he like, I guess I
don't know that. He like stuck a hook into it
and then.

Speaker 3 (38:14):
Oh, my gosh, you guys, and you.

Speaker 4 (38:18):
Know they it's just they made a ton of money.
So l Row and all his buddies they're honing this con.
They do it over and over and kidding, they did
it way more than once, and they make a ton
of money. He was able to scam three hundred and
fifty thousand dollars from the Texas Bass Tournament circuit.

Speaker 3 (38:34):
Damn right. The judges got wise to.

Speaker 4 (38:37):
Him, though, and they eventually they called someone in to
analyze the fish and they're like, this is not local.

Speaker 2 (38:43):
This is a local species.

Speaker 3 (38:46):
This is like, Nemo, get this out of here.

Speaker 2 (38:48):
This is a European fish totally.

Speaker 4 (38:51):
So in eighty five, nineteen eighty five, he and three
anglers they got fines and five year prison sentences because
and they pled guilty.

Speaker 2 (39:00):
Of course three fifty thousand fraud.

Speaker 4 (39:01):
Yeah, Im Terry, he's the government's star witness, which got
him a lighter sentence in the lesser.

Speaker 2 (39:07):
Okay, he went snitched, Yeah.

Speaker 3 (39:08):
He snitched. But this isn't just an American problem, No,
I bet not.

Speaker 4 (39:12):
Romania's national carp fishing team they were as crooked as
they come, you star. They cheated their way to a
win at the fourteenth World carp Angling Championships in twenty twelve.

(39:32):
That was on their home waters. No really, it was
held in Romania. The England national team thought something was fishy,
so they lodged a formal complaint against the host Romanians
because it turns out that like for months, the Romanians
had been going down to like where they were going
to go fishing and feeding the carp like a special

(39:55):
local bait that would give them an advantage during the
turn brilliant. And so they're just get this is the
bait They're going to brilliant, fattening them up, and they're
like creating a preference in the fish for their special baits.

Speaker 2 (40:07):
A little freaky fish treats and the Brits.

Speaker 3 (40:11):
The Brits use like a slurry of flour egg.

Speaker 4 (40:15):
And dog beans. No, it's like, you know, this is
the English carp respond to flower egg and dog food kibble.
It's you know, insert English cuisine joke. So the Romanian
carp they're like, not about this, Like we have been
eating delicacies and you want to give us this garbage
where it's like a year ago they would have been like,
sounds good to me, you know, keep spoon and pops.

(40:35):
So that kind of baiting. It's not illegal, but it's unsportsmanlike.

Speaker 5 (40:42):
The fish apparently not okay, I guess the judge didn't
think of it.

Speaker 4 (40:45):
Ian Huntington, team manager of the England carp team. He
said their defeat was tough bait to swallow, so quote
hard lessons have been learned and it has been a
very difficult experience to pick the team and ourselves up
after this event. It is obvious that any team fishing

(41:06):
with the particular type of bait would do well and
the rest would really struggle to get a bite. Within
two hours of the match starting, we were asking ourselves
questions about the bait.

Speaker 2 (41:16):
I understand that his team flounder. Is he going to
keep carping about this?

Speaker 7 (41:20):
Yes?

Speaker 3 (41:21):
Yes, that was for you was so good. I felt
that through my whole body. This is so good.

Speaker 4 (41:26):
So Romania they take first place in both team and
individual categories. The Bulgarian, Siberian and Portuguese teams they were
practicing at the same lake as the Romanians and they
saw them in the lead up to it. They're like,
what's you fishing with? And they're like, maybe a little
bit of this, So they started using that same bait
and that's why they came in second thirty four, right

(41:49):
behind Romania. England came in eighteen. Well it wasn't just England,
but South Africa and France came up empty two.

Speaker 3 (42:00):
How much fish did the Romanian team yank from the
water in order to win the gold?

Speaker 2 (42:05):
How much? Elizabeth One report.

Speaker 3 (42:07):
Said one point seven tons of fish. That's just laying wasteed.
I don't know.

Speaker 4 (42:15):
Speaking of England, they had a bass switcheroo, kind of
like the one in Texas. Matthew Clark won Guernsey's twenty
twelve Balwick Basque Club tournament. He pulled in a thirteen pound,
thirteen ounce bass.

Speaker 2 (42:29):
Yea fish.

Speaker 4 (42:31):
Yeah, it was three pounds bigger than the second place fish.

Speaker 3 (42:34):
Okay, and you know it's.

Speaker 4 (42:35):
Usually like a game of ounces pounds ridiculous. So the
winner was announced, and then Clark and the second place fisherman,
Shane Bentley, they posed for photos with their fish, you know,
like when they're holding up the line or like you
know how someone they cradle it in front of them
like they just caught a newly birthed baby.

Speaker 3 (42:53):
Congratulations.

Speaker 2 (42:54):
Okay, So my friend Chris posted those pictures on Instagram
cradling baby fish, right, so babyish.

Speaker 4 (43:01):
Bentley the second place He looks over at clark'sfish and
he realizes.

Speaker 3 (43:06):
I've seen that before, but where I can't fish? Yeah,
I've seen I know that fish.

Speaker 2 (43:12):
I know that you know him.

Speaker 3 (43:14):
Where do I know him from?

Speaker 2 (43:15):
What?

Speaker 3 (43:17):
He recognized him from? The local Saint peter Port aquarium.

Speaker 2 (43:21):
Oh my god, he recognized aquarium.

Speaker 4 (43:24):
He said, he said, he tells the Express newspaper quote.
It stood out because it had very distinct markings on
its head. When the bass was lifted out of the
tank for the photo, I thought, that's the fish from
the aquarium. The next morning, I went to the aquarium.
I looked in the tank, but I couldn't see the fish.
Then the woman looked and she couldn't find the fish.

(43:46):
So Clark scale the cliff. The winner, Scale the cliff,
climbed a rope ladder and broke into the aquarium, and
he told police that he was going to return the
fish after the contest, but he dropped and injured it
as he made his getaway. Quote he took it to
a fish seller who didn't realize it was stolen and
chopped it up. An aquarium spokesperson told The Express. All

(44:09):
we got back was the head and tail. You know,
I love animals more than anything, but for some reason,
this is absolutely hysterical. So he got sentenced to one
hundred hours of community service for that. Oh yeah, and
then that brings us to the most infamous of fishing scandals. Okay,
you know, like the Irish dancing Hullabluo. This one went

(44:31):
down in twenty twenty two. Scan It's sort of what
kicked off this whole episode idea, because we got a
lot of recommendations for it, and I remember when I
first saw the clip, I was like, oh, I gotta
just show them this, So Jacob Runyon, age forty three,
and Chase Kaminski, aged thirty six, two grown men who
should know better.

Speaker 2 (44:51):
Oh no, yeah, I recognize this tone.

Speaker 4 (44:53):
So the Lake Erie Walleye Trail Tournament in Cleveland is
high stakes. Oh yeah, big, thirty thousand dollars on the lines.
Er Oh yeah, it draws dozens of teams, big sponsors,
and you can win not just cash, but like super
snazzy fishing boats.

Speaker 3 (45:09):
You know, kind of like the glitter paint.

Speaker 4 (45:13):
So since this is fishing and there's a lot of
money on the line, the organizers routinely subject winners to
polygraph tests. Do you remember remember Erlo McNeil, right, the
Texas guy. Uh he and his crew used to get
around those polygraph tests by taking kludes.

Speaker 2 (45:33):
What yeah, where are they finding kluds?

Speaker 4 (45:34):
Well back in the day, oh of course, eighties, Yeah
they still so run In and Kaminsky, you know, they
had a bang up twenty twenty one season.

Speaker 2 (45:43):
And they're used like GHB to beat the test.

Speaker 4 (45:45):
Well, there's no kaludes anymore, so I know. But the
twenty twenty one they won more than three hundred thousand dollars.

Speaker 3 (45:51):
That came in in prizes.

Speaker 2 (45:53):
Impressive.

Speaker 4 (45:54):
Yeah, and they also lost some of that money when
one of them failed a tournament's polygraph test of like
you know, stockpiled luthes.

Speaker 2 (46:02):
So beta blockers. Oh god, I love.

Speaker 4 (46:06):
So they signed up for the tournament and they went
out to catch the heaviest walleye and Lake Erie okay,
and it seemed like they did. They pulled out four
whoppers and they took the day. There is a viral
video of the event, and it is amazing, of course.
And since I can't show it, here's Sarin. I invite
you to close you eyes.

Speaker 6 (46:28):
Oh yeah, I want you to picture.

Speaker 4 (46:31):
It's September thirtieth, twenty twenty two. The Ridiculous Crime Antarctica
episode dropped yesterday and let me tell you you loved it.

Speaker 3 (46:40):
Who were you?

Speaker 4 (46:41):
Your name is Braden Lee Ryder. That's all one word,
spider Man. You're a fictional attendee of the Lake Erie
Walleye Trail Tournament. You aren't a fisherman. You just like
their fashion and the smell of fish. So there you
are on the shore of the lake with scores of
other fish beans, all eager to take a look a
winning catches. You heard their enormous.

Speaker 3 (47:02):
God, what a time to be alive.

Speaker 4 (47:04):
As men murmur and mumble around you, you watch Jacob
Runyan and Chase Kamiski strut to the stage and accept
their places first top Dogs, big Fish.

Speaker 3 (47:15):
Everyone hates them.

Speaker 4 (47:17):
They hoist two heavy walleye into the air, their oakley
blade sunglasses reflecting the cloudy sky. They're under armour hoodies
and blazoned with a mishmash of sponsor logos and the
word Runyon Ranger on the back. This is their moment.
And then the tournament director, Jason Fisher, I mean, can
you are you kidding me?

Speaker 2 (47:35):
That is his real last name, Jason the Argonaut.

Speaker 4 (47:38):
Jason Fisher makes his move. Runyan and Kamisky. They put
their catch into a milk crate. Fisher walks over, takes
the crate away. He walks to the side of the
stage and sets.

Speaker 3 (47:49):
The crate on the ground.

Speaker 4 (47:51):
After conferring with an associate, he lifts one of the
fish from the crate and sets it on the asphalt.
Runyon stands by, stone faced as Fisher takes a knife.

Speaker 3 (47:59):
From his potu. The crowd grows silent.

Speaker 4 (48:02):
Fisher stabs his blade into the side of the fish
and draws it upward from the tail to the glassy
dead eyes. He reaches into the guts of the walleye
and pulls something out. It's a lead weight the size
of a ping pong ball. The crowd irrupts. There is

(48:24):
shouting for a freshwater sport. They share our using salting language.
Saren Runyon stands there, silent, staring as fisher continues to
slice open the winning catches, pulling out more weights and
even fish filets.

Speaker 3 (48:38):
A filet of fish somebody else.

Speaker 4 (48:41):
Yeah, he's likes just each fish, tons of weights coming
out of it and fish filets. They shoved extra fish
into the fish to win a boat.

Speaker 3 (48:51):
Call the cops.

Speaker 4 (48:52):
One guy yells he needs to go to jail. The
man standing next to you, holding his phone and recording
the whole thing, ask the question on everyone's mind.

Speaker 3 (49:00):
You got anything to say? Runyan does not.

Speaker 4 (49:05):
So the five weighted fish were confiscated. Runyan and his
pal get kicked out, and he's just he's just standing
there the whole time.

Speaker 2 (49:13):
I'm just taking it as.

Speaker 3 (49:15):
Everyone's yelling at him and swearing, and it's just like.

Speaker 2 (49:17):
Going there on a dock, right, or I could.

Speaker 4 (49:20):
Right exactly and So, by the way, if you want
to watch the video, search Walleye Tournament Cheaters on YouTube
and there's one posted by any oh Outdoors that's it's
like uncut, it's it's raw tape. They don't even bleep
out all the bad words. It's it's it's heavy.

Speaker 3 (49:36):
So a grand jury indicted the two on charges of cheating,
attempted grand theft, and possessing criminal tools, and the charges
are fifth degree felonies.

Speaker 2 (49:44):
Damn.

Speaker 3 (49:45):
Quote.

Speaker 4 (49:46):
I take all crime very seriously, and I believe what
these two individuals attempted to do was not only dishonorable
but also criminal. Prosecutor Michael C. O'Malley chimed in. The
dudes also faced a misdemeanor count of unlawful ownership of
wild an animals, and that's related to the raw fish
filets that they allegedly have on their boat to shove
into the fish they caught. They pleaded guilty to cheating

(50:08):
and unlawful ownership of wild animals. They were sentenced to
ten days in jail and a year and a half probation,
and they each also had to pay twenty five hundred
dollars fine.

Speaker 2 (50:18):
Damn.

Speaker 3 (50:18):
Both men had their fishing licenses suspended.

Speaker 2 (50:21):
For three years.

Speaker 4 (50:23):
Yeah, maximum penalty allowed by law. Kaminski was also required
to forfeit his boat worth one hundred and thirty thousand dollars.

Speaker 2 (50:31):
Oh.

Speaker 4 (50:32):
Michael O'Malley, the prosecutor, said that the duo quote deserve
to have their fishing license suspended for life. These two
should be banned from every fishing tournament for life. They
are thieves and now they are convicted felons.

Speaker 3 (50:47):
What is your ridiculous takeaway?

Speaker 2 (50:49):
Oh Man, I would have tried, and I have to
admit this to pull off the answer of I don't
know what these fish have been eating, and I would
have tried for a long time to save and they
would have been filming that. I would have regretted it
later on, but I would have tried it.

Speaker 3 (51:06):
I think that's amazing and I think they should have done.

Speaker 2 (51:08):
What's your ridiculous takeaway, Elizabeth?

Speaker 3 (51:10):
That was really good.

Speaker 4 (51:11):
My ridiculous takeaway is everyone should try their hardest to
not be competitive.

Speaker 2 (51:18):
Not be competitive.

Speaker 3 (51:19):
Don't be competitive.

Speaker 2 (51:20):
I'm going to be less competitive than you are.

Speaker 3 (51:22):
I'm more talking to myself.

Speaker 2 (51:23):
I bet I could be less competitive.

Speaker 3 (51:24):
Than it could be way more or less producer Dave.

Speaker 2 (51:27):
Take note of this. I'd like you to mark that
I can be less competitive.

Speaker 3 (51:31):
That's all I have for today.

Speaker 4 (51:33):
You can find us online at ridiculous Crime dot com.
We're also at Ridiculous Crime on both Twitter and Instagram.
You can email Ridiculous Crime at gmail dot com and
no one will answer you. Leave us a talk back
on the iHeart app reach out Biby. Ridiculous Crime is
hosted by Elizabeth Dutton and Zaren Burnette, produced and edited

(51:55):
by Angler Dangler, Dave Cousten. Research is by Cutthroat Squared
Answer Marissa and big Mouth Bass Resistance leader Andrea Song
Sharpened Hear. The theme song is by Bear seven point
thirty two Thomas Lee and Bear five.

Speaker 3 (52:08):
Ten Travis Dutton.

Speaker 4 (52:09):
Post wardrobe is provided by Botany five hundred. Executive producers
are Ben We Got a Live One Bowlin and Noel
How is your catch already Battered? And Fried Brown.

Speaker 2 (52:25):
Dis Crime Say It One More Time, Geeks Cry.

Speaker 1 (52:32):
Ridiculous Crime is a production of iHeartRadio. Four more podcasts
to my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.