December 3, 2025 • 40 mins
“Iron Mike” Malloy survived not one, not two, but more than nine attempts on his life before he finally met his end. Malloy became the target of a group of acquaintances later dubbed the “Murder Trust,” who conspired to kill him for insurance money. What followed remains one of the most astonishing strings of failed murder attempts in history.
The conspirators served him cocktails laced with poison, swapped in antifreeze, turpentine, and even rat poison—none of which seemed to affect him at all. When that failed, they tried abandoning him in a snowbank to freeze, and later even staged a taxi hit-and-run. Each time, Malloy recovered, defying their plans and cementing his status as a near-mythic figure in true-crime lore.
Writer Riley Knight has chronicled the story of Mike Malloy along with some of history’s other strangest deaths. Some true crime, others simply unbelievable.
You can read his book, History's Strangest Deaths, here and listen to his podcast, Half-Arsed History, here.
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Guest: Riley Knight
Host: Claire Murphy
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
As the saying goes, there are only two certainties in life,
death and taxes. But what if your death ends up
going down in history as amongst the most interesting, the
most confusing, or even surrounded by the most conspiracy theories.
For example, there's an irishman living in New York City
in the nineteen twenties and thirties. It's the depression era,
(00:25):
and a lot of people are out of work, homeless,
and finding whatever way they can to make it through
the day. For Mike mlloy, it was drinking. He would
go to the local speakeasy as often as he could
to drown out the woes life had handed him. To
the owner of the bar, though, Mike started to look
less and less like a patron and more and more
like some easy cash. The plan the bar owner and
(00:48):
his group of accomplices would hatch would lead to them
attempting to murder Mike mlloy once, twice, three times, and
more each time. The method of delay that death sentence
became more unhinged and elaborate. The problem for them was
that Mike malloy, who would go on to be nicknamed
Ian Michael Mike the durable through no effort of his
(01:11):
own simply could not or would not die. I'm Claire
Murphy and this is True Crime Conversations, a podcast exploring
the world's most notorious crimes by speaking to the people
who know the most about them. Today we're chadding to
the author of the book History's Strangest Deaths, Riley Knight.
He's lined up fifty tails spanning thousands of years of history,
(01:34):
of people who've taken the certainty of death and made
it a truly spectacular event, from Australia's disappearing Prime Minister
to a duke whose toilet run ended up rather more
spikier than he expected. Riley joins us now to take
us through some of his favorite ways to die. Riley,
thank you so much for joining us on True Crime Conversations.
(01:56):
I would like to kick off today's conversation because you
have written a book about strange deaths, and some of
them are natural causes, some of them very mysterious. But
seeing as we are true Crime Conversations, we want to
start off with things that were actual crimes, so I
would like to begin by talking about iron Mike Malloy.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
Oh a well chosen. We're talking about crimes for sure.
Speaker 1 (02:18):
So well, many many crimes committed against this one man.
But as a descendant myself of Irish malloy's, I know
they're made of pretty sturdy stuff. But can you give
us just a little idea of who Mike mlloy was
and where he was in the world at this time.
Speaker 2 (02:32):
So I'm Mike mlloy was, as he says, an Irish feller,
and he immigrated to the United States, as many Irish
people did towards the end of the around the turn
of the twentieth century, sort of end of the nineteenth
early early twentieth century, obviously a huge amount of immigration
over to the Big Apple. And he picked up work
over there doing this and that. He's a firefighter at
one stage, worked in a couple of other jobs, but
(02:52):
unfortunately in his later years he fell on hard times
and ended up taking to the bottle, ended up homeless
as well. So the po was having a very rough
go of things. But he did like a drink, and
this tended to be how he would drown his sorrows.
And there was a group of rather unscrupulous blokes who
saw an opportunity in that. Right. There was this fellow
(03:15):
Tony Marino who owned a bar in New York City,
and he had actually successfully pulled off a life insurance
scam previously. Right. I'm not sure if this woman was
a patron of his at the bar or what have you,
but he essentially tricked her into signing life insurance documents
with him as the beneficiary, murdered her right by freezing
(03:36):
her to death, got her so drunk, left her in
her bedroom with the window open on a freezing night.
She froze. The death was deemed natural, right, and therefore
her life insurance paid out, and Marino ended up benefiting
from this. So obviously he's just seeing dollar signs when
he looks at this bloke Mike Malloy, thinking well, I
can pull a similar scheme with this fellow. But he
(03:57):
did take a obviously, you know that thing doesn't strike well,
it does strike twice, but you know, in a figurative sense,
lightning doesn't strike twice. He didn't want the He didn't
want to pull exactly the same scam and freeze Iron
Mike to death.
Speaker 1 (04:09):
So look a little bit suspicious if that happened.
Speaker 2 (04:12):
Yes, exactly, Yes, So he took a slightly different approach,
or many different approaches in trying to knock this bloke
off in fact.
Speaker 1 (04:18):
Okay, so let's start at the beginning, because there were
many many attempts on Iron Mike Malloy's life. How did
they initially deem the correct way to knock him off
without raising too much suspicion.
Speaker 2 (04:32):
Well, they thought, given that this bloke did love a drink, right,
they thought that that would be the sort of the
most natural way for you know, it wouldn't raise many
eyebrows if he was found to have sort of drank
himself to.
Speaker 1 (04:44):
Death, right, like alcohol poisoning.
Speaker 2 (04:46):
Exactly, essentially just just dying because of over consumption of alcohol.
So that was plan a right, So Marino invites him
into the bar and says, mate, drinks around the house.
Don't even worry about it. The bartender, whose name was
Joseph Murphy, just plied him with alcohol and then put
in front of him what he said was a political petition.
(05:07):
Right when you signed this for me, mate, thanks very much.
In fact, it was, as you probably guessed, a life
insurance policy was a life insurance policy document that Marino
and his other accomplices. They were later called the Murder Trust,
the sensational appellation that was given to them by the
other tabloids. They fronted the money for the life insurance premium, right,
(05:28):
and they continued to just give as much booze to
this bloke, Mike malloy as he could possibly chuck down
his hole. And this guy just drank and drank and drank,
like day in and day he'd come in, he would
drink himself insensible, pass out and then get up, stagger outside,
and come back the next day and do it again
(05:49):
and again. This guy was seemingly indestructible and an iron liver. Right,
This alcohol didn't It's not that it didn't touch it,
because again he was passing it and staggering out of
the bar as a choke, but it didn't kill him.
And after you know, quite some time, and obviously at
some cost as well.
Speaker 1 (06:07):
I mean they've well, yeah, he's giving him free drinks, right,
free drinks.
Speaker 2 (06:10):
The buzz well into the red here, and so it's
a big problem and they say, okay, we're gonna have
to up the ante here because clearly, right just plying
him with booze, he's not going to die of liver
fated and know what's going on with this bloke, but
is indestructible.
Speaker 1 (06:22):
So stage two, what do they start to deploy?
Speaker 2 (06:25):
So they start to adulterate the drinks a little bit.
They start to add a couple of extra ingredients to
turn his alcohol into what should have been, in their
minds at least lethal cocktails. Now, they made a slight
error in how they started this campaign because the first
(06:45):
thing that they added to his drinks was engine coolant. Right,
you'll often see in the I found this very interesting. Actually,
when I was researching this story, a lot of the
literature on it is American. Right, Obviously this's happened in America,
so there's a lot of American writing about it. And
so they talked to about how they added anti freeze
to the drinks, and I was trying to find stuff
about anti freeze, and I was like, what, it turns
(07:07):
out that antifreeze and engine coolant are the same thing.
You can put one liquid in a car engine that
both prevents it from overheating and prevents it from freezing.
There's just there's just one liquid that does that, Like this.
Speaker 1 (07:18):
Some wild chemical compound going on.
Speaker 2 (07:21):
Well, there's another very interesting chemical attribute of anti freeze
or engine coolant. It's poisonous. Obviously, it'll like, don't drink it,
it'll kid you. It goes in the car, it doesn't
go and you go. Except an antide, You're not gonna
believe this. An antidote to engine cool and anti freeze.
Anti freeze poisoning is alcohol. Alcohol counteracts the effects of
(07:43):
ethanol poisoning, right apparently, which is the main one of
the main ingredients in this in this substance. And so
what they were doing essentially is mixing poison into a
glass of antidote, which they then served to this bloke.
And then so they're scratching there, why is this killing him?
Speaker 1 (07:58):
So iron Mike is just still happily drinking a way
none the wiser.
Speaker 2 (08:01):
Yeah, it didn't even seem to be I don't know,
I mean maybe was his taste buds were so shot
that he didn't notice the adulteration whatsoever. But yeah, after that,
I mean, look, this bloke again had had an incredible
constitution because after the engine cool and failed, they started
to put turpentine in his drinks equine liniment, right, a
heat rub for horses. They put rat poison in his drinks.
(08:22):
They put wood alcohol. That wood alcohol will kill you
so fast. Right, if you drink wood alcohol, you will
go blind and then you will die.
Speaker 1 (08:30):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (08:31):
But again it's filled with ethanol, and alcohol is an
antidote to this.
Speaker 1 (08:37):
So nearly everything they're giving him is counteracted by the alcohol.
Speaker 2 (08:40):
I don't know why he didn't die with the rat poisoning, right,
Like I understand he's not a rat, it's not designed
to kill it. But rat poison is pretty lethal. You know.
I've tried it myself. I haven't conclusively discovered this, but
I'll read the label, the warning and I'll take the
word for it. But no, all of this stuff that
was put into his drinks, it's still just didn't kill him.
Speaker 1 (08:59):
So they must be getting desperate by this stage because,
as we mentioned before, they're now paying premiums to the
insurance company. He's drinking the bar dry every night, so
they are losing money on this. Un now, yes, Yd,
so they get desperate, like what are they what's their
next step?
Speaker 2 (09:16):
Well, as I say in the book, it seems to
be that this is the point that they got to
the no bad ideas stage of conspiracy. Because one of
the guys in the murder Trust he claimed to have
seen someone die after eating like thirty oysters and washing
them down with whiskey.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
Okay, he was.
Speaker 2 (09:34):
Like, well, I don't know, man, maybe like oysters and
whiskey is lethal, who knows. So they tried that, going
by a bunch of oysters right and fed in them
and gave him wisky. That didn't work. They made him
a sandwich with rotten sardines, right, sprinkled with a little
bit of rat poisoning, you know, just just.
Speaker 1 (09:50):
Fased good measure, yep.
Speaker 2 (09:52):
And then also, like a Looney Tunes cartoon, put some
carpet tax in the sandwich as well. Mike just ate
it and didn't seem like they just didn't it just
didn't touch him, like I guess you know he was
that drunk or that hungry the night is this guy
made of I Look, he was very well, he was
very deserving of the nickname that he got later on
(10:13):
Iron Mike, right, Like, this guy was seemingly untouchable. Anyway,
none of this has worked, right, the sardines, the rat poison,
the carp attacks, the horse liniment, the turpentine, the wood alcohol, like,
none of this has worked. And so at this point
Marino goes right, Okay, look, I'll tell you what does work, right, buggaret,
buddy getting suspicious with the authorities. I'll tell you what
does work. Freezing him to death. We've done that before,
(10:34):
would do it again, yep. So the next stage, right,
they got him drunk again. He passed out. They soaked
him with water. This is in the middle of winter
in New York, so that's freezing cold, snow's coming down.
Soaked him with water, dumped him in a park, right,
and left him to essentially die, And the life insuring
they looked a little closely, they'd see that Marino was
(10:55):
once again the beneficiary of a life insurance where this
guy had frozen a death, just like the other life beforehand.
But this guy, like at this point, they just need
him dead, so they'll do whatever they can. Except that's
a rather bad fortune because they dumped him in a
park where he was found by passing police officers who obviously,
you know, were concerned for this bloke or perhaps you know,
(11:18):
not happy with him his vagrancy, And so they took
him back to the station where he warmed up, survived,
and then headed back to the bar the next day
to keep stuck in the drinks down.
Speaker 1 (11:28):
What is this like attempt ten? Now, like, how many
attempts of his life has he actually survived?
Speaker 2 (11:34):
By this point, they have run out of space on
the white board at this stage, right, so they like
plan E, Plan F, Plan G, plan HS like they're
running out of letters. Yeah, at this stage they hire
they bring a fifth member in to the murder trust,
a cab driver, right, who had the sufficient moral flexibility
to come on board with their plan. And they took
(11:55):
a very straightforward approach to they still needed. Obviously, they
couldn't just shoot him or stab him, right because then
suspicious circumstances, they're not going to get life insurance pout.
But what if he was just like accidentally hit by
a car.
Speaker 1 (12:04):
I mean he's a drunk, right.
Speaker 2 (12:06):
Yeah, he's drunk, he's stumbling home, right, So what they
did is essentially staged a well, they staged a hit
and run. But they again were very, very determined to
make sure this guy was dead. So after taking him
out into the street, getting the guy with the taxi
to run over him, that he then backed over him
as well, which is not what a lot of hit
(12:26):
and run drivers now. I don't know, anyway, they really
did their best to make sure that he was dead.
But surprise, surprise, he survived. He was taken to hospital
and he lived to fight another day. The blokes in
the murder Trust, after having taken him outside run over
him with the taxi twice. They're looking in the papers, right,
(12:46):
trying to find the death notice, trying to find the obituar.
You know, sadly Mike order didn't come, and so they
don't know what to do. They don't know where he's got,
they don't know that he's survived, they don't know that
he's in the hospital. It is weeks later, right that
molloy walks back into the bar, cheerful as anything. How
about a drink? Boys, right, because he has this offer
of I mean, they've been playing with him with free
(13:07):
booze for weeks now, right, Why wouldn't he go straight
back there and have a drink after getting a discharge
from hospital.
Speaker 1 (13:13):
So he has no inkling that we know of at
this stage that these men are the ones who are
trying to knock him off.
Speaker 2 (13:18):
Well, look, look, I don't know, it doesn't seem like it,
or maybe the siren call of an open bar was
just too much for him to ignore, But he did
continue to go back to this bar, and he did
continue to be served these drinks. Is as you know,
these blokes were trying to figure out a way to
kill him. But in the end they finally they did
(13:39):
something that put the whole thing beyond any form of doubt, right,
And it is unfortunate because obviously it's been a terrific
tale so far, but we all know that it was
going to come to a tragic end. And sadly, Mike
mulloy he did die when they again got him so
drunk that he passed out. They took him upstairs, they
took a hose from like a gas forrcet, taped it
(14:01):
into his mouth and essentially made him breathe in gas
while passed out until until unfortunately, he did die, and
he was there in front of it like they were
sure of it this time, right, they watched him die, right,
this time it's yeah, okay, he's dead. And then what
they then had to do was payoff a shonky doctor
to sign off on a dodgy death certificate saying that
(14:24):
he had died of pneumonia. And then right they went
to the life insurance company with this death certificate and
they received the payer. At the end of all of this,
the murder Trust did get their payday because they accepted
the doctor's note. They said, Okay, this guy's died of pneumonia,
fair enough, nothing suspicious about that, you know, being very quickly,
(14:44):
I just don't. Let's not get to a current or
anything like that. That's fine, But it's interesting that you
say before, why wasn't this guy suspicious? Right now? Look,
he's an older fella. He's had a fair few drinks
in him over his time. Maybe he's not in the
sort of the clearest frame of mind to be thinking
critically about what's going on to But I'll tell you
who were the cops the police at this stage, right,
(15:05):
they've heard rumors about this guy who because obviously the
story is spreading about this guy who's just drinking like
a fish every night. Oh, he's got hit by a car.
He got picked up by the cops for being left
in the freezing.
Speaker 1 (15:19):
So they're starting to go, hang on.
Speaker 2 (15:21):
A minute, they're starting to piecings together.
Speaker 1 (15:22):
This is starting to look sas right.
Speaker 2 (15:24):
And when it was announced that this guy had died,
right when when the I don't know, the paperwork for
the dead the death to whatever else was officially lodged.
The cops like, right, okay, we need to look into this.
So before his corpse can be disposed of once and
for all, the police step in. They order a full
like coronial investigation into this guy's death, and of course
(15:45):
the coroner immediately finds that he didn't die of pneumonia.
He died because he had essentially been gassed. So the
ill gotten gains of the murder Trust was not long enjoyed.
It wasn't long before these guys would I mean, look,
very clear trail of evidence, right, okay, who could have
possibly done this to him? Was it the guy who
(16:05):
owned the bar where he was drinking, who was also
a beneficiary of his life? Well, and impossible to determine.
Let's go to lunch, you know, so, very very quick
and clear path to the perpetrators here, the murder Trust.
They were all rounded up and they were sent to
New York's infam a sing sing prison, and eventually they
had a scheduled appointment with the electric chair. So that
(16:28):
was the end of them. They did receive. I suppose
they're just deserts for their attempt to kill this fella.
But it's incredible to think that he survived. It's a
good thing he wasn't put in the electric chair because
he would have knocked out, you know, the power grid
in New York City if they've tried to blast him.
Speaker 1 (16:46):
So that's the legacy he leaves behind as Iron Mike then, right,
the man who was essentially indestructible. So I guess he's
become a bit of a legend for that.
Speaker 2 (16:53):
Yeah, and there. I mean, obviously, at the time when
the story broke, there was a huge amount of coverage
in the papers. It was a sensational story. Right. The
news has had an absolute field day with this because
it had everything that people I mean, there's murder and
intrigue and there was there were plots and schemes and
money and all that sort of stuff on the line.
So people love this story, and there's there's a lot
of stuff that was written about it, both at the
time and in the years since. Right, But you can't like,
(17:16):
I found it really interesting while researching the story to
go back and read all of those newspaper reports because
you know, you watch old newsreels and no the people
are talking like this and O news today and you're
sort of a Matt that you can hear that voice
in the way that the terrible shocking news today from
New York City, when it was like it's there's a
there's a real I mean, we have sensational, sensationalist journalism today, right,
(17:38):
but man, one hundred years ago, they really know it.
They knew what they were. It was sensational media. They
really they loved.
Speaker 1 (17:44):
A bit of drama. You're listening to True Crime Conversations
with me, Claire Murphy. I'm speaking with Riley Knight about
some of history's strangest deaths. Up next, we discussed the
death of Australian Prime Minister Harold Holt and the suspicious
way in which he went missing. Let's move on and
bring it a little bit closer to home, because there
(18:05):
is a death yere in Australia which whilst I think
legally it's considered accidental, there's a lot of conspiracy theorists
who believe it's actually a crime. Of course, we are
talking about the death of Prime Minister Harold Holt. Can
you before we get into what happened to him, just
give us an idea, because obviously he's before many of
(18:26):
our times. What kind of Prime minister was he what
legacy did he leave politically behind him?
Speaker 2 (18:31):
So Prome Minister Harol Holt came in at a time
where the Australian Liberal Party, which confusingly for any international
listeners is our conservative party. The Liberal Party under Robert
Menzies right, our longest serving PM, had been in power
for a very very long time, right, And in this
post war period, the Australian Liberal Party really established itself
as this sort of center right political bastion, which obviously
(18:55):
it still is today. But Holt, while a member of
the Liberal Party, was a little more progress in his outlook, right,
and he sort of dragged Australia kicking and screaming into
the twentieth century, which was, you know, obviously high time
for such a thing, given it was the nineteen sixties.
But he actually did a lot of good work domestically
in unpicking some of Australia's more backwards political institutions. Right,
(19:20):
he did important work in unpicking the White Australia policy,
which would later on going to be properly abolished in
the nineteen seventies. And generally speaking, again while still a
member of the Liberal Party, had a political legacy that
does reflect on him pretty well by today's standards, although
not when it comes to his foreign policy, which was
an absolute disaster because he was involved with US President
(19:42):
Lyndon B. Johnson's campaigns in Vietnam, there was a controversy
about conscription, so as something of a mixed legacy, although
I think you know, the work that he did in
tackling some of the systemic and institutionalized racism in this
country throughout the sixties obviously reflects very well on in him,
even if his international policy or foreign policy record isn't
(20:03):
isn't necessarily the best. So an interesting and sometimes divisive
figure in Australian history, but also so much of his
political legacy is completely overshadowed by his well he's not
even his death, his disappearance, of course, well.
Speaker 1 (20:19):
We don't ever have it confirmed because nobody has ever
been found.
Speaker 2 (20:22):
That's it. We don't actually know for sure. What we
can make a good guess, But again, there are plenty
of people out there who have more interesting I guess
you could say theories about what this guy's fate may
have actually been.
Speaker 1 (20:33):
Well, this is interesting because he has become the bart
of a lot of jokes and one monumental one which
we'll discuss later. But I often see on social media
feeds now Americans when they discover this story, 'll like,
excuse me, Australia, please explain how you lost a whole
prime minister, Like, please explain.
Speaker 2 (20:53):
We misplaced him. Yeah, he sort of fell between the
couch cushions of history and we never saw him again.
Speaker 1 (20:58):
Well, let's talk about what actually happened the day he disappeared.
Speaker 2 (21:02):
Yes, right, So Harold Holt, even as an older fellow, right,
was a very keen swimmer. Love to swim. He would
often go out in the surf and in Southern Victoria,
on the coast of Southern Victoria had a number of
spots that he he loved to go and favorite hornsity
going swim in the surf and do it as spear fishing,
that sort of thing. There's actually there's a pretty famous
(21:23):
photo of him, I think holding a spear gun. Right,
he's the he's got the flippers on everything. So he
was very much into that sort of thing. So the
point I'm trying to make it very strong swimmer, very
comfortable in the water. Anyway, one day he's down at
Chevy at beach on the Victorian coastline and it's a
very rough day out in the surf. He's down there
with some mates and they decide, well, he decides that
(21:43):
he wants to go in for a dip. Right now,
this isn't surprising. Again, we know that he loves to swim.
The others they all look at the conditions. They're like, oh,
dun know about this, Harold mate. Doesn't doesn't look like
the day for it. One of his other friends decides
to come into the water with him, right but again,
rough surf, poor conditions. It is a little bit dangerous.
Holt however, but his famous quote was I know this
beach like the back of my hand. However, he gets
(22:05):
in the water with this other fellow. This other fella
very quickly realized, okay, I'm not up to this task.
He comes out of the surf that Holt remained in
the water and was caught by a rip. Right now,
Australians listening will know how deadly rips can be. They
are one of the leading causes of accidental death in
the water. So what happens is a rip is a
(22:25):
sort of very strong outward current that will pull you
away from the beach and it's terrifying being caught in one.
And your first instinct is, oh, I need to swim
back to shore right, But if you do that, you're
swimming against the current. What you need to do is
actually swim parallel to the beach itself. You need to
swim out of the rip to the left or to
the right and then you can let the waves carry
you back in. But it's terrifying to be caught in
the rip.
Speaker 1 (22:45):
And we would presume that being the very strong swimmer
and knowledgeable ocean man that he was at howld Holt
would probably have known that information.
Speaker 2 (22:53):
And this is the most confusing thing is because if
he had been caught in well, when he was caught
in this rip, given the experience he had choppy when
rough orders like this, he would have known what to do, right,
he would have known how to safely exit the rip.
But he didn't and he was dragged out to sea
and he was never seen again. Now, in the days
that followed, the weeks that followed, there were huge efforts
(23:16):
put on, of course to find I mean, he's our
prime minister, right, second to the Australian Test cricket captain right,
he is the most important bloke in the country. So
there's a huge rescue effort to try to find him.
There's choppers going up in the air above the water.
There are divers going into these awful conditions, right, some
(23:37):
of the bravest people you can imagine, going in to
try to search for Harold Holt in these terrible choppy waters.
But days and days passed and no sign, no sign whatsoever,
not a scrap of evidence was found as to what
happened to Harold Holt. He was dragged out into the
sea and as I say, was never seen again, and
(23:58):
we have never conclusively determined what actually happened to him. Obviously,
there's you know, the base assumption is that he sadly
just drowned. But as you've already mentioned, there are there
are a couple of interesting conspiracy theories that have emerged
over the over the years.
Speaker 1 (24:13):
Well, let's explore those, because, like you're right, we would
naturally presume that he's been swept out to sea, and
the ocean is a very big body of water and
things do go missing, never to be seen again. The
fact that nothing has ever washed ashore anywhere ever again
is strange, but not unheard of.
Speaker 2 (24:28):
No, certainly, right, Like you can like corpses whatever else
detried us in the in the sea can just get
lost in the eddies of the ocean and you know,
just eating my fish, sink to the bottom or whatever. Like.
It's it's not a guarantee that you're going to have
a body returned to shore yet exactly.
Speaker 1 (24:43):
However, there are some people who think, and you mentioned
that there was some controversy within his Prime ministerialship about
his involvement or bringing Australia into the Vietnam War, how
does that tie into what happened that day? What's the
conspiracy theory about what happened to him?
Speaker 2 (24:59):
Well, certainly there there are a great many, right, they're
all the usual ones as aliens, as lizard people, all
that sort of stuff. But some of the ones that
perhaps a little more well at least there's a threat
of logic running through them. We know that the CIA was, say,
was interventionalist sometimes in foreign affairs when they felt the
need to be. And some people have sort of you know,
(25:19):
they've got the red string out and they have put
together this sort of Pepe Sylvia like assembly of evidence
that suggests that the CIA right, unhappy with Holt and
his deeply unpopular approach because obviously, you know, the Vietnam
issue in Australia was massive. There may be some listeners
who are old enough to remember how much of an
issue it was, right conscription, being sent off to fight
(25:40):
in a war that we really had no skin in
the game, all of that sort of stuff. And Holt
was a supporter of the United States and President Johnson's
campaigning in Vietnam. But there are those who put forward
the idea that the CIO felt that he couldn't be
trusted and felt that he was not the man for
the job to lead Australia when it comes to maintaining
ongoing support for this American campaign in South and Southeast Asia.
(26:04):
So I don't as a historian, I don't particularly give
this theory very much credence. I'll make that clear. I
don't think this is what happened, But conspiracy theories like
this are always interesting to discuss and look into. And
some people put forward the idea that this was a
CIA hit job, right, and that he was essentially assassinated
(26:24):
by the CIA. I don't know how they managed to
do this. I don't know how they managed to engineer
a rip on Chevy at Beach on the day that
he happened. But hey, listen, there is plenty of evidence
out there about the CIA having done absolutely mental stuff
in trying to knock off world leaders, right, like the
number of times they tried to assassinate for del Castro,
this guy, I don't know if you heard of this
for del Castro, Right, he also loved diving. He loved
(26:47):
to go and collect conch shells, right, like beautiful con
shells from the bottom of the of the sea in Cuba.
The CIA tried to hatch a plot where they would poison, right,
put contact poison on conch shells that he would then
dive tow pick up and be poisoned by it, like
touch them and die as a result of that. They
tried he loved ice cream, so they tried to poison
his ice cream. They tried to send them exploding cigars,
(27:08):
right Like. The CIA have done some really really out
there stuff in trying to fulfill their policy objectives.
Speaker 1 (27:14):
So it's not out of the realms of possibility that
they could have organized something like this.
Speaker 2 (27:19):
Look, if it emerged that there were some strong evidence
that this this sort of thing had happened, it wouldn't
be like, wow, that was out of character. I guess
that's the way that I put it. It's not it
wouldn't be completely out of the field. Having said that,
there is not much concrete evidence that has ever emerged
for this. And look, I don't mind talking about these
conspiracy theories and sort of having, you know, having a
bit of a chuckle at them, but I I sort
(27:41):
of do feel I need to once once again reiterate
that there there is not a lot of historical evidence
for this. Another very popular conspiracy theory, this one is
a little bit more ludicrous, was that he was picked
up by a Chinese submarine, he did a deal with defected, Yeah,
he defected to the CCP and when and lived the
rest of these days, you know, in bliss in China. Again,
(28:05):
not a whole lot of evidence for that, but people
do like to put these theories together, and even if
there isn't necessarily a huge amount of evidence for them, again,
they are pretty funny to explore.
Speaker 1 (28:14):
So well, I guess we have to end his story
with the joke that is on him, with the dedication,
because this is when people who don't live in Australia
find out that this happened. I think it really paints
a picture for them of what the Australian sense of
humor is actually like. So please explain what we dedicated
(28:34):
to the now presumed deceased Harold Holt.
Speaker 2 (28:38):
So obviously there was a period of you know, it
was a national shock and mourning for the loss of
a prime minister, and internationally too as well. This bloke
was known across the world stage. Mean, it was the
head of government. Of course he was going to be
His loss was going to be acknowledged internationally, and once
all the memorials and the ceremonies and all that sort
of stuff we're done. A bunch of different things were
named after him, as you'd expect this. I think there's
(28:58):
a suburb in Canberra named after him. Yeah right, there's
even a US warship, right, I guess, in some way
acknowledging his contribution to the ongoing US campaigning. There is
the USS Harold Holt. But all of these things, right,
that's what you'd expect, suburbs, warships, whatever. I was very boring, right,
(29:19):
of course, of course you're going to name that sort
of stuff after him. In his own electorate in Melbourne.
Right out in glen Iris, there was a certain local
government facility, shall we say, a recreational center that was
undergoing a refurbishment of renovation at the time, and when
it reopened as a fitting tribute, a symbol, a way
(29:42):
to honor our fallen prime minister, the local government in
Glarus they decided to rename this recreational center after Harold Holt.
But to be a bit more specific, when I say
recreational center, I can tell you that this recreational center
was and still is a swimming pool, and it is
(30:02):
still called the Harold Holt Memorial Swimming Center to this day.
You can take the tram out to glen Iris and
you can go and have a swim in a pool
named after I am Australian Prime minister who drowned.
Speaker 1 (30:15):
Yep. And that says a lot about who we are
as people, I believe. Yes. Next, Riley takes us through
some of the world's strangest and most unusual depths, including
the bizarre and accidental ways people have lost their lives
throughout history. Okay, moving on from Harold Holt, can we
(30:39):
talk about there does seem to be an incredible amount
of figures throughout history who have died on the toilet.
Speaker 2 (30:47):
Oh yeah.
Speaker 1 (30:48):
The one that stands out for most of us, that
we probably already know of is obviously Elvis, who had
some kind of massive coronary event. He was very overweight
at the time whilst on the toilet. There's a few
in your book too, but there's one that stands out
to me because the way my brain has imagined how
this unfolded, and I'm not one hundred cent sure if
that's the way it actually unfolded, but I'd like to
(31:10):
speak to you about it is the death of Duke Godfrey,
the fourth of Lower Lorraine. So just give us an
idea of who he is in history to start with.
Speaker 2 (31:19):
So he was, he was a duke. He was a
loyal subject of the Holy Roman Empire, right which at
the time loosely, loosely what is today Germany, although a
bit bigger than that areas of France, Switzerland, Northern Italy, Austria,
Czech Republic, Poland. It was a very large and very
(31:40):
complicated realm. Right, Yeah, I think the only word that
actually makes sense in its name. It was an empire.
It wasn't particularly Roman and also very holy anyway, Duke
Godfrey is a loyal vassal of the Holy Roman Empire.
He was married to a very important woman in the
history of the Middle Ages, Matilda of Tuscany, very very
very powerful woman. She ruled most of northern what is
(32:01):
today in northern Italy. Now, these two didn't get along.
Their marriage was one of obviously in the way that
you know the grand tradition of European nobles. They married
for political reasons, not for love, and they ended up
on the wrong side of a political divide between the
Holy Roman Emperor and the Pope. Right, and it's thought
that Duke Godfrey was such an inconvenience right for not
(32:23):
just his wife but the general supporters of the pope everywhere,
that he was assassinated, right to just get him out
of the way, to remove him from the picture so
that the people who supported the pope could continued. There
was a whole thing called the investors to controversy. It's
very try and boring it, but essentially it came down
to who was the real boss, who was in charge
of things? Was it the Holy Roman Emperor Emperor was
at the pope. Now Duke Godfrey loyal vassal of the
(32:44):
Holy Roman Emperor Emperor. He's paying the ask for anyone
who sports the pope, including his wife. So he gets
knocked off. The full story behind exactly who and how
his assassination was organized by, and all that sort of
stuff that's never never been full. It was. It was
a very cleanly and professionally done thing, tell you.
Speaker 1 (33:00):
But cleanly is probably not the word.
Speaker 2 (33:02):
It wasn't that at all. It wasn't clearly done. It's
a very good point from a from a procedural standpoint
rather than a trackable one, certainly. But Duke Godfrey was
assassinated in and look, you've got to feel for the
bloke because when you go and have a sit on
(33:22):
the toilet, mate, like this is a time for peace
and tranquility. It's a time to rest, reflection, recuperate resort,
read the back of a shampoo bottle. If you're in
a literary mood, you know it's a time. It's a
it's a place where you should feel safe, is what
I'm trying to know. Anyway, one day Godfrey, he goes
to the guard rode right and hiding in the I
(33:43):
don't know how to politely hiding in the area. And yeah,
the area into which this fowl effluvium would be deposited. Right,
was an assassin? Now here is a man dedicated to
his craft. Right, they hire assassin. How we need to
We need you to knock off Duke Godfrey. Oh okay, yeah,
no worry, that's fine. Duke's my speciality. I'll give you
(34:04):
a nack a special right for it. We do need
you to do it, really, okay, there are some condition
there are some strings attached. No, this bloke he crawled
into essentially a cess pit, and he waited there for
this bloke to arrive with at once for I learn
a spear. He didn't want anyone to get too close. Right,
he's doing it at some distance.
Speaker 1 (34:25):
So he's holding a spear in a cess pit and
waiting for the Duke to sit down.
Speaker 2 (34:28):
He's waiting for the duke sit down. But the thing,
like I was never there was a question that plagued
me when I was researching this death because I was
never able to determine how did you know it was
the duke?
Speaker 1 (34:37):
Good question, how do you know it was the duke?
Speaker 2 (34:39):
Like? What did he look up at this this guy's
bum winking at him. Go, yep, I know that us anywhere.
That's a duke elastic I've ever seen one.
Speaker 1 (34:47):
I have no idea, did not even think of that.
But yes, good question.
Speaker 2 (34:50):
How did this guy determined like you don't want to
knock you know what, you know, want some poor server
to come in and look? Maybe it was one of
those situations like you know, like a CEO will have
like a private toilet.
Speaker 1 (34:58):
In the exclusive to jukes. Yeah, that's what I.
Speaker 2 (35:02):
May be thinking, right, That might explain it was his
own private little gartera robe. In any case, Godfrey goes in,
sits down, gets rid of to murder of brown snake.
And this assassin struck from below. And I don't know
how much grizzly. I'm sure the listeners can imagine.
Speaker 1 (35:18):
You know, I mean, we are interested in knowing the
trajectory of the sphere.
Speaker 2 (35:22):
I guess well upwards. I can tell you the direction
it took. And yes, this poor old lo duke Godfrey,
he was done away with again at a time when
all he, as you say, should have been a peaceful
and reflective time for him. But instead, yeah, he bled
to death with perforated guts. The poor bloke after having
(35:44):
been killed on the toilet.
Speaker 1 (35:46):
Okay, I would just like to finally ask you if
there is a story in the book that you just
love telling more than any of the others, Like do
you have a little favorite that you pull out at
parties that, yes, is your go to?
Speaker 2 (35:59):
So there was this law his name was Clement for Landingham. Right,
had a bit of a checkered past. He was on
the wrong side of the American Civil War, that sort
of thing. But in his later years he worked as
a lawyer and he was once he was given the
job to defend a client from a murder charge. Now,
this client was accused of having shot another man in
the guts in a barroom brawl. Right, So this guy's
(36:21):
he's been arrested, he's been charged, and he's going to
be put in front of the judge and he's going
to be tried for murder. For Landingham, he came out
with a very novel criminal defense here that he was
going to use to get his client off this charge.
He said, no, no, no, no, no, my client didn't shoot anyone.
What actually happened was the guy who died, right, the
supposed murder victim, He actually shot himself in the guts.
Speaker 1 (36:43):
Now interesting, how.
Speaker 2 (36:44):
Did he do this? A lot of raysed diabouts. You
can imagine him pitching this idea to the other defense
lawyers the defense and thanking, oh, okay, well you better
be going somewhere with this, Clement. So Clement then right again,
saying that this guy shot himself in the guts. He
took a pistol, he put it in his pocket, and
he demonstrated to his colleagues how this guy could have
(37:05):
put his hand in his pocket, tried to pull out
a gun of his own to shoot his client, right
because of his the barroom. But all things are getting heated.
And what he did, you know, he fumbled and stumbled
with the gun and it obviously went off while while
it was in his pocket and shot him in the guts. Now,
this actually, on the face of it, is actually a
pretty plausible thing that could have happened. But obviously the
landing and wanted to put it beyond a shadow of
(37:26):
a doubt because, as I say, put a pistol in
his pocket, fumbled around with it trying to pull it out,
didn't realize it was loaded, and shot himself in the
guts while trying to do this, and he died of
the wound.
Speaker 1 (37:42):
So I mean proves his point though, Right.
Speaker 2 (37:44):
That's what That's exactly it. I mean, we talked about
that assassin being dedicated to his craft. How is this
lawyer for being dedicated to his craft. He wanted to
prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that this guy
could have shot himself in the guts, and he did
so by shooting himself in the guts. Right, he put
his life on the line and in the like and
this is the most most unbelievable part of the story. Right,
the guy got off the murder charge. The defense team
(38:06):
they rock up at the court. They're like, oh, well yeah,
so here's our theory. We we tested it pretty thoroughly.
We've got the corps to prove it. You're on us.
So you know, Exhibit A. A guy what shot himself
in the guts, just like we're saying that this guy did.
So what do you reckon? And this guy got off
the murder charge. His lawyer defended him from beyond the grave.
Speaker 1 (38:26):
To the death. Okay, well, we can all hope for
legal representation that dedicated if in such time we would
need it. Yes, Riley, thank you. So much for sharing
some of the stories from your book, History Stranger's Deaths.
It is such a riotous read. I cannot recommend enough.
And I understand you're working on part two as we speak.
Speaker 2 (38:47):
There is a this is a scoop. Actually I haven't
announced this anywhere else publicly, so yes, there is a
second book coming. It's in the works. It's been worked
on right now and should be out next year. So
if you like the first one, maybe you're like that.
I don't know, it's kind of funny sometimes the book
like it's not. My mum liked it like so well.
Speaker 1 (39:05):
I hope you've got her endorsement written on the dust
jacket of your next one, ringing indoor exactly. Yeah, thank
you so much, Riley, appreciate you giving us your time.
Speaker 2 (39:12):
Thank you, Thanks so much.
Speaker 1 (39:13):
Once again, a big thank you to Riley for helping
us tell these stories. You can read more about his book,
History's Stranger's Depths and listen to his podcast Half Fast
History at the links in our show notes. If you
want to see images from this story, head to our
Instagram page at True Crime Conversations, give us a follow
and have a look at our case explainers as well,
why are you there. If you enjoy this podcast, please
(39:35):
review our show on Apple Podcasts or leave a comment
on Spotify. True Crime Conversations is hosted by me Claire Murphy.
Our senior producer is Tarlie Blackman. Our Group Executive Producer
is A Laria Brophy and there's been audio designed by
Tina Madelof. Thanks so much for listening. I'll be back
next week with another True Crime Conversation. True Crime Conversation
(40:00):
uns acknowledges the traditional owners of land and waters that
this podcast was recorded on
As the saying goes, there are only two certainties in life,
death and taxes. But what if your death ends up
going down in history as amongst the most interesting, the
most confusing, or even surrounded by the most conspiracy theories.
For example, there's an irishman living in New York City
in the nineteen twenties and thirties. It's the depression era,
(00:25):
and a lot of people are out of work, homeless,
and finding whatever way they can to make it through
the day. For Mike mlloy, it was drinking. He would
go to the local speakeasy as often as he could
to drown out the woes life had handed him. To
the owner of the bar, though, Mike started to look
less and less like a patron and more and more
like some easy cash. The plan the bar owner and
(00:48):
his group of accomplices would hatch would lead to them
attempting to murder Mike mlloy once, twice, three times, and
more each time. The method of delay that death sentence
became more unhinged and elaborate. The problem for them was
that Mike malloy, who would go on to be nicknamed
Ian Michael Mike the durable through no effort of his
(01:11):
own simply could not or would not die. I'm Claire
Murphy and this is True Crime Conversations, a podcast exploring
the world's most notorious crimes by speaking to the people
who know the most about them. Today we're chadding to
the author of the book History's Strangest Deaths, Riley Knight.
He's lined up fifty tails spanning thousands of years of history,
(01:34):
of people who've taken the certainty of death and made
it a truly spectacular event, from Australia's disappearing Prime Minister
to a duke whose toilet run ended up rather more
spikier than he expected. Riley joins us now to take
us through some of his favorite ways to die. Riley,
thank you so much for joining us on True Crime Conversations.
(01:56):
I would like to kick off today's conversation because you
have written a book about strange deaths, and some of
them are natural causes, some of them very mysterious. But
seeing as we are true Crime Conversations, we want to
start off with things that were actual crimes, so I
would like to begin by talking about iron Mike Malloy.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
Oh a well chosen. We're talking about crimes for sure.
Speaker 1 (02:18):
So well, many many crimes committed against this one man.
But as a descendant myself of Irish malloy's, I know
they're made of pretty sturdy stuff. But can you give
us just a little idea of who Mike mlloy was
and where he was in the world at this time.
Speaker 2 (02:32):
So I'm Mike mlloy was, as he says, an Irish feller,
and he immigrated to the United States, as many Irish
people did towards the end of the around the turn
of the twentieth century, sort of end of the nineteenth
early early twentieth century, obviously a huge amount of immigration
over to the Big Apple. And he picked up work
over there doing this and that. He's a firefighter at
one stage, worked in a couple of other jobs, but
(02:52):
unfortunately in his later years he fell on hard times
and ended up taking to the bottle, ended up homeless
as well. So the po was having a very rough
go of things. But he did like a drink, and
this tended to be how he would drown his sorrows.
And there was a group of rather unscrupulous blokes who
saw an opportunity in that. Right. There was this fellow
(03:15):
Tony Marino who owned a bar in New York City,
and he had actually successfully pulled off a life insurance
scam previously. Right. I'm not sure if this woman was
a patron of his at the bar or what have you,
but he essentially tricked her into signing life insurance documents
with him as the beneficiary, murdered her right by freezing
(03:36):
her to death, got her so drunk, left her in
her bedroom with the window open on a freezing night.
She froze. The death was deemed natural, right, and therefore
her life insurance paid out, and Marino ended up benefiting
from this. So obviously he's just seeing dollar signs when
he looks at this bloke Mike Malloy, thinking well, I
can pull a similar scheme with this fellow. But he
(03:57):
did take a obviously, you know that thing doesn't strike well,
it does strike twice, but you know, in a figurative sense,
lightning doesn't strike twice. He didn't want the He didn't
want to pull exactly the same scam and freeze Iron
Mike to death.
Speaker 1 (04:09):
So look a little bit suspicious if that happened.
Speaker 2 (04:12):
Yes, exactly, Yes, So he took a slightly different approach,
or many different approaches in trying to knock this bloke
off in fact.
Speaker 1 (04:18):
Okay, so let's start at the beginning, because there were
many many attempts on Iron Mike Malloy's life. How did
they initially deem the correct way to knock him off
without raising too much suspicion.
Speaker 2 (04:32):
Well, they thought, given that this bloke did love a drink, right,
they thought that that would be the sort of the
most natural way for you know, it wouldn't raise many
eyebrows if he was found to have sort of drank
himself to.
Speaker 1 (04:44):
Death, right, like alcohol poisoning.
Speaker 2 (04:46):
Exactly, essentially just just dying because of over consumption of alcohol.
So that was plan a right, So Marino invites him
into the bar and says, mate, drinks around the house.
Don't even worry about it. The bartender, whose name was
Joseph Murphy, just plied him with alcohol and then put
in front of him what he said was a political petition.
(05:07):
Right when you signed this for me, mate, thanks very much.
In fact, it was, as you probably guessed, a life
insurance policy was a life insurance policy document that Marino
and his other accomplices. They were later called the Murder Trust,
the sensational appellation that was given to them by the
other tabloids. They fronted the money for the life insurance premium, right,
(05:28):
and they continued to just give as much booze to
this bloke, Mike malloy as he could possibly chuck down
his hole. And this guy just drank and drank and drank,
like day in and day he'd come in, he would
drink himself insensible, pass out and then get up, stagger outside,
and come back the next day and do it again
(05:49):
and again. This guy was seemingly indestructible and an iron liver. Right,
This alcohol didn't It's not that it didn't touch it,
because again he was passing it and staggering out of
the bar as a choke, but it didn't kill him.
And after you know, quite some time, and obviously at
some cost as well.
Speaker 1 (06:07):
I mean they've well, yeah, he's giving him free drinks, right,
free drinks.
Speaker 2 (06:10):
The buzz well into the red here, and so it's
a big problem and they say, okay, we're gonna have
to up the ante here because clearly, right just plying
him with booze, he's not going to die of liver
fated and know what's going on with this bloke, but
is indestructible.
Speaker 1 (06:22):
So stage two, what do they start to deploy?
Speaker 2 (06:25):
So they start to adulterate the drinks a little bit.
They start to add a couple of extra ingredients to
turn his alcohol into what should have been, in their
minds at least lethal cocktails. Now, they made a slight
error in how they started this campaign because the first
(06:45):
thing that they added to his drinks was engine coolant. Right,
you'll often see in the I found this very interesting. Actually,
when I was researching this story, a lot of the
literature on it is American. Right, Obviously this's happened in America,
so there's a lot of American writing about it. And
so they talked to about how they added anti freeze
to the drinks, and I was trying to find stuff
about anti freeze, and I was like, what, it turns
(07:07):
out that antifreeze and engine coolant are the same thing.
You can put one liquid in a car engine that
both prevents it from overheating and prevents it from freezing.
There's just there's just one liquid that does that, Like this.
Speaker 1 (07:18):
Some wild chemical compound going on.
Speaker 2 (07:21):
Well, there's another very interesting chemical attribute of anti freeze
or engine coolant. It's poisonous. Obviously, it'll like, don't drink it,
it'll kid you. It goes in the car, it doesn't
go and you go. Except an antide, You're not gonna
believe this. An antidote to engine cool and anti freeze.
Anti freeze poisoning is alcohol. Alcohol counteracts the effects of
(07:43):
ethanol poisoning, right apparently, which is the main one of
the main ingredients in this in this substance. And so
what they were doing essentially is mixing poison into a
glass of antidote, which they then served to this bloke.
And then so they're scratching there, why is this killing him?
Speaker 1 (07:58):
So iron Mike is just still happily drinking a way
none the wiser.
Speaker 2 (08:01):
Yeah, it didn't even seem to be I don't know,
I mean maybe was his taste buds were so shot
that he didn't notice the adulteration whatsoever. But yeah, after that,
I mean, look, this bloke again had had an incredible
constitution because after the engine cool and failed, they started
to put turpentine in his drinks equine liniment, right, a
heat rub for horses. They put rat poison in his drinks.
(08:22):
They put wood alcohol. That wood alcohol will kill you
so fast. Right, if you drink wood alcohol, you will
go blind and then you will die.
Speaker 1 (08:30):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (08:31):
But again it's filled with ethanol, and alcohol is an
antidote to this.
Speaker 1 (08:37):
So nearly everything they're giving him is counteracted by the alcohol.
Speaker 2 (08:40):
I don't know why he didn't die with the rat poisoning, right,
Like I understand he's not a rat, it's not designed
to kill it. But rat poison is pretty lethal. You know.
I've tried it myself. I haven't conclusively discovered this, but
I'll read the label, the warning and I'll take the
word for it. But no, all of this stuff that
was put into his drinks, it's still just didn't kill him.
Speaker 1 (08:59):
So they must be getting desperate by this stage because,
as we mentioned before, they're now paying premiums to the
insurance company. He's drinking the bar dry every night, so
they are losing money on this. Un now, yes, Yd,
so they get desperate, like what are they what's their
next step?
Speaker 2 (09:16):
Well, as I say in the book, it seems to
be that this is the point that they got to
the no bad ideas stage of conspiracy. Because one of
the guys in the murder Trust he claimed to have
seen someone die after eating like thirty oysters and washing
them down with whiskey.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
Okay, he was.
Speaker 2 (09:34):
Like, well, I don't know, man, maybe like oysters and
whiskey is lethal, who knows. So they tried that, going
by a bunch of oysters right and fed in them
and gave him wisky. That didn't work. They made him
a sandwich with rotten sardines, right, sprinkled with a little
bit of rat poisoning, you know, just just.
Speaker 1 (09:50):
Fased good measure, yep.
Speaker 2 (09:52):
And then also, like a Looney Tunes cartoon, put some
carpet tax in the sandwich as well. Mike just ate
it and didn't seem like they just didn't it just
didn't touch him, like I guess you know he was
that drunk or that hungry the night is this guy
made of I Look, he was very well, he was
very deserving of the nickname that he got later on
(10:13):
Iron Mike, right, Like, this guy was seemingly untouchable. Anyway,
none of this has worked, right, the sardines, the rat poison,
the carp attacks, the horse liniment, the turpentine, the wood alcohol, like,
none of this has worked. And so at this point
Marino goes right, Okay, look, I'll tell you what does work, right, buggaret,
buddy getting suspicious with the authorities. I'll tell you what
does work. Freezing him to death. We've done that before,
(10:34):
would do it again, yep. So the next stage, right,
they got him drunk again. He passed out. They soaked
him with water. This is in the middle of winter
in New York, so that's freezing cold, snow's coming down.
Soaked him with water, dumped him in a park, right,
and left him to essentially die, And the life insuring
they looked a little closely, they'd see that Marino was
(10:55):
once again the beneficiary of a life insurance where this
guy had frozen a death, just like the other life beforehand.
But this guy, like at this point, they just need
him dead, so they'll do whatever they can. Except that's
a rather bad fortune because they dumped him in a
park where he was found by passing police officers who obviously,
you know, were concerned for this bloke or perhaps you know,
(11:18):
not happy with him his vagrancy, And so they took
him back to the station where he warmed up, survived,
and then headed back to the bar the next day
to keep stuck in the drinks down.
Speaker 1 (11:28):
What is this like attempt ten? Now, like, how many
attempts of his life has he actually survived?
Speaker 2 (11:34):
By this point, they have run out of space on
the white board at this stage, right, so they like
plan E, Plan F, Plan G, plan HS like they're
running out of letters. Yeah, at this stage they hire
they bring a fifth member in to the murder trust,
a cab driver, right, who had the sufficient moral flexibility
to come on board with their plan. And they took
(11:55):
a very straightforward approach to they still needed. Obviously, they
couldn't just shoot him or stab him, right because then
suspicious circumstances, they're not going to get life insurance pout.
But what if he was just like accidentally hit by
a car.
Speaker 1 (12:04):
I mean he's a drunk, right.
Speaker 2 (12:06):
Yeah, he's drunk, he's stumbling home, right, So what they
did is essentially staged a well, they staged a hit
and run. But they again were very, very determined to
make sure this guy was dead. So after taking him
out into the street, getting the guy with the taxi
to run over him, that he then backed over him
as well, which is not what a lot of hit
(12:26):
and run drivers now. I don't know, anyway, they really
did their best to make sure that he was dead.
But surprise, surprise, he survived. He was taken to hospital
and he lived to fight another day. The blokes in
the murder Trust, after having taken him outside run over
him with the taxi twice. They're looking in the papers, right,
(12:46):
trying to find the death notice, trying to find the obituar.
You know, sadly Mike order didn't come, and so they
don't know what to do. They don't know where he's got,
they don't know that he's survived, they don't know that
he's in the hospital. It is weeks later, right that
molloy walks back into the bar, cheerful as anything. How
about a drink? Boys, right, because he has this offer
of I mean, they've been playing with him with free
(13:07):
booze for weeks now, right, Why wouldn't he go straight
back there and have a drink after getting a discharge
from hospital.
Speaker 1 (13:13):
So he has no inkling that we know of at
this stage that these men are the ones who are
trying to knock him off.
Speaker 2 (13:18):
Well, look, look, I don't know, it doesn't seem like it,
or maybe the siren call of an open bar was
just too much for him to ignore, But he did
continue to go back to this bar, and he did
continue to be served these drinks. Is as you know,
these blokes were trying to figure out a way to
kill him. But in the end they finally they did
(13:39):
something that put the whole thing beyond any form of doubt, right,
And it is unfortunate because obviously it's been a terrific
tale so far, but we all know that it was
going to come to a tragic end. And sadly, Mike
mulloy he did die when they again got him so
drunk that he passed out. They took him upstairs, they
took a hose from like a gas forrcet, taped it
(14:01):
into his mouth and essentially made him breathe in gas
while passed out until until unfortunately, he did die, and
he was there in front of it like they were
sure of it this time, right, they watched him die, right,
this time it's yeah, okay, he's dead. And then what
they then had to do was payoff a shonky doctor
to sign off on a dodgy death certificate saying that
(14:24):
he had died of pneumonia. And then right they went
to the life insurance company with this death certificate and
they received the payer. At the end of all of this,
the murder Trust did get their payday because they accepted
the doctor's note. They said, Okay, this guy's died of pneumonia,
fair enough, nothing suspicious about that, you know, being very quickly,
(14:44):
I just don't. Let's not get to a current or
anything like that. That's fine, But it's interesting that you
say before, why wasn't this guy suspicious? Right now? Look,
he's an older fella. He's had a fair few drinks
in him over his time. Maybe he's not in the
sort of the clearest frame of mind to be thinking
critically about what's going on to But I'll tell you
who were the cops the police at this stage, right,
(15:05):
they've heard rumors about this guy who because obviously the
story is spreading about this guy who's just drinking like
a fish every night. Oh, he's got hit by a car.
He got picked up by the cops for being left
in the freezing.
Speaker 1 (15:19):
So they're starting to go, hang on.
Speaker 2 (15:21):
A minute, they're starting to piecings together.
Speaker 1 (15:22):
This is starting to look sas right.
Speaker 2 (15:24):
And when it was announced that this guy had died,
right when when the I don't know, the paperwork for
the dead the death to whatever else was officially lodged.
The cops like, right, okay, we need to look into this.
So before his corpse can be disposed of once and
for all, the police step in. They order a full
like coronial investigation into this guy's death, and of course
(15:45):
the coroner immediately finds that he didn't die of pneumonia.
He died because he had essentially been gassed. So the
ill gotten gains of the murder Trust was not long enjoyed.
It wasn't long before these guys would I mean, look,
very clear trail of evidence, right, okay, who could have
possibly done this to him? Was it the guy who
(16:05):
owned the bar where he was drinking, who was also
a beneficiary of his life? Well, and impossible to determine.
Let's go to lunch, you know, so, very very quick
and clear path to the perpetrators here, the murder Trust.
They were all rounded up and they were sent to
New York's infam a sing sing prison, and eventually they
had a scheduled appointment with the electric chair. So that
(16:28):
was the end of them. They did receive. I suppose
they're just deserts for their attempt to kill this fella.
But it's incredible to think that he survived. It's a
good thing he wasn't put in the electric chair because
he would have knocked out, you know, the power grid
in New York City if they've tried to blast him.
Speaker 1 (16:46):
So that's the legacy he leaves behind as Iron Mike then, right,
the man who was essentially indestructible. So I guess he's
become a bit of a legend for that.
Speaker 2 (16:53):
Yeah, and there. I mean, obviously, at the time when
the story broke, there was a huge amount of coverage
in the papers. It was a sensational story. Right. The
news has had an absolute field day with this because
it had everything that people I mean, there's murder and
intrigue and there was there were plots and schemes and
money and all that sort of stuff on the line.
So people love this story, and there's there's a lot
of stuff that was written about it, both at the
time and in the years since. Right, But you can't like,
(17:16):
I found it really interesting while researching the story to
go back and read all of those newspaper reports because
you know, you watch old newsreels and no the people
are talking like this and O news today and you're
sort of a Matt that you can hear that voice
in the way that the terrible shocking news today from
New York City, when it was like it's there's a
there's a real I mean, we have sensational, sensationalist journalism today, right,
(17:38):
but man, one hundred years ago, they really know it.
They knew what they were. It was sensational media. They
really they loved.
Speaker 1 (17:44):
A bit of drama. You're listening to True Crime Conversations
with me, Claire Murphy. I'm speaking with Riley Knight about
some of history's strangest deaths. Up next, we discussed the
death of Australian Prime Minister Harold Holt and the suspicious
way in which he went missing. Let's move on and
bring it a little bit closer to home, because there
(18:05):
is a death yere in Australia which whilst I think
legally it's considered accidental, there's a lot of conspiracy theorists
who believe it's actually a crime. Of course, we are
talking about the death of Prime Minister Harold Holt. Can
you before we get into what happened to him, just
give us an idea, because obviously he's before many of
(18:26):
our times. What kind of Prime minister was he what
legacy did he leave politically behind him?
Speaker 2 (18:31):
So Prome Minister Harol Holt came in at a time
where the Australian Liberal Party, which confusingly for any international
listeners is our conservative party. The Liberal Party under Robert
Menzies right, our longest serving PM, had been in power
for a very very long time, right, And in this
post war period, the Australian Liberal Party really established itself
as this sort of center right political bastion, which obviously
(18:55):
it still is today. But Holt, while a member of
the Liberal Party, was a little more progress in his outlook, right,
and he sort of dragged Australia kicking and screaming into
the twentieth century, which was, you know, obviously high time
for such a thing, given it was the nineteen sixties.
But he actually did a lot of good work domestically
in unpicking some of Australia's more backwards political institutions. Right,
(19:20):
he did important work in unpicking the White Australia policy,
which would later on going to be properly abolished in
the nineteen seventies. And generally speaking, again while still a
member of the Liberal Party, had a political legacy that
does reflect on him pretty well by today's standards, although
not when it comes to his foreign policy, which was
an absolute disaster because he was involved with US President
(19:42):
Lyndon B. Johnson's campaigns in Vietnam, there was a controversy
about conscription, so as something of a mixed legacy, although
I think you know, the work that he did in
tackling some of the systemic and institutionalized racism in this
country throughout the sixties obviously reflects very well on in him,
even if his international policy or foreign policy record isn't
(20:03):
isn't necessarily the best. So an interesting and sometimes divisive
figure in Australian history, but also so much of his
political legacy is completely overshadowed by his well he's not
even his death, his disappearance, of course, well.
Speaker 1 (20:19):
We don't ever have it confirmed because nobody has ever
been found.
Speaker 2 (20:22):
That's it. We don't actually know for sure. What we
can make a good guess, But again, there are plenty
of people out there who have more interesting I guess
you could say theories about what this guy's fate may
have actually been.
Speaker 1 (20:33):
Well, this is interesting because he has become the bart
of a lot of jokes and one monumental one which
we'll discuss later. But I often see on social media
feeds now Americans when they discover this story, 'll like,
excuse me, Australia, please explain how you lost a whole
prime minister, Like, please explain.
Speaker 2 (20:53):
We misplaced him. Yeah, he sort of fell between the
couch cushions of history and we never saw him again.
Speaker 1 (20:58):
Well, let's talk about what actually happened the day he disappeared.
Speaker 2 (21:02):
Yes, right, So Harold Holt, even as an older fellow, right,
was a very keen swimmer. Love to swim. He would
often go out in the surf and in Southern Victoria,
on the coast of Southern Victoria had a number of
spots that he he loved to go and favorite hornsity
going swim in the surf and do it as spear fishing,
that sort of thing. There's actually there's a pretty famous
(21:23):
photo of him, I think holding a spear gun. Right,
he's the he's got the flippers on everything. So he
was very much into that sort of thing. So the
point I'm trying to make it very strong swimmer, very
comfortable in the water. Anyway, one day he's down at
Chevy at beach on the Victorian coastline and it's a
very rough day out in the surf. He's down there
with some mates and they decide, well, he decides that
(21:43):
he wants to go in for a dip. Right now,
this isn't surprising. Again, we know that he loves to swim.
The others they all look at the conditions. They're like, oh,
dun know about this, Harold mate. Doesn't doesn't look like
the day for it. One of his other friends decides
to come into the water with him, right but again,
rough surf, poor conditions. It is a little bit dangerous.
Holt however, but his famous quote was I know this
beach like the back of my hand. However, he gets
(22:05):
in the water with this other fellow. This other fella
very quickly realized, okay, I'm not up to this task.
He comes out of the surf that Holt remained in
the water and was caught by a rip. Right now,
Australians listening will know how deadly rips can be. They
are one of the leading causes of accidental death in
the water. So what happens is a rip is a
(22:25):
sort of very strong outward current that will pull you
away from the beach and it's terrifying being caught in one.
And your first instinct is, oh, I need to swim
back to shore right, But if you do that, you're
swimming against the current. What you need to do is
actually swim parallel to the beach itself. You need to
swim out of the rip to the left or to
the right and then you can let the waves carry
you back in. But it's terrifying to be caught in
the rip.
Speaker 1 (22:45):
And we would presume that being the very strong swimmer
and knowledgeable ocean man that he was at howld Holt
would probably have known that information.
Speaker 2 (22:53):
And this is the most confusing thing is because if
he had been caught in well, when he was caught
in this rip, given the experience he had choppy when
rough orders like this, he would have known what to do, right,
he would have known how to safely exit the rip.
But he didn't and he was dragged out to sea
and he was never seen again. Now, in the days
that followed, the weeks that followed, there were huge efforts
(23:16):
put on, of course to find I mean, he's our
prime minister, right, second to the Australian Test cricket captain right,
he is the most important bloke in the country. So
there's a huge rescue effort to try to find him.
There's choppers going up in the air above the water.
There are divers going into these awful conditions, right, some
(23:37):
of the bravest people you can imagine, going in to
try to search for Harold Holt in these terrible choppy waters.
But days and days passed and no sign, no sign whatsoever,
not a scrap of evidence was found as to what
happened to Harold Holt. He was dragged out into the
sea and as I say, was never seen again, and
(23:58):
we have never conclusively determined what actually happened to him. Obviously,
there's you know, the base assumption is that he sadly
just drowned. But as you've already mentioned, there are there
are a couple of interesting conspiracy theories that have emerged
over the over the years.
Speaker 1 (24:13):
Well, let's explore those, because, like you're right, we would
naturally presume that he's been swept out to sea, and
the ocean is a very big body of water and
things do go missing, never to be seen again. The
fact that nothing has ever washed ashore anywhere ever again
is strange, but not unheard of.
Speaker 2 (24:28):
No, certainly, right, Like you can like corpses whatever else
detried us in the in the sea can just get
lost in the eddies of the ocean and you know,
just eating my fish, sink to the bottom or whatever. Like.
It's it's not a guarantee that you're going to have
a body returned to shore yet exactly.
Speaker 1 (24:43):
However, there are some people who think, and you mentioned
that there was some controversy within his Prime ministerialship about
his involvement or bringing Australia into the Vietnam War, how
does that tie into what happened that day? What's the
conspiracy theory about what happened to him?
Speaker 2 (24:59):
Well, certainly there there are a great many, right, they're
all the usual ones as aliens, as lizard people, all
that sort of stuff. But some of the ones that
perhaps a little more well at least there's a threat
of logic running through them. We know that the CIA was, say,
was interventionalist sometimes in foreign affairs when they felt the
need to be. And some people have sort of you know,
(25:19):
they've got the red string out and they have put
together this sort of Pepe Sylvia like assembly of evidence
that suggests that the CIA right, unhappy with Holt and
his deeply unpopular approach because obviously, you know, the Vietnam
issue in Australia was massive. There may be some listeners
who are old enough to remember how much of an
issue it was, right conscription, being sent off to fight
(25:40):
in a war that we really had no skin in
the game, all of that sort of stuff. And Holt
was a supporter of the United States and President Johnson's
campaigning in Vietnam. But there are those who put forward
the idea that the CIO felt that he couldn't be
trusted and felt that he was not the man for
the job to lead Australia when it comes to maintaining
ongoing support for this American campaign in South and Southeast Asia.
(26:04):
So I don't as a historian, I don't particularly give
this theory very much credence. I'll make that clear. I
don't think this is what happened, But conspiracy theories like
this are always interesting to discuss and look into. And
some people put forward the idea that this was a
CIA hit job, right, and that he was essentially assassinated
(26:24):
by the CIA. I don't know how they managed to
do this. I don't know how they managed to engineer
a rip on Chevy at Beach on the day that
he happened. But hey, listen, there is plenty of evidence
out there about the CIA having done absolutely mental stuff
in trying to knock off world leaders, right, like the
number of times they tried to assassinate for del Castro,
this guy, I don't know if you heard of this
for del Castro, Right, he also loved diving. He loved
(26:47):
to go and collect conch shells, right, like beautiful con
shells from the bottom of the of the sea in Cuba.
The CIA tried to hatch a plot where they would poison, right,
put contact poison on conch shells that he would then
dive tow pick up and be poisoned by it, like
touch them and die as a result of that. They
tried he loved ice cream, so they tried to poison
his ice cream. They tried to send them exploding cigars,
(27:08):
right Like. The CIA have done some really really out
there stuff in trying to fulfill their policy objectives.
Speaker 1 (27:14):
So it's not out of the realms of possibility that
they could have organized something like this.
Speaker 2 (27:19):
Look, if it emerged that there were some strong evidence
that this this sort of thing had happened, it wouldn't
be like, wow, that was out of character. I guess
that's the way that I put it. It's not it
wouldn't be completely out of the field. Having said that,
there is not much concrete evidence that has ever emerged
for this. And look, I don't mind talking about these
conspiracy theories and sort of having, you know, having a
bit of a chuckle at them, but I I sort
(27:41):
of do feel I need to once once again reiterate
that there there is not a lot of historical evidence
for this. Another very popular conspiracy theory, this one is
a little bit more ludicrous, was that he was picked
up by a Chinese submarine, he did a deal with defected, Yeah,
he defected to the CCP and when and lived the
rest of these days, you know, in bliss in China. Again,
(28:05):
not a whole lot of evidence for that, but people
do like to put these theories together, and even if
there isn't necessarily a huge amount of evidence for them, again,
they are pretty funny to explore.
Speaker 1 (28:14):
So well, I guess we have to end his story
with the joke that is on him, with the dedication,
because this is when people who don't live in Australia
find out that this happened. I think it really paints
a picture for them of what the Australian sense of
humor is actually like. So please explain what we dedicated
(28:34):
to the now presumed deceased Harold Holt.
Speaker 2 (28:38):
So obviously there was a period of you know, it
was a national shock and mourning for the loss of
a prime minister, and internationally too as well. This bloke
was known across the world stage. Mean, it was the
head of government. Of course he was going to be
His loss was going to be acknowledged internationally, and once
all the memorials and the ceremonies and all that sort
of stuff we're done. A bunch of different things were
named after him, as you'd expect this. I think there's
(28:58):
a suburb in Canberra named after him. Yeah right, there's
even a US warship, right, I guess, in some way
acknowledging his contribution to the ongoing US campaigning. There is
the USS Harold Holt. But all of these things, right,
that's what you'd expect, suburbs, warships, whatever. I was very boring, right,
(29:19):
of course, of course you're going to name that sort
of stuff after him. In his own electorate in Melbourne.
Right out in glen Iris, there was a certain local
government facility, shall we say, a recreational center that was
undergoing a refurbishment of renovation at the time, and when
it reopened as a fitting tribute, a symbol, a way
(29:42):
to honor our fallen prime minister, the local government in
Glarus they decided to rename this recreational center after Harold Holt.
But to be a bit more specific, when I say
recreational center, I can tell you that this recreational center
was and still is a swimming pool, and it is
(30:02):
still called the Harold Holt Memorial Swimming Center to this day.
You can take the tram out to glen Iris and
you can go and have a swim in a pool
named after I am Australian Prime minister who drowned.
Speaker 1 (30:15):
Yep. And that says a lot about who we are
as people, I believe. Yes. Next, Riley takes us through
some of the world's strangest and most unusual depths, including
the bizarre and accidental ways people have lost their lives
throughout history. Okay, moving on from Harold Holt, can we
(30:39):
talk about there does seem to be an incredible amount
of figures throughout history who have died on the toilet.
Speaker 2 (30:47):
Oh yeah.
Speaker 1 (30:48):
The one that stands out for most of us, that
we probably already know of is obviously Elvis, who had
some kind of massive coronary event. He was very overweight
at the time whilst on the toilet. There's a few
in your book too, but there's one that stands out
to me because the way my brain has imagined how
this unfolded, and I'm not one hundred cent sure if
that's the way it actually unfolded, but I'd like to
(31:10):
speak to you about it is the death of Duke Godfrey,
the fourth of Lower Lorraine. So just give us an
idea of who he is in history to start with.
Speaker 2 (31:19):
So he was, he was a duke. He was a
loyal subject of the Holy Roman Empire, right which at
the time loosely, loosely what is today Germany, although a
bit bigger than that areas of France, Switzerland, Northern Italy, Austria,
Czech Republic, Poland. It was a very large and very
(31:40):
complicated realm. Right, Yeah, I think the only word that
actually makes sense in its name. It was an empire.
It wasn't particularly Roman and also very holy anyway, Duke
Godfrey is a loyal vassal of the Holy Roman Empire.
He was married to a very important woman in the
history of the Middle Ages, Matilda of Tuscany, very very
very powerful woman. She ruled most of northern what is
(32:01):
today in northern Italy. Now, these two didn't get along.
Their marriage was one of obviously in the way that
you know the grand tradition of European nobles. They married
for political reasons, not for love, and they ended up
on the wrong side of a political divide between the
Holy Roman Emperor and the Pope. Right, and it's thought
that Duke Godfrey was such an inconvenience right for not
(32:23):
just his wife but the general supporters of the pope everywhere,
that he was assassinated, right to just get him out
of the way, to remove him from the picture so
that the people who supported the pope could continued. There
was a whole thing called the investors to controversy. It's
very try and boring it, but essentially it came down
to who was the real boss, who was in charge
of things? Was it the Holy Roman Emperor Emperor was
at the pope. Now Duke Godfrey loyal vassal of the
(32:44):
Holy Roman Emperor Emperor. He's paying the ask for anyone
who sports the pope, including his wife. So he gets
knocked off. The full story behind exactly who and how
his assassination was organized by, and all that sort of
stuff that's never never been full. It was. It was
a very cleanly and professionally done thing, tell you.
Speaker 1 (33:00):
But cleanly is probably not the word.
Speaker 2 (33:02):
It wasn't that at all. It wasn't clearly done. It's
a very good point from a from a procedural standpoint
rather than a trackable one, certainly. But Duke Godfrey was
assassinated in and look, you've got to feel for the
bloke because when you go and have a sit on
(33:22):
the toilet, mate, like this is a time for peace
and tranquility. It's a time to rest, reflection, recuperate resort,
read the back of a shampoo bottle. If you're in
a literary mood, you know it's a time. It's a
it's a place where you should feel safe, is what
I'm trying to know. Anyway, one day Godfrey, he goes
to the guard rode right and hiding in the I
(33:43):
don't know how to politely hiding in the area. And yeah,
the area into which this fowl effluvium would be deposited. Right,
was an assassin? Now here is a man dedicated to
his craft. Right, they hire assassin. How we need to
We need you to knock off Duke Godfrey. Oh okay, yeah,
no worry, that's fine. Duke's my speciality. I'll give you
(34:04):
a nack a special right for it. We do need
you to do it, really, okay, there are some condition
there are some strings attached. No, this bloke he crawled
into essentially a cess pit, and he waited there for
this bloke to arrive with at once for I learn
a spear. He didn't want anyone to get too close. Right,
he's doing it at some distance.
Speaker 1 (34:25):
So he's holding a spear in a cess pit and
waiting for the Duke to sit down.
Speaker 2 (34:28):
He's waiting for the duke sit down. But the thing,
like I was never there was a question that plagued
me when I was researching this death because I was
never able to determine how did you know it was
the duke?
Speaker 1 (34:37):
Good question, how do you know it was the duke?
Speaker 2 (34:39):
Like? What did he look up at this this guy's
bum winking at him. Go, yep, I know that us anywhere.
That's a duke elastic I've ever seen one.
Speaker 1 (34:47):
I have no idea, did not even think of that.
But yes, good question.
Speaker 2 (34:50):
How did this guy determined like you don't want to
knock you know what, you know, want some poor server
to come in and look? Maybe it was one of
those situations like you know, like a CEO will have
like a private toilet.
Speaker 1 (34:58):
In the exclusive to jukes. Yeah, that's what I.
Speaker 2 (35:02):
May be thinking, right, That might explain it was his
own private little gartera robe. In any case, Godfrey goes in,
sits down, gets rid of to murder of brown snake.
And this assassin struck from below. And I don't know
how much grizzly. I'm sure the listeners can imagine.
Speaker 1 (35:18):
You know, I mean, we are interested in knowing the
trajectory of the sphere.
Speaker 2 (35:22):
I guess well upwards. I can tell you the direction
it took. And yes, this poor old lo duke Godfrey,
he was done away with again at a time when
all he, as you say, should have been a peaceful
and reflective time for him. But instead, yeah, he bled
to death with perforated guts. The poor bloke after having
(35:44):
been killed on the toilet.
Speaker 1 (35:46):
Okay, I would just like to finally ask you if
there is a story in the book that you just
love telling more than any of the others, Like do
you have a little favorite that you pull out at
parties that, yes, is your go to?
Speaker 2 (35:59):
So there was this law his name was Clement for Landingham. Right,
had a bit of a checkered past. He was on
the wrong side of the American Civil War, that sort
of thing. But in his later years he worked as
a lawyer and he was once he was given the
job to defend a client from a murder charge. Now,
this client was accused of having shot another man in
the guts in a barroom brawl. Right, So this guy's
(36:21):
he's been arrested, he's been charged, and he's going to
be put in front of the judge and he's going
to be tried for murder. For Landingham, he came out
with a very novel criminal defense here that he was
going to use to get his client off this charge.
He said, no, no, no, no, no, my client didn't shoot anyone.
What actually happened was the guy who died, right, the
supposed murder victim, He actually shot himself in the guts.
Speaker 1 (36:43):
Now interesting, how.
Speaker 2 (36:44):
Did he do this? A lot of raysed diabouts. You
can imagine him pitching this idea to the other defense
lawyers the defense and thanking, oh, okay, well you better
be going somewhere with this, Clement. So Clement then right again,
saying that this guy shot himself in the guts. He
took a pistol, he put it in his pocket, and
he demonstrated to his colleagues how this guy could have
(37:05):
put his hand in his pocket, tried to pull out
a gun of his own to shoot his client, right
because of his the barroom. But all things are getting heated.
And what he did, you know, he fumbled and stumbled
with the gun and it obviously went off while while
it was in his pocket and shot him in the guts. Now,
this actually, on the face of it, is actually a
pretty plausible thing that could have happened. But obviously the
landing and wanted to put it beyond a shadow of
(37:26):
a doubt because, as I say, put a pistol in
his pocket, fumbled around with it trying to pull it out,
didn't realize it was loaded, and shot himself in the
guts while trying to do this, and he died of
the wound.
Speaker 1 (37:42):
So I mean proves his point though, Right.
Speaker 2 (37:44):
That's what That's exactly it. I mean, we talked about
that assassin being dedicated to his craft. How is this
lawyer for being dedicated to his craft. He wanted to
prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that this guy
could have shot himself in the guts, and he did
so by shooting himself in the guts. Right, he put
his life on the line and in the like and
this is the most most unbelievable part of the story. Right,
the guy got off the murder charge. The defense team
(38:06):
they rock up at the court. They're like, oh, well yeah,
so here's our theory. We we tested it pretty thoroughly.
We've got the corps to prove it. You're on us.
So you know, Exhibit A. A guy what shot himself
in the guts, just like we're saying that this guy did.
So what do you reckon? And this guy got off
the murder charge. His lawyer defended him from beyond the grave.
Speaker 1 (38:26):
To the death. Okay, well, we can all hope for
legal representation that dedicated if in such time we would
need it. Yes, Riley, thank you. So much for sharing
some of the stories from your book, History Stranger's Deaths.
It is such a riotous read. I cannot recommend enough.
And I understand you're working on part two as we speak.
Speaker 2 (38:47):
There is a this is a scoop. Actually I haven't
announced this anywhere else publicly, so yes, there is a
second book coming. It's in the works. It's been worked
on right now and should be out next year. So
if you like the first one, maybe you're like that.
I don't know, it's kind of funny sometimes the book
like it's not. My mum liked it like so well.
Speaker 1 (39:05):
I hope you've got her endorsement written on the dust
jacket of your next one, ringing indoor exactly. Yeah, thank
you so much, Riley, appreciate you giving us your time.
Speaker 2 (39:12):
Thank you, Thanks so much.
Speaker 1 (39:13):
Once again, a big thank you to Riley for helping
us tell these stories. You can read more about his book,
History's Stranger's Depths and listen to his podcast Half Fast
History at the links in our show notes. If you
want to see images from this story, head to our
Instagram page at True Crime Conversations, give us a follow
and have a look at our case explainers as well,
why are you there. If you enjoy this podcast, please
(39:35):
review our show on Apple Podcasts or leave a comment
on Spotify. True Crime Conversations is hosted by me Claire Murphy.
Our senior producer is Tarlie Blackman. Our Group Executive Producer
is A Laria Brophy and there's been audio designed by
Tina Madelof. Thanks so much for listening. I'll be back
next week with another True Crime Conversation. True Crime Conversation
(40:00):
uns acknowledges the traditional owners of land and waters that
this podcast was recorded on
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