August 1, 2022 • 48 mins
In this entry, we discuss the McMartin Pre-School case and the rise of ritualistic child abuse accusations of the 1980s and 90s.
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Ref:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2R21tWs-qCw
https://open.spotify.com/episode/2wpJHaSIGEDby9ZipHKhWp?si=f56bb07367164512
https://www.aetv.com/real-crime/mcmartin-preschool
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Marissa (00:00):
Macabrepedia makes light of dark subject matter and
(00:02):
may not be suitable for allaudiences. Listener discretion
is advised.
Matthew (00:09):
Child abuse is a very real horrific and unfortunately
common occurrence. abuse in anyform is a very serious topic and
one discovered should beaddressed through appropriate
channels. Child abuse is a crimewell deserving of punishment.
And for those who are convictedof child abuse often find that
there is a special kind oftreatment for them, even amongst
(00:31):
other criminals. The impact onsurviving victims is permanent.
Even those who make peace withthe events still always have
that as a defining moment intheir lives. Today's entry deals
with the accusations ofritualistic physical and sexual
abuse in the daycares, andpreschools of 1980s and 90s
(00:53):
America. Accusations fueled byMiss handling of situations,
heavy handed leading questionsof children by police and
advocacy groups, and the peakingof the Satanic Panic. Understand
that this entry focuses on theabsurdity of some of these
claims and highlights theaspects of the Satanic Panic.
(01:16):
What it doesn't aim to do isdownplay the severity of child
abuse or to encourage people todismiss a child's claims of
abuse. Join us as we add anotherentry into this our
Macabrepedia.
Marissa (01:36):
Hello, and welcome to Macabrepedia marriage of true
crime the truly bizarre asalways, we are Your host,
Marissa and Matthew. And Idefinitely sounds like this week
is not going to be nearly as funas last week's on Dungeons and
Dragons.
Matthew (01:49):
Well, depends on how you look at it. So yes, this is
this is part of the SatanicPanic series that we're doing.
And yes, it does deal with childabuse. The idea though, is that
and a bit of a spoiler, there,there was no convictions of
child abuse. And the the claimsthat were made are on believably
(02:15):
bizarre to the point that therethere is unlikely any level of
child abuse that actuallyhappens in this story. Well,
that is a relief. Yeah. So justwe'll just get that out of the
way. Straight up. Now. Thatdoesn't mean that I won't be
telling you parts of the storiesand the things that have
happened there or the claimsthat some of the children were
(02:36):
making. That being said it justin the in the claims that are
made. They're just soridiculous. Yeah, there's just
there's no ifs, ands or butsabout it, like just throw it
out. It's ridiculous, right?
Marissa (02:50):
I'm pretty unfamiliar with this. So I'm interested to
see what you have to say,
Matthew (02:53):
well, throughout the 80s and 90s, there was a growing
Satanic Panic as we kind oftalked about, right. So there's
this moral panic. And then wealready touched on role playing
games and how that led intothere as well. But in the,
throughout the throughout thatdecade, there was a ton of
(03:16):
ritualistic child abuse claimsthat were happening, some were
just on individuals, there werepeople who were claiming that
they were they, they hadrepressed repressed memories
that went through hypnotism,were able to unlock these these
hidden suppressed memories ofthe satanic rituals that they
(03:37):
were brought into. Yeah, I'veseen people do that. Yeah, where
these people were claiming thatthey were, they had been taken
from their school, and were, youknow, subjected to watching
animals be sacrificed and allthese crazy things. There's,
there's one girl and we're notgoing to really cover this. I'm
just going to kind of breezeover some of these because we're
really actually going to befocusing on a particular case,
(03:59):
specifically, but there wasthere's this Australian girl who
was claiming that she had hadmultiple pregnancies and had to
eat her fetuses in front of theritual during the rituals and
all this stuff and justlistening to her like you can
see and I might link it in, inthe show notes. But if you
listen to her claims, sheclearly does not understand what
(04:24):
what it looks like to have ababy. Like there's just there's
no there's no way like she justdoesn't it just there's the red
flags all over the place thatthere's no it did not happen.
There's no damn way. Okay,gotcha. But and also it just
doesn't make sense. Like, shehad even claimed that she still
had like a four year olddaughter, who was still being
(04:44):
held by these satanicworshippers who were in this
like country estate, and thather daughter was still being
held there. You can tell ifsomebody's ever fully carried a
baby to turn All right when shecan, and she and she was in
school at the time, and at theage of like 12 years old when
(05:07):
she was was she was saying thatwhen this was happening 12 to
15. You don't think that any ofthe teachers or anything would
have noticed that you were ninemonths pregnant? That's
fulfilled? It's a lot of
Marissa (05:18):
very unlikely. I mean, you're not saying it's
impossible, but very, verylikely.
Matthew (05:21):
Very, very likely.
Yeah. It was her grandmother whowas a leader of this Cabal.
Anyways, case for another day,maybe. What we're actually
focusing on today is theMcMartin preschool trial. This
happened in the early 1980s. Itwas a preschool in Manhattan
Beach, California. And it waskind of a family run business.
(05:43):
for Virginia. McMartin was thefounder of the preschool and her
son or her grandson becomes abecomes the focal point for a
lot of these claims. Now, thereason we're focusing
particularly on the McMartinpreschool trial is one there are
other podcasts there that havededicated entire seasons to
(06:04):
other trials along the side. I'mnot saying that there's that
there's nobody else who'scovered in McMartin trials, but
there was an uncovered does anamazing job of doing a case in
Canada. If you want to listen toa really well done, top notch
kind of investigative report onon the subject, you can go check
(06:29):
that out uncovered. So let'stalk about the McMartin
preschool trial. And the reasonwe're kind of focusing on this
one specifically on also isbecause this was the most
expensive trial and the longesttrial in US history. Really,
(06:52):
wow, it stretched for fiveyears. Oh, fan went into
retrial. Yeah. So
Marissa (07:03):
how much it cost? You said the most expensive Yeah,
Matthew (07:06):
it was like five or $15 million, or something along
those lines. So crazy. Okay.
Yeah, it was it was ridiculousthat the amount of money that
had a ton of specials here. Iwasn't, that wasn't a fact that
I was really drilling down on.
So I don't know if since then,sorry. No, no, I'm just saying I
don't know if since then, it'sit's then if there's been a more
(07:26):
expensive one, but I do notbelieve that there was a longer
one like this will stretch downfor a decade. So in 1983 This
woman named Judy Johnson has ason who is at the McMartin
preschool. Now her son iscomplaining about having trouble
(07:50):
sitting or bowel have painfulbowel movements or something
along this line. Judy,unfortunate. Yeah. So Judy
begins to ask the childquestions and kind of like,
start to interrogate him aboutwhat's what's causing all of
this. And she eventually comesto believe that her child and
(08:14):
child the children areprotected. So I don't know where
kids name or anything like that.
But But Judy ends up getting astory out of her son, who claims
to her belief that he had beensodomized at the school. And
he's like two years old. Oh,wow. Yeah. He so she then
reports this to the police, thepolice? Of course, absolutely.
(08:39):
The police then bring ininvestigators to kind of take a
look at this. And they findnothing. Nothing that shows that
there's any real evidence ofthis pot for whatever reason?
Well, I guess I shouldn't saythat knowing where this goes. I
say well, for whatever reason.
(09:00):
But the police having noevidence as to what's going on
with this child as to any kindof level of abuse. They decide.
Well, just to be on the safeside. Let's go ahead and send
out letters to every parent ofall the children at the McMartin
(09:22):
preschool and there that's gonnacause
Marissa (09:25):
a panic a little bit.
Yeah,
Matthew (09:27):
so you see where this is gonna do. So on September 8,
eighth 18th or so use aVictorian or so on September
8 1983. The the the policedepartment sent out these
letters that basically say, youcan read it that's all over
that. You can easily get a holdof so I'm not going to read the
(09:48):
whole thing too, because it's alittle bit long, but I will do
some of the highlights. So theysent out this letter that says
that there's an investigationinvolving child molestation And
at the McMartin preschool,particularly in regards to Ray
Buckley, who's the grandson andslash son of the other some of
(10:11):
the other people a young child atwo year old. No, no Ray Buckley
is one of the IS is the grandsonof the owner of the
Marissa (10:18):
bison adult. Yeah, he's he's one of the teachers they do
this without knowing withoutactually having any evidence
zero evidence so they didn'tthey put
Matthew (10:28):
his name on this guy.
Yeah, they put his name into theletter and say, Ray Buckley is
being investigated for childmolestation and then they go
further on to encourage theparents to interrogate their
children about it aboutinappropriate touching sodomy,
fondling, all of this, all ofthis stuff.
Marissa (10:52):
That sounds very mishandled in my opinion.
Matthew (10:54):
And then at the end, of course, they're like, at the
very end of the of the lastletter, it says, there's no
evidence to indicate that themanagement of Virginia McMartin
preschool, had any knowledge ofthe situation, and no
detrimental informationconcerning the operation of the
school has been discoveredduring this investigation. Also,
(11:14):
no other employee in the schoolis under investigation forever,
Marissa (11:17):
any criminal act, just this one guy.
Matthew (11:19):
So it goes hammer in on on Ray, so they sent out this
letter, it's like 200 letters goout. So all of a sudden, all
these all these parents areasking their kid, hey, what's
going on with this? And ofcourse, they're like, Be
discreet, don't share this,right. So they so they go, and
there's all these parents aretalking to their kids about
what's going on what's going on?
And the kids are like, nothing.
(11:39):
What are you talking about? Ihave no idea. And these are,
this is a preschool. So we'reonly dealing with very young
children. So they're trying toget the their kids that to
confess or to, you know, feelcomfortable enough to let let
them know what's going on. Noneof the kids are saying anything
about it. They're just like, Ihave no idea what you're talking
about. Eventually, there is aadvocacy group called The
(12:05):
Children's InstituteInternational, which is a Los
Angeles based advocacy group forchild abuse basically. So word
spreads after these letters goout about this possible crime.
Possible child molestation,understandably so. Yeah. Because
parents are going to starttalking, I mean, if 200 people
(12:27):
in a community suddenly get aletter that their kids might be
being molested. So now all of asudden, they're reaching out to
maybe the people who used tohave kids there. And other than
that, right, so spreads andspreads and spreads. So CI,
which is a Children's InstituteInternational, they start doing
two plus hour investigationswith each of the children. Now,
(12:47):
you may be familiar with kind ofa joke, where people will hold
up a doll and say, show me onthe doll where they touched you.
Right?
Marissa (13:01):
What's the joke part,
Matthew (13:02):
dude? Like? Yeah, no, I've seen it. I'm just saying
like, it's not like it. There'snot like a punchline to the
joke, but okay, yeah, it's oftenused in like, that will show me
where the bet you know, when Ishow me where the Batman touched
you comes from this, okay, it isno longer something that can be
used because see I what theywere basically doing. They sit
the kids down for two plus hoursof interrogations, like if
(13:23):
you've ever seen, like suspectsbeing interrogated for a crime,
it's kind of like that, exceptthey're doing it with these,
these anatomically correctdolls. So they give them these
dolls. And they're asking thekids, you know, tell me about
the games you play at theschool. And the kids are like,
they tell them about thedifferent games they play and
what they do. And they're like,Well, is there any games that
(13:46):
you play where you have to benaked? And the kids are like,
What? No, yeah. So then they'relike, Well, little Timmy. And
little Jane. They told me thatthey play naked games. You don't
play naked games? And the kidslike No, no, like, Well, why
wouldn't you be included inthose games? Have you ever heard
that there? Were these othergames? Why wouldn't they include
(14:09):
you? So there? And then the kidslike, oh, I don't? And then
eventually the kids like, oh,yeah, yeah. Oh, I've played that
game. Because now you're makingthe kid feel like there. Yeah.
And it's like all these otherkids were leading. Exactly. So
this is where this is kind ofand they they video all of these
interviews as well. So thesekids are shown with these dolls,
(14:29):
they have the dolls or they playwith the dolls and, and they're
being asked these leadingquestions. And sometimes they'll
have the dolls and they'll thekids will have the dolls, and
they'll put them on like thecouch or a chair or something.
And sometimes they'll put thetwo dolls together, like one in
each hand, put them together andthen set them down so that the
dolls are touching each other.
Interviewers like well, thatshows that they're like I
(14:52):
already said that the dog dollwas Ray effectively and the
other day All was a student. Sothe fact that they put the two
dogs together that shows thatthey're laying together. So
they're reading into all thisstuff. So this starts to spiral
and just go nuts, right? So theykeep, they keep doing these
weird interviewing techniqueswhere they're leading and
(15:14):
leading and leading and leading.
And, of course, the interviewersare taking bits that are true
from a student that says, Oh,this is what happened. And then
they take that, and they, theyuse that to get a confession out
of another child, and so on andso forth. So one of them might
have said, and there was therewas a game that they that they
(15:34):
had said, where it was calledNaked movie star. I don't know
the details of the game, but itwas a game where basically, the
kids would pose nude forphotographs. That's what that's
what, that's what the thenarrative is being built on.
That that's what's happening. Sothen,
Marissa (15:54):
I mean, obviously, anything like that you really
have to take seriously, but itdefinitely sounds like they are
going crazy with it.
Matthew (15:59):
Right? Yeah, absolutely. If you hear one of
these claims, yeah, that's fine.
But if you are trying to getsomeone to, to confess, to
having pictures taken of them,yeah. And they're telling you
they never had the picturestaken. And eventually they're
like, Okay, yeah, I guess maybethey might have, then all of a
sudden, you're like, boom, gotit? No, that's not how that's
(16:21):
supposed to be handled. Right.
So again, I'm not saying like,don't like you should go into it
with some pretty with a prettyserious always assume that
they're, I mean, at the risk ofmaking it seem. I understand.
Innocent until proven guilty.
But in a claim that's thatserious, like go into it
(16:41):
assuming that the person is notlying. Right? And go into it to
be like, is there something herefor sure, get that? Absolutely.
But if you're the person who'stelling you telling this other
person that they were molested,and the person selling, you
know, I wasn't, then back off,you know, they weren't. So this
this actually even thisescalates to the point where the
(17:03):
students are eventually sayingthat there's underground
tunnels, underneath
Marissa (17:13):
the ESA, with underground tunnels with these
stories? I
Matthew (17:17):
don't know. I'm curious to know. Well, the one in
Michigan for the DND one. Yeah,that actually, they did have
underground tunnels. Thepreschool did not have
underground tunnels. There wereno tunnels under the preschool.
And this was later found out byarchaeologists who were brought
in. And because other peoplewere just digging around, oh, no
citizens were just takingequipment to the location of the
(17:40):
school and digging holes to tryto find stuff. And then an
archeology team came in andstarted actually like doing an
investigation. They're in therepulling up like pieces of debris
that are from previous decadesand eras. So then this, this
narrative begins to build whereit's like, well, they they were
tunnels down there. And thenwhat happened was, Nick Martin
(18:02):
is found out that the kids weretelling people about the
tunnels. So they filled them allin buildings there. It was, like
a garbage dump underneath there.
So anyway, so in the kids aresaying that the way to get into
these tunnels because they can'tfind any in the entrance, is
that the kids would be flusheddown the toilet. And or, and I'm
like, What
Marissa (18:22):
is a red flag for you?
Matthew (18:24):
Yeah, I was like, I was like, this is the same year that
Mario came out, I think, and I'mlike, is this what they're doing
is like, but anyway, there's nolink to that. But this is. So
the kids are being flushed downthe toilet to get into these
underground tunnels, theunderground tunnels lead to hot
air balloons, and privateairplanes come on that then the
(18:44):
kids would get on fly to Mexico,where they would have celebrity,
ritualistic satanic meetings.
And the reason that they getthis scene where they know
they're Chuck Norris, Oh, no.
Chuck Norris, because thestudents are provided with
(19:05):
pictures of the differentpeople. Well, who are the people
who did this to you? And they'repulling they have, they're
pointing out Chuck Norris as aperson who was there. There in
one of the police who was in theinvestigation was beat was
pointed as as one of the one ofthe people who was buying this.
So instead of just being like,well, this is ridiculous,
(19:26):
because clearly, Chuck Norrisand Detective are not the people
who are doing this right. Likeclearly that should that is not
the issue. No, instead they'relike, well, the police are
involved too. This is a bigpolice cover up. And it's like
Marissa (19:40):
and there are tunnels under the school to take these
kids to private planes and flyto Mexico. Chuck Norris does
this not just I mean, this justreeks of like a very young
child's imagination or a dreamor something like this does not
make any logical sense.
Matthew (19:54):
So that is one of the things and you'll see this not
in our episode per se, but likeif you ever listen Under people
when they're trying to defendthis kind of like accusation
coming from a child, it's like achild couldn't make this up.
child couldn't make this up. AndI'm like, what part of child
like imagination? Do you notunderstand some
Marissa (20:12):
things? Sure. They couldn't like if it's a more
mature subject, and they've beenexposed to absolutely, but this
is them, going into tunnels andgetting on planes and flying to
meet Chuck Norris, who's one ofthe biggest celebrities of the
day. No, that child can make
Matthew (20:25):
that and so, so this also so during this time, Judy
Johnson, it turns out, they'retrying to get her to go the in
the case, I know this is kind ofall over the place. This is
this. It's a wackadoodle story.
But anyways, Ray is in and sevenother teachers have been brought
(20:48):
in and accusations have beenbrought against them, including
like the 6070 or 67 year oldVirginia who's like this, like
super nice old lady. So much infact that the child, Judy
Johnson, who started this wholething, her child was not
actually registered at theschool properly. Judy just
(21:10):
dropped her two year old off atthe school one day, and Virginia
being the grandmotherly personthat she is didn't have her go
through all of the paperwork.
Now. You'll hear this presentedas like, almost as if like Judy
dropped him off in the parkinglot and drove away. I don't
(21:31):
think that's what it was. Ithink that Judy just didn't
understand that you have to likeregister to do her due
diligence. Yes, she rolled up inthere and was like, Hey, I have
to go to work. You need to watchmy kid. This is a daycare,
right? Yeah, I think that's moreof the I'm giving Judy the
benefit of the doubt on this.
Because I don't she don't Idon't think she just like left
the child wandering in theplayground. And then they were
like, Oh, we have one more extrakid. And then never asked
(21:52):
anything about it later. Soanyway, so she didn't actually
properly register this kid. Sothat's, that's kind of a weird
thing. Like, Judy doesn't knowhow to do that. Okay, Judy, also
is a is from most sources, aridiculous alcoholic and
possible schizophrenic. She hadalso made claims that her ex
(22:14):
husband had been sought amaizingher child, wow. Right. So the
CII brings in their medicalexperts, and the medical experts
are doing examinations of thesekids, including taking pictures
of their genitals and all thisstuff to prove that there was
scarring that could possibly beassociated with with
(22:39):
molestation.
Marissa (22:43):
I mean, if they haven't been if they haven't had this
happen to them before you don'tthink this is gonna traumatize
them
Matthew (22:50):
right? That's what I'm saying. I'm like so you're
you're upset because somebody istook pictures of them naked and
now you're naked? Exactly. aretaking the celebrity the the
movie star naked movie stargame? And then there? And then
what are you doing? The Nakedmovie start? Yeah, yeah. What
are you What? How does this makesense to you guys. So anyways,
(23:11):
the the reason it becomes like aSatanic Panic is is Judy Johnson
is also saying that hurt thather son said that Ray could fly
and had taken a drill, and wasdrilling holes into their
armpits and like to get bloodout of them. And that he was
(23:31):
ritualistically sacrificinganimals, including killing a
horse with a baseball bat infront of in front of the
students, and all this stuff. SoJudy is almost certainly a
schizophrenic before that Judycan ever get brought to trial to
go on there and actually, youknow, make a statement. She ends
(23:54):
up drinking herself to death. Sothere's that. And clearly just a
sign of somebody who needed waymore mental health. Help than
then she was obviouslyreceiving. And unfortunately,
she had a very young childcaught up in Yeah, it has to it
(24:15):
has to deal with stuff likethat. Like, yeah, I have I have
a schizophrenic or manicdepressive, somewhat
schizophrenic grandmother. And Ikind of understand like, when
they go, they get a little wackysometimes and you just have to,
you know, there's you don't knowwhat's real and not particularly
at that age. I remember certainmath. That's probably a story
for another day, maybe, butWell, no, I'll share it. My My
(24:39):
grandmother used to sit out ather windows at her house when
she was babysitting me. And shewould and I was like five, six
years old. And she's looking outinto other people's houses. And
she's like, I don't know whothat person is. I bet that
person probably killed everybodyin the house and she would say
stuff like this to me. And I'mlike,
Marissa (24:57):
You were quite young and like,
Matthew (24:58):
what like, what do we Do you know she come home? But
what's funny is I remembered Iremember this perfectly well.
She's looking into theneighbor's house and there's a
there's a guy in the house. He'sa bald dude, not wearing a
shirt, standing in the kitchen,looking like he's doing dishes
or making a sandwich orsomething. And I'm sitting there
and she's like, I don't know whothat is. I bet he broke in
(25:19):
there. I bet he heard all thosepeople. And I'm like, Who breaks
into a house and makes asandwich with the shirt off?
Like, what are you talking? I'mlike six years old, like, What
are you talking about? I tell mymom, whatever. And then nothing
really comes of it. I'm not 100%positive that nobody was
murdered in that house. Butanyways, I digress. So yeah,
(25:42):
being around people who havemental health issues, severe
mental health issues. As achild, like what do you do like
this is an adult who's supposedto know what they're doing. But
again, even the child's So Youngat this point, he doesn't even
really know how you grew up withit, you get used to it. Yeah, he
might not he might not even haveknown that his mom was all doing
this behind behind his back, youknow, but anyway, she dies
(26:05):
before she can ever take thestand. The one of the big things
that they were trying to utilizeto get re convicted on this is
his obsession with pyramids.
Apparently, Ray would sometimesdrive around Los Angeles with a
pyramid hat. And when I say apyramid hat, I'm not talking
like it's like a baseball cap.
(26:25):
But whether it's a pyramid, likeI'm talking like, like a wire
pyramid, like aluminum foilstyle, kind of hat on. And he
would go to like pyramidconventions. And even a woman
who had testified against him,initially said that she had met
him at a pyramid convention, andthat she couldn't seduce him.
(26:49):
And the reason that they weresaying that, and he's a pretty
good looking guy, pretty fit guyand everything. They were trying
to utilize that to be like, Thisis a beautiful woman, and she
couldn't seduce Ray, which meansthat he must be a sexual
deviant. And he works. And he'sobsessed with pyramids as well.
So he must be a child molester.
These are the kinds of this isthe kind of avenue that they
were used using for this. Sheeventually recanted that and
(27:11):
said that she did actuallyseduce him and they did sleep
together. But okay, here northere, but this is their kind of
trying to make him seem likehe's some kind of weirdo. Right?
Marissa (27:21):
Yeah, I mean, people don't understand stuff like
that. I guess they are trying touse that against him. Sure.
Matthew (27:26):
And it is a little weird to drive around with. Yes,
but are they each their own?
The. So Ray, Ray's lawyers wouldsay like, he was like, the most
courageous person that they'dever defended. Like, he just was
like, I don't have anything toworry about, because I didn't do
(27:47):
anything, right. So he just hejust kind of always held that as
like, the truth will, will comeout. And he, he got the end of
the first like five year trial,he ends up getting off because
the jury can't come to a to aconclusion. So it's a hung jury.
He gets retried later. Stillnothing. But this is ruining his
(28:11):
life. Like I mean, even if youget acquitted and found not
guilty. It doesn't matter. Likeif you if you polled people in
that era, about this case, 83%of them are like, oh, yeah,
absolutely. He did it. Like heabsolutely was molesting these
kids. Now, I feel like thereason that this was drawn out
(28:33):
for so long is so see, I was thelead with the interviewing of
the children. And I think thatthey were able to kind of, I
think that you can, you can kindof pull back all of the people
are flying in and flying in and,you know, the the ritualistic
(28:57):
portions of it and gettingflushed down toilets and
armpits. Yeah. So that you canyou pull that back and you still
feel like, is there somethingthere? Like, what where are they
getting some of this though, youknow, and I must come from
somewhere, right? And I kind ofI back that, you know, like, you
should, you should be like,Okay, this is a word. I'm
talking to a three year old.
(29:18):
This is This is tough to get thefull story.
Marissa (29:21):
You should take it seriously. Absolutely.
Matthew (29:23):
So but I feel like that's what kind of prolonged
this thing was like there has tobe something. But there were
hundreds, hundreds of hours ofvideoed interviews with these
kids. And they only actuallywere able to bring a handful
like less than I think it waslike I think it was like six or
eight that they actually broughtto trial because all the other
(29:44):
ones were so nuts that they thatthat the prosecution was like,
no, like, there's no way we canbring this to court, right. So
they kind of weeded it out. Andactually the lead person who was
it In charge of CIA is a womannamed ki MacFarlane when it went
(30:06):
to retrial so Oh, she was out.
During the initial trial, shewas on the stand for five weeks.
Wow. Yeah. Going out stuff.
Yeah. But the way that shepresented this, the information
was so bizarre and the stuffthat she was believing was
(30:30):
happening. It seems like she waspretty bought into the whole
satanic ritualistic practicespart that when it re trialed,
the defense tried to get her totake the stance. Just got to be
anyway, so Ray ends up he getshe ends up getting off without
(30:50):
any issue. He, there were somethere was a little bit of jail
time because of like bales andstuff like that, I believe. But
he, but he ends up disappearingafter this. There's a couple of
interviews where he's on likeLarry King Live and stuff like
that. And he, you know, tellshis story and whatever, but it's
just it's so bizarre like andduring this time. Like you you
(31:15):
hear these things about theseritualistic satanic practices.
And again, this the McMartincase is, is not unique in all
and most most of the claims arejust not not unique, like
they're a lot of this stuff is,is you can see this in some of
the other cases that you canfind with that. And then you
(31:37):
have these other people who havethese repressed these repressed
dreams or repressed memories,and everything are coming
forward at this time about theseritualistic things. And they're
eating up all of this time onlike talk shows at the time. So
I remember as a as a kid, aroundthis time, early 90s, late 80s,
seeing things like Sally, JessyRaphael, and Geraldo Rivera. So
(32:03):
Geraldo, he had a two hour show,on Satanism in 1988. He's
blaming metal music and all thisstuff. And we'll kind of get
into that in the next episode.
But he's calling he's callingfor Satanism warnings to be on
the labels. And this is alsokind of the time where we have
that little black and whitelittle Parental discretion
(32:25):
label. That's all Oh, is thatthat's where this is where this
all kind of started. But we'lltouch on that in the next
episode. But when you hear thesepeople like, like the girl in
Australia and stuff, and again,I'm not saying she didn't go
through some kind of trauma. I'mnot saying she wasn't abused in
some fashion. Absolutely not.
(32:46):
Because I don't know. But thestory she's telling is not true.
No way was she were she part ofa satanic cult that was eating
her aborted fetuses. It nothappening. But as a kid at
roughly the same age, about 1012years old during this time, in
(33:08):
the early 90s. Like I rememberseeing these, these shows that
were talking about ritualisticchild abuse when because I used
to watch talk shows because Iwas a weird little kid. But
like, it's the stories thatthey're telling are all fairly
similar about the ritualisticsexual stuff that's happening in
these these things. And, and,and I remember either seeing at
(33:30):
the time or read a rerun of it,but like Anton LaVey, who and
his daughter were on a talkshows at the time, and he was
he's the person who started thefounded the church of Satan, and
the religion of Satanism andSatanism and LaVeyan. Satanism.
(33:52):
Yeah. And there is a differencebetween like the Church of Satan
and the satanic church, andthey're kind of different belief
structures, but, and Anton is areally cool character. He's
definitely a character in and ofhimself. But like, these were
the things that were constantlyin the media, and you're just
getting pumped full of all this,all this, this, this Satan is
around every corner, kind of
Marissa (34:13):
Yeah, and we've talked about this before, there are
like little clusters of theseevents that happen all
throughout history. I mean, evensomething more extreme, like
school shootings are a thingright now, which is horrible.
But it's something that'shappened in the past with like
mass murder, AX murders andstuff. There's just these
clusters of events, becausepeople see it, and they copy it.
So that kind of sounds similarto what's happening.
Matthew (34:33):
Not only that, but it's what the media gloms onto Yeah,
right. So when they're, whenthey're grabbing a hold of this,
and they're presenting that andthen if that starts to pick up
traction, that other outletsstart to pick up stories on that
too. So it it becomesparticularly in the 80s and 90s.
I'm in Well, actually it'sprobably worse now but in the
(34:55):
80s and 90s the news and talkshows and and stuff like that
That was where you're getting,you're getting fed all of this
information all the time. Soit's about it's, it's the click
Beatty stuff, right? It's thestuff that gets you to watch,
right. So they try to go foroutrageous, they try to get the
stuff that that they think thatthe popular population is
talking about. So that's whatperpetuates a moral panic when
(35:17):
that happens. So like now wehave our algorithms where your
algorithm on your phone might bedifferent than mine, because I
look at different articles. Butthe net, the narrative that's
being fed to you is based uponyour interests. And that's kind
of or whatever you happen totalk about today. Right. And
that's kind of what's happeningwith with the media of this time
period, is like Satanism becomesgate catches, catches enough
(35:41):
headlines, that all of a sudden,all the headlines are looking
for more stories that go intothis, and it just blooms into
this crazy epidemic ofritualistic like things like,
but also during this time, thenthis isn't something that you
really fit into other anotherstory, I'm not gonna do an
entire story on this kind ofthing. But during the Satanic
(36:03):
Panic, even like Procter andGamble, the company that
basically owns everything thatyou've ever cleaned your house
or your body with, like, tidebounce downy for breeze, and
that's just the US products, I'msure there's other ones and
other other places. They had tochange their logo during this
time period, because their logoat the time was a crescent
(36:28):
shaped face of a man like likeIt looks like a like a moon with
with a face on it. Right. And hehas like a beard that kind of is
the the chin part of this of themoon. And then he has like a
hat. That kind of soundsfamiliar. And then you know what
that looks like? There's acouple of stars that are in
there. Yeah. And that was theProcter and Gamble logo for over
(36:49):
100 years. And then somebodygets a hold of it. And says that
they actually located that thatimage and where actually
originates from is from anEgyptian spell book of curses.
And then you may remember
Marissa (37:04):
that they have the spellbook did they pointed out?
It was
Matthew (37:09):
it was so it kind of got lost in in everything at
that point. It was some like, itwas it was it was a Christian. I
don't remember I don't rememberexactly who it was, had done it.
I don't think I have it in mynotes here. But there was some
it was it was like this. It wassomething pretty small. This guy
found it this logo and says thatit was part of that was part of
the suggestion curse book. Butthat's not really what makes it
(37:31):
catch fire. What ends uphappening is if you remember, on
another talk show host, PhilDonahue. He had, according to
the story, he had the the headof Procter and Gamble on his
(37:52):
show, where he stated that theyhad that Procter and Gamble
actually was proud of how theyfunded satanic cults, that they
were an active member of, say,the Satanism movement, and that
they were actually promotingthis. And that aired in 1982, or
(38:15):
maybe 85, or possibly 89. Itnever aired because it didn't
actually happen. Doesn't soundlike something that people
believe that the head of Procterand Gamble was on Phil Donahue
and said that they are a sataniccompany to the point that
Procter and Gamble is now P andG. Like their emblem is just a p
and A G. And it used to havelike a little bit of a crescent
(38:36):
still on the side of the G. Gotrid of that. Yeah, there's so
they got
Marissa (38:42):
so it's now just full on corporate boring.
Matthew (38:45):
Yeah, because they can't because they got
absolutely blasted for this,this fake story. And that's kind
of what happens with this. Like,once the story gets out, and
people begin to twist thenarrative into being that
there's, there's Mario styletunnels that you get that you
were dropping into. Airportsthrough it's the same thing you
(39:08):
know, it just it's the it's thestory that that people want to
believe is what people build offof. But anyways, that will kind
of do it for the MC Martin andthe McMartin preschool and Ray
Buckley story. It's just it'sjust kind of a wild thing. I
(39:33):
guess I could have presented itin a little more concise way,
but it's just it's so batty andweird and just just nuts as far
as the stuff that was happening
Marissa (39:44):
these days. Wild Times, wild
Matthew (39:46):
times. But yeah, I mean, this this was eventually
reviewed by a by by specialiststhat were like the interviewing
process is just absolutelygarbage for these kids. And now,
you're not allowed to do any ofthose tactics to get any
information out of out ofchildren, because it's it was
(40:09):
absolutely the heaviest handedleading of questions that you
could possibly do. They reallyshamed the children into these
confessions. They, they, they,
Marissa (40:19):
they probably traumatized them.
Matthew (40:21):
Oh, yeah. And there's even like, later, those who did
come forward with this, likeyours, like 30 years later, they
said that they, they're not sureif they were actually if
anything actually happened tothem. Because Because because of
how, just like trauma traumaticthe whole experience, was it? I
(40:42):
mean, it got jumbled up in theirmind. Yeah, they don't, they
can't remember what was real andwhat wasn't at that point. And,
yeah, so the, I mean, if you,the interviewers would praise
the story that they wanted toget out of the child. So they'd
be like, Oh, wow, really? Tellme more, you know, and the kids
like, oh, yeah, this is great.
Um, you know, whatever. And notonly that, like, a four year old
(41:02):
and a two and a half hourinterview is going to tell you,
whatever you want to know, toget out of that interview, like,
can I just go home, right? Soit's, it's wild. And I'm just
trying to the reason I didn'treally drill down on a lot of
like, the, the day by day, likeset by set is because I'm just
trying to get a feel for thewildness of the Satanic Panic.
(41:23):
Not specifically, like,
Marissa (41:28):
we don't need detailed trials.
Matthew (41:31):
So yeah, if any of you guys have any stories of this
time period, and kind ofremember, exposure to these
types of stories, make sure youshare it with us. Absolutely. I
would love to hear those. Alwaysexcited to hear what other
people's experiences were in thewhole Satanic Panic era. And we
got quite a bit of feedback fromlisteners as to sharing their
(41:56):
Satanic Panic related stories.
Particularly around we have wehave a lot of a lot of tabletop
role playing. Yes. People wholistened. So there's a lot of
lot of d&d related stories thatwere shared. Hopefully,
hopefully, none of our listenershad to go through the the
(42:17):
ritualistic abuse scandals ofthis era. So maybe, maybe we
won't get that much feedback onon sharing of stories from from
that era, I guess. d&d. Yeah,you can share whatever stories
you want, but I think peoplewill probably be a little bit
more open to sharing theirstories with the the d&d stuff,
(42:39):
but anyways, I apologize if thisyou know, seems a little bit
kind of bouncing all over theplace. If you may have noticed
there was a lapse in our, ourscheduling, as we did not put it
out an episode last week.
(42:59):
Partially it due to, you know,electrical fires and whatnot,
that happened in the house funtimes, but also because I, you
know, I do have my bipolarissues. And sometimes I'm going
through a depressed moment and Ican't make myself do anything.
(43:21):
And then sometimes coming out ofthat, I am in a kind of a manic
state and it makes it so thatit's hard for me to you know,
keep my mouth at the same speedas my brain. So that's kind of
what may have been coming acrossin this episode. But anyways,
it's what we'll get through it.
It's been been plenty of yearswhere I've been dealing with it.
But anyways, moving on to ourWell, it's actually turning into
(43:46):
Marisa McCobb minute whileyou've
Marissa (43:50):
been doing the episode later. Yeah. So I will do them
carpeted if that's the case.
Yeah. Um, versus McCobb minute.
So in 1976, while at Pikeamusement park in Long Beach,
California, a stagehand for ashow that was planning to film
there, the $6 million man,sprucing up the area to prepare
(44:12):
for an upcoming scene. The scenewas to take place on a haunted
amusement park ride with atunnel full of ghosts, demons
and skeletons. Have you heardthe story?
Matthew (44:22):
No, I just don't know the $6 million man.
Marissa (44:25):
I know. You know, there's no, I'm asking if you
knew this, but you probably doonce I say. The stagehand saw a
mannequin hanging from a noosein the corner of the room and he
went over to move it. When hegrabbed it and the mannequins
hand came right off. When thestagehand looked down at it, he
noticed what appeared to be bonebeneath the layers of skin skin.
Police were called and themummified corpse was taken to
(44:48):
the Los Angeles coroner'soffice. The body was covered in
layers of wax and paint. And theoriginal incisions from the
bodies autopsy and embalmingwere still visible. The It was
identified as Elmer McCurdy, anoutlaw who had died 65 years
earlier. When I figured it wasgonna be Yeah, in 1911. He had
(45:08):
been killed in a police shootoutafter robbing a train his body
taken to a funeral home butnever claimed by relatives
seeing an opportunity, TheUndertaker and bombed the body
and let people see it if theyput a nickel in his mouth. And
of course, he made he made anickel every time that happened.
This made him a good bit ofmoney. And five years later, a
(45:29):
man who owned a carnival claimedto be his relative and claimed
the body saying that he wasgoing to put it to rest.
Matthew (45:36):
How convenient that he also has a carnival. Yeah,
Marissa (45:40):
he he was not and he did not. Instead, he made it the
star attraction of his travelingcarnival. For 60 years.
McCarty's body made it this wayaround various haunted houses,
wax museums, and carnivals, andeventually made its way as a
prop on an amusement ride atPark pike amusement park, though
(46:03):
nobody knows how it finallyended up there. His body was
finally put to rest. And hisgravestone has not his not only
his death here, but also wasburial year with no explanation
for the 65 year gap written onit. Actually, it says Elmer
McCurdy shot by Sheriff's Possein Osage hills. On October
(46:27):
7 1911, returned to Guthrie,Oklahoma, from Los Angeles
County, California for burial.
April 20/22 1977. That's all itsays.
Matthew (46:37):
That's awesome. Yeah.
Marissa (46:38):
So that's our my comment. I thought that was
pretty interesting.
Matthew (46:41):
Well, that's what McCobb minutes are all about?
Yes, it is being being littlebite size. Interesting little
things. Yeah. Sorry. I stumbledover that a bit. But I, we
appreciate you joining us asalways, and just kind of getting
some information as to what thedecades of the 80s and 90s were
like with in regards to themoral and Satanic Panic. We will
(47:05):
continue this series a littlebit more going into the next
episode, where we tacklebackmasking backmasking. Yeah,
that's when you play a recordbackwards, and it tells you to
go out here hail satan. Butanyways, well, that is next
week. But thank you, as alwaysfor listening. And a big shout
(47:25):
out to our newest patron. Iguess I know him as as magic.
But that also makes it so thatwe have multiple magics it is
our and our patrons. ButJonathan Seabolt really big
shout out to you have been afriend for a long time. And
(47:47):
yeah, and also he has a numberof creative endeavors, as well.
And he's been YouTubing for likeseven, eight years now. I've
known him since kindergarten.
But he wasn't YouTubing
Marissa (47:59):
for YouTube wasn't around.
Matthew (48:01):
But he still he was always a great event. Anyways,
this is not a show about him.
Thank you, magic for the supportand supporting us in our
creative endeavors. And for thefor and all of our patrons, of
course, thank you so much forshowing your support for what we
do here. And for listeners, ofcourse thank you. Also, if you
want to reach out to us, you cando so on Twitter and Facebook at
(48:23):
Macabrepedia.
Marissa (48:29):
We are also on Instagram and Macabrepediapod
and you can shoot us an email atmacabrepediapod@gmail.com.
Matthew (48:38):
Thank you as always for listening and join us next week
as we add another entry intothis our Macabrepedia
Macabrepedia makes light of dark subject matter and
(00:02):
may not be suitable for allaudiences. Listener discretion
is advised.
Matthew (00:09):
Child abuse is a very real horrific and unfortunately
common occurrence. abuse in anyform is a very serious topic and
one discovered should beaddressed through appropriate
channels. Child abuse is a crimewell deserving of punishment.
And for those who are convictedof child abuse often find that
there is a special kind oftreatment for them, even amongst
(00:31):
other criminals. The impact onsurviving victims is permanent.
Even those who make peace withthe events still always have
that as a defining moment intheir lives. Today's entry deals
with the accusations ofritualistic physical and sexual
abuse in the daycares, andpreschools of 1980s and 90s
(00:53):
America. Accusations fueled byMiss handling of situations,
heavy handed leading questionsof children by police and
advocacy groups, and the peakingof the Satanic Panic. Understand
that this entry focuses on theabsurdity of some of these
claims and highlights theaspects of the Satanic Panic.
(01:16):
What it doesn't aim to do isdownplay the severity of child
abuse or to encourage people todismiss a child's claims of
abuse. Join us as we add anotherentry into this our
Macabrepedia.
Marissa (01:36):
Hello, and welcome to Macabrepedia marriage of true
crime the truly bizarre asalways, we are Your host,
Marissa and Matthew. And Idefinitely sounds like this week
is not going to be nearly as funas last week's on Dungeons and
Dragons.
Matthew (01:49):
Well, depends on how you look at it. So yes, this is
this is part of the SatanicPanic series that we're doing.
And yes, it does deal with childabuse. The idea though, is that
and a bit of a spoiler, there,there was no convictions of
child abuse. And the the claimsthat were made are on believably
(02:15):
bizarre to the point that therethere is unlikely any level of
child abuse that actuallyhappens in this story. Well,
that is a relief. Yeah. So justwe'll just get that out of the
way. Straight up. Now. Thatdoesn't mean that I won't be
telling you parts of the storiesand the things that have
happened there or the claimsthat some of the children were
(02:36):
making. That being said it justin the in the claims that are
made. They're just soridiculous. Yeah, there's just
there's no ifs, ands or butsabout it, like just throw it
out. It's ridiculous, right?
Marissa (02:50):
I'm pretty unfamiliar with this. So I'm interested to
see what you have to say,
Matthew (02:53):
well, throughout the 80s and 90s, there was a growing
Satanic Panic as we kind oftalked about, right. So there's
this moral panic. And then wealready touched on role playing
games and how that led intothere as well. But in the,
throughout the throughout thatdecade, there was a ton of
(03:16):
ritualistic child abuse claimsthat were happening, some were
just on individuals, there werepeople who were claiming that
they were they, they hadrepressed repressed memories
that went through hypnotism,were able to unlock these these
hidden suppressed memories ofthe satanic rituals that they
(03:37):
were brought into. Yeah, I'veseen people do that. Yeah, where
these people were claiming thatthey were, they had been taken
from their school, and were, youknow, subjected to watching
animals be sacrificed and allthese crazy things. There's,
there's one girl and we're notgoing to really cover this. I'm
just going to kind of breezeover some of these because we're
really actually going to befocusing on a particular case,
(03:59):
specifically, but there wasthere's this Australian girl who
was claiming that she had hadmultiple pregnancies and had to
eat her fetuses in front of theritual during the rituals and
all this stuff and justlistening to her like you can
see and I might link it in, inthe show notes. But if you
listen to her claims, sheclearly does not understand what
(04:24):
what it looks like to have ababy. Like there's just there's
no there's no way like she justdoesn't it just there's the red
flags all over the place thatthere's no it did not happen.
There's no damn way. Okay,gotcha. But and also it just
doesn't make sense. Like, shehad even claimed that she still
had like a four year olddaughter, who was still being
(04:44):
held by these satanicworshippers who were in this
like country estate, and thather daughter was still being
held there. You can tell ifsomebody's ever fully carried a
baby to turn All right when shecan, and she and she was in
school at the time, and at theage of like 12 years old when
(05:07):
she was was she was saying thatwhen this was happening 12 to
15. You don't think that any ofthe teachers or anything would
have noticed that you were ninemonths pregnant? That's
fulfilled? It's a lot of
Marissa (05:18):
very unlikely. I mean, you're not saying it's
impossible, but very, verylikely.
Matthew (05:21):
Very, very likely.
Yeah. It was her grandmother whowas a leader of this Cabal.
Anyways, case for another day,maybe. What we're actually
focusing on today is theMcMartin preschool trial. This
happened in the early 1980s. Itwas a preschool in Manhattan
Beach, California. And it waskind of a family run business.
(05:43):
for Virginia. McMartin was thefounder of the preschool and her
son or her grandson becomes abecomes the focal point for a
lot of these claims. Now, thereason we're focusing
particularly on the McMartinpreschool trial is one there are
other podcasts there that havededicated entire seasons to
(06:04):
other trials along the side. I'mnot saying that there's that
there's nobody else who'scovered in McMartin trials, but
there was an uncovered does anamazing job of doing a case in
Canada. If you want to listen toa really well done, top notch
kind of investigative report onon the subject, you can go check
(06:29):
that out uncovered. So let'stalk about the McMartin
preschool trial. And the reasonwe're kind of focusing on this
one specifically on also isbecause this was the most
expensive trial and the longesttrial in US history. Really,
(06:52):
wow, it stretched for fiveyears. Oh, fan went into
retrial. Yeah. So
Marissa (07:03):
how much it cost? You said the most expensive Yeah,
Matthew (07:06):
it was like five or $15 million, or something along
those lines. So crazy. Okay.
Yeah, it was it was ridiculousthat the amount of money that
had a ton of specials here. Iwasn't, that wasn't a fact that
I was really drilling down on.
So I don't know if since then,sorry. No, no, I'm just saying I
don't know if since then, it'sit's then if there's been a more
(07:26):
expensive one, but I do notbelieve that there was a longer
one like this will stretch downfor a decade. So in 1983 This
woman named Judy Johnson has ason who is at the McMartin
preschool. Now her son iscomplaining about having trouble
(07:50):
sitting or bowel have painfulbowel movements or something
along this line. Judy,unfortunate. Yeah. So Judy
begins to ask the childquestions and kind of like,
start to interrogate him aboutwhat's what's causing all of
this. And she eventually comesto believe that her child and
(08:14):
child the children areprotected. So I don't know where
kids name or anything like that.
But But Judy ends up getting astory out of her son, who claims
to her belief that he had beensodomized at the school. And
he's like two years old. Oh,wow. Yeah. He so she then
reports this to the police, thepolice? Of course, absolutely.
(08:39):
The police then bring ininvestigators to kind of take a
look at this. And they findnothing. Nothing that shows that
there's any real evidence ofthis pot for whatever reason?
Well, I guess I shouldn't saythat knowing where this goes. I
say well, for whatever reason.
(09:00):
But the police having noevidence as to what's going on
with this child as to any kindof level of abuse. They decide.
Well, just to be on the safeside. Let's go ahead and send
out letters to every parent ofall the children at the McMartin
(09:22):
preschool and there that's gonnacause
Marissa (09:25):
a panic a little bit.
Yeah,
Matthew (09:27):
so you see where this is gonna do. So on September 8,
eighth 18th or so use aVictorian or so on September
8 1983. The the the policedepartment sent out these
letters that basically say, youcan read it that's all over
that. You can easily get a holdof so I'm not going to read the
(09:48):
whole thing too, because it's alittle bit long, but I will do
some of the highlights. So theysent out this letter that says
that there's an investigationinvolving child molestation And
at the McMartin preschool,particularly in regards to Ray
Buckley, who's the grandson andslash son of the other some of
(10:11):
the other people a young child atwo year old. No, no Ray Buckley
is one of the IS is the grandsonof the owner of the
Marissa (10:18):
bison adult. Yeah, he's he's one of the teachers they do
this without knowing withoutactually having any evidence
zero evidence so they didn'tthey put
Matthew (10:28):
his name on this guy.
Yeah, they put his name into theletter and say, Ray Buckley is
being investigated for childmolestation and then they go
further on to encourage theparents to interrogate their
children about it aboutinappropriate touching sodomy,
fondling, all of this, all ofthis stuff.
Marissa (10:52):
That sounds very mishandled in my opinion.
Matthew (10:54):
And then at the end, of course, they're like, at the
very end of the of the lastletter, it says, there's no
evidence to indicate that themanagement of Virginia McMartin
preschool, had any knowledge ofthe situation, and no
detrimental informationconcerning the operation of the
school has been discoveredduring this investigation. Also,
(11:14):
no other employee in the schoolis under investigation forever,
Marissa (11:17):
any criminal act, just this one guy.
Matthew (11:19):
So it goes hammer in on on Ray, so they sent out this
letter, it's like 200 letters goout. So all of a sudden, all
these all these parents areasking their kid, hey, what's
going on with this? And ofcourse, they're like, Be
discreet, don't share this,right. So they so they go, and
there's all these parents aretalking to their kids about
what's going on what's going on?
And the kids are like, nothing.
(11:39):
What are you talking about? Ihave no idea. And these are,
this is a preschool. So we'reonly dealing with very young
children. So they're trying toget the their kids that to
confess or to, you know, feelcomfortable enough to let let
them know what's going on. Noneof the kids are saying anything
about it. They're just like, Ihave no idea what you're talking
about. Eventually, there is aadvocacy group called The
(12:05):
Children's InstituteInternational, which is a Los
Angeles based advocacy group forchild abuse basically. So word
spreads after these letters goout about this possible crime.
Possible child molestation,understandably so. Yeah. Because
parents are going to starttalking, I mean, if 200 people
(12:27):
in a community suddenly get aletter that their kids might be
being molested. So now all of asudden, they're reaching out to
maybe the people who used tohave kids there. And other than
that, right, so spreads andspreads and spreads. So CI,
which is a Children's InstituteInternational, they start doing
two plus hour investigationswith each of the children. Now,
(12:47):
you may be familiar with kind ofa joke, where people will hold
up a doll and say, show me onthe doll where they touched you.
Right?
Marissa (13:01):
What's the joke part,
Matthew (13:02):
dude? Like? Yeah, no, I've seen it. I'm just saying
like, it's not like it. There'snot like a punchline to the
joke, but okay, yeah, it's oftenused in like, that will show me
where the bet you know, when Ishow me where the Batman touched
you comes from this, okay, it isno longer something that can be
used because see I what theywere basically doing. They sit
the kids down for two plus hoursof interrogations, like if
(13:23):
you've ever seen, like suspectsbeing interrogated for a crime,
it's kind of like that, exceptthey're doing it with these,
these anatomically correctdolls. So they give them these
dolls. And they're asking thekids, you know, tell me about
the games you play at theschool. And the kids are like,
they tell them about thedifferent games they play and
what they do. And they're like,Well, is there any games that
(13:46):
you play where you have to benaked? And the kids are like,
What? No, yeah. So then they'relike, Well, little Timmy. And
little Jane. They told me thatthey play naked games. You don't
play naked games? And the kidslike No, no, like, Well, why
wouldn't you be included inthose games? Have you ever heard
that there? Were these othergames? Why wouldn't they include
(14:09):
you? So there? And then the kidslike, oh, I don't? And then
eventually the kids like, oh,yeah, yeah. Oh, I've played that
game. Because now you're makingthe kid feel like there. Yeah.
And it's like all these otherkids were leading. Exactly. So
this is where this is kind ofand they they video all of these
interviews as well. So thesekids are shown with these dolls,
(14:29):
they have the dolls or they playwith the dolls and, and they're
being asked these leadingquestions. And sometimes they'll
have the dolls and they'll thekids will have the dolls, and
they'll put them on like thecouch or a chair or something.
And sometimes they'll put thetwo dolls together, like one in
each hand, put them together andthen set them down so that the
dolls are touching each other.
Interviewers like well, thatshows that they're like I
(14:52):
already said that the dog dollwas Ray effectively and the
other day All was a student. Sothe fact that they put the two
dogs together that shows thatthey're laying together. So
they're reading into all thisstuff. So this starts to spiral
and just go nuts, right? So theykeep, they keep doing these
weird interviewing techniqueswhere they're leading and
(15:14):
leading and leading and leading.
And, of course, the interviewersare taking bits that are true
from a student that says, Oh,this is what happened. And then
they take that, and they, theyuse that to get a confession out
of another child, and so on andso forth. So one of them might
have said, and there was therewas a game that they that they
(15:34):
had said, where it was calledNaked movie star. I don't know
the details of the game, but itwas a game where basically, the
kids would pose nude forphotographs. That's what that's
what, that's what the thenarrative is being built on.
That that's what's happening. Sothen,
Marissa (15:54):
I mean, obviously, anything like that you really
have to take seriously, but itdefinitely sounds like they are
going crazy with it.
Matthew (15:59):
Right? Yeah, absolutely. If you hear one of
these claims, yeah, that's fine.
But if you are trying to getsomeone to, to confess, to
having pictures taken of them,yeah. And they're telling you
they never had the picturestaken. And eventually they're
like, Okay, yeah, I guess maybethey might have, then all of a
sudden, you're like, boom, gotit? No, that's not how that's
(16:21):
supposed to be handled. Right.
So again, I'm not saying like,don't like you should go into it
with some pretty with a prettyserious always assume that
they're, I mean, at the risk ofmaking it seem. I understand.
Innocent until proven guilty.
But in a claim that's thatserious, like go into it
(16:41):
assuming that the person is notlying. Right? And go into it to
be like, is there something herefor sure, get that? Absolutely.
But if you're the person who'stelling you telling this other
person that they were molested,and the person selling, you
know, I wasn't, then back off,you know, they weren't. So this
this actually even thisescalates to the point where the
(17:03):
students are eventually sayingthat there's underground
tunnels, underneath
Marissa (17:13):
the ESA, with underground tunnels with these
stories? I
Matthew (17:17):
don't know. I'm curious to know. Well, the one in
Michigan for the DND one. Yeah,that actually, they did have
underground tunnels. Thepreschool did not have
underground tunnels. There wereno tunnels under the preschool.
And this was later found out byarchaeologists who were brought
in. And because other peoplewere just digging around, oh, no
citizens were just takingequipment to the location of the
(17:40):
school and digging holes to tryto find stuff. And then an
archeology team came in andstarted actually like doing an
investigation. They're in therepulling up like pieces of debris
that are from previous decadesand eras. So then this, this
narrative begins to build whereit's like, well, they they were
tunnels down there. And thenwhat happened was, Nick Martin
(18:02):
is found out that the kids weretelling people about the
tunnels. So they filled them allin buildings there. It was, like
a garbage dump underneath there.
So anyway, so in the kids aresaying that the way to get into
these tunnels because they can'tfind any in the entrance, is
that the kids would be flusheddown the toilet. And or, and I'm
like, What
Marissa (18:22):
is a red flag for you?
Matthew (18:24):
Yeah, I was like, I was like, this is the same year that
Mario came out, I think, and I'mlike, is this what they're doing
is like, but anyway, there's nolink to that. But this is. So
the kids are being flushed downthe toilet to get into these
underground tunnels, theunderground tunnels lead to hot
air balloons, and privateairplanes come on that then the
(18:44):
kids would get on fly to Mexico,where they would have celebrity,
ritualistic satanic meetings.
And the reason that they getthis scene where they know
they're Chuck Norris, Oh, no.
Chuck Norris, because thestudents are provided with
(19:05):
pictures of the differentpeople. Well, who are the people
who did this to you? And they'repulling they have, they're
pointing out Chuck Norris as aperson who was there. There in
one of the police who was in theinvestigation was beat was
pointed as as one of the one ofthe people who was buying this.
So instead of just being like,well, this is ridiculous,
(19:26):
because clearly, Chuck Norrisand Detective are not the people
who are doing this right. Likeclearly that should that is not
the issue. No, instead they'relike, well, the police are
involved too. This is a bigpolice cover up. And it's like
Marissa (19:40):
and there are tunnels under the school to take these
kids to private planes and flyto Mexico. Chuck Norris does
this not just I mean, this justreeks of like a very young
child's imagination or a dreamor something like this does not
make any logical sense.
Matthew (19:54):
So that is one of the things and you'll see this not
in our episode per se, but likeif you ever listen Under people
when they're trying to defendthis kind of like accusation
coming from a child, it's like achild couldn't make this up.
child couldn't make this up. AndI'm like, what part of child
like imagination? Do you notunderstand some
Marissa (20:12):
things? Sure. They couldn't like if it's a more
mature subject, and they've beenexposed to absolutely, but this
is them, going into tunnels andgetting on planes and flying to
meet Chuck Norris, who's one ofthe biggest celebrities of the
day. No, that child can make
Matthew (20:25):
that and so, so this also so during this time, Judy
Johnson, it turns out, they'retrying to get her to go the in
the case, I know this is kind ofall over the place. This is
this. It's a wackadoodle story.
But anyways, Ray is in and sevenother teachers have been brought
(20:48):
in and accusations have beenbrought against them, including
like the 6070 or 67 year oldVirginia who's like this, like
super nice old lady. So much infact that the child, Judy
Johnson, who started this wholething, her child was not
actually registered at theschool properly. Judy just
(21:10):
dropped her two year old off atthe school one day, and Virginia
being the grandmotherly personthat she is didn't have her go
through all of the paperwork.
Now. You'll hear this presentedas like, almost as if like Judy
dropped him off in the parkinglot and drove away. I don't
(21:31):
think that's what it was. Ithink that Judy just didn't
understand that you have to likeregister to do her due
diligence. Yes, she rolled up inthere and was like, Hey, I have
to go to work. You need to watchmy kid. This is a daycare,
right? Yeah, I think that's moreof the I'm giving Judy the
benefit of the doubt on this.
Because I don't she don't Idon't think she just like left
the child wandering in theplayground. And then they were
like, Oh, we have one more extrakid. And then never asked
(21:52):
anything about it later. Soanyway, so she didn't actually
properly register this kid. Sothat's, that's kind of a weird
thing. Like, Judy doesn't knowhow to do that. Okay, Judy, also
is a is from most sources, aridiculous alcoholic and
possible schizophrenic. She hadalso made claims that her ex
(22:14):
husband had been sought amaizingher child, wow. Right. So the
CII brings in their medicalexperts, and the medical experts
are doing examinations of thesekids, including taking pictures
of their genitals and all thisstuff to prove that there was
scarring that could possibly beassociated with with
(22:39):
molestation.
Marissa (22:43):
I mean, if they haven't been if they haven't had this
happen to them before you don'tthink this is gonna traumatize
them
Matthew (22:50):
right? That's what I'm saying. I'm like so you're
you're upset because somebody istook pictures of them naked and
now you're naked? Exactly. aretaking the celebrity the the
movie star naked movie stargame? And then there? And then
what are you doing? The Nakedmovie start? Yeah, yeah. What
are you What? How does this makesense to you guys. So anyways,
(23:11):
the the reason it becomes like aSatanic Panic is is Judy Johnson
is also saying that hurt thather son said that Ray could fly
and had taken a drill, and wasdrilling holes into their
armpits and like to get bloodout of them. And that he was
(23:31):
ritualistically sacrificinganimals, including killing a
horse with a baseball bat infront of in front of the
students, and all this stuff. SoJudy is almost certainly a
schizophrenic before that Judycan ever get brought to trial to
go on there and actually, youknow, make a statement. She ends
(23:54):
up drinking herself to death. Sothere's that. And clearly just a
sign of somebody who needed waymore mental health. Help than
then she was obviouslyreceiving. And unfortunately,
she had a very young childcaught up in Yeah, it has to it
(24:15):
has to deal with stuff likethat. Like, yeah, I have I have
a schizophrenic or manicdepressive, somewhat
schizophrenic grandmother. And Ikind of understand like, when
they go, they get a little wackysometimes and you just have to,
you know, there's you don't knowwhat's real and not particularly
at that age. I remember certainmath. That's probably a story
for another day, maybe, butWell, no, I'll share it. My My
(24:39):
grandmother used to sit out ather windows at her house when
she was babysitting me. And shewould and I was like five, six
years old. And she's looking outinto other people's houses. And
she's like, I don't know whothat person is. I bet that
person probably killed everybodyin the house and she would say
stuff like this to me. And I'mlike,
Marissa (24:57):
You were quite young and like,
Matthew (24:58):
what like, what do we Do you know she come home? But
what's funny is I remembered Iremember this perfectly well.
She's looking into theneighbor's house and there's a
there's a guy in the house. He'sa bald dude, not wearing a
shirt, standing in the kitchen,looking like he's doing dishes
or making a sandwich orsomething. And I'm sitting there
and she's like, I don't know whothat is. I bet he broke in
(25:19):
there. I bet he heard all thosepeople. And I'm like, Who breaks
into a house and makes asandwich with the shirt off?
Like, what are you talking? I'mlike six years old, like, What
are you talking about? I tell mymom, whatever. And then nothing
really comes of it. I'm not 100%positive that nobody was
murdered in that house. Butanyways, I digress. So yeah,
(25:42):
being around people who havemental health issues, severe
mental health issues. As achild, like what do you do like
this is an adult who's supposedto know what they're doing. But
again, even the child's So Youngat this point, he doesn't even
really know how you grew up withit, you get used to it. Yeah, he
might not he might not even haveknown that his mom was all doing
this behind behind his back, youknow, but anyway, she dies
(26:05):
before she can ever take thestand. The one of the big things
that they were trying to utilizeto get re convicted on this is
his obsession with pyramids.
Apparently, Ray would sometimesdrive around Los Angeles with a
pyramid hat. And when I say apyramid hat, I'm not talking
like it's like a baseball cap.
(26:25):
But whether it's a pyramid, likeI'm talking like, like a wire
pyramid, like aluminum foilstyle, kind of hat on. And he
would go to like pyramidconventions. And even a woman
who had testified against him,initially said that she had met
him at a pyramid convention, andthat she couldn't seduce him.
(26:49):
And the reason that they weresaying that, and he's a pretty
good looking guy, pretty fit guyand everything. They were trying
to utilize that to be like, Thisis a beautiful woman, and she
couldn't seduce Ray, which meansthat he must be a sexual
deviant. And he works. And he'sobsessed with pyramids as well.
So he must be a child molester.
These are the kinds of this isthe kind of avenue that they
were used using for this. Sheeventually recanted that and
(27:11):
said that she did actuallyseduce him and they did sleep
together. But okay, here northere, but this is their kind of
trying to make him seem likehe's some kind of weirdo. Right?
Marissa (27:21):
Yeah, I mean, people don't understand stuff like
that. I guess they are trying touse that against him. Sure.
Matthew (27:26):
And it is a little weird to drive around with. Yes,
but are they each their own?
The. So Ray, Ray's lawyers wouldsay like, he was like, the most
courageous person that they'dever defended. Like, he just was
like, I don't have anything toworry about, because I didn't do
(27:47):
anything, right. So he just hejust kind of always held that as
like, the truth will, will comeout. And he, he got the end of
the first like five year trial,he ends up getting off because
the jury can't come to a to aconclusion. So it's a hung jury.
He gets retried later. Stillnothing. But this is ruining his
(28:11):
life. Like I mean, even if youget acquitted and found not
guilty. It doesn't matter. Likeif you if you polled people in
that era, about this case, 83%of them are like, oh, yeah,
absolutely. He did it. Like heabsolutely was molesting these
kids. Now, I feel like thereason that this was drawn out
(28:33):
for so long is so see, I was thelead with the interviewing of
the children. And I think thatthey were able to kind of, I
think that you can, you can kindof pull back all of the people
are flying in and flying in and,you know, the the ritualistic
(28:57):
portions of it and gettingflushed down toilets and
armpits. Yeah. So that you canyou pull that back and you still
feel like, is there somethingthere? Like, what where are they
getting some of this though, youknow, and I must come from
somewhere, right? And I kind ofI back that, you know, like, you
should, you should be like,Okay, this is a word. I'm
talking to a three year old.
(29:18):
This is This is tough to get thefull story.
Marissa (29:21):
You should take it seriously. Absolutely.
Matthew (29:23):
So but I feel like that's what kind of prolonged
this thing was like there has tobe something. But there were
hundreds, hundreds of hours ofvideoed interviews with these
kids. And they only actuallywere able to bring a handful
like less than I think it waslike I think it was like six or
eight that they actually broughtto trial because all the other
(29:44):
ones were so nuts that they thatthat the prosecution was like,
no, like, there's no way we canbring this to court, right. So
they kind of weeded it out. Andactually the lead person who was
it In charge of CIA is a womannamed ki MacFarlane when it went
(30:06):
to retrial so Oh, she was out.
During the initial trial, shewas on the stand for five weeks.
Wow. Yeah. Going out stuff.
Yeah. But the way that shepresented this, the information
was so bizarre and the stuffthat she was believing was
(30:30):
happening. It seems like she waspretty bought into the whole
satanic ritualistic practicespart that when it re trialed,
the defense tried to get her totake the stance. Just got to be
anyway, so Ray ends up he getshe ends up getting off without
(30:50):
any issue. He, there were somethere was a little bit of jail
time because of like bales andstuff like that, I believe. But
he, but he ends up disappearingafter this. There's a couple of
interviews where he's on likeLarry King Live and stuff like
that. And he, you know, tellshis story and whatever, but it's
just it's so bizarre like andduring this time. Like you you
(31:15):
hear these things about theseritualistic satanic practices.
And again, this the McMartincase is, is not unique in all
and most most of the claims arejust not not unique, like
they're a lot of this stuff is,is you can see this in some of
the other cases that you canfind with that. And then you
(31:37):
have these other people who havethese repressed these repressed
dreams or repressed memories,and everything are coming
forward at this time about theseritualistic things. And they're
eating up all of this time onlike talk shows at the time. So
I remember as a as a kid, aroundthis time, early 90s, late 80s,
seeing things like Sally, JessyRaphael, and Geraldo Rivera. So
(32:03):
Geraldo, he had a two hour show,on Satanism in 1988. He's
blaming metal music and all thisstuff. And we'll kind of get
into that in the next episode.
But he's calling he's callingfor Satanism warnings to be on
the labels. And this is alsokind of the time where we have
that little black and whitelittle Parental discretion
(32:25):
label. That's all Oh, is thatthat's where this is where this
all kind of started. But we'lltouch on that in the next
episode. But when you hear thesepeople like, like the girl in
Australia and stuff, and again,I'm not saying she didn't go
through some kind of trauma. I'mnot saying she wasn't abused in
some fashion. Absolutely not.
(32:46):
Because I don't know. But thestory she's telling is not true.
No way was she were she part ofa satanic cult that was eating
her aborted fetuses. It nothappening. But as a kid at
roughly the same age, about 1012years old during this time, in
(33:08):
the early 90s. Like I rememberseeing these, these shows that
were talking about ritualisticchild abuse when because I used
to watch talk shows because Iwas a weird little kid. But
like, it's the stories thatthey're telling are all fairly
similar about the ritualisticsexual stuff that's happening in
these these things. And, and,and I remember either seeing at
(33:30):
the time or read a rerun of it,but like Anton LaVey, who and
his daughter were on a talkshows at the time, and he was
he's the person who started thefounded the church of Satan, and
the religion of Satanism andSatanism and LaVeyan. Satanism.
(33:52):
Yeah. And there is a differencebetween like the Church of Satan
and the satanic church, andthey're kind of different belief
structures, but, and Anton is areally cool character. He's
definitely a character in and ofhimself. But like, these were
the things that were constantlyin the media, and you're just
getting pumped full of all this,all this, this, this Satan is
around every corner, kind of
Marissa (34:13):
Yeah, and we've talked about this before, there are
like little clusters of theseevents that happen all
throughout history. I mean, evensomething more extreme, like
school shootings are a thingright now, which is horrible.
But it's something that'shappened in the past with like
mass murder, AX murders andstuff. There's just these
clusters of events, becausepeople see it, and they copy it.
So that kind of sounds similarto what's happening.
Matthew (34:33):
Not only that, but it's what the media gloms onto Yeah,
right. So when they're, whenthey're grabbing a hold of this,
and they're presenting that andthen if that starts to pick up
traction, that other outletsstart to pick up stories on that
too. So it it becomesparticularly in the 80s and 90s.
I'm in Well, actually it'sprobably worse now but in the
(34:55):
80s and 90s the news and talkshows and and stuff like that
That was where you're getting,you're getting fed all of this
information all the time. Soit's about it's, it's the click
Beatty stuff, right? It's thestuff that gets you to watch,
right. So they try to go foroutrageous, they try to get the
stuff that that they think thatthe popular population is
talking about. So that's whatperpetuates a moral panic when
(35:17):
that happens. So like now wehave our algorithms where your
algorithm on your phone might bedifferent than mine, because I
look at different articles. Butthe net, the narrative that's
being fed to you is based uponyour interests. And that's kind
of or whatever you happen totalk about today. Right. And
that's kind of what's happeningwith with the media of this time
period, is like Satanism becomesgate catches, catches enough
(35:41):
headlines, that all of a sudden,all the headlines are looking
for more stories that go intothis, and it just blooms into
this crazy epidemic ofritualistic like things like,
but also during this time, thenthis isn't something that you
really fit into other anotherstory, I'm not gonna do an
entire story on this kind ofthing. But during the Satanic
(36:03):
Panic, even like Procter andGamble, the company that
basically owns everything thatyou've ever cleaned your house
or your body with, like, tidebounce downy for breeze, and
that's just the US products, I'msure there's other ones and
other other places. They had tochange their logo during this
time period, because their logoat the time was a crescent
(36:28):
shaped face of a man like likeIt looks like a like a moon with
with a face on it. Right. And hehas like a beard that kind of is
the the chin part of this of themoon. And then he has like a
hat. That kind of soundsfamiliar. And then you know what
that looks like? There's acouple of stars that are in
there. Yeah. And that was theProcter and Gamble logo for over
(36:49):
100 years. And then somebodygets a hold of it. And says that
they actually located that thatimage and where actually
originates from is from anEgyptian spell book of curses.
And then you may remember
Marissa (37:04):
that they have the spellbook did they pointed out?
It was
Matthew (37:09):
it was so it kind of got lost in in everything at
that point. It was some like, itwas it was it was a Christian. I
don't remember I don't rememberexactly who it was, had done it.
I don't think I have it in mynotes here. But there was some
it was it was like this. It wassomething pretty small. This guy
found it this logo and says thatit was part of that was part of
the suggestion curse book. Butthat's not really what makes it
(37:31):
catch fire. What ends uphappening is if you remember, on
another talk show host, PhilDonahue. He had, according to
the story, he had the the headof Procter and Gamble on his
(37:52):
show, where he stated that theyhad that Procter and Gamble
actually was proud of how theyfunded satanic cults, that they
were an active member of, say,the Satanism movement, and that
they were actually promotingthis. And that aired in 1982, or
(38:15):
maybe 85, or possibly 89. Itnever aired because it didn't
actually happen. Doesn't soundlike something that people
believe that the head of Procterand Gamble was on Phil Donahue
and said that they are a sataniccompany to the point that
Procter and Gamble is now P andG. Like their emblem is just a p
and A G. And it used to havelike a little bit of a crescent
(38:36):
still on the side of the G. Gotrid of that. Yeah, there's so
they got
Marissa (38:42):
so it's now just full on corporate boring.
Matthew (38:45):
Yeah, because they can't because they got
absolutely blasted for this,this fake story. And that's kind
of what happens with this. Like,once the story gets out, and
people begin to twist thenarrative into being that
there's, there's Mario styletunnels that you get that you
were dropping into. Airportsthrough it's the same thing you
(39:08):
know, it just it's the it's thestory that that people want to
believe is what people build offof. But anyways, that will kind
of do it for the MC Martin andthe McMartin preschool and Ray
Buckley story. It's just it'sjust kind of a wild thing. I
(39:33):
guess I could have presented itin a little more concise way,
but it's just it's so batty andweird and just just nuts as far
as the stuff that was happening
Marissa (39:44):
these days. Wild Times, wild
Matthew (39:46):
times. But yeah, I mean, this this was eventually
reviewed by a by by specialiststhat were like the interviewing
process is just absolutelygarbage for these kids. And now,
you're not allowed to do any ofthose tactics to get any
information out of out ofchildren, because it's it was
(40:09):
absolutely the heaviest handedleading of questions that you
could possibly do. They reallyshamed the children into these
confessions. They, they, they,
Marissa (40:19):
they probably traumatized them.
Matthew (40:21):
Oh, yeah. And there's even like, later, those who did
come forward with this, likeyours, like 30 years later, they
said that they, they're not sureif they were actually if
anything actually happened tothem. Because Because because of
how, just like trauma traumaticthe whole experience, was it? I
(40:42):
mean, it got jumbled up in theirmind. Yeah, they don't, they
can't remember what was real andwhat wasn't at that point. And,
yeah, so the, I mean, if you,the interviewers would praise
the story that they wanted toget out of the child. So they'd
be like, Oh, wow, really? Tellme more, you know, and the kids
like, oh, yeah, this is great.
Um, you know, whatever. And notonly that, like, a four year old
(41:02):
and a two and a half hourinterview is going to tell you,
whatever you want to know, toget out of that interview, like,
can I just go home, right? Soit's, it's wild. And I'm just
trying to the reason I didn'treally drill down on a lot of
like, the, the day by day, likeset by set is because I'm just
trying to get a feel for thewildness of the Satanic Panic.
(41:23):
Not specifically, like,
Marissa (41:28):
we don't need detailed trials.
Matthew (41:31):
So yeah, if any of you guys have any stories of this
time period, and kind ofremember, exposure to these
types of stories, make sure youshare it with us. Absolutely. I
would love to hear those. Alwaysexcited to hear what other
people's experiences were in thewhole Satanic Panic era. And we
got quite a bit of feedback fromlisteners as to sharing their
(41:56):
Satanic Panic related stories.
Particularly around we have wehave a lot of a lot of tabletop
role playing. Yes. People wholistened. So there's a lot of
lot of d&d related stories thatwere shared. Hopefully,
hopefully, none of our listenershad to go through the the
(42:17):
ritualistic abuse scandals ofthis era. So maybe, maybe we
won't get that much feedback onon sharing of stories from from
that era, I guess. d&d. Yeah,you can share whatever stories
you want, but I think peoplewill probably be a little bit
more open to sharing theirstories with the the d&d stuff,
(42:39):
but anyways, I apologize if thisyou know, seems a little bit
kind of bouncing all over theplace. If you may have noticed
there was a lapse in our, ourscheduling, as we did not put it
out an episode last week.
(42:59):
Partially it due to, you know,electrical fires and whatnot,
that happened in the house funtimes, but also because I, you
know, I do have my bipolarissues. And sometimes I'm going
through a depressed moment and Ican't make myself do anything.
(43:21):
And then sometimes coming out ofthat, I am in a kind of a manic
state and it makes it so thatit's hard for me to you know,
keep my mouth at the same speedas my brain. So that's kind of
what may have been coming acrossin this episode. But anyways,
it's what we'll get through it.
It's been been plenty of yearswhere I've been dealing with it.
But anyways, moving on to ourWell, it's actually turning into
(43:46):
Marisa McCobb minute whileyou've
Marissa (43:50):
been doing the episode later. Yeah. So I will do them
carpeted if that's the case.
Yeah. Um, versus McCobb minute.
So in 1976, while at Pikeamusement park in Long Beach,
California, a stagehand for ashow that was planning to film
there, the $6 million man,sprucing up the area to prepare
(44:12):
for an upcoming scene. The scenewas to take place on a haunted
amusement park ride with atunnel full of ghosts, demons
and skeletons. Have you heardthe story?
Matthew (44:22):
No, I just don't know the $6 million man.
Marissa (44:25):
I know. You know, there's no, I'm asking if you
knew this, but you probably doonce I say. The stagehand saw a
mannequin hanging from a noosein the corner of the room and he
went over to move it. When hegrabbed it and the mannequins
hand came right off. When thestagehand looked down at it, he
noticed what appeared to be bonebeneath the layers of skin skin.
Police were called and themummified corpse was taken to
(44:48):
the Los Angeles coroner'soffice. The body was covered in
layers of wax and paint. And theoriginal incisions from the
bodies autopsy and embalmingwere still visible. The It was
identified as Elmer McCurdy, anoutlaw who had died 65 years
earlier. When I figured it wasgonna be Yeah, in 1911. He had
(45:08):
been killed in a police shootoutafter robbing a train his body
taken to a funeral home butnever claimed by relatives
seeing an opportunity, TheUndertaker and bombed the body
and let people see it if theyput a nickel in his mouth. And
of course, he made he made anickel every time that happened.
This made him a good bit ofmoney. And five years later, a
(45:29):
man who owned a carnival claimedto be his relative and claimed
the body saying that he wasgoing to put it to rest.
Matthew (45:36):
How convenient that he also has a carnival. Yeah,
Marissa (45:40):
he he was not and he did not. Instead, he made it the
star attraction of his travelingcarnival. For 60 years.
McCarty's body made it this wayaround various haunted houses,
wax museums, and carnivals, andeventually made its way as a
prop on an amusement ride atPark pike amusement park, though
(46:03):
nobody knows how it finallyended up there. His body was
finally put to rest. And hisgravestone has not his not only
his death here, but also wasburial year with no explanation
for the 65 year gap written onit. Actually, it says Elmer
McCurdy shot by Sheriff's Possein Osage hills. On October
(46:27):
7 1911, returned to Guthrie,Oklahoma, from Los Angeles
County, California for burial.
April 20/22 1977. That's all itsays.
Matthew (46:37):
That's awesome. Yeah.
Marissa (46:38):
So that's our my comment. I thought that was
pretty interesting.
Matthew (46:41):
Well, that's what McCobb minutes are all about?
Yes, it is being being littlebite size. Interesting little
things. Yeah. Sorry. I stumbledover that a bit. But I, we
appreciate you joining us asalways, and just kind of getting
some information as to what thedecades of the 80s and 90s were
like with in regards to themoral and Satanic Panic. We will
(47:05):
continue this series a littlebit more going into the next
episode, where we tacklebackmasking backmasking. Yeah,
that's when you play a recordbackwards, and it tells you to
go out here hail satan. Butanyways, well, that is next
week. But thank you, as alwaysfor listening. And a big shout
(47:25):
out to our newest patron. Iguess I know him as as magic.
But that also makes it so thatwe have multiple magics it is
our and our patrons. ButJonathan Seabolt really big
shout out to you have been afriend for a long time. And
(47:47):
yeah, and also he has a numberof creative endeavors, as well.
And he's been YouTubing for likeseven, eight years now. I've
known him since kindergarten.
But he wasn't YouTubing
Marissa (47:59):
for YouTube wasn't around.
Matthew (48:01):
But he still he was always a great event. Anyways,
this is not a show about him.
Thank you, magic for the supportand supporting us in our
creative endeavors. And for thefor and all of our patrons, of
course, thank you so much forshowing your support for what we
do here. And for listeners, ofcourse thank you. Also, if you
want to reach out to us, you cando so on Twitter and Facebook at
(48:23):
Macabrepedia.
Marissa (48:29):
We are also on Instagram and Macabrepediapod
and you can shoot us an email atmacabrepediapod@gmail.com.
Matthew (48:38):
Thank you as always for listening and join us next week
as we add another entry intothis our Macabrepedia
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