July 17, 2023 • 54 mins
Jillian Lauren had no idea what she was getting into when she wrote her first letter to prolific serial killer Samuel Little. All she knew was her research had led her to believe he was good for far more murders than the three for which he had been convicted. While the two exchanged dozens of letters and embarked on hundreds of hours of interviews, Lauren gained the trust of a monster. After maintaining his innocence for decades, Little confessed to the murders of ninety-three women, often drawing his victims in haunting detail as he spoke. How could one man evade justice, manipulating the system for over four decades?As the FBI, the DOJ, the LAPD, and countless law enforcement officials across the country worked to connect their cold cases with the confessions, Lauren's coverage of the investigations and obsession with Little's victims only escalated.New York Times bestselling author and lead of the Starz docuseries Confronting a Serial Killer Jillian Lauren delivers the harrowing report of her unusual relationship with a psychopath. But this is more than a deep dive into the actions of Samuel Little. Lauren's riveting and emotional accounts reveal the women who were lost to cold files, giving Little's victims a chance to have their stories heard for the first time. BEHOLD THE MONSTER: Confronting America's Most Prolific Serial Killer-Jillian Lauren
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You are now listening to True Murder, The most shocking
killers in True crime History and the authors that have
written about him Gasey, Bundy, Dahmer, The Nightstalker, BTK. Every
week another fascinating author talking about the most shocking and
infamous killers in true crime history. True Murder with your
(01:29):
host journalist and author Dan Zupanski, Good Evening.
Speaker 5 (01:43):
Jillian Lauren had no idea what she was getting into
when she wrote her first letter to prolific serial killer
Samuel Little. All she knew was her research had led
her to believe that he was good for far more
murders than the three for which he had been convicted.
While the two extra changed dozens of letters and embarked
on hundreds of hours of interviews, Lauren gained the trusts
(02:05):
of a monster. After maintaining his innocence for decades, Little
confessed to the murders of ninety three women, often drawing
his victims in haunting detail as he spoke, how could
one man evade justice? Manipulating the system for over four decades,
as the FBI, the DOJ, the LAPD, and countless law
(02:25):
enforcement officials across the country worked to connect their coal
cases with the confessions. Lauren's coverage of the investigations and
obsession with Little's victims only escalated. New York Times bestselling
author and lead of the Stars docuseries Confronting a serial Killer,
Jillian Lauren delivers the harrowing report of her unusual relationship
(02:48):
with a psychopath. But this is more than a deep
dive into the actions of Samuel Little. Lauren's riveting and
emotional accounts revealed the women who were lost to cold files,
giving Little's victims a check ants to have their stories
heard for the first time. The book that we're featuring
this evening is Behold the Monster, Confronting America's most prolific
(03:08):
serial killer, with my special guest, journalist and best selling author,
Jillian Lauren. Welcome to the program, and thank you so
much for this interview. Jillian Lauren, thank you for having me.
Thank you so much for this interview. Congratulations on this book,
Behold the Monster.
Speaker 2 (03:23):
Thank you so much. It has been a treacherous journey
in many ways and one of great enlightenment as well.
And I can't wait to see what this next incarnation
of it looks like I can't wait for it to
get out into the world.
Speaker 5 (03:45):
Let's start with as you do. Los Angeles, October twenty seventeen.
You were writing a mystery novel, How to Sow a
Girl in Half, with reference to Elizabeth Short's famous murder.
You write that every col case in Los Angeles as
a custodial detective, tell us about legendary robbery Homicide Division
Cold Case Special Section detective Mitzi Roberts and what she
(04:10):
talked to you about, specifically a case that you became
ultimately involved with.
Speaker 2 (04:16):
Yes, ultimately very involved with, entrenched with. But you missed
a piece there, Dan because you said Elizabeth Short, and
not everybody knows that that is the Black Dahlia, which
is probably the most famous cold case of all time.
A young white woman was found tortured, bisected, ex sanguinated
(04:42):
in a field in Lamarte Park in Los Angeles, and
the media went wild and it was never solved. There
are several applausible theories, but is it will never be
solved and the detective who took the case no one
and wants that case. Okay, no actual detective who's working
(05:04):
homicide wants to be the custodial detective of the black
Dahlia case, because it means you're going to get calls
every day from some kouk who thinks it was their dad,
and you're obligated to follow up on those tips. I
used to joke around the cops that I was just
gonna call in a new Black Dahlia tip every day.
(05:25):
I was just gonna like call in the car. It's
just like I just you know, I know it was
my mother in law who killed a black Doahalia. But
what I got was an interview, and I got that
through writer Michael Connolly, who has served as a mentor
to me through my career. And I decided I was
(05:47):
going to do a departure. I was writing a novel,
and you know, in some ways, I was having a blast.
I was interviewing these detectives. I got this famous detective
do an interview with me through Michael. He was like,
she's okay, this one's all right. You can talk to her.
And at the very end of the interview, I said,
(06:09):
what are you most proud of and she said, I
am proud of them all. But I did catch this
serial killer once and that was pretty cool and that
was what sort of set me on the very beginning
of the Yellow Brick Road.
Speaker 5 (06:23):
Tell us about this traveling down Yellow Brick Road and
this opportunity you say, of a lifetime, and also that
you landed in the middle of an ongoing investigation. Tell
us more about what you learned about Samuel will Little
and this case.
Speaker 2 (06:40):
Well, I was like, what serial killer? What are you
talking about? This is kind of my thing, So how
have I never heard of this guy? And she said, well,
you know, we nailed him in the late two thousands
for three murders from three DNA hits. Working at the
(07:00):
Cold Case Special Section at Robbery Homicide Division, which is
the fancy LA detectives that you see on TV. That's them,
Harry Bosch and Renee Ballard. Renee Ballard is actually Mitzi Roberts.
That's who the character is based on. And they're running evidence.
(07:21):
They're running old evidence on a Department of Justice grant
as forensic as DNA fingerprinting and forensic science advanced all
of a sudden, these cold cases that were so hard
to connect through traditional gumshoeer because they were often stranger murders. Transience,
(07:45):
you know, how are you going to connect them. All
of a sudden, here comes this way. So they got one, two, three,
and then there was a manhunt across the country to
catch this guy because is he still killing people? I mean?
And for how long? They ran his wrap sheet and
the DA, the Deputy DA, Beth Silverman, who prosecuted the
(08:10):
grim Sleeper Chester Turner, like almost every serial killer who
was operating in the eighties and nineties in Los Angeles,
said she'd never seen a rap. She liked it before
in her life. You know. He was arrested day after
day after day after day for petty theft, for assault
(08:33):
and for every well, and for murder and for kidnapping,
and got off again and again and again. So all together,
Samuel Little had a sixty year crime career, and almost
forty of it included serial killing, included sexual serial killing.
Speaker 5 (08:55):
What do you do with this information? You talk about
New York Magazine talking to an editor there. What does
this book behold the monster? What did it first start off?
As well?
Speaker 2 (09:08):
I just skip the step there because I skipped to
the amount of murders I knew many months later before
I started the case. All I knew was that there
were three. He was convicted for and that the detective
who had nailed him, and the deputy district Eternity and
(09:31):
many of the other detectives thought there were many more
murders across the country. I had no idea the scope
of the carnage when I started. I thought I'd write
an article. Maybe I'd turn up some evidence that there
were more Sam Little related murders across the country. I'd
(09:51):
get some heat on it, and then maybe local jurisdictions
would be inspired, or family members come forward, or you know,
would start to pursue these cold cases. Again. That was
really my goal. Like, I didn't go in there to
start solving murders. I didn't go in there to insert
(10:14):
myself into the middle of an FBI investigation. I wouldn't
recommend that to anybody. I went in to talk to
Sam Little, and I also thought, what a splashy story.
Here's an underreported serial killer. Maybe I can say, oh,
there are these other victims. If I can get this
(10:34):
guy talking. And that's kind of my thing, you know,
like if I have a superpower, that's sort of it, right,
And so I'm like, if anyone can do it, I can.
I Like, I can figure an angle into the sky.
I didn't take it lightly, you know. I studied what
I was doing. I studied successful confessions of serial killers
(10:58):
in the past. I studied all kinds of interview techniques,
you know. I looked at the brilliant work of Hugh
Ainsworth and Steven Michau who did the interviews with Bundy
where they got him to confess in the third person,
and I, because you're so smart. I just read those
(11:19):
words of theirs over and over again. You're so smart,
you know, we bet you could analyze somebody like this right,
and then got him talking about himself that way. And
I was like, that was a turn of brilliance. Now
I had that in my back pocket, you know. I
had a few different ideas, but I was like, I'm
(11:39):
gonna I'm gonna get this guy talking. And then I thought,
you know, and if I can't, then I spent a
lot of research, but not a ton. And I wrote
some letters to a serial killer and I'm gonna walk
into a men's maximum security prison and I've never seen
one before, so let's give it a shot. And that's
how it started. It didn't start with any possible idea
(12:02):
of what the horizons.
Speaker 5 (12:04):
So tell us how you exactly contacted him before we
talk about your visit where he was in prisoned, and
talk about the actual meeting with Samuel Little.
Speaker 2 (12:15):
So Samuel Little was incarcerated and had been there since
twenty fourteen, since his conviction at the California State Prison,
Los Angeles, which is actually in Lancaster, which just about
an hour and a half from my house. And in
order to get in on a visiting day, you have
to leave it about four thirty in the morning. And
(12:37):
when I contacted Lori Abraham at New York Magazine and
I said, think I have this underreported serial killer that
I could maybe start contacting and maybe I get a
story out of. And she said, you know, we're not
going to just do some gruesome serial killer story. You know,
we're not doing something nationalist. We're not doing something exploitative
(12:58):
like come back at me with an angle. And I'm like, okay,
So I wasn't sure what that was yet, but I'm like,
here's my angle. I'm going to start writing some letters.
So I started writing letters, and you have to request
giving you all my professional secrets here. You need to request,
you know, visitors admission. And it takes about six months
(13:20):
to get one, and not only do you have to
request it, your inmates has to request it. So as
I waited for that to come through, I sort of
sort of slowly massaged a rapport with him and listen
to his professions of innocence, innocence, innocence, innocence, innocence, and
I just was waiting to get face to faced for
(13:44):
I started to contradict that, or to a challenge it
in any way, you know, But I said, you know,
I do think if you're innocent of these times, and
in fact, you're just a very unlucky guy who happened
to be at all of these places. That's you know,
just because my DNA was there does in me and
(14:04):
I killed her just means I was there. I'm just
an unlucky guy. But I mean he stopped all that
once he started confessing and began to really embrace his
crimes more than deny them. I mean, he was long
past and he appeals, and he knew he was going
to die soon. He was no man so die famous
(14:27):
or die in obscurity, and I think he decided to
die famous.
Speaker 5 (14:31):
Tell us about James Holland you call him some people
have called him the Space Cowboy. He's a Texas Ranger,
and only.
Speaker 2 (14:39):
I called him the Space Cowboy. Okay, I'll only call him.
That's my personal nickname for him. I mean, one of
the things I do in the book is like reveal
my process right as a journalist, you know, I don't
just say like, this is this and this happened. I'm like,
here's my journey of figuring out how this happened and
(15:03):
how to talk to these people. But one of the
ways I remember people remember their names. I give them
funny nicknames in my head. And when Texas Ranger James
Holland met Samuel Little Samuel would Little thought me and
text range James Halm was in the big tall hat
(15:23):
and the sinkle Peso star and the whole thing, and
sam All said, why do you use some kind of
cowboy from Mars? So then in my notes he became
the Space Cowboy. Then that winds in the book, and
you know, I think that's one of the things that
makes it unique, you know, is that it's a it's
an unfolding. So you asked me two things. What was
(15:45):
it like to meet sam What was it like to
meet Jim? Sometimes I think it wasn't that different. But
what it was like to meet Sam was there was
so much, uh, there's drama and pressure the you know,
(16:06):
I mean, it's one of the largest men's maximum security facilities.
It's horribly overcrowded. I'm in the country, it's horribly overcrowded.
It is in the middle of the desert with this
punishing atmosphere, and you walk, you know, you walk the
moms and their kids. You walk like about a mile
(16:28):
front a visitors parking lot to the visitors waiting center,
and you wait and you wait, you wait, wait, and
then every single weekend it seems like there's a new
wardrobe something that you violated. You know, I had to
chew my own underwire out of my bra because there
are no sharp objects, there are no sharp objects available,
(16:51):
and the metal detector kept getting set off. So you know,
like there was that kind of dramatic experience getting into
the prison, getting into B block, you know, and then
have Sam little roll up to me in a wheelchair,
you know, and talk to me. It was two days
(17:12):
before he confessed, and you know, after about a total
of six hours conversation, and it would be so easy
to say that you know, it was looking into the
eyes of evil, you know, which is what I think
(17:32):
that you know, they love in documentaries, you know, And
it wasn't It was like talking to human being who
I found sort of surprisingly challenging, surprisingly charming, surprisingly like
I mean, probably not at that point, not that early.
(17:54):
But I don't know if I've ever wanted to crawl
up over a table and kill someone myself that infuriating or.
Speaker 6 (18:03):
Like, so he could bring me to such depths of
it wasn't him, I know, Sam was an aberration. Like
the depths that he brought me to were the stories
of the victims and you know, and how he chose
them and how.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
They were treated. You know, he chose them because no
one would care, and you know, the things they said
to him, and the way that he justified his crimes
by his you know, asking for forgiveness, and so he
believed he was forgiven, like Saint Paul on the Road
(18:46):
to Damascus. And I just said, well, I'm not really
not sure that's how it works. I don't know, but
that I could crawl across this trade table and straight
angle you myself, you know. But I mean, frankly, most
of our conversations were were interesting. He was a fantastic
(19:07):
storyteller with an incredible, incredible recollection, which is something that
we shared. And he could really recollect times and and
bring things to life, like you know, the steel trade
in Lorain, Ohio, and the and the transgender clubs in
(19:30):
Miami in the seventies. And you know, I sort of
went on this journey around the country talking to victims'
families and talking to law enforcement, and I thought, you
know that knowing somebody like Sam little who I mean,
evil is a tough word, but it is the takeaway,
(19:55):
you know that, you know the takeaway. He's dead now,
it's a couple of years, and still I wake up
and when I hear his voice in my head, it's
that takeaway. But that doesn't explain much about how he
got away with it, about how whole society, society participated
in it. Law enforcement and you know, everyone who looked away,
(20:21):
you know, and and every institution that abused the little
boys who were in you know, reformed schools, and you know,
possibly like you know, flipped on all those genes that
were in there already. But you know, what would have
(20:42):
happened had not the abuse, had not the head trauma happened.
Who knows Sam says the same exact thing would have happened.
They said there was nothing that would have changed him.
Speaker 5 (20:58):
Let's choose this as an opportunity to stop to hear
these messages.
Speaker 3 (21:02):
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Speaker 5 (21:31):
Details we haven't talked about, and you do explore in
this undertaking of this book. You talk about the origins
of some of the things that he coveted, is paraphilia especially,
so you go right back and it's fascinating when you
confront him with the model from inside Detective that was
(21:55):
huge influence in his life and his life of crime
tell us.
Speaker 2 (22:00):
Well, you know, Sam Little has a very developed narrative
about how necks became his sexual fixation and strangulation became.
As he would have said, you know how sex and
death got twisted up insighed him right. He doesn't know
(22:21):
God made him how he was, but that was true
and he knew it from the moment he started seeing.
You see this among serial killers, violent pornography doesn't mean
a plus B equill see and everyone who looks at
violent pornography is going to turn into a serial killer.
There really aren't that many of them statistically within the population,
(22:45):
but it does tend to be something that is commonality.
And there were these they weren't quite pornography, and you
could buy them. You could buy them at the corner store.
You could buy them at the five and dimes, was
the seven eleven, and they were true detective or inside detective,
and they showed I mean, I sort of couldn't believe
(23:06):
it when I you know, I started finding like vindage
magazine dealers and I was like, I'm going to find
this one. This one. He was obsessed with these and
he would steal them. And there was this one story
about a woman named Gloria Fairy. Gloria Fairy ran off
from her home where she was poor and abused when
(23:29):
she was sixteen with her boyfriend who's much older than her,
and and then she tried to leave him. She went
to work at laundrying Cleveland. He strangled her to death
for the crime of leaving him and left her in
the park. And there were a couple of magazines that
(23:51):
featured this story, and Sam became obsessed, and he became
obsessed with the picture, in particular of Gloria Fairy Blonde.
There was she was and pearls and had this very
long neck. And he'd been looking in next since he
was five. And there was a little girl in class,
Carol Messenger, a little redhead girl who used to make
(24:14):
funny faces at him, and he would fantasize about putting
his hands around her neck. And then there was a
teacher that he fantasized about in the third grade and
her neck. And you know, he had this whole narrative
and sometimes, I would mean often always I questioned his
veracity and his narratives were so colorful, and you know,
(24:39):
so I checked, I checked my work. And one of
the things that made me think that maybe this whole
thing was made up. Was Carol Messenger the little Redhead Girl.
And I was just thinking, who's the little redhead girl?
What does that sound like? And I was like, that's
Charlie Brown. That's the crush in Charlie Brown, that's the
(24:59):
crushing piece. Nuts is the little redhead girl. And I
was like, did he make a whole thing up? Except
that no, I've corroborated it. And also I found these magazines.
I found nineteen fifty four Inside Detective, nineteen fifty five
True Detective. Maybe switch those around, I'm not sure one
(25:22):
or the other. I found two and there was a
story of Gloria Faria and there was the picture he described.
So by the time I brought him that picture, he
was already in Texas. He was confessing to the FBI
he'd been extra guided to Texas. He was in a
sheriff he was in a county jail in Wise County.
(25:47):
I mean, I sort of couldn't believe it. I was like,
what this looks. There's less there's more security at my
kids high school. And I did get to go and
interview there and I showed him the Gloria Fairy pictures.
And he was just like where did you get these?
(26:09):
And where did you like? How? And I was like,
you want them? You know, you want these pictures? Well,
then you know I want things too, I mean, And
that is what it was always like with Sam and me.
You know, he was like, I want a TV. I
was like, cool, I want things to you know, I
want a story.
Speaker 5 (26:29):
You push him finally, you say you're sick of the BS,
and so you say you wanted something. You wanted to
know things like how did it feel to kill? You
wanted to know some serious things, and you wanted some
serious information from him.
Speaker 2 (26:43):
Yeah. So when I when I got those magazines and
when I was able to make copies and get in
the pictures he wanted and set of vile thing to do.
Perhaps I don't know, but I said, tell me about
Denise and Odessa you and you know it gave me
one of the more detailed stories I've gotten from him. It's,
you know, one of my favorite chapters in the book.
(27:04):
Although I can't read it, I really I don't know
if I can read it again. As many times as
I've been over it and copy edited it, you know,
and quoted it and showed it to people. There was
a moment a few days ago and I was like,
I don't think I can read the Denise chapter on tour.
(27:25):
I don't think I could look at it again. It
was just, you know, it was told to me in
such detail. And it was also going back to the
Texas Ranger. Texas Ranger James Holland, who is this sort
of legendary you know, serial killer whisperer and works multi
(27:46):
jurisdictionally within Texas. But if he has a Texas case
that's connected to a case in another state, that gives
him jurisdiction there as well. So he was able to
locate the Denise Brother's case and that is what brought
him to sam Now Texas Ranger James Allen and I
(28:07):
happened to come upon the same serial killer at the
same time. So that was how I got involved in
the FBI investigation.
Speaker 5 (28:15):
Now, the thing is is that at one point Samuel
Little confesses and says that he has killed ninety three women.
So the task for the FBI, James Holland, and for
you as well is to get confirmation somehow.
Speaker 2 (28:30):
Well, I mean that's also for local jurisdictions, right, you know,
I mean I'm not a detective. So although that did
turn out that did turn out to happen, it's not
you know, I didn't go in as a citizen sleuth, right,
you know. I went in as a journalist, and it
just so happened that as he was confessing to me.
(28:51):
You know, there were a number of cases where I
was asking unusual questions and I would get details that
perhaps the cops weren't getting. So I was communicating with
law enforcement about the conversations we had about particular murders,
and there were a handful that my details were the
(29:12):
lynchpin that sought the case. But I didn't, you know,
go in there to go solve murders. I just started
to learn as I went.
Speaker 5 (29:20):
So it's an interesting relationship you have because the Texas
Ranger and the FBI are cautioning you, but at the
same time they're respecting your journalism and its effect and
also the results that you garnered from the interviews with
Samuel Little.
Speaker 2 (29:38):
Yes, and the LAPD as well, and like I said,
and local jurisdictions. No, I had really amazing experiences with
detectives across the country, and there are detectives, you know,
in small jurisdictions, who are the only cold case department
(29:58):
there is. I've asked as I, well, how many people
are in your cold case department? Me, you know, on
my spare time so much of the time. It's a
work of passion for detectives, these people who didn't get justice,
and they tend to be the good ones, so you know.
And I also interviewed people who you know, and law
(30:22):
enforcement officers who ignored the claims of marginalized women in
the eighties, and and you know, you know, I did
more confrontational interviews as well, but I was helped by
local cops all across the country at the FBI and
I I mean, you know, journalists and law enforcement have
(30:43):
a classically tense relationship because my job is to is
to find stuff out, you know, my job is to
hold people accountable. And law enforcement tends to be a
very cloistered community. And they would I try to like
you just go away and let them do your job.
Let them do their job. I mean, they said as
(31:05):
much to me, you know, like, thank you, young lady
for your help. Go Why don't you go let law
enforcement do their job and stay in your lane. I'm like,
I'm really sorry, but I'm dug in here, you know,
and I have an exclusive with a serial killer who's
in the middle of ninety three confessions. Now, those ninety
(31:27):
three confessions weren't to me, you know, I would be
maybe in the thirties I would say, I got, you know,
of like detailed confessions from him. He was confessing to
law enforcement, and I was focusing on cases in it.
I was doing a deeper dive. Wasn't my goal to
get every single confession out of him that was already
(31:49):
being done.
Speaker 5 (31:50):
How many were confirmed soon and then how many were
confirmed shortly after? Or Out of those ninety three, about.
Speaker 2 (31:58):
Thirty five confirmed very quickly, which was one of the
things that really and I saw the process of how
they confirmed it and how precise and meticulous they were
about it, you know. And this includes the data analyst,
doctor Christy Palazolo from the FBI, and doctor Angela Williamson
(32:24):
from the DOJ. It wasn't just Texas Ranger James Holland
and local pds that, you know. I was convinced that
they were doing their work and doing it properly. And
thirty five happened fast. I mean, now it's twenty twenty
three and we're at sixty three, sixty three, I believe,
(32:48):
and I just got to move. I have a map
with pins in it that I made at the beginning
because it was so hard to sort of imagine the carnage.
And also I wanted to see his pattern across the
United States because he you know, he was he was
a drifter. He was a traveler. He traveled mostly on
(33:08):
the ten back and forth across the United States, theft
by day, murder by night. So I made this map
and the red pins in it are for the victims
that I know that are still unsolved, and the black
pins are solves. And I got to change one out
the other week. And it's been it's been a while.
(33:29):
And believe that this book coming out, you know, I
have the most comprehensive list of Sam Little's victims that
I know of out there. It's all in the book.
I believe that we're going to see salves. You know,
we're going to see action and also awareness and hopefully,
(33:49):
you know, I'll entertain you and grab you from the
first page to the last, because that's how you get
people to care.
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what we you write about is incredible. Some there are
(35:24):
living victims. There are some victims that escaped the clutches
of Samuel Little and specifically a woman that fought him,
and you you write that boxed him, also that you
had alluded to it and or you had mentioned it.
But you go explore how on earth this guy, even
though he was a major suspect in so many of
(35:47):
these murders, that even with grand jury indictments, those failed
trials failed, even with living victims like the one you chronicle.
Leela McLain Bowlegs, can can you tell us just this
incredible story that really demonstrates and illustrates what Samuel Little
was all about?
Speaker 2 (36:07):
Well, there were four victims who survived Samuel Little's attacks.
The first two were Hilden Nelson and leidlal McLean in
Pasca Goola, Mississippi. Pascagoula, Mississippi in the late eighties was
on fire. There was an area, it's a rural part
of Mississippi. There was an area called Carver Village where
(36:30):
you could get anything you wanted. On half of the
street was the front, and on the other half of
the street was the projects. And on the front was
where there were pool halls and juke joints and music
and prostitutes and guns and drugs and teas and blues
(36:50):
and anything you wanted all night long, and people had
come from all over the South to come to Carver Village. Now,
the women who lived in the projects often worked as prostitutes.
And the two women who survived there, the first one
Hilden Nelson, who is the woman who I interview in
my book. I have the only interview with her, only
(37:13):
interview she ever gave. She and her friends had a
pact that you know, if you walked up into your
room with a man and it took longer than fifteen minutes,
somebody would come, and there was they were breeze ways,
you know, like walkways, like two story buildings walkways. Somebody
(37:33):
would come and knock on your door. And so her
best friend came and knocked on her door, and a
man's voice answered, like, she's fine, she's handling her business.
But that wasn't their deal. So Dolores was her friend's name,
walked around the back and they had window fans. You know,
it was hot Mississippi, it was a summer. She kicked
(37:55):
in the window fan and Sam was strangling Hilda in
the bathtub with a scarf and drowning her. And Sam
just stood up and walked out. And so she was
saved by her friend. Now, she didn't report this, but
words started to get around amongst the women, and just
(38:16):
a few years later, Sam picked up five foot two
inch spark plug named Layla McClain who ran Pool Hall,
which was in the back was a brothel where you
would rent rooms. And she was also a prostitute. And
she got in a car with Sam and she told
(38:38):
him where to go, and he's like, no, I'm going
somewhere else. And she immediately saw that he was not
going where he said he was going. And this woman
is the only woman who fought him off out of
ninety three. I mean, plenty of women fought him and
she just I mean at the trial she said, I
(39:00):
learned to box because I had too many step brothers.
She took her foot and put it on the gas
and took the wheel and tried to drive the car
into a wall, and then she boxed him. I mean,
they said how many doors were in that car? Said,
I know there were four because I was in and
out of them so many times. You know, like I ran,
(39:24):
he grabbed me, I ran, he grabbed me. Finally she
got away. She ran across four lanes of traffic and
the shipyards that were there were getting out. It was
a change of shift.
Speaker 1 (39:35):
I was there.
Speaker 2 (39:36):
I stood there like it was crazy. Four lanes of
traffic and it was so long, and she ran, she
ran back to the front, and she tripped over some
man who's peeing in the bushes. Smokey Joe was peeing
in the bushes, and he grabbed her and dragged her
to the front, and they took her to the hospital
(39:57):
where she stayed for three days. Many men, many years
later she lived to testify about it, though she tried
before that. And you know, I will just never forget
them saying you showed up at a hospital with particular
hemorrhaging in your eyes, which is what happens when you're strangled.
It's the blood vessels and your eyes break, and you know,
(40:20):
and you couldn't speak for three days, and you had
bruises around your neck, and you'd been hitting the head
so many times you couldn't see. Did you report what
happened to you? And she said no, ma'am. And the
prosecutor said, let me put this another way. Did any
doctor ask you what happened to you? And she said no, ma'am.
(40:41):
And she said, well, why didn't you report it? Why
didn't you talk to them afterward? And she said, well,
I'm going to walk down to the police station in Pascagoula, Mississippi,
and said I was working as a prostitute and I
was assaulted. I'd wind up in jail. They don't know
why I'm down there. They don't know why who I
am or what I'm working. You know, and you, Aunt,
you couldn't commit a crime against a black prostitute in
(41:03):
Mississippi at that time, sim Lane wasn't considered a crime,
and their testimony was never subpoenaed until well, eventually they
both did go report it. Their testimony was never subpoenaed
until a white girl went missing. Her name was Melinda
la Prie, and they connected him to Sam when they
showed up at the courthouse old it was eight months pregnant.
(41:26):
They showed up testified at Melinda La Prie's grand jury indictment,
and Hilda took one look at Sam and she urinated
on the floor and they made her clean it up
and they sent them home without testifying. So it wasn't
until they testified. It wasn't until they testified at Sam's
trial in twenty and thirteen that they finally got to
(41:50):
tell their stories. So Layla McClain Elda Nelson. There was
another victim, Laurie Carriage in San Diego, who testified then
and testified again in La Sam served eighteen months on
was initially attempted murder, kidnapping, assault, rape. He did some
(42:11):
time for kidnapping, served eighteen months in a four year sentence.
The other victim didn't show up and it's never been
identified again. Aunt Tanya Jackson Lori Carriage still very much
alive and is a trauma counselor and living in Portland
and works through victims of violent crime. But she is furious,
(42:33):
furious that he served eighteen months after having tried to
kill her. He left her for dead, he thought she
was dead and she just played possum by the side
of the road until he was gone. And you know,
if you really want to hear some anger about how
the social justice system treated a woman they felt, you know,
was an unreliable witness, in spite of how precise and
(42:58):
impeccable her testimony was, as well as the cops involved
in the case. In spite of that, he served eighteen months,
drove straight to La and killed two women in one night.
Speaker 5 (43:09):
Yes's incredible.
Speaker 2 (43:10):
So the book itself, you know, is reaching out to
a larger themes of you know, how we pursue social justice,
how forensic science can level the field in some ways,
but also our attitudes as a society have to change.
And it's a story about the fascinating lives of the
(43:31):
people involved in this world.
Speaker 5 (43:35):
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Speaker 5 (44:10):
Now you talk about not seeing Samuel Little and then
he was returned to Los Angeles County and you had
an opportunity to see him again. Tell us about this,
the difference in these visits. Tell us about that meeting again.
Speaker 2 (44:26):
Well, when he was extra dined into Texas, I had
an idea that I was rid of him. I mean
that I'd be able to ask him the questions I
wanted to ask, because by that time, you know, I
was so deep within the investigations. You know, there was
no dropping the story for me. But I thought it
would be nice to not have to see him again.
(44:48):
Like I say, you know, my experiences with him were
always they were everything, you know, I mean, they were interesting,
they were ultimately you I think every one of them
took a bite out of me. You know, it just
had to sit there and look and look that in
the eye. And the fact that I did it for
(45:09):
so long, which I also think really gave me a
unique perspective. I don't know that there's a journalist that's
done that sort of long term research with somebody where
you get to see their personality unfold in so many ways,
or say the layers of the onion peeling away. But
yet when they actradited him to Texas, I thought like, oh,
(45:32):
now I don't have to now I can just pretend, oh, bummer,
too bad they brought Texas. Now, you know, I can't
see him all that much. And then you know, when
they gave him the option at the end of it,
at the end of the confessions and at the end
of his conviction for the murder of Denis Brothers, they
(45:52):
gave him the option of where he wanted to be,
and he said he wanted to be back in Los
Angeles with his journalist. The difference, I mean every time
I talked to Sam was different. There was a time
I was working on the documentary Joe Berlinger, who did
the amazing Paradise Lost serie, you know, the recent Ted
(46:13):
Bundy and Jeffrey John documentaries in Netflix did a documentary
about me working on this book and working on Sam
Little's cases. And for that and also you know, for
my own research, I pretty much talked to Sam on
the phone from prison every day. And one of the
(46:33):
things I did for the documentary was, you know, like
they can't always have you know, a big fancy camera
there when every moment of something real happens in a
true crime story or what that relationship was like. So
I put a go pro in my office and every
single time I walked in, I turned it on and
(46:55):
I was just like, no matter what, no matter what,
no matter how shitt you look, no matter you just
like ran in from the pool where you were with
your kids, you know, their aaron and not in a bikini,
and I'm like, no matter what, just like like show
what it was like, because that's what it was like.
You know, it was like running up from Christmas dinner
(47:16):
and you know, and I think that Keith to do
it montage in the documentary that shows like how very
many times they spoke to him and you know, and
like what different kind of conditions I was in. They
even asked me. They were like really, like, I mean,
we realize this is powerful, but like most people don't
(47:40):
want to be, you know, photographed like bent over their
desk crying in a bikini. And I was just like,
fuck it. You know, I'm not a model. Can I
say fuck it?
Speaker 4 (47:50):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (47:51):
Fuck it, I'm not a model. You know. I was
doing my job and I don't care, and you know,
and that is what it was like.
Speaker 1 (48:00):
It was.
Speaker 2 (48:00):
It was different every day. And you know, but as
we sort of you know, COVID started approaching and there
were ideas that they were going to start shutting down visitation.
You know, he made me his next of kin, and
we had an understanding that I was going to donate
his brain to science and then I do something respectful
(48:24):
with the rest of the two hundred pounds of them.
And then when they did shut down the visiting, very
shortly after, Sam went into the into the infirmary with
COVID related symptoms and died there on December thirtieth, twenty twenty.
And it was so the COVID crisis was so crazy,
(48:47):
and there were meat trucks in the in the parking
lot of the corner's office, and I was never able
to get that brain, which is a real shame. What
I did get was packages and packages and packages of
things that were in his cell. And also I got
(49:09):
one surprising letter that I think can sum up in
a sense. You know, when people say, what was it
like talk to associated path, you know, you know, really
what was it like? You know, I was like, you
were looking at the devil, and I was like, do
you think that the devil shows up dressed like the devil?
You think the devil's that stupid? You know, like he
(49:32):
was just he was a Toddler. He was a con man.
He was charming. He taught me so much. All nightmares
about him for the rest of my life. But the
end of his life, he was he was testy, you know,
he was getting he was and also he was starting
to get fan letter after fan letter after fan letter,
and so all of a sudden, he's like, well, really,
(49:55):
you know, this person's offering me money, and and you know,
maybe I'm gonna tell them my story. I'm just like,
just shut up, Sam. You know, I've been talking to
you for years, you know, like I've got your story.
But he would shake me down. He was a hust
so he would shake you down to the last minute.
(50:18):
And I'm his real I'm like his last friend. I'm
his real friend. I'm the only one who's come to
see him in prison. You know, he knows these people
are just gonna take the drawings, the you know, tracings
of his hands. He did, the tracings of his penis.
He did the drawings people would ask for, you know,
(50:40):
for three hundred dollars or whatever, or because they love him,
love him, love him, love me. They don't know why
I would call him a monster. And in any case,
I remember one of our last conversations was like, you
gave me enough money for ramen, but not a hot
pot like you are just you know, because I put
(51:02):
like fifteen bucks on his books every once in a while.
And you know, he was like, and not a high pathage.
You're just like every one of these bitches, you're this,
You're that. I get a letter in the mount he
left me one thousand and ninety seven dollars. I was like,
you had money, you had money the whole time, and
(51:23):
you're shaking down your last friend for five bucks, like
you can't help yourself, just doing to see if you
can do it to me, you know, And yeah, I
got the I opened that check and I was just like,
fuck it sad. You know, there's a piece that'll be
(51:44):
a mystery to me forever. There's a piece that's just
he wanted and he took. There are a lot of
reasons maybe that's what he wanted. You know, I explore
them in the book Scientific Psychological. If you figure it out,
send me a line.
Speaker 5 (52:01):
We haven't talked about it, but you chronicle in this book.
And for those that will discover this book, it's incredible.
His to say the least, less auspicious beginning. His grandparents
were he thought were his parents, his father he thought
was his brother, and then kind of echoing Bundy or
(52:24):
the Bundy legend, he was told about this at one
point in a humiliating fashion. Sure, and like you, you
chronicle in this book too, his stay at the Boys
Industrial Reformatory did some shaping in or misshaping his character
along the way. I want to thank you very much
(52:45):
for coming on and talking about your extraordinary book, Behold
the Monster, Confronting America's most prolific serial Killer. For those
that might want to find out further about this, do
you have a website and you do any social media?
Speaker 2 (52:57):
I do have a website. I do social media, and
you know, and I welcome you all to come check
it out. And you know, I try to restore the
names and humanity of Sam's victims. Come help as well,
and please read the book. I'm at Jillianlauren dot com.
(53:18):
There's also a documentary called Confronting a Serial Killer by
Joe Berlinger streaming on most major services right now. I'm
on TikTok. Jillian Lauren author. I'm talking about missing persons,
I'm talking about true prime stories. I'm talking about self defense,
(53:39):
and I would love you look at my TikTok. My
Instagram is at Jillian Lauren, TikTok at Jillie Lauren Facebook,
somewhere Jillian Lauren author, but really go to my website
pre order the book. Support this effort. I'm very proud
of it.
Speaker 5 (53:57):
Yes, and indeed you should. Who knows to you? Thank
you so much for Behold the Monster, Confronting America's most
prolific serial killer. Thank you so much for this interview,
and you have a great evening. Jillian Lauren, Thank you,
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You are now listening to True Murder, The most shocking
killers in True crime History and the authors that have
written about him Gasey, Bundy, Dahmer, The Nightstalker, BTK. Every
week another fascinating author talking about the most shocking and
infamous killers in true crime history. True Murder with your
(01:29):
host journalist and author Dan Zupanski, Good Evening.
Speaker 5 (01:43):
Jillian Lauren had no idea what she was getting into
when she wrote her first letter to prolific serial killer
Samuel Little. All she knew was her research had led
her to believe that he was good for far more
murders than the three for which he had been convicted.
While the two extra changed dozens of letters and embarked
on hundreds of hours of interviews, Lauren gained the trusts
(02:05):
of a monster. After maintaining his innocence for decades, Little
confessed to the murders of ninety three women, often drawing
his victims in haunting detail as he spoke, how could
one man evade justice? Manipulating the system for over four decades,
as the FBI, the DOJ, the LAPD, and countless law
(02:25):
enforcement officials across the country worked to connect their coal
cases with the confessions. Lauren's coverage of the investigations and
obsession with Little's victims only escalated. New York Times bestselling
author and lead of the Stars docuseries Confronting a serial Killer,
Jillian Lauren delivers the harrowing report of her unusual relationship
(02:48):
with a psychopath. But this is more than a deep
dive into the actions of Samuel Little. Lauren's riveting and
emotional accounts revealed the women who were lost to cold files,
giving Little's victims a check ants to have their stories
heard for the first time. The book that we're featuring
this evening is Behold the Monster, Confronting America's most prolific
(03:08):
serial killer, with my special guest, journalist and best selling author,
Jillian Lauren. Welcome to the program, and thank you so
much for this interview. Jillian Lauren, thank you for having me.
Thank you so much for this interview. Congratulations on this book,
Behold the Monster.
Speaker 2 (03:23):
Thank you so much. It has been a treacherous journey
in many ways and one of great enlightenment as well.
And I can't wait to see what this next incarnation
of it looks like I can't wait for it to
get out into the world.
Speaker 5 (03:45):
Let's start with as you do. Los Angeles, October twenty seventeen.
You were writing a mystery novel, How to Sow a
Girl in Half, with reference to Elizabeth Short's famous murder.
You write that every col case in Los Angeles as
a custodial detective, tell us about legendary robbery Homicide Division
Cold Case Special Section detective Mitzi Roberts and what she
(04:10):
talked to you about, specifically a case that you became
ultimately involved with.
Speaker 2 (04:16):
Yes, ultimately very involved with, entrenched with. But you missed
a piece there, Dan because you said Elizabeth Short, and
not everybody knows that that is the Black Dahlia, which
is probably the most famous cold case of all time.
A young white woman was found tortured, bisected, ex sanguinated
(04:42):
in a field in Lamarte Park in Los Angeles, and
the media went wild and it was never solved. There
are several applausible theories, but is it will never be
solved and the detective who took the case no one
and wants that case. Okay, no actual detective who's working
(05:04):
homicide wants to be the custodial detective of the black
Dahlia case, because it means you're going to get calls
every day from some kouk who thinks it was their dad,
and you're obligated to follow up on those tips. I
used to joke around the cops that I was just
gonna call in a new Black Dahlia tip every day.
(05:25):
I was just gonna like call in the car. It's
just like I just you know, I know it was
my mother in law who killed a black Doahalia. But
what I got was an interview, and I got that
through writer Michael Connolly, who has served as a mentor
to me through my career. And I decided I was
(05:47):
going to do a departure. I was writing a novel,
and you know, in some ways, I was having a blast.
I was interviewing these detectives. I got this famous detective
do an interview with me through Michael. He was like,
she's okay, this one's all right. You can talk to her.
And at the very end of the interview, I said,
(06:09):
what are you most proud of and she said, I
am proud of them all. But I did catch this
serial killer once and that was pretty cool and that
was what sort of set me on the very beginning
of the Yellow Brick Road.
Speaker 5 (06:23):
Tell us about this traveling down Yellow Brick Road and
this opportunity you say, of a lifetime, and also that
you landed in the middle of an ongoing investigation. Tell
us more about what you learned about Samuel will Little
and this case.
Speaker 2 (06:40):
Well, I was like, what serial killer? What are you
talking about? This is kind of my thing, So how
have I never heard of this guy? And she said, well,
you know, we nailed him in the late two thousands
for three murders from three DNA hits. Working at the
(07:00):
Cold Case Special Section at Robbery Homicide Division, which is
the fancy LA detectives that you see on TV. That's them,
Harry Bosch and Renee Ballard. Renee Ballard is actually Mitzi Roberts.
That's who the character is based on. And they're running evidence.
(07:21):
They're running old evidence on a Department of Justice grant
as forensic as DNA fingerprinting and forensic science advanced all
of a sudden, these cold cases that were so hard
to connect through traditional gumshoeer because they were often stranger murders. Transience,
(07:45):
you know, how are you going to connect them. All
of a sudden, here comes this way. So they got one, two, three,
and then there was a manhunt across the country to
catch this guy because is he still killing people? I mean?
And for how long? They ran his wrap sheet and
the DA, the Deputy DA, Beth Silverman, who prosecuted the
(08:10):
grim Sleeper Chester Turner, like almost every serial killer who
was operating in the eighties and nineties in Los Angeles,
said she'd never seen a rap. She liked it before
in her life. You know. He was arrested day after
day after day after day for petty theft, for assault
(08:33):
and for every well, and for murder and for kidnapping,
and got off again and again and again. So all together,
Samuel Little had a sixty year crime career, and almost
forty of it included serial killing, included sexual serial killing.
Speaker 5 (08:55):
What do you do with this information? You talk about
New York Magazine talking to an editor there. What does
this book behold the monster? What did it first start off?
As well?
Speaker 2 (09:08):
I just skip the step there because I skipped to
the amount of murders I knew many months later before
I started the case. All I knew was that there
were three. He was convicted for and that the detective
who had nailed him, and the deputy district Eternity and
(09:31):
many of the other detectives thought there were many more
murders across the country. I had no idea the scope
of the carnage when I started. I thought I'd write
an article. Maybe I'd turn up some evidence that there
were more Sam Little related murders across the country. I'd
(09:51):
get some heat on it, and then maybe local jurisdictions
would be inspired, or family members come forward, or you know,
would start to pursue these cold cases. Again. That was
really my goal. Like, I didn't go in there to
start solving murders. I didn't go in there to insert
(10:14):
myself into the middle of an FBI investigation. I wouldn't
recommend that to anybody. I went in to talk to
Sam Little, and I also thought, what a splashy story.
Here's an underreported serial killer. Maybe I can say, oh,
there are these other victims. If I can get this
(10:34):
guy talking. And that's kind of my thing, you know,
like if I have a superpower, that's sort of it, right,
And so I'm like, if anyone can do it, I can.
I Like, I can figure an angle into the sky.
I didn't take it lightly, you know. I studied what
I was doing. I studied successful confessions of serial killers
(10:58):
in the past. I studied all kinds of interview techniques,
you know. I looked at the brilliant work of Hugh
Ainsworth and Steven Michau who did the interviews with Bundy
where they got him to confess in the third person,
and I, because you're so smart. I just read those
(11:19):
words of theirs over and over again. You're so smart,
you know, we bet you could analyze somebody like this right,
and then got him talking about himself that way. And
I was like, that was a turn of brilliance. Now
I had that in my back pocket, you know. I
had a few different ideas, but I was like, I'm
(11:39):
gonna I'm gonna get this guy talking. And then I thought,
you know, and if I can't, then I spent a
lot of research, but not a ton. And I wrote
some letters to a serial killer and I'm gonna walk
into a men's maximum security prison and I've never seen
one before, so let's give it a shot. And that's
how it started. It didn't start with any possible idea
(12:02):
of what the horizons.
Speaker 5 (12:04):
So tell us how you exactly contacted him before we
talk about your visit where he was in prisoned, and
talk about the actual meeting with Samuel Little.
Speaker 2 (12:15):
So Samuel Little was incarcerated and had been there since
twenty fourteen, since his conviction at the California State Prison,
Los Angeles, which is actually in Lancaster, which just about
an hour and a half from my house. And in
order to get in on a visiting day, you have
to leave it about four thirty in the morning. And
(12:37):
when I contacted Lori Abraham at New York Magazine and
I said, think I have this underreported serial killer that
I could maybe start contacting and maybe I get a
story out of. And she said, you know, we're not
going to just do some gruesome serial killer story. You know,
we're not doing something nationalist. We're not doing something exploitative
(12:58):
like come back at me with an angle. And I'm like, okay,
So I wasn't sure what that was yet, but I'm like,
here's my angle. I'm going to start writing some letters.
So I started writing letters, and you have to request
giving you all my professional secrets here. You need to request,
you know, visitors admission. And it takes about six months
(13:20):
to get one, and not only do you have to
request it, your inmates has to request it. So as
I waited for that to come through, I sort of
sort of slowly massaged a rapport with him and listen
to his professions of innocence, innocence, innocence, innocence, innocence, and
I just was waiting to get face to faced for
(13:44):
I started to contradict that, or to a challenge it
in any way, you know, But I said, you know,
I do think if you're innocent of these times, and
in fact, you're just a very unlucky guy who happened
to be at all of these places. That's you know,
just because my DNA was there does in me and
(14:04):
I killed her just means I was there. I'm just
an unlucky guy. But I mean he stopped all that
once he started confessing and began to really embrace his
crimes more than deny them. I mean, he was long
past and he appeals, and he knew he was going
to die soon. He was no man so die famous
(14:27):
or die in obscurity, and I think he decided to
die famous.
Speaker 5 (14:31):
Tell us about James Holland you call him some people
have called him the Space Cowboy. He's a Texas Ranger,
and only.
Speaker 2 (14:39):
I called him the Space Cowboy. Okay, I'll only call him.
That's my personal nickname for him. I mean, one of
the things I do in the book is like reveal
my process right as a journalist, you know, I don't
just say like, this is this and this happened. I'm like,
here's my journey of figuring out how this happened and
(15:03):
how to talk to these people. But one of the
ways I remember people remember their names. I give them
funny nicknames in my head. And when Texas Ranger James
Holland met Samuel Little Samuel would Little thought me and
text range James Halm was in the big tall hat
(15:23):
and the sinkle Peso star and the whole thing, and
sam All said, why do you use some kind of
cowboy from Mars? So then in my notes he became
the Space Cowboy. Then that winds in the book, and
you know, I think that's one of the things that
makes it unique, you know, is that it's a it's
an unfolding. So you asked me two things. What was
(15:45):
it like to meet sam What was it like to
meet Jim? Sometimes I think it wasn't that different. But
what it was like to meet Sam was there was
so much, uh, there's drama and pressure the you know,
(16:06):
I mean, it's one of the largest men's maximum security facilities.
It's horribly overcrowded. I'm in the country, it's horribly overcrowded.
It is in the middle of the desert with this
punishing atmosphere, and you walk, you know, you walk the
moms and their kids. You walk like about a mile
(16:28):
front a visitors parking lot to the visitors waiting center,
and you wait and you wait, you wait, wait, and
then every single weekend it seems like there's a new
wardrobe something that you violated. You know, I had to
chew my own underwire out of my bra because there
are no sharp objects, there are no sharp objects available,
(16:51):
and the metal detector kept getting set off. So you know,
like there was that kind of dramatic experience getting into
the prison, getting into B block, you know, and then
have Sam little roll up to me in a wheelchair,
you know, and talk to me. It was two days
(17:12):
before he confessed, and you know, after about a total
of six hours conversation, and it would be so easy
to say that you know, it was looking into the
eyes of evil, you know, which is what I think
(17:32):
that you know, they love in documentaries, you know, And
it wasn't It was like talking to human being who
I found sort of surprisingly challenging, surprisingly charming, surprisingly like
I mean, probably not at that point, not that early.
(17:54):
But I don't know if I've ever wanted to crawl
up over a table and kill someone myself that infuriating or.
Speaker 6 (18:03):
Like, so he could bring me to such depths of
it wasn't him, I know, Sam was an aberration. Like
the depths that he brought me to were the stories
of the victims and you know, and how he chose
them and how.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
They were treated. You know, he chose them because no
one would care, and you know, the things they said
to him, and the way that he justified his crimes
by his you know, asking for forgiveness, and so he
believed he was forgiven, like Saint Paul on the Road
(18:46):
to Damascus. And I just said, well, I'm not really
not sure that's how it works. I don't know, but
that I could crawl across this trade table and straight
angle you myself, you know. But I mean, frankly, most
of our conversations were were interesting. He was a fantastic
(19:07):
storyteller with an incredible, incredible recollection, which is something that
we shared. And he could really recollect times and and
bring things to life, like you know, the steel trade
in Lorain, Ohio, and the and the transgender clubs in
(19:30):
Miami in the seventies. And you know, I sort of
went on this journey around the country talking to victims'
families and talking to law enforcement, and I thought, you
know that knowing somebody like Sam little who I mean,
evil is a tough word, but it is the takeaway,
(19:55):
you know that, you know the takeaway. He's dead now,
it's a couple of years, and still I wake up
and when I hear his voice in my head, it's
that takeaway. But that doesn't explain much about how he
got away with it, about how whole society, society participated
in it. Law enforcement and you know, everyone who looked away,
(20:21):
you know, and and every institution that abused the little
boys who were in you know, reformed schools, and you know,
possibly like you know, flipped on all those genes that
were in there already. But you know, what would have
(20:42):
happened had not the abuse, had not the head trauma happened.
Who knows Sam says the same exact thing would have happened.
They said there was nothing that would have changed him.
Speaker 5 (20:58):
Let's choose this as an opportunity to stop to hear
these messages.
Speaker 3 (21:02):
Lucky Land Casino asking people, what's the weirdest place you've
gotten lucky?
Speaker 1 (21:06):
Lucky? In line at the Delhi I guess ah, in
my dentist's office more than once.
Speaker 3 (21:11):
Actually do I have to say?
Speaker 4 (21:13):
Yes?
Speaker 1 (21:13):
You do?
Speaker 3 (21:14):
In the car before my kid's pta meeting?
Speaker 1 (21:16):
Really yes, excuse me? What's the weirdest place you've gotten lucky?
I never win? And tell well, there you have it.
Speaker 3 (21:22):
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com play for free right now?
Speaker 1 (21:27):
Are you feeling lucky? No, we're just necessary for my
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Speaker 5 (21:31):
Details we haven't talked about, and you do explore in
this undertaking of this book. You talk about the origins
of some of the things that he coveted, is paraphilia especially,
so you go right back and it's fascinating when you
confront him with the model from inside Detective that was
(21:55):
huge influence in his life and his life of crime
tell us.
Speaker 2 (22:00):
Well, you know, Sam Little has a very developed narrative
about how necks became his sexual fixation and strangulation became.
As he would have said, you know how sex and
death got twisted up insighed him right. He doesn't know
(22:21):
God made him how he was, but that was true
and he knew it from the moment he started seeing.
You see this among serial killers, violent pornography doesn't mean
a plus B equill see and everyone who looks at
violent pornography is going to turn into a serial killer.
There really aren't that many of them statistically within the population,
(22:45):
but it does tend to be something that is commonality.
And there were these they weren't quite pornography, and you
could buy them. You could buy them at the corner store.
You could buy them at the five and dimes, was
the seven eleven, and they were true detective or inside detective,
and they showed I mean, I sort of couldn't believe
(23:06):
it when I you know, I started finding like vindage
magazine dealers and I was like, I'm going to find
this one. This one. He was obsessed with these and
he would steal them. And there was this one story
about a woman named Gloria Fairy. Gloria Fairy ran off
from her home where she was poor and abused when
(23:29):
she was sixteen with her boyfriend who's much older than her,
and and then she tried to leave him. She went
to work at laundrying Cleveland. He strangled her to death
for the crime of leaving him and left her in
the park. And there were a couple of magazines that
(23:51):
featured this story, and Sam became obsessed, and he became
obsessed with the picture, in particular of Gloria Fairy Blonde.
There was she was and pearls and had this very
long neck. And he'd been looking in next since he
was five. And there was a little girl in class,
Carol Messenger, a little redhead girl who used to make
(24:14):
funny faces at him, and he would fantasize about putting
his hands around her neck. And then there was a
teacher that he fantasized about in the third grade and
her neck. And you know, he had this whole narrative
and sometimes, I would mean often always I questioned his
veracity and his narratives were so colorful, and you know,
(24:39):
so I checked, I checked my work. And one of
the things that made me think that maybe this whole
thing was made up. Was Carol Messenger the little Redhead Girl.
And I was just thinking, who's the little redhead girl?
What does that sound like? And I was like, that's
Charlie Brown. That's the crush in Charlie Brown, that's the
(24:59):
crushing piece. Nuts is the little redhead girl. And I
was like, did he make a whole thing up? Except
that no, I've corroborated it. And also I found these magazines.
I found nineteen fifty four Inside Detective, nineteen fifty five
True Detective. Maybe switch those around, I'm not sure one
(25:22):
or the other. I found two and there was a
story of Gloria Faria and there was the picture he described.
So by the time I brought him that picture, he
was already in Texas. He was confessing to the FBI
he'd been extra guided to Texas. He was in a
sheriff he was in a county jail in Wise County.
(25:47):
I mean, I sort of couldn't believe it. I was like,
what this looks. There's less there's more security at my
kids high school. And I did get to go and
interview there and I showed him the Gloria Fairy pictures.
And he was just like where did you get these?
(26:09):
And where did you like? How? And I was like,
you want them? You know, you want these pictures? Well,
then you know I want things too, I mean, And
that is what it was always like with Sam and me.
You know, he was like, I want a TV. I
was like, cool, I want things to you know, I
want a story.
Speaker 5 (26:29):
You push him finally, you say you're sick of the BS,
and so you say you wanted something. You wanted to
know things like how did it feel to kill? You
wanted to know some serious things, and you wanted some
serious information from him.
Speaker 2 (26:43):
Yeah. So when I when I got those magazines and
when I was able to make copies and get in
the pictures he wanted and set of vile thing to do.
Perhaps I don't know, but I said, tell me about
Denise and Odessa you and you know it gave me
one of the more detailed stories I've gotten from him. It's,
you know, one of my favorite chapters in the book.
(27:04):
Although I can't read it, I really I don't know
if I can read it again. As many times as
I've been over it and copy edited it, you know,
and quoted it and showed it to people. There was
a moment a few days ago and I was like,
I don't think I can read the Denise chapter on tour.
(27:25):
I don't think I could look at it again. It
was just, you know, it was told to me in
such detail. And it was also going back to the
Texas Ranger. Texas Ranger James Holland, who is this sort
of legendary you know, serial killer whisperer and works multi
(27:46):
jurisdictionally within Texas. But if he has a Texas case
that's connected to a case in another state, that gives
him jurisdiction there as well. So he was able to
locate the Denise Brother's case and that is what brought
him to sam Now Texas Ranger James Allen and I
(28:07):
happened to come upon the same serial killer at the
same time. So that was how I got involved in
the FBI investigation.
Speaker 5 (28:15):
Now, the thing is is that at one point Samuel
Little confesses and says that he has killed ninety three women.
So the task for the FBI, James Holland, and for
you as well is to get confirmation somehow.
Speaker 2 (28:30):
Well, I mean that's also for local jurisdictions, right, you know,
I mean I'm not a detective. So although that did
turn out that did turn out to happen, it's not
you know, I didn't go in as a citizen sleuth, right,
you know. I went in as a journalist, and it
just so happened that as he was confessing to me.
(28:51):
You know, there were a number of cases where I
was asking unusual questions and I would get details that
perhaps the cops weren't getting. So I was communicating with
law enforcement about the conversations we had about particular murders,
and there were a handful that my details were the
(29:12):
lynchpin that sought the case. But I didn't, you know,
go in there to go solve murders. I just started
to learn as I went.
Speaker 5 (29:20):
So it's an interesting relationship you have because the Texas
Ranger and the FBI are cautioning you, but at the
same time they're respecting your journalism and its effect and
also the results that you garnered from the interviews with
Samuel Little.
Speaker 2 (29:38):
Yes, and the LAPD as well, and like I said,
and local jurisdictions. No, I had really amazing experiences with
detectives across the country, and there are detectives, you know,
in small jurisdictions, who are the only cold case department
(29:58):
there is. I've asked as I, well, how many people
are in your cold case department? Me, you know, on
my spare time so much of the time. It's a
work of passion for detectives, these people who didn't get justice,
and they tend to be the good ones, so you know.
And I also interviewed people who you know, and law
(30:22):
enforcement officers who ignored the claims of marginalized women in
the eighties, and and you know, you know, I did
more confrontational interviews as well, but I was helped by
local cops all across the country at the FBI and
I I mean, you know, journalists and law enforcement have
(30:43):
a classically tense relationship because my job is to is
to find stuff out, you know, my job is to
hold people accountable. And law enforcement tends to be a
very cloistered community. And they would I try to like
you just go away and let them do your job.
Let them do their job. I mean, they said as
(31:05):
much to me, you know, like, thank you, young lady
for your help. Go Why don't you go let law
enforcement do their job and stay in your lane. I'm like,
I'm really sorry, but I'm dug in here, you know,
and I have an exclusive with a serial killer who's
in the middle of ninety three confessions. Now, those ninety
(31:27):
three confessions weren't to me, you know, I would be
maybe in the thirties I would say, I got, you know,
of like detailed confessions from him. He was confessing to
law enforcement, and I was focusing on cases in it.
I was doing a deeper dive. Wasn't my goal to
get every single confession out of him that was already
(31:49):
being done.
Speaker 5 (31:50):
How many were confirmed soon and then how many were
confirmed shortly after? Or Out of those ninety three, about.
Speaker 2 (31:58):
Thirty five confirmed very quickly, which was one of the
things that really and I saw the process of how
they confirmed it and how precise and meticulous they were
about it, you know. And this includes the data analyst,
doctor Christy Palazolo from the FBI, and doctor Angela Williamson
(32:24):
from the DOJ. It wasn't just Texas Ranger James Holland
and local pds that, you know. I was convinced that
they were doing their work and doing it properly. And
thirty five happened fast. I mean, now it's twenty twenty
three and we're at sixty three, sixty three, I believe,
(32:48):
and I just got to move. I have a map
with pins in it that I made at the beginning
because it was so hard to sort of imagine the carnage.
And also I wanted to see his pattern across the
United States because he you know, he was he was
a drifter. He was a traveler. He traveled mostly on
(33:08):
the ten back and forth across the United States, theft
by day, murder by night. So I made this map
and the red pins in it are for the victims
that I know that are still unsolved, and the black
pins are solves. And I got to change one out
the other week. And it's been it's been a while.
(33:29):
And believe that this book coming out, you know, I
have the most comprehensive list of Sam Little's victims that
I know of out there. It's all in the book.
I believe that we're going to see salves. You know,
we're going to see action and also awareness and hopefully,
(33:49):
you know, I'll entertain you and grab you from the
first page to the last, because that's how you get
people to care.
Speaker 5 (33:57):
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what we you write about is incredible. Some there are
(35:24):
living victims. There are some victims that escaped the clutches
of Samuel Little and specifically a woman that fought him,
and you you write that boxed him, also that you
had alluded to it and or you had mentioned it.
But you go explore how on earth this guy, even
though he was a major suspect in so many of
(35:47):
these murders, that even with grand jury indictments, those failed
trials failed, even with living victims like the one you chronicle.
Leela McLain Bowlegs, can can you tell us just this
incredible story that really demonstrates and illustrates what Samuel Little
was all about?
Speaker 2 (36:07):
Well, there were four victims who survived Samuel Little's attacks.
The first two were Hilden Nelson and leidlal McLean in
Pasca Goola, Mississippi. Pascagoula, Mississippi in the late eighties was
on fire. There was an area, it's a rural part
of Mississippi. There was an area called Carver Village where
(36:30):
you could get anything you wanted. On half of the
street was the front, and on the other half of
the street was the projects. And on the front was
where there were pool halls and juke joints and music
and prostitutes and guns and drugs and teas and blues
(36:50):
and anything you wanted all night long, and people had
come from all over the South to come to Carver Village. Now,
the women who lived in the projects often worked as prostitutes.
And the two women who survived there, the first one
Hilden Nelson, who is the woman who I interview in
my book. I have the only interview with her, only
(37:13):
interview she ever gave. She and her friends had a
pact that you know, if you walked up into your
room with a man and it took longer than fifteen minutes,
somebody would come, and there was they were breeze ways,
you know, like walkways, like two story buildings walkways. Somebody
(37:33):
would come and knock on your door. And so her
best friend came and knocked on her door, and a
man's voice answered, like, she's fine, she's handling her business.
But that wasn't their deal. So Dolores was her friend's name,
walked around the back and they had window fans. You know,
it was hot Mississippi, it was a summer. She kicked
(37:55):
in the window fan and Sam was strangling Hilda in
the bathtub with a scarf and drowning her. And Sam
just stood up and walked out. And so she was
saved by her friend. Now, she didn't report this, but
words started to get around amongst the women, and just
(38:16):
a few years later, Sam picked up five foot two
inch spark plug named Layla McClain who ran Pool Hall,
which was in the back was a brothel where you
would rent rooms. And she was also a prostitute. And
she got in a car with Sam and she told
(38:38):
him where to go, and he's like, no, I'm going
somewhere else. And she immediately saw that he was not
going where he said he was going. And this woman
is the only woman who fought him off out of
ninety three. I mean, plenty of women fought him and
she just I mean at the trial she said, I
(39:00):
learned to box because I had too many step brothers.
She took her foot and put it on the gas
and took the wheel and tried to drive the car
into a wall, and then she boxed him. I mean,
they said how many doors were in that car? Said,
I know there were four because I was in and
out of them so many times. You know, like I ran,
(39:24):
he grabbed me, I ran, he grabbed me. Finally she
got away. She ran across four lanes of traffic and
the shipyards that were there were getting out. It was
a change of shift.
Speaker 1 (39:35):
I was there.
Speaker 2 (39:36):
I stood there like it was crazy. Four lanes of
traffic and it was so long, and she ran, she
ran back to the front, and she tripped over some
man who's peeing in the bushes. Smokey Joe was peeing
in the bushes, and he grabbed her and dragged her
to the front, and they took her to the hospital
(39:57):
where she stayed for three days. Many men, many years
later she lived to testify about it, though she tried
before that. And you know, I will just never forget
them saying you showed up at a hospital with particular
hemorrhaging in your eyes, which is what happens when you're strangled.
It's the blood vessels and your eyes break, and you know,
(40:20):
and you couldn't speak for three days, and you had
bruises around your neck, and you'd been hitting the head
so many times you couldn't see. Did you report what
happened to you? And she said no, ma'am. And the
prosecutor said, let me put this another way. Did any
doctor ask you what happened to you? And she said no, ma'am.
(40:41):
And she said, well, why didn't you report it? Why
didn't you talk to them afterward? And she said, well,
I'm going to walk down to the police station in Pascagoula, Mississippi,
and said I was working as a prostitute and I
was assaulted. I'd wind up in jail. They don't know
why I'm down there. They don't know why who I
am or what I'm working. You know, and you, Aunt,
you couldn't commit a crime against a black prostitute in
(41:03):
Mississippi at that time, sim Lane wasn't considered a crime,
and their testimony was never subpoenaed until well, eventually they
both did go report it. Their testimony was never subpoenaed
until a white girl went missing. Her name was Melinda
la Prie, and they connected him to Sam when they
showed up at the courthouse old it was eight months pregnant.
(41:26):
They showed up testified at Melinda La Prie's grand jury indictment,
and Hilda took one look at Sam and she urinated
on the floor and they made her clean it up
and they sent them home without testifying. So it wasn't
until they testified. It wasn't until they testified at Sam's
trial in twenty and thirteen that they finally got to
(41:50):
tell their stories. So Layla McClain Elda Nelson. There was
another victim, Laurie Carriage in San Diego, who testified then
and testified again in La Sam served eighteen months on
was initially attempted murder, kidnapping, assault, rape. He did some
(42:11):
time for kidnapping, served eighteen months in a four year sentence.
The other victim didn't show up and it's never been
identified again. Aunt Tanya Jackson Lori Carriage still very much
alive and is a trauma counselor and living in Portland
and works through victims of violent crime. But she is furious,
(42:33):
furious that he served eighteen months after having tried to
kill her. He left her for dead, he thought she
was dead and she just played possum by the side
of the road until he was gone. And you know,
if you really want to hear some anger about how
the social justice system treated a woman they felt, you know,
was an unreliable witness, in spite of how precise and
(42:58):
impeccable her testimony was, as well as the cops involved
in the case. In spite of that, he served eighteen months,
drove straight to La and killed two women in one night.
Speaker 5 (43:09):
Yes's incredible.
Speaker 2 (43:10):
So the book itself, you know, is reaching out to
a larger themes of you know, how we pursue social justice,
how forensic science can level the field in some ways,
but also our attitudes as a society have to change.
And it's a story about the fascinating lives of the
(43:31):
people involved in this world.
Speaker 5 (43:35):
Let's use this as an opportunity to stop to hear
these messages.
Speaker 3 (43:39):
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Lucky?
Speaker 3 (43:44):
In line of the Delhi, I guess ah in my
dentist's office more than months. Actually do I have to say?
Speaker 4 (43:50):
Yes?
Speaker 1 (43:50):
You do?
Speaker 3 (43:51):
In the car before my kid's PTA meeting?
Speaker 2 (43:53):
Really?
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Speaker 1 (44:04):
Are you feeling lucky? No, we're not necessary void my
long eighteen plus terms conditions, plus he what everygains.
Speaker 5 (44:10):
Now you talk about not seeing Samuel Little and then
he was returned to Los Angeles County and you had
an opportunity to see him again. Tell us about this,
the difference in these visits. Tell us about that meeting again.
Speaker 2 (44:26):
Well, when he was extra dined into Texas, I had
an idea that I was rid of him. I mean
that I'd be able to ask him the questions I
wanted to ask, because by that time, you know, I
was so deep within the investigations. You know, there was
no dropping the story for me. But I thought it
would be nice to not have to see him again.
(44:48):
Like I say, you know, my experiences with him were
always they were everything, you know, I mean, they were interesting,
they were ultimately you I think every one of them
took a bite out of me. You know, it just
had to sit there and look and look that in
the eye. And the fact that I did it for
(45:09):
so long, which I also think really gave me a
unique perspective. I don't know that there's a journalist that's
done that sort of long term research with somebody where
you get to see their personality unfold in so many ways,
or say the layers of the onion peeling away. But
yet when they actradited him to Texas, I thought like, oh,
(45:32):
now I don't have to now I can just pretend, oh, bummer,
too bad they brought Texas. Now, you know, I can't
see him all that much. And then you know, when
they gave him the option at the end of it,
at the end of the confessions and at the end
of his conviction for the murder of Denis Brothers, they
(45:52):
gave him the option of where he wanted to be,
and he said he wanted to be back in Los
Angeles with his journalist. The difference, I mean every time
I talked to Sam was different. There was a time
I was working on the documentary Joe Berlinger, who did
the amazing Paradise Lost serie, you know, the recent Ted
(46:13):
Bundy and Jeffrey John documentaries in Netflix did a documentary
about me working on this book and working on Sam
Little's cases. And for that and also you know, for
my own research, I pretty much talked to Sam on
the phone from prison every day. And one of the
(46:33):
things I did for the documentary was, you know, like
they can't always have you know, a big fancy camera
there when every moment of something real happens in a
true crime story or what that relationship was like. So
I put a go pro in my office and every
single time I walked in, I turned it on and
(46:55):
I was just like, no matter what, no matter what,
no matter how shitt you look, no matter you just
like ran in from the pool where you were with
your kids, you know, their aaron and not in a bikini,
and I'm like, no matter what, just like like show
what it was like, because that's what it was like.
You know, it was like running up from Christmas dinner
(47:16):
and you know, and I think that Keith to do
it montage in the documentary that shows like how very
many times they spoke to him and you know, and
like what different kind of conditions I was in. They
even asked me. They were like really, like, I mean,
we realize this is powerful, but like most people don't
(47:40):
want to be, you know, photographed like bent over their
desk crying in a bikini. And I was just like,
fuck it. You know, I'm not a model. Can I
say fuck it?
Speaker 4 (47:50):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (47:51):
Fuck it, I'm not a model. You know. I was
doing my job and I don't care, and you know,
and that is what it was like.
Speaker 1 (48:00):
It was.
Speaker 2 (48:00):
It was different every day. And you know, but as
we sort of you know, COVID started approaching and there
were ideas that they were going to start shutting down visitation.
You know, he made me his next of kin, and
we had an understanding that I was going to donate
his brain to science and then I do something respectful
(48:24):
with the rest of the two hundred pounds of them.
And then when they did shut down the visiting, very
shortly after, Sam went into the into the infirmary with
COVID related symptoms and died there on December thirtieth, twenty twenty.
And it was so the COVID crisis was so crazy,
(48:47):
and there were meat trucks in the in the parking
lot of the corner's office, and I was never able
to get that brain, which is a real shame. What
I did get was packages and packages and packages of
things that were in his cell. And also I got
(49:09):
one surprising letter that I think can sum up in
a sense. You know, when people say, what was it
like talk to associated path, you know, you know, really
what was it like? You know, I was like, you
were looking at the devil, and I was like, do
you think that the devil shows up dressed like the devil?
You think the devil's that stupid? You know, like he
(49:32):
was just he was a Toddler. He was a con man.
He was charming. He taught me so much. All nightmares
about him for the rest of my life. But the
end of his life, he was he was testy, you know,
he was getting he was and also he was starting
to get fan letter after fan letter after fan letter,
and so all of a sudden, he's like, well, really,
(49:55):
you know, this person's offering me money, and and you know,
maybe I'm gonna tell them my story. I'm just like,
just shut up, Sam. You know, I've been talking to
you for years, you know, like I've got your story.
But he would shake me down. He was a hust
so he would shake you down to the last minute.
(50:18):
And I'm his real I'm like his last friend. I'm
his real friend. I'm the only one who's come to
see him in prison. You know, he knows these people
are just gonna take the drawings, the you know, tracings
of his hands. He did, the tracings of his penis.
He did the drawings people would ask for, you know,
(50:40):
for three hundred dollars or whatever, or because they love him,
love him, love him, love me. They don't know why
I would call him a monster. And in any case,
I remember one of our last conversations was like, you
gave me enough money for ramen, but not a hot
pot like you are just you know, because I put
(51:02):
like fifteen bucks on his books every once in a while.
And you know, he was like, and not a high pathage.
You're just like every one of these bitches, you're this,
You're that. I get a letter in the mount he
left me one thousand and ninety seven dollars. I was like,
you had money, you had money the whole time, and
(51:23):
you're shaking down your last friend for five bucks, like
you can't help yourself, just doing to see if you
can do it to me, you know, And yeah, I
got the I opened that check and I was just like,
fuck it sad. You know, there's a piece that'll be
(51:44):
a mystery to me forever. There's a piece that's just
he wanted and he took. There are a lot of
reasons maybe that's what he wanted. You know, I explore
them in the book Scientific Psychological. If you figure it out,
send me a line.
Speaker 5 (52:01):
We haven't talked about it, but you chronicle in this book.
And for those that will discover this book, it's incredible.
His to say the least, less auspicious beginning. His grandparents
were he thought were his parents, his father he thought
was his brother, and then kind of echoing Bundy or
(52:24):
the Bundy legend, he was told about this at one
point in a humiliating fashion. Sure, and like you, you
chronicle in this book too, his stay at the Boys
Industrial Reformatory did some shaping in or misshaping his character
along the way. I want to thank you very much
(52:45):
for coming on and talking about your extraordinary book, Behold
the Monster, Confronting America's most prolific serial Killer. For those
that might want to find out further about this, do
you have a website and you do any social media?
Speaker 2 (52:57):
I do have a website. I do social media, and
you know, and I welcome you all to come check
it out. And you know, I try to restore the
names and humanity of Sam's victims. Come help as well,
and please read the book. I'm at Jillianlauren dot com.
(53:18):
There's also a documentary called Confronting a Serial Killer by
Joe Berlinger streaming on most major services right now. I'm
on TikTok. Jillian Lauren author. I'm talking about missing persons,
I'm talking about true prime stories. I'm talking about self defense,
(53:39):
and I would love you look at my TikTok. My
Instagram is at Jillian Lauren, TikTok at Jillie Lauren Facebook,
somewhere Jillian Lauren author, but really go to my website
pre order the book. Support this effort. I'm very proud
of it.
Speaker 5 (53:57):
Yes, and indeed you should. Who knows to you? Thank
you so much for Behold the Monster, Confronting America's most
prolific serial killer. Thank you so much for this interview,
and you have a great evening. Jillian Lauren, Thank you,
good night. Thank you,
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