169. 2025: New Year, New True Crime Binge! (Part Two)

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome back listeners to episode two of New Year, New
Binge twenty twenty five edition. I'm Alison, and I hope
your twenty twenty five is already off to a fantastic start.
If you're like me, the new year is the perfect
time to add new podcasts to your rotation, whether you're
cleaning up after a wild celebration or sipping coffee while

(00:20):
reflecting on your goals. I've got just the recommendations to
keep you company and to spark your curiosity. Let's jump
right in. First up in episode two is my very

(00:56):
own podcast, Coffee and Cases. A new year that means
new opportunities to bring light to the past, and that's
exactly what we aim to do at Coffee and Cases podcast.
Our resolution for twenty twenty five is to continue shedding
light on the mysteries that remain unsolved, in amplifying the
voices of victims whose stories demand answers. From puzzling disappearances

(01:18):
to baffling cold cases. Coffee and Cases combines research with
heartfelt storytelling, all while you sip your favorite brew. If
your resolution is to uncover the truth and keep these
stories alive, We'll be right here with you. One case
at a time. My name is Alison Williams, and I
am the co host of Coffee and Cases, a true

(01:39):
crime podcast where we like our coffee hot and our
cases cold. Joining me each week is my co host, Maggie.
We alternate weeks telling each other about lesser known cases.
We tell stories each week in the hopes that someone
out there with any information concerning the case will take
those tips to law enforcement so justice and closure can

(01:59):
be brought to the families. As these families know, conversation
helps to keep their missing family member in the public consciousness,
helping to keep their memories alive. The following is an
excerpt from episode two hundred and fifteen concerning the disappearance
of Brenda Condon. If you'd like to hear more, be
sure to check out that episode or any of our

(02:20):
new episodes, which get released each Thursday on your favorite
podcasting app. We like to think that if we live
our lives in ways that are admirable, that nothing too
bad will ever happen to us. Even though we know
that evil, that pain, and that suffering are indiscriminate, we

(02:42):
also wonder why bad things happen to good people, or
why bad people seem to prosper. We know that something
bad could happen to any one of us at any second,
yet we're still shocked. And the reasonable person doesn't get
hired when the considerate person falls ill, and when the
faithful person is mistreated. So too many were shocked when

(03:06):
the person at the center of our case this week
went missing. She was responsible, she was tidy, she was caring,
she was outgoing, she was a good friend, and she
was a loving mother. But none of those things stopped
someone nefarious from entering her life and taking her away
the end of her work shift in Spring Township, Pennsylvania,

(03:29):
on February twenty seventh, nineteen ninety one. This is the
case of Brenda Condon. Brenda Louise Condon was born on
March first, nineteen sixty two, and was the youngest of

(03:51):
five children. When Brenda was only three years old, she
lost her mother, which left her older sister, Iris, twelve
years her elder, to step into the motherly role, and
Iris happily did so while their father was still the
disciplinarian for the children. Iris remembers taking Brenda with her

(04:12):
nearly everywhere she went. It was when Brenda turned sixteen
that the roles shifted for her. You see, when Brenda
was sixteen, she found out that she was pregnant and
she would soon be a mom herself. She went from
being the baby of the family to being the mom.
Even though Brenda didn't have memories of the person her

(04:35):
mother was, she had the role her sister had played
in her life to guide her. She was excited for
this new adventure, and, perhaps because she had lost her
own mother, vowed to always be there for her child
no matter what. Her boyfriend at the time, Tom, who
was around ten years older than Brenda, asked Brenda to

(04:57):
marry him when he learned that she was pregnant, and
they soon began their own small family with the birth
of their son, Todd. Two years later, Tom and the
then eighteen year old Brenda had their second child, a
baby girl they named Shauna, and things were good for
several years after. However, by the time Brenda was in

(05:19):
her early twenties, she had been married for close to
six years, already had two children, and was beginning to
grow apart from her husband. Even their divorce, though, showed
Brenda's maturity despite her young age of twenty two. She
and Tom had a conversation about what was best for
their kids, and had mutually decided that the children should

(05:42):
remain living with her ex husband. That way, the divorce
wouldn't disrupt their lives any more than it had to.
Tom lived in a more rural location where they already
had friends, and Brenda had moved into an apartment complex.
Brenda and Tom were amicable. There was no ill will,
There wasn't fighting or screaming in front of the kids.

(06:05):
There wasn't even a custody agreement. Brenda was welcome to
come pick the kids up and spend time with them
whenever she or they wanted. By nineteen eighty nine, after
the divorce, Brenda established a successful cleaning business with one
branch in Williamsport and one branch in State College, Pennsylvania.

(06:26):
Brenda seemed to be thriving. Business was good, she was
able to have fun with her friends in a way
that she hadn't been able to do in her teens,
and there was a new man she had been seeing
named Greg Palizzari. Brenda and her friends had met Greg
as he was in a band that played at several
bars that they frequented. But Greg wasn't just a musician.

(06:48):
He also owned a Sonoco gas station called, as one
might obviously guess, Greg's Sonoko, So since he was rooted
due to his business, Brenda decided to move in with
him at a home located at nineteen fifty nine Harvest
Circle in State College, Pennsylvania, after they had become an

(07:09):
official couple. The good news was that in this new location,
it put her closer to her children than she had
previously been. Brenda had also begun to make friends with
Greg's friends in State College as the two grew serious.
By nineteen ninety one, when our case takes place, the
pair had been dating for about two years. It was

(07:31):
one of those friends, a very close friend, as Brenda's
sister Iris sat on the Unfound podcast, named Carl, who
owned a local bar called Carl's Bad Tavern. Those are
separate words. Carl's Bad Tavern and a rural area of
Spring Township, Pennsylvania, on State Route five fifty two miles

(07:55):
north of Belfont, Pennsylvania, and Carl was looking for some
extra help at the bar when he approached Brenda to
gauge her interest in bartending. She was all in, even
though Brenda hadn't ever bartended before. She had a magnetic
personality and was an extremely quick learner. In fact, even
though she had only worked quite literally one or two shifts,

(08:19):
Carl already trusted her enough to ask her to take
on a shift by herself and to work a double.
Brenda began a shift on the evening of February twenty sixth,
nineteen ninety one, would close the bar down by herself,
get the deposit ready for the bank clean up, and
then go home for a few hours of rest before

(08:40):
returning to begin the morning shift on the twenty seventh,
again alone from ten am to six pm. It had
seemed like a decent second job that, along with her
home cleaning business, had the potential to make her some
good money. Brenda pulled into work in her nineteen eighty
six gray Mercury capri, dressed in jeans, a silver shirt

(09:04):
covering a black tank top, and wearing black cowboy boots,
ready to start the first shift. According to most accounts,
that shift was pretty uneventful. Like always, most of the
customers were regulars, with a few new faces at the bar.
Brenda poured drinks and made small talk. She was kind
and likable, so it came easy to her. Even though

(09:27):
a double shift would mean she'd likely feel exhausted the
next afternoon, she didn't mind. It would just get her
one day closer to her birthday, which was only a
couple of days away on March first, and also closer
to some birthday celebrations with both her boyfriend and with
her family. When Brenda's replacement shift came in on February

(09:48):
twenty seventh at six pm, they saw her car parked
in the lot. However, when they entered the bar, they
didn't see Brenda anywhere. The door had been unlocked, but
the lights were off. The receipts from the evening shift
were neatly organized. Obviously Brenda had worked up the deposit,
but where was she. It was clear that some patrons

(10:11):
had come in because there were empty glasses on the bar,
with the money for the drinks laid either beside or
under the empty glasses, But that meant that Brenda hadn't
collected the money from them. Why not. After searching the
bar and finding Brenda nowhere, someone had called Greg to
see if he had heard from her. It was at

(10:33):
this point that Greg told them he hadn't seen her either,
that she hadn't come home after her shift the evening before.
I couldn't find it in any of my research. Who
had initially called the police to alert them that Brenda
was nowhere to be found. I don't know if coworkers called,

(10:54):
if Carl, the owner of the tavern did, if Brenda's
boyfriend Greg did after he had been alerted, or what.
I do wonder how alarms weren't raised for Greg when
Brenda didn't return home between shifts to sleep, and Wyatt
took until the following evening when the next shift came
in to realize she was missing. However, perhaps he believed

(11:20):
she could have gone to her sister's or to a
friend's house, or maybe he wasn't home himself to know
that she didn't return. Regardless of who made that first call,
there was an obvious bias and belief that she was
young and would show back up. In fact, a sincere
effort and investigation into finding Brenda didn't happen until March second,

(11:45):
the day after her twenty ninth birthday, when she didn't
show up to pick up her children, aged ten and twelve.
In nineteen ninety one, Brenda's sister Iris didn't know her
sister was missing until several days after the coworkers discovered
her missing and had alerted Greg. Iris said that Greg

(12:07):
hadn't called her, but that could be because even though
Iris knew Brenda had a boyfriend, Brenda had never brought
Greg around nor introduced the two of them. So Iris
learned about her sister from a call place to her
by the Spring Township Police Department on that Friday. They

(12:28):
asked if she were Brenda Condon's sister and when the
last time was that she had heard from her sister.
Iris let them know that she was and it had
been a few days, but that Brenda would be there
the next day for a birthday celebration. No, they told
her she likely wouldn't because she hadn't been seen nor
heard from for several days. Her boyfriend, Greg had just

(12:51):
come in on that same day, Friday to say that
Brenda was missing. Then they asked if Iris could come
in to file the missing person's report, since she was
the oldest blood relative, her children were obviously too young
to do so. When Iris learned that Brenda hadn't been
seen and hadn't shown up to pick up the kids,

(13:15):
she knew that whatever had happened to Brenda had been
the result of foul play. She had not left on
her own. Remember, Brenda knew what it was like to
grow up without a mother. Brenda's sister Iris stated her
reporter Mike Joseph quote, she grew up without her own mother.
She would never have done that to her kids because

(13:36):
she knew what it was like. Meyers said, I felt
that she was gone that night. She never walked away
from that sight end quote. In other words, Brenda would
have never left her children and not told them where
she was going. Whatever had happened to her, and wherever
she had gone was not of her own free will.

(13:59):
Her family were positive, Brenda's son told Lee Hall of
Fox forty three. Once officers realized she wasn't showing up,
then they realized they had a problem, because she was
always very punctual and conscientious about being there for us.
The problem was that by the time that law enforcement

(14:21):
took the missing person's report, the scene of the abduction
had already been greatly contaminated. It had even been contaminated
by the time they first came to the tavern in
response to first hearing about Brenda. Even then, by the
time her coworkers knew Brenda wasn't there. They found that

(14:42):
two vendors had already come into the bar through the
unlocked door to complete their rounds and restock. Like the
cigarette vending machine vendor, who hadn't even known anything was
a miss, just believed that whoever was supposed to be
on duty had stepped out. There were empty glasses sitting
on the bar with money by them, so either Brenda

(15:02):
hadn't had a chance to fully clean the night before,
or patrons had come in walked behind the bar to
make themselves drinks before leaving the money for them, and
the replacement shift had come in to begin getting things
ready for the evening, moving things before even knowing the
tavern was a potential crime scene. At this point, so

(15:24):
many surfaces had now been touched by others. What they
did determine was that the motive for whatever happened had
not been robbery. First, we assumed the deposit from the
night shift was still there. I say we assume because
when Carl came in to inventory his bar, he didn't

(15:44):
report that anything had been taken. Additionally, even though Brenda's
keys and her purse were gone, her car was still
in the parking lot. Whoever had done this hadn't come
back for it.

Speaker 2 (15:57):
No.

Speaker 1 (15:58):
It seemed instead that the point of what what ever
had happened had solely been to take Brenda. Yet while
that seemed obvious, there was one detail that left everyone stumped.

(16:18):
If your heart skips a beat at the unexpected, heart
Starts Pounding as the podcast for you. From eerie disappearances
to spine tingling historical crimes, It's a reminder that life's
mysteries are often closer than we think. If you want
to develop your analytical skills, this year, Heart Starts Pounding
dives into cases that leave you questioning every detail.

Speaker 3 (16:41):
Hi, this is Calin with the Heart Starts Pounding podcast.
I wanted to include today the story of Jared mc
ready because it's one that still keeps me up at
night and it plays on a lot of my biggest
fears of being out in the woods and getting lost.
I hope you enjoy it, and if you do, you
can check out Heart Starts Pounding wherever you get your podcasts.
Also on Instagram and TikTok at Hartzwards Founding, and we're

(17:05):
also on YouTube now. Thanks so.

Speaker 4 (17:10):
Every summer from ages sixteen to twenty two, I worked
at summer camps. I loved it. It was the most
fun I've ever had in my entire life. Being nestled
in the middle of the woods, away from society for
eight weeks, you just really feel like you're in your
own world. If you've ever been to camp, then maybe
you can understand what I'm about to say next. But

(17:32):
there is a darkness that hangs over the camping experience,
whether you're aware of it or not. For instance, every
summer I'd watch as the head of the camp I
worked at wields an old school TV set and a
VHS player into the rec room. This was before the
campers even showed up to the camp. It was just
us counselors, but all of us would have to sit

(17:54):
shoulder to shoulder on the floor and watch a video
on the dangers of what could happen if you took
your eyes off a child for even a moment, In
just the blink of an eye, they could be gone.
I'm going to tell you the story of a troop
leader named Dennis who had that exact experience happened to him.
On July nineteenth, nineteen ninety one, a scout master named

(18:18):
Dennis hiked with his troop up the side of a
mountain near San Gorgonio in California. The troop consisted of
six middle school boys who belonged to the Mormon Church
in San Bernardino, and now that school was out and
summer was in full swing, the troop offered programs like
this hike for Scouts. It was supposed to be a

(18:38):
fun but challenging climb up to the summit of the mountain,
where the boys could look out at all they had
accomplished in their fifteen mile or twenty four kilometer trek.
The only problem, Dennis thought as he looked out at
all the boys, was that not every twelve year old
was in the best shape for the trek. Five of
them laughed and ran around as they effortlessly trecked up

(19:01):
the mountain, but one boy, Jared Negretti, was having a
hard time. Earlier that morning, the group had packed up
their campsite by Dry Lake and moved it a mile
up the mountain to a new camping location. Today, they
were set to trek up the last, albeit most challenging
part of the summit. Most of today's hike was going

(19:23):
to be above ten thousand feet or three thousand meters,
meaning oxygen would be thinner and the already steep and
rocky climb was going to be more taxing. Jared seemed
like he was already exhausted from the mile ascent with
his packs this morning, and he was struggling to keep
up with the group.

Speaker 5 (19:44):
Just then, one of the.

Speaker 4 (19:45):
Boys suggested they race to the top of the mountain,
and the others shouted in agreement. Off they ran, bounding
over the big rocks in the path and skillfully maneuvering
through the slim parts of the trails. Dennis followed the
boy up the last stretch to the summit. When they
finally reached the peak, around them was a three hundred

(20:06):
and sixty degree view of San Bernardino. Other hikers stood around,
snapping pictures and posing by the sign that displayed their accomplishment.
It was an awe inspiring view for the boys to witness.
They made it up just before sunset. The only problem
was not everyone was there. Jared had not made it

(20:29):
to the top. That's when two hikers pulled Dennis aside.
They told him that they had passed a boy scout
further back who was really struggling and kept wandering off
the path. That was definitely Jared, Dennis thought. He thanked
the hikers for letting him know and told them that

(20:49):
he'd be picking the boy up on his way down.
If the hikers had passed him, he must not be
that far down the mountain, Dennis assumed, and so the
other five boys were rounded up and they all started
their descent. Dennis imagined where Jared would be in his head,
but as they got closer to the area, Jared was
nowhere to be found. Maybe he just turned around and

(21:13):
tried to get back to their camp, But no matter
how far the troop hiked, Jared wasn't anywhere. Details of
what happened next are a little hazy, but we know
that at one thirty AM, an emergency call was finally
placed to police to inform them that Jared was missing.
He was last seen by the hikers around six thirty pm.

(21:37):
The police were not able to start their search for
another two hours, meaning that nine hours would go by
from the time Jared went missing to when the search
for him began. What followed was search parties, largely led
by volunteers, setting out to search as much of the
mountain as they could, covering about forty five square miles.

(21:58):
People searched on foot, on horseback, and his parents even
circled the area in a helicopter, shouting his name out
on the bullhorn. They vowed that no stone on the
mountain would remain unturned. Searchers were made aware of the
last thing that he was wearing green pants, glasses, high tops,
and a tan shirt. Actually, a few days passed with

(22:22):
no sign of the boy, but emergency services wouldn't give
up just yet. There was still a chance that he
was alive. There was fresh water on the mountain full
of fish, It was possible to survive alone up there.
Plus Jared was known to always have a snack on
him that could potentially hold him over. But they also

(22:42):
started to fear the worst. See, sometimes when children are lost,
they'll freak out and think that they'll get in trouble
if they're found, so they'll hide from search parties intentionally.
Searchers also worried that in a panic, Jared may have
tried to take a route straight down the mountain and
back to civilization, even if it was off of a path.

(23:05):
We know from the last people who saw Jared that
he was having trouble staying on the trail. They even
told him to stay on the path as they passed,
worried that he may hurt himself. But also a big
issue searchers faced was that where Jared was last seen
was near the resting place before the final summit up
the mountain, meaning there was a chance that Jared took

(23:28):
off on the wrong trail. There is a small break
in the search, however, on July twenty second, when footprints
matching Jared's are found three miles away at the ten
thousand foot peak of the High Creek Trail, heading back
down a trail from the big peak the boys raced two.
The footprints don't really seem to go anywhere, though, so

(23:52):
they don't offer much help other than showing that Jared
was there and that he had potentially stayed on.

Speaker 6 (23:59):
A path to get to this peak.

Speaker 4 (24:01):
The search continues, occasionally aided by troop leader Dennis. It
seems like an unspoken agreement amongst everyone that this wouldn't
have happened if Dennis had paid better attention. Jared's parents
tried to take some of the blame off of Dennis,
saying that perhaps their son bent down to tie his
shoe and leaving him behind was completely unintentional. However, another

(24:26):
parent confirms that the boys were racing and Dennis did
take off with them. Scout rules, at least at the time,
said two important things. One was that the slowest hiker
sets the pace, and two troop leaders should be too deep.
Typically there were two troop leaders assigned to a group

(24:48):
like this, and for this trip there actually originally were,
but the day of the hike, the second leader called out. Dennis.
Not wanting to cancel the trip for the kids and
and confident in his fifteen years of involvement with the
boy Scouts, decided to keep the trip on. But though
Dennis claimed to be an expert hiker, he had only

(25:11):
worked with this particular troupe for five months, and though
scouting taught the boy's basic survival skills, it was nothing
compared to what someone would need to survive in the
mountains for days on end. The sheriff's deputy noted that
every day Jared was missing, his chance of survival drastically dropped.

(25:33):
A study done by Oregon Health and Science University found
that ninety nine percent of people found alive during search
and rescue missions were found within the first fifty one
hours of being reported missing. That means if Jared was
reported missing at one thirty am on July twentieth, fifty

(25:53):
one hours later, it was four to thirty am on
July twenty second. That was the day that Jared's foot
prints were found, So when those footprints are ultimately ruled
to not lead to anything on July twenty fourth, Jared's
chances of being found alive are under one percent. But

(26:13):
the community was not ready to give up on the
young boy just yet, and the search continued. People were hopeful.
They shared stories of miraculous survival tales, like how a
man in California stayed alive once for thirty nine days
in the wilderness, surviving on bugs and moss. Maybe they

(26:35):
ignored the fact that the man was a former marine
with far more survival training than young Jared. By July
twenty eighth, over a week had passed and some of
the searchers were starting to feel like they wouldn't find
Jared alive. They were still blanketed across the mountain when

(26:57):
all of a sudden, one of them calls out that
they found something. Other searchers run over to the area
at the bottom of a slope near a river, where
they see a few snack wrappers, a beef jerky, and
a camera. The area isn't on any trail. It looks
like Jared may have slid down on his bottom and

(27:19):
the contents fell out of his pockets. The camera is
sent in to process photos. Maybe there's something useful on there,
but what they find instead is haunting. Twelve photos were
developed from Jared's camera. Most were images of the Mount

(27:40):
Sangorgonio landscape, trees, hillsides, a photo of a mountain peak
in the distance. But it was the last photo that
was taken on the camera that chilled investigators and still
haunts searchers to this day. For the final photo on

(28:00):
the camera, Jared turned the lens towards himself. It's a
close up of his face. His arms were maybe not
long enough to get a fuller photo. Instead, we just
see his eyes and nose illuminated by a bright flash,
indicating that it was night when the photo was taken.

(28:21):
In it, his eyes are slightly squinted, maybe from the
brightness of the flash, though some think he may be
afraid of something. Though this camera was found no more
traces of Jared would be and the search was eventually
called off a little more than a week later. Nineteen

(28:44):
days after Jared was first reported missing, authorities believed there
was at that point a zero percent chance he was
still alive. To this day, no one knows what happened
to Jared. Some people belie he fell to his death
shortly after going missing. The camera was found off of

(29:05):
a trail, so maybe Jared was trying to get down
the mountain the fastest way possible and fell or ran
into an animal. Logan Clark has a different theory, though.
He was a private investigator hired by the Negretts who
believed Jared was kidnapped. In his investigation, he came across
two other people in the area who said they had

(29:28):
been kidnapped or nearly kidnapped. One was a ten year
old boy who was able to get away from his
captor on September seventh of that same year, and the
other was a man in his late twenties who was
abducted and buried up to his neck. He was able
to escape three days later. Other very important parts of

(29:49):
those stories are missing, however, like what did the abductor
look like, was it the same abductor? And did anyone
else see that person on the mountain the day that
Jared went missing. Police have largely discounted this theory. Jared's
remains have never been found, and most believe that they're

(30:12):
still on the mountain. His parents blame the Scouts and
the Mormon Church, though neither of them were ever charged
with any crime. Instead, sheriff deputies spoke to Scout leaders
to teach them more safety protocols to make sure no
child ever went missing under their care. Again, Dennis was
moved from his position to a state supervisor role. Many

(30:36):
who are interested in this case go back to the
last photo of Jared. What can be learned from just
two eyes and a nose? Is his brow furrowed? Is
he afraid? Is there something behind him? What clues does
this photo hold and will it ever help someone locate him?

(31:02):
They always told us it can happen in an instant.
One moment you turn your back on your campers, and
the next thing you know, one is missing. But in
the case of Jared Negretti, it seemed like that wasn't
the case. Dennis knowingly walked away from his camper and
brushed it off when others brought up concerns about Jared

(31:23):
struggling on the trails. If the group had more patience
and stayed together, we probably wouldn't be wondering what happened
to the boy today.

Speaker 1 (31:38):
The new Year is a time to reflect on life's
big questions about morality, existence, and the choices we make.
That's exactly the space where Mortal Musings thrives. The podcast
blends the intrigue of true crime with thought provoking discussions,
philosophical and ethical dilemmas, and some humor that the case is.

(32:01):
As they say on the show, they take the cases seriously,
but not themselves. If your twenty twenty five resolution is
to explore the deeper meanings behind humanity's darkest moments and
maybe chuckle a little along the way, Mortal Musings will
challenge your perspective and leave you laughing, as you'll see

(32:21):
in this montage they've put together.

Speaker 6 (32:24):
New Year Time for New Binge. My name is Megan
and I am one half of the podcast Mortal Musings.
Along with my co host Neil, we'd like to tell
you guys from true crime cases, although we don't exclusively
stick to true crime we'll also get into some other
dark and interesting topics. For little peek into our podcast,

(32:45):
we thought we'd give you a bit of a variety show.
First up, we have the Miyazaua family murders. On the
thirty first December in the year two thousand, a family
of four were found murdered in their home. Who did
this and why? Today we are going to be talking
about the murder of the Miyazawa family, also known as

(33:08):
the Setagaya family murders.

Speaker 5 (33:11):
That's two different families.

Speaker 6 (33:12):
No, so Setagaya is the area.

Speaker 5 (33:16):
Okay, Oh, you're gonna have fun with this one.

Speaker 6 (33:19):
Yeah. Before we get into it, I will say that
this is a Japanese case. I've tried my best with pronunciations,
but please forgive me. If I'm getting anything slightly off.

Speaker 5 (33:30):
I can help because you're a linguist. I know I
know a bit of Japanese. It is my mother's tongue.

Speaker 6 (33:40):
Did you mean to say that? What you said mother's
tongue not mother tongue.

Speaker 7 (33:48):
It's all all right.

Speaker 6 (33:49):
It's mother tongue like motherland, not mothers. Following this, he
takes a shit in the toilet and doesn't flush.

Speaker 5 (34:00):
Oh, that's disrespectful. That that is a sign of disrespect.
That that's not only they find in the bodies, but
they're going to find a big fucking log in shitter
the smell of that.

Speaker 6 (34:14):
He then dumps the contents of Ysuko's handbag and the
Ko's wallet, as well as household keys and a white
towel stained with his blood into the toilet. So DNA,
yes they do. Investigators are getting there and they're like, oh,
look at all the shit dumping the toilet. Then they
move in this literal shit dumped in the toilet.

Speaker 5 (34:34):
See, that's even more disrespectful because yet their food, Yes,
shut it out and didn't flush it. Like it's a
double whammy. That it really is.

Speaker 6 (34:47):
Quote when you compare victims who die from an illness
or natural causes to those who are suddenly murdered, they
look very different.

Speaker 5 (34:56):
What's they fucking do?

Speaker 6 (34:59):
There are theory as to whether it was down to
either money or, like Vikio's mother said, a grudge that
was being held against the family.

Speaker 5 (35:10):
Do you know what it could be?

Speaker 8 (35:12):
No?

Speaker 5 (35:12):
No, No, were they refusing to sell? No, So it's
not the city.

Speaker 6 (35:18):
Then next we're going to talk about the bone breaker
killer and the survival of Bad Phillips. In this case,
we hear about the unfathomable courage and willpower of Bad
Phillips and the twisted desires of Joe Clark, the bone
breaker Killer.

Speaker 5 (35:38):
What we're covering today.

Speaker 6 (35:40):
Today we are going to be talking about the bone
Breaker Killer, also the survival of Bad Phillips fad what
bad Phillips, Bad Philips bad Bad short for Thadius. He
twists it until he hears the bone snap bad, screams

(36:01):
out in pain about it.

Speaker 5 (36:02):
Fucking did.

Speaker 6 (36:04):
Joe tells that that he is fascinated with the sound
of breaking bones. Bet you're on, Well, that's what that
says to him, bad ass. Why don't you just do
it to yourself? Joe tells him that he can never
get the right angle. He would also put leg braces
on that and try to get him to walk with
the man.

Speaker 5 (36:25):
If he told me to walk, I's a fuck off.
You even carry me, I'll get a wheelchair.

Speaker 6 (36:31):
Unfortunately, Joe walks in and he finds that laid there,
and he's shocked that that has made it all the
way down there as far as he.

Speaker 5 (36:40):
Did, and he went fair Fox to here for that.
I'll take you on.

Speaker 6 (36:45):
Not quite. Joe's pissed. He was fucking fuming about that's
ability here six million in compensation and fifteen million impunitive damages.

Speaker 5 (36:56):
I don't think Joe has that no.

Speaker 6 (36:58):
No bad has no received any money, as Joe doesn't
have a fucking sense to his name. Unfortunately, following on
from the survival of that Phillips and the torture that
was inflicted on him by the bone breaker Killer, we
have the story of Mary Mallon, or more unfortunately known
as typhoid Mary. Now I don't think this needs much

(37:19):
of an explanation, but Mary Mallon was an Irish immigrant
who was accused of infecting quite a few people with typhoid.
This was during her time as a cook for the
wealthy in New York during the nineteen hundreds. Today we
are going to talk about the story of Mary Mallan.
Sound familiar, right.

Speaker 5 (37:38):
We're nearly sixty episodes. She was also known when it
ever sounded familiar.

Speaker 6 (37:43):
She was also known as typhoid Mary. Does that sound familiar?

Speaker 5 (37:48):
Is it like a wrestler.

Speaker 6 (37:52):
Typhoid Mary?

Speaker 5 (37:54):
I don't know, ye laughing that there used to be
one called m Quake and shit earthquake and with that
hurricane two big fat blokes. So no typhoon, Mary, I've
never heard of.

Speaker 6 (38:12):
Did you say typhoon? Yeah, typhoid. What's her disease?

Speaker 5 (38:19):
Oh? Oh, that sounds really bad.

Speaker 6 (38:23):
That's much worse than I thought.

Speaker 5 (38:26):
It's not like having a wrestler. That's the same as
if you had a wrestler called lepper Luke or something
like that.

Speaker 6 (38:33):
Lepper Luke. Mary Mallin was born in the twenty third
of September in eighteen sixty nine to parents John and
Catherine Mallen in Cookstown, County, Tyrone. In eighteen eighty four,
at the age of fifteen, Mary left Ireland for a
new life in America. She settled in New York City,
where she would live with her Auntie until she found

(38:53):
her feet.

Speaker 5 (38:55):
I couldn't do that. Do what New York City?

Speaker 9 (38:59):
Well?

Speaker 6 (38:59):
Eighteen hundred as well?

Speaker 5 (39:01):
Not great, well nowhere it was at all.

Speaker 6 (39:07):
Mary was a skilled cook and over the years she
had built quite a good reputation for herself. Now, around
this time there was quite a few outbreaks of typhoid,
and if you're unfamiliar with the symptoms of typhoid, you're
looking at fever, headaches, diarrhea, all ranging from mild to severe.
That's flu and if left untreated, septicemia and death.

Speaker 5 (39:32):
So it's it's like a flu.

Speaker 6 (39:34):
I mean, yeah, you're getting a fever?

Speaker 10 (39:38):
Yeah?

Speaker 6 (39:41):
What what do you pull in the face out?

Speaker 9 (39:43):
Though?

Speaker 5 (39:43):
What's because why are they calling it typhoid?

Speaker 6 (39:46):
Because it is?

Speaker 2 (39:48):
So?

Speaker 5 (39:49):
I don't I don't get it. What don't you get
The symptoms are the same as flu, isn't it.

Speaker 6 (39:56):
He also called a man named George Soper, a sanit
engineer who once said quote, I was called an epidemic fighter.

Speaker 5 (40:06):
Ha bye who bye who? George Who? Who fucking said that?

Speaker 6 (40:14):
Last, and arguably the least, Richard Speck. Richard Speck was
a mass murderer who terrorized a group of student nurses
in nineteen sixty six. Although Neil was just a shock
by Richard's backstory. So today we're going to cover a
mass murder, and it is the case of Richard Speck.

(40:35):
Are you familiar?

Speaker 2 (40:37):
No?

Speaker 5 (40:37):
Should I?

Speaker 6 (40:38):
I'd say it's a big enough one. How long ago
was it? It happened in the sixties.

Speaker 5 (40:45):
I went alive.

Speaker 2 (40:45):
Then.

Speaker 6 (40:47):
He was also starting to struggle academically. He was failing
all of his subjects and he would end up dropping
out of school at the age of sixteen.

Speaker 5 (40:55):
Well, they were going to fail all the subjects. He
were always pissed.

Speaker 6 (40:58):
Richard wasn't actually a round for the birth of his daughter.
He was currently serving a twenty two day sentence for
disturbing the peace after boxing the head off someone. Richard
was convicted of both forgery and burglary. So again you'd
kind of think, you know, it's kind of got off
a bit easy there, sixteen months. You know. Also he's

(41:21):
got his daughter, you'd think he's delighted to see her. No,
he was back inside within a week's time. In a week, Yeah,
for Fox's sake, Richard, come on. So he was arrested
on the ninth of September nineteen sixty five. Neil here
to venture. I guess we've had disturbing the peace, We've
had forgery, or we've had burglary.

Speaker 5 (41:43):
Right, so we've had fighting, forgery, burglary, smoking drink and
fighting indecent exposure. You guys, a lad.

Speaker 6 (41:49):
Out no, in the car park of an apartment building. Yeah,
he attacked one with a seventeen inch carving knife.

Speaker 5 (41:58):
Well, that's escalated.

Speaker 6 (42:00):
Richard stabbed a man with a knife and was charged
with aggravated assault. Richard robbed the shop, stealing seventy cartons
of cigarettes, which he would then sell on.

Speaker 5 (42:09):
This guy's just taking the pick.

Speaker 11 (42:11):
He really is.

Speaker 6 (42:14):
I'd heard of Richard Speck the mass murderer.

Speaker 5 (42:17):
Yeah, sorry, I just completely forgot this is You told
me at the beginning this is a mass murder. Yes,
how much fucking shit does he do before this mass murder?

Speaker 6 (42:28):
We like to think of it as you'll come for
the true crime and stay for the comic relief. And
at the end of each episode we don't like to
leave you guys hanging. We're going to tell you a
tale of oddity, which, to be fair, could be anything
from the Legs of Mike the Headless Chicken, baby Cages,
Balloonfest eighty six, the Real Life Weakened at Bernie's, including

(42:50):
both the Irish and Brazilian edition, and let's not forget
about the story of a septic penis. Happy New Year, lads,
and remember we like to take the cases seriously, but
not ourselves. Find us wherever you get your podcasts.

Speaker 1 (43:14):
What better way to kick off the new year than
with the podcast that combines jaw dropping true crime stories
with humor and personality. True Crime Creepers is your perfect
companion for twenty twenty five, offering thrilling cases delivered in
a way that keeps you on the edge of your
seat and laughing along the way. If your resolution is
to lighten the mood while still diving deep into the

(43:36):
fascinating world of true crime, true Crime Creepers as you covered,
They're witty, banter, and sharp storytelling make every episode feel
like a conversation with friends, if your friends had a
knack for unraveling the wildest crimes.

Speaker 11 (43:52):
Welcome to another episode of True Crime Creepers, where we
talk about all the real life creeps, from serial killers
to con artists. I'm Kristin, that crime fanatic who loves
to tell these stories.

Speaker 10 (44:02):
And I'm Mogap, the true crime neubie who hasn't heard
any of them.

Speaker 11 (44:06):
We are in New York City for this one. It
was Wednesday, July twenty third, nineteen eighty and the Berlin
Ballet had come to New York to perform at the
famous Metropolitan Opera House commonly referred to as the met
not to be confused with the other Met, which is

(44:28):
the Metropolitan Museum of Art different MET. The MET is
the famous centerpiece of Lincoln Center, located on the Upper
West Side of Manhattan, which is an affluent area of
New York. It's mostly residential but considered to be one
of Manhattan's cultural and intellectual hubs, mostly thanks to the
Lincoln Center, which is on the south end of the
Upper west Side. It's a complex of buildings that spans

(44:50):
over twenty five acres and fifteen blocks and comprises thirty
indoor and outdoor facilities, including the famous performing art school
Juilliard and of course the MET. What sorry, were you
thinking of Save the Last Dance?

Speaker 7 (45:08):
Yes?

Speaker 8 (45:09):
Because I just did you want there's this video there's
a I don't know if it's a ticket talk or whatever,
and someone's like, can we dissect this movie real quick?

Speaker 7 (45:19):
Yeah?

Speaker 10 (45:20):
Have you seen it?

Speaker 11 (45:20):
Uh huh?

Speaker 8 (45:21):
I just saw it, Yes, And I watched it like
three times. I was dying because I liked that movie.

Speaker 10 (45:28):
And then I was like, wait, this is all terrible.

Speaker 11 (45:32):
It's so bad. And you go back and you look
at this dance that you think when you were watching
it twenty years ago, twenty five years ago, however long
you think that like she is killing it, right, yes,
and she's doing this the most ridiculous like simple dance.
She does a little hop, a little like jump hop thing,

(45:53):
and the Juilliard people are like, yeah, she's killing Welcome
to Juilliard. Like she finishes and they're like, welcome to
j What did she do?

Speaker 12 (46:03):
She like swooshed her foot around the stage a couple
of times are she goes back to steps now that
she can like do hip hop and they show the
dancing and she's just like swiat just she's.

Speaker 11 (46:14):
Like Chris crossing her feet a little. But welcome to Juilliard.
So bad?

Speaker 3 (46:19):
All right?

Speaker 11 (46:20):
Moving on all that to say, Lincoln Center is a
really big deal when it comes to the arts in
New York. The Met is the largest repertory opera house
in the entire world, seating approximately thirty eight hundred people.
But on the night of July twenty third, nineteen eighty,
it said that four thousand and four people were in

(46:42):
attendance to see the Berlin Ballet perform at the Met.
It was a completely sold out show. It was a
big deal that the Berlin Ballet was in New York.
They were only there for eleven days and people were
really excited.

Speaker 10 (46:54):
To see them.

Speaker 11 (46:56):
This show was a mixed repertoire. That night they were
going to be performing The Firebird first, which is a
ballet composed by Igor Stravinsky, who is so famous that
I have heard of him. Yeah, me too.

Speaker 6 (47:08):
Yeah.

Speaker 11 (47:08):
After five, After Firebird they would there would be a
performance of Piazzola's Five Tangos, which I guarantee I butchered,
followed by a performance by these famous Russian dancers, Valerie
and Galina Panoff. They were a married couple of don
quixotes pa de dou, which is the in the simplest terms,

(47:29):
is a love dance.

Speaker 10 (47:31):
But which they're crushing it right now.

Speaker 11 (47:33):
Thank you so much. I really worked on this, but
I'm also sure I have none of it right. But
the Kennedy Center describes a pa de doo as the
coming together of two people who carry with them all
kinds of intense emotions, including love and grief and fear
and deceit, joy and longing. And then after the Panoff's performance,

(47:53):
Miss Julie by tour Rangstrom would end the night. I
apologize or any part of that.

Speaker 10 (48:01):
That was inct had a do up in here.

Speaker 11 (48:03):
Pad the second performance the Five Tangos that was to
be performed to pre recorded music, and so the musicians
in the orchestra would be able to take like a
forty five minute break during that time, so they could
go hang out in the loans, they could get a coffee,
a snack, whatever, until it was time for them to
come back for this particular performance. This was an orchestra

(48:23):
made up of like local freelance musicians, So this wasn't
an orchestra that played together regularly and that all knew
each other very well. I think a lot of them
kind of knew who each other was. They were all
professional musicians in New York.

Speaker 9 (48:37):
Yeah.

Speaker 10 (48:37):
Is it like a small circle or is it like
a large circle because it's New York, you.

Speaker 11 (48:41):
Know, right. I think it's like kind of both. I
think it's like big enough that they're not always playing together,
but it's small enough that you kind of recognize most people.
You know, you kind of know who each other is.
Usually is kind of the impression that I got. But
I have a new idea, really. I Tangos ended at

(49:01):
nine thirty, which is when the orchestra was meant to
be back in the pit to perform Don Quixote, but
one musician did not come back from the break, a
thirty one year old violinist named Helen Mintis. I mean
Mintis Mintis, Mentis Mintis named Helen Mintix. This is a
high profile, very professional group of musicians. These are not

(49:25):
musicians that would ever ever miss a que and Helen
was at the apex of her career, like, no way
would she risk that by just not showing back up.
But she wasn't there when it was time to start,
and the show ended up going on without her, and
in fact, even by the end of the last performance
at eleven thirty, she would never show back up. She

(49:47):
had disappeared in the middle of a performance at the
Metropolitan Opera House.

Speaker 10 (49:55):
So good things. She was a violin, not like you know,
a bassoon. There's well, because there's definitely more of a
for the show.

Speaker 11 (50:02):
You mean, well, I need it saba good thing there
show could just go on without her. That would have
been real devasttage.

Speaker 10 (50:13):
Listen, if I'm callous, it's only because of you.

Speaker 11 (50:17):
I it's only because of you. Put it on a
T shirt. I don't know if she's murdered yet she yet, Yeah,
you're saying the line the hot dog line was very
long that night. That's very possible. No, this was very
alarming because Helen was a very responsible, award winning performer.

Speaker 10 (50:41):
She was feel bad.

Speaker 11 (50:43):
Well, you obviously had all of the information before, so
you're your concern should have been with the show.

Speaker 9 (50:50):
Yeah.

Speaker 11 (50:52):
She was a Juilliard graduate who had been playing professionally
since she was a teenager. Helen was the youngest of
three sisters, raised on a poultry farm in a tiny
community called Aldergrove in British Columbia. And by tiny, I
mean there was like maybe three hundred people that lived
in Aldergrove and five of them were Helen's immediate family,

(51:13):
So okay, when I say tiny, I mean tiny. Her
parents were Swedish. They had immigrated to Canada from Finland,
and Helen had loved music from a very early age.
She was a very gifted piano player, but her true
love was the violin, which she started playing at eight
years old. Her parents were really supportive of her gifts.

(51:34):
She was just like this natural and they were very supportive.
They would drive her seventy six miles every week to
Vancouver so that she could study the violin with this
well renowned teacher which was something they really couldn't afford,
but they made it work for Helen's sake and it
paid off. As a teenager, she served as a concertmaster
of the Vancouver Junior Philharmonic and a soloist with the

(51:58):
Seattle Symphony as a teenager. At nineteen, she left Canada
to attend Juilliard, one of the most prestigious performing art
schools in the entire world and the number one performing
art school in the United States, where she earned both
her bachelor's and master's degrees. I feel like it really
was made famous by I know.

Speaker 6 (52:19):
I'm like, is that how I know the name?

Speaker 2 (52:22):
Like?

Speaker 11 (52:22):
Surely not right?

Speaker 10 (52:23):
Like at least from the center stage that has more dancing.

Speaker 11 (52:28):
Like center Stage. Wasn't it Juilliard though, was it?

Speaker 10 (52:30):
I feel like they said the name.

Speaker 11 (52:32):
Yeah, they probably talked about it. Maybe that's yeah. I
can't mamagine I'm going to give myself at least center Stage,
which I'm sure is not that much better. But I
center stage is the ballet at the end is at
least I mean, it's corny, but it's ten million times
better than Saved the Last Dance. It's at least real dancing.
I mean it might have been a very obvious, you know,

(52:56):
calling her out on everything that she had done.

Speaker 8 (52:58):
But I know that we say we're gonna do this
with Fast and Furious, but we may actually have to
watch Save the Last Dance and like, Okay, the review's
already been.

Speaker 11 (53:08):
Done, but I'm astutely done for that. Yeah, okay, I
don't know what else we could add to the conversation
after having one. I mean, that's it just got it
so good. So Helen earned both her bachelor's and master's
degrees at Juilliard, and it was there that she met
the woman who would become her best friend, Judith Olsen,

(53:29):
who was a fellow musician. She was a pianist, who
said that Helen was just known for being very friendly.
She was always making cheesecakes for her friends, Like this
was something she was known for. She was always making cheesecakes. Yeah,
and Judith called Helen and a better friends. Right, where's
my cheesecake? Friends? Excuse me?

Speaker 7 (53:47):
Cheesecake?

Speaker 12 (53:48):
Of course.

Speaker 11 (53:48):
Then I'm like, do I need to be a better
friend and be making cheesecakes for people? Because I don't
want to do that.

Speaker 10 (53:53):
I met capacity.

Speaker 11 (53:54):
Yeah, I don't think anybody wants a cheesecake for me, honestly.
To be honest, Judith called Helen a world class giggler
and said that if they ever started to giggle, there
was just no stopping it. They would just be in
constant fits of giggling. They had such a good time
when they were together.

Speaker 5 (54:12):
That's so cute.

Speaker 11 (54:13):
But when it came to her music, Helen took that
very very seriously. She had decided at a young age
that music would be her life. She went to Europe
and studied under master violinists in Switzerland and Italy, and
then she came back to America. In the summers, she
worked as a camp counselor at this summer camp for
artists near Montreal, and that's where she met her husband,

(54:36):
Jannis Mintix. He was a sculptor so an artist as well,
and it was basically love at first sight. And by
this time Helen had been living in New York and
after the summer she went back to New York and
begged Janis to come visit her. He told her that
he couldn't, he didn't have the money. So she sent
him the money and was like, you have to come,

(54:56):
and so he did. And after that they were just inseparable,
and they got married in nineteen seventy six and settled
together in New York and at this time in nineteen
eighty they had an apartment on the Upper West Side,
just about ten blocks from the met So after Helen
failed to return to the pit after this break, others

(55:17):
in the orchestra that noticed that empty chair kept looking
around for her. Thomas Suarez was another violinist in the orchestra,
and he actually wrote an article about his experience that
night that was published on violinists dot Com that I
have linked, and he said that it was beyond strange
that Helen was nowhere to be found. He watched the
door up until the moment that he had to start playing,

(55:39):
just kind of waiting for her to walk through.

Speaker 10 (55:41):
Like she's gonna like run in real quick, like she
had a yeah, number two emergency or something, or.

Speaker 11 (55:46):
Something like where is she? And when she didn't, the
only explanation he could come up with was that she'd
suddenly gotten sick, or maybe an emergency had happened that
had caused her to leave so abruptly, But she had
left behind her twin ten thousand dollars violin.

Speaker 10 (56:02):
Yeah, not she's not doing that.

Speaker 11 (56:04):
Which was still sitting in her seat. I mean, this
has to be like her most likely her most prized possession,
her violin, and noticing that the violin was still out,
Thomas took her violin and put it in its case
outside the pit to protect it just before the act began,
and then the performance had to go on. After curtain call,

(56:27):
the orchestra started to pack up and leave, and Helen
still never came back for her violin. She would have
never left it behind. Something was definitely wrong, But what
could have gone wrong in the middle of a performance
at the famous Metropolitan Opera House.

Speaker 10 (56:44):
This is like, okay, high society, knowing what you know
now as a true crime podcaster, and you're this guy.

Speaker 11 (56:51):
Who's waiting what was his name I forgot already, Thomas Warez.

Speaker 10 (56:56):
Do you grab the violin because it's twenty thousand dollars
and you know it's her price possession or do you
leave it because now you're like, I don't want to
be caught this, like I don't want to move anything,
I don't want to touch you think, or do you
pack that up and take it with you? Thinking like
she's just gonna.

Speaker 11 (57:12):
Well so it's interesting later we'll talk about this, because
somebody does end up bringing it to her husband that night.
I don't know who that is. I don't think it
was the same guy, because he did not mention doing
that in his article, and I would assume he would
probably say that he had done that. But I read

(57:33):
in another article that somebody had come and delivered it.
So I think everybody's kind of doing all of it.
I don't think anybody knows what to do. But my
instinct would be to protect somebody's very expensive instrument, like
especially as a musician, and knowing what that instrument means
to that person.

Speaker 10 (57:52):
This is their livelihood, Like you can't go play without it.

Speaker 11 (57:56):
Yeah, and like it's like a car I'm you know, yeah,
you're like take it now to car Loan for that thing,
and that's yeah, that's your whole livelihood. So I probably
would have wanted to like do him a solid and
be like, Okay, if she's not coming, I'm not leaving
this sitting on her chair. I'm going to go put
it up for her. I wouldn't even be thinking a
crime had happened. That would be the furthest I would

(58:16):
think emergency she must have gotten sick or she abruptly
had to leave. I would absolutely not. That we're in
the Metropolitan Opera House. What crime could have been committed
here on a forty five minute intermission break, which wasn't
even an intermission. It's not like the audience was out
roaming about like it was just a break. They had
a pre recorded music to the dance, so they didn't

(58:39):
need the orchestra for that part.

Speaker 10 (58:41):
I'm picturing only murders in the building. The season we're
watching now with like oh with Paul Rudd.

Speaker 11 (58:48):
Yeah, I haven't finished that season.

Speaker 2 (58:50):
I need to go back and finish it.

Speaker 11 (58:52):
Yeah. I liked it, it was good, but I'm I
do you need to finish it?

Speaker 10 (58:56):
So a few of the.

Speaker 11 (58:58):
Members of the orchestra decided to stay back as everyone
else was leaving, so that they could look for her.
One person called her apartment that she shared with her husband,
Yanis might be Yanis y honesty, honest, hoping that she'd
just gone home and they could get an explanation for
this and they'd know she was okay. But there was

(59:18):
no answer at home. And this is because Yanis was
waiting outside the met in his car to pick Helen up,
which he did every night that she performed. Another source
said that he was not in a car, that he
was waiting to walk her home either way. When she
didn't show up, he decided to head home to their
apartment ten blocks away on the Upper West Side, hoping

(59:40):
maybe there had been a miscommunication and she'd like already left,
maybe she'd gotten out earlier than she had said and
she'd walked herself home. He'd actually called the apartment before
he left to see if she was there, and he'd
gotten a busy signal, so he figured she was at
home on the phone and he was like relieved, like, oh,
I'll just find her, and some our wires got somehow

(01:00:00):
and she's already gone home.

Speaker 10 (01:00:02):
Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 11 (01:00:04):
But when he arrived at the apartment on seventy fifth Street,
she wasn't there, and he would later find out that
the busy signal was from all the other people at
the met calling to see if she was there, because
remember this is nineteen eighty. We got one line, and
if you're calling, it's holding up the line. Not too
long after, around midnight, there was a knock on the

(01:00:26):
door and Yannis rushed to it, hoping and expecting it
to be Helen, but instead it was one of her
colleagues who had come to return her violin. Like I said,
I'm not sure if this is Thomas or not. And
this is like, so the show got out at eleven thirty,
and they said that the violin was returned at midnight,
so this is like pretty soon after. But I'm not

(01:00:47):
certain how correct this timeline is. I think all the
people involved aren't necessarily like gonna give exact times, given
what they're going through this night.

Speaker 10 (01:00:56):
You know, also like someone that knew where she lived
though to to return it.

Speaker 11 (01:01:02):
Yeah, like a friend. I mean it's it's I don't
know who it is, and it's not important. I don't
want you to get hung up on that detail because
it's not important, but it must Yeah, it must have
been like a friend she had in the orchestra. But
that was one thing that I mentioned is that like
this orchestra didn't all know each other well. So when
she didn't show back up, like some of them were
like concerned, but some of them, like they didn't know her,

(01:01:23):
They didn't like not everybody knew her work ethic, not
everybody knew who she was. So right, it wasn't like
like really stand out to a lot of people, but
there were a few people that noticed and that were
alarmed by this. Jannis. At this point, his wife's violin
has been returned to him. She is not home. He

(01:01:45):
is now in a full panic, knowing something is wrong,
and he called nine one one to report his wife missing.
The assistant house manager at the Met had also made
a call into nine one one to make a report,
so these reports are both coming in. Detective Michael Struck
with the NYPD's twentieth Precinct, which serves the Upper West Side,

(01:02:07):
got a call from another detective in the squad telling
him that he'd better get down to the Met.

Speaker 10 (01:02:12):
But it's not like anyone heard anything happen.

Speaker 8 (01:02:14):
It's not like thee No, she's just missing, Yeah we heard, Yeah, No,
it's we have a missing musician and nobody knows where
she is.

Speaker 11 (01:02:24):
And like this was the Metropolitan Opera House. I mean,
it's a very big deal that a crime may have
happened here, but at this point, yeah, they don't know
what has happened. So Detective Struck arrived at the Met
and he was teamed up with Detective Jerry Georgio and
one of the first things they did was they checked
her locker and they found all of her street clothes

(01:02:46):
in there, meaning she was still in her orchestra clothes.
That and the fact that her violin had been left behind,
told detectives that she was certainly still somewhere in the building.
She could be injured somewhere, she could be trapped, she
could just be lost. Either way, they needed to work
fast to find her, but this would be no easy feat.

(01:03:07):
From the outside, the Met just looks like a two
or three story building and not that wide, but inside
it's actually a ten level labyrinth. This place is utterly huge,
starting with just the stage. One reason the Met is
so famous is because it has one of the most

(01:03:28):
technologically advanced stages in the world. It uses tons of
these hydraulic elevators motorized stage rigging systems that allow very
complex productions to be held there. It can even hold
up to four different opera productions at the same time
because the stage can just rotate them so.

Speaker 10 (01:03:50):
Like, oh, you have like a set and then it
just like goes behind another one.

Speaker 11 (01:03:53):
That was my understanding by what I was reading, But
I don't know a lot about like stage how dare things? Yeah,
but that was my understanding was that it just like
rotates through. It's a very large stage, very complicated, and
so this means that the backstage is also just as
large and complicated. In fact, the auditorium takes up only

(01:04:15):
a quarter of the entire building. Like I said, seats
seats part, Yeah, like the seats in the stage. That's
only a quarter of the whole building. It was said
that it is very easy to get lost in the
backstage area. There are ten levels of the met including
the roof, and then three levels below ground that are
mostly these like massive storage spaces. Under the stage, there's

(01:04:38):
large workshops for scenery, construction, costumes, wigs, and electric equipment.
There's kitchens, offices, and employee canteen. There's dressing room spaces
that surround the stage on multiple floors. There's two large
rehearsal halls that are three floors below the stage that
are nearly as large as the main stage. They can

(01:04:59):
fully block performances. They said it's like an entire city
back there, and stage hands had warned performers not to
go anywhere by themselves because they could open a door
go somewhere. Realized they'd made a wrong turn and find
themselves locked in or just completely lost. So the thought

(01:05:20):
that Helen had just gotten lost in the building wasn't
from nowhere, like it was a possibility. And I think
that's what everybody is hoping for. She got locked in somewhere,
she's lost, Like, we just got a find her, she'll
be okay. So they immediately put search teams together to
meticulously search the labyrinth that is the Met, and around sunrise,
one of the engineers found a pair of shoes on

(01:05:42):
the roof, very clearly women's shoes.

Speaker 10 (01:05:47):
But that's sunrise and this show inted at midnight.

Speaker 11 (01:05:51):
Yeah, at eleven thirty. It took twelve hours, well they
said twelve hours. It was around eight thirty in the
morning when they finally found her. The search team is
called up to the roof and they all spread out
searching for her. This roof is nearly as large and
sprawling as the inside of the Met. There's multiple levels
on this roof. It's not just like poking your head

(01:06:13):
up and seeing the whole thing, like you had to
really look. They had to look everywhere, and one officer
just happened to peer down this very narrow opening in
the roof that led down to an air shaft and there,
about thirty to forty five feet down, he saw the
body of Helen Mintix lying there, laying face up on

(01:06:34):
a cross beam. It appeared like she'd been pushed down
a ventilation shaft. They had to go down three stories
to get where she was, and there they found a
gruesome scene. That was a little sneak peek of our
episode one five, the Murder of Helen Hagness Mintix. To

(01:06:55):
see how this story ends, find True Crime Creepers anywhere
you get your podcasts. We hope you'll check us out.

Speaker 1 (01:07:08):
Next, let me introduce you to Private Dix, a podcast
that blends humor and crime in the best possible way.
The hosts share investigative tales with a comedic twist, making
every episode entertaining, unforgettable, and apparently solvable. If your resolutionist
to channel your inner detective, this show is the perfect fit.

(01:07:31):
They're out to crack even more puzzling cases and bring
you along for the ride.

Speaker 7 (01:07:36):
Hello, this is Richard Toodle from Private Dicks podcast, where
we solve all the world's mysteries one hundred percent of
the time. Here's a little clip of our episode on
billionaire Michael Rockefeller who went out looking for primitive art
in the jungles of Indonesia and never came home. We
solved it by the end, so we'll listen to the

(01:07:57):
full episode. It's octob race there for less than a month.
He goes back, joins up with his old adventure buddy
Renee Wassing, and they go back up to see the
asthmat Michael didn't want to waste time this time. He
brings a lot of money and he doesn't want to
paddle through the swamps. He buys a catamaran so he
can get around faster. It's basically just like two canoes
tied together, but as motor Yeah, so we can go

(01:08:18):
make a ton more trades and like a fraction of
the time. They enlist the help of two local teenagers,
Simon and Frank or came remember their names, but they
could point out where all the little towns are. This
tactic worked for Michael, as over the first few weeks
in their voyage he visited thirteen different villages. Michael collected
many things that these first few weeks shield spears, paddles,

(01:08:38):
bamboo horns, drums, bowls, but nothing got him as interested
as the bisch Boles. He just wanted more and more
bisch pol. By mid November, the four travelers headed back
to the bigger city of Agats to resupply for another
month of adventure. Then on November seventh, Michael and friends
decided they were going to head down to the Arafura

(01:08:59):
Sea coast and southern Asthmat. Not many Westerners have been there.
Only one missionary had ever been there and knew that
area well, a guy named Cornelius van Kessel, which I
find a great name, And he was gonna go meet
up with Michael. And as they crossed the Bets River,
conflicting tides and strong winds created big waves and cross currents.
The catamaran capsizes because one of these big waves just

(01:09:22):
knocked it over, basically flipped, surprised, shocked, kind of holding
on to the side of the boat as it's flipped over.
The two teenagers just go like we're going to shore,
and they just swimmed ashore. They were as Matt and
they basically swam everywhere. They were amphibious little guys. Michael
and Renee were still stuck out there on their boat.

(01:09:42):
It was about ten miles out from shore Wassing and
Michael didn't want to leave the boat. Wassing was a
terrible swimmer. Michael was a Harvard Man, though forced to
swim at birth. They actually had a swimming test at Harvard.
Did you guys know this? Every student had to pass
or be forced into swimming classes until you could pass
it in the sixties, Like, if you went to Harvard,
you had to pass the swimming tests. Stupid.

Speaker 2 (01:10:05):
That's awesome. I hope so many Harvard kids drown.

Speaker 7 (01:10:10):
You don't even have to anymore.

Speaker 3 (01:10:11):
Though.

Speaker 7 (01:10:12):
You could be a fat slob and go to Harvard.
Now they probably don't, they're Harvard men.

Speaker 2 (01:10:16):
But I mean, well, hold on, fat slab is rude. Also,
that is someone who would ace the swimming test.

Speaker 7 (01:10:23):
What are you talking about, a fat slob?

Speaker 2 (01:10:25):
Yeah, yeah, there was just bob around in the water.
They wouldn't even have to paddle.

Speaker 7 (01:10:31):
First of all, fat slav is rude. My bad, Sorry,
I didn't mean to offend you.

Speaker 2 (01:10:35):
I just mean, like you you need to, you know,
be more accurate. Now they're called aquatic accelerators.

Speaker 7 (01:10:43):
Just trying to talk like Harvard man, your fat slob.

Speaker 2 (01:10:46):
Hind closed doors Harvard. That's what they talk about the
skull and bones meetings. They say, you know, racial slurs
and bodies.

Speaker 7 (01:11:01):
Yeah, so Michael, he could swim do the Harvard thing,
but he didn't want to leave the boat because he
didn't want to lose all the sh that he just
acquired over the past couple days. Sore, just gripping onto
the ship. The morning, Michael's you know, and I'm gonna go.
I'm going to take interest the swim. I'm going to
make it to the shore. It's not that far. So
he ties two empty fuel jugs to him to act
as like a flotation device, and he takes off his pants,

(01:11:24):
takes off his shoes, and he starts to swim. Meanwhile, Renee,
who's the terrible swimmers like dude, don't do it. The
first rule of getting lost at sea is you don't
leave the boat. Someone will find you. You are super rich.
Someone's looking for us very soon. This is where Michael
swims out into the ocean trying to make it to shore.
This is where Michael goes missing. No one really sees
him past this point. A couple hours after Michael decides

(01:11:46):
to head to shore, lossing is saved by some rescue
helicopters a couple hours later, rescue helicopters sent by his
parents and the Dutch government. The two boys who swam
earlier actually made it safely to shore and form the
Dutch government that Michael was floating besides his capsized boat.
Nelson heard about his son going missing. The governor in
New York. No expense was spared. He and Michael's twin

(01:12:09):
sister Mary went to Merrouk. I guess it's about one
hundred and fifty miles south of Asthmadi. He flew to Indonesia, which,
like you could have stayed in New York, he didn't
go to where he flipped. You just literally sit in
the big city. When they landed, there was already a
bunch of paparazzi waiting for them, which I find hilarious
that I don't know this paparazzi in Indonesia. I don't know.

(01:12:31):
I didn't know that was a thing. They're just sitting
there waiting for him. Story's huge because obviously he's a
rich kid, Rockefillers especially. But it didn't take much time
for the Dutch government to call this an accidental death
by drowning. It was by November twenty fourth, they sent
a letter to the New York Times saying this, So
it's like two weeks later, beyond three weeks, I guess

(01:12:52):
the Dutch government thought that if Michael had made it
to shore, which they didn't think he did. If he had,
they said, he probably would have ran into some villagers,
and those villagers, like the Asthmats, are usually very nice
to Westerners of always willing to help. The fact that
they never heard anything from any of these villages means
that he's probably drowned. So as soon as he gets
that news, Nelson gets back in his plane flies back

(01:13:15):
to America, thanking the government of Netherlands for sparing no
expense and trying to find his kid. Michael's sister Mary
sticks around for a bit longer, hoping her brother will
pop up. He never did. Nothing was ever found, no bones,
no clues, no nothing. Then there's a bunch of theories
of what happened to Michael Rockeveller. So let's talk about him.

(01:13:35):
What do you guys think happened to this little ding dong?

Speaker 9 (01:13:38):
Well, I'm like, just hearing about this whole bish thing,
I'm thinking maybe, you know, he wanted to go find
some more bish if he did get to shore and
ended up being sacrificed for ghost jiz.

Speaker 7 (01:13:49):
Okay, okay, it's a pretty good theory. It's not far
off what people think happening. Do you guys have an
idea what's going on here? Rick? Or you want to
wait till the end for your theory. I don't think
I have anything all that grand okay, fair enough?

Speaker 2 (01:14:02):
Yeah, I think he died cold and alone somewhere and
uh oh, I'm sorry theory. I thought you meant hopes
and wishes. Yeah, I don't have one of them.

Speaker 7 (01:14:14):
It's honestly, RJ. What your wishes is like nice compared
to what probably happened to him. So, like, why are
you being so nice to the Rockefellers.

Speaker 2 (01:14:22):
What are you?

Speaker 7 (01:14:22):
A billionaire shill?

Speaker 2 (01:14:24):
Yeah? Yeah, you know me, right wing conservative capitalist.

Speaker 7 (01:14:30):
I knew it. I knew it as soon as I
started this episode. I'm like, he's gonna side at the Rockefellers.

Speaker 9 (01:14:35):
Sleep a Rockefeller. I mean, I personally, I don't want
to say that I signed with them, but clearly they've
won their way to the top of one country.

Speaker 5 (01:14:42):
Who's to say they couldn't do it for this small village.

Speaker 2 (01:14:44):
I think he could be their run in the place.

Speaker 7 (01:14:47):
RJ. Rockefeller Junior figured it out, figured it out.

Speaker 5 (01:14:52):
Big, big if true.

Speaker 2 (01:14:54):
Yeah, I mean that's that's why I live in one
hundred and three thousand dollars house. Stay here of gunshots. Well,
Michael Rockefeller lives in a jungle.

Speaker 7 (01:15:03):
Okay, yeah, you're you're upset. You now you're starting to
brag about all your wealth.

Speaker 13 (01:15:08):
Okay, No, hold on, Because only the incredibly wealthy have
the privilege and ability to deny themselves the safety of
modern It's like, that's that is strict.

Speaker 2 (01:15:20):
That's just like how like only like middle class people
go camping. It's it's it's like rich camping. It's just
like life endangering, you know, like going into the jungles
or Mount Everest and and then they die doing these things.
You know, just like a neoliberal white couple who make
one hundred and eighty thousand dollars a year die in
the middle of the woods from a bear attack.

Speaker 5 (01:15:42):
Yeah, but two times a year, forty seven seasons total.

Speaker 9 (01:15:46):
There's a lot of people that go out there and
get it done just for the you know, from rigs
to riches on survival.

Speaker 2 (01:15:51):
As a member of the working class. I am going
to die in my home of a heart related illness,
and only not because I've had hospice, but because I
can't afford to go to the hospital. I'll be dying
in my home.

Speaker 7 (01:16:04):
That's nice, you know, it's always nice.

Speaker 2 (01:16:07):
We think we could all be so lucky to be
twenty three and disappear off the face of the earth.
All right, this is white privilege right there.

Speaker 7 (01:16:16):
He's so mad about it, and I love it. Okay,
let's talk about the theories. Okay. So first theory, which
is the dumbest one in my opinion, is that he
went native, like he just got to shore decided like
I'm gonna live. This is where I want to live,
you know what I mean, free of money, free of family,
you know, free of everything, live in a jungle, beautiful frontier, unexplored,
untouched by Western A simpler way. Somebody argue a better way.

(01:16:39):
Michael just said like this. He loved the peerness of
the whole thing. He loved the primitive culture so much.
So maybe you just like went there and decided, like
bake your death being a Rockefeller. You know. Maybe it's
like he didn't even fake his death. He just like
made an agreement with his family. You know, you don't
know if they found them. They're down there real quick.
His dad left real quick, like all wanted to do

(01:17:00):
is get all the family business. And like Nelson said, sure,
he persisted, and Michael lived in the jungle for the
rest of his life. They never put an obituary in
the paper for him, so there's never like they never
really accepted that he died. They took the whole front
page out when he was born, but when he dies,
they did nothing. There is a gravestone for him. There's
no body the parents knowing, and allowing him to live

(01:17:23):
in the jungle is highly spectatively. It's like just me.
But like it's funny in a way, like maybe even
in the jungle they supported him, you know what I mean.
They just send him tobacco and axes and whatever else.

Speaker 2 (01:17:33):
You can say that they didn't like him because he's rich.
They very well could have afforded a body to put
in his grave.

Speaker 7 (01:17:42):
But imagine he's like a trust fund, like he said,
he's a jungle trust fund kid. He's just got as
many axes as he wants, and he just lives like
a king with his fishing line in his tobacco.

Speaker 2 (01:17:53):
And listen, I know I said I didn't have a theory,
but let's be realistic. He probably was wide eyed, you know,
and like an ideal stick about yeah, maybe going native,
but he got green infronout immediately.

Speaker 3 (01:18:05):
Oh probably.

Speaker 7 (01:18:07):
Yeah, it's not true though. No one never seen like
they would have seen him by now. It's not like
the hugest area in the world, living in the jungle
of New Guinea. Nothing ever. No, no white guy I.

Speaker 2 (01:18:16):
Thought you're gonna say, getting getting caged and cannibalized was
was not.

Speaker 7 (01:18:22):
No, that's very possible. But him living amongst the people
are in the bushes in the jungle somewhere like this.

Speaker 2 (01:18:27):
I feel like they never they like they it probably
isn't true, and they probably never did it until he
showed out there and they were like, I hate this
guy so much, I want to eat it.

Speaker 7 (01:18:36):
Let's do a real bitch ceremony.

Speaker 2 (01:18:38):
Yeah.

Speaker 7 (01:18:38):
Yeah, Like the jungle that he got when he's missing
in is not like it's it's super uninhabited. There's like
twenty thousand people that live in that area. Somebody would
have seen. That's all I'm just saying, Like, now there
is The reason this is even a theory is there's
some film from nineteen sixty nine taken near where Michael
had disappeared that shows a white man paddling like crazy

(01:18:59):
on a boat with some villagers. He's like dressed up
in their garb and stuff like that. It's taken when
New York magazine sent some reporters to do a month
long investigation into the disappearance of Michael. It was actually
Charlton Heston's son Fraser, making a documentary about missing Michael,
and he found some uncut film from the New York
magazine where they found the footage from the light Skin Paddlers.

(01:19:22):
Charlton Heston's trying to make a documentary in the eighties
or whatever or not. Charlton Hesson's kid, Fraser, and he
finds all this old footage and he finds this dude's
white dude paddling. So they look into it, and the
reporter from New York magazine had notes about an albino asthmad.
It was actually just said like an albino dude, but
you can only see him in the distance, just paddling,
and it looks like a white dude with him. He's

(01:19:42):
like did he just join a fucking trap, not just
the albino guy. So that never really panned out to anything,
but it was interesting when they found it. It was
like this big like he's living there. But no, never
panned out for anyone. Even Fraser doesn't think that that's
who it was. He thinks it's so an albino guy.
So nobody know what even thinks this. It's just fun
little thing. For the uncensored version of that episode, go

(01:20:03):
to anywhere you listen to podcasts and search up Private Dicks.
It's already out and you can listen to all about it.
I love collaborating with all you guys, and make sure
to listen to everybody else's podcast and go give them
a rating and review. Have a good rest of your day, dickheads.

Speaker 1 (01:20:23):
Closing us out today a Sandy from Twisted Travel and
True Crime. If your resolution is to travel to new
places without leaving your couch, then Twisted Travel and True
Crime is just what you need. This podcast takes you
on a journey to the world's darkest corners, exploring true
crime cases from every corner of the globe. Their resolution

(01:20:44):
this year to take you on even more twisted adventures
filled with chilling stories from places you may never have
even heard of. Are you ready for an international mystery tour?

Speaker 14 (01:20:55):
They fell to the sky holding hands, smiling and laughing.
They let go of each other, preparing to open their parachutes.
The fleeting feeling of happy exhilaration was followed by fear
and dread as Else Van Dorn discovered that hers wouldn't
open properly from the sky. Her teammates watched as she
plunged to the ground, screaming. As this episode unravels, much

(01:21:19):
like the strings of her parachute, it was discovered that
the cords had been cut. She had been murdered. Hello
and welcome to Twisted Travel and true Crime. I'm your host, Sandy.
Let's fly to the province of Limburg, Belgium, where the
beer is tasty, the cheese is stinky but delicious, and
the population is very dense, which might be why some

(01:21:42):
people take to the skies, including else.

Speaker 7 (01:21:47):
Else.

Speaker 14 (01:21:47):
Van Dorn was born in June of nineteen sixty eight
in the heart of Antwerp. As an adult, she led
a life that seemed pretty ordinary. A married woman and
mother of two, she along with her husband Yon, managed
a quaint family run jewelry store in the peaceful town
of Ranst But beneath this veneer of suburban tranquility, Elle's

(01:22:09):
typical life took a turn in nineteen ninety four when
she discovered a passion for skydiving. Her husband, Yon was
her initial partner in the skies, but over time his
enthusiasm for the sport waned and his attention turned toward
different interests like football and sculpting. Meanwhile, Else blossomed in

(01:22:30):
her new found obsession. It truly had become an obsession.
She spent almost every weekend and holiday jumping from planes.
By nineteen ninety eight, her skydiving ambitions and skill level
had grown to a point where she was able to
compete in formation jumping. This is when skydivers build patterns
with their bodies while in freefall. A formation team usually

(01:22:54):
consists of four to eight performers and one videographer in skydiving.
For seven years, when she joined an all female skydiving
team known as the Divas, They traveled weekend after weekend
entering competitions and shows. With more than a thousand jumps
under her belt, Else and her team even ventured into

(01:23:16):
the skydiving World Championships in two thousand three. If her
plan was to make skydiving into a career, fate had
something else in mind. In two thousand four, ahernia forced
her to part ways with the divas. Following a full recovery,
she chose to embrace skydiving for the sheer joy of it.
She joined the Swart Park Skydiving Club and by two

(01:23:39):
thousand and six, at age thirty eight, she had completed
over twenty three hundred jumps. Somewhere under the blue sky
of Belgium, Else van Doren met a new friend, one
who shared her love of skydiving and her name, Else
Claudeman's was a young, aspiring primary school teacher. The two

(01:23:59):
women formed a cl close friendship. They hung out so
much that Else van Dorn began referring to the younger
Els as Babs to avoid confusion, and before long all
the club members called her that as well. Going forward,
I will call Els Klaudeman's Babs as well. The two
women and another Dutch skydiver named Marcel Summers were nearly inseparable,

(01:24:22):
and soon they were practicing formations together on a very
regular basis. Marcel was the same age as Els, and
was a skydiving instructor. He and Els took twenty two
year old Babs under their wings and helped her learn
about formation diving. On November eighteenth, two thousand six, Else, Marcel, Babs,

(01:24:43):
and another skydiver named Tom were going to jump in
a four person formation. Three of the four jumped at
a height of thirteen thousand feet, which is about two
and a half miles up or nearly four kilometers. When
the jump signal was given, the inex experienced Babs seemed
to have missed her mark and jumped a little bit
later than the others. The first three jumpers were in

(01:25:06):
free fall and Babs couldn't catch up with them. At
nine thousand feet, Els, Marcel, and Tom broke their practice formation.
They spread apart, preparing to open their parachutes. Marcel and
Tom broke away and opened their chutes, but Else continued
her downward plunge. She was wearing a camera on her head,

(01:25:27):
which captured her as she fell. She pulls her main
parachute cord, but nothing happens at first. When it starts
to come out, it's tangled and doesn't open properly. Ells
knows the emergency procedures. Once in her past, she'd had
to pull her reserve parachute when her main chute didn't
want to fully open. She pulled the reserve cord, but

(01:25:50):
it didn't open either, and by this point she was
falling at a speed of two hundred kilometers per hour
or nearly one hundred and twenty five miles an hour.
That's a two mile i'll drop per minute, so she
had only seconds to open her parachute completely. In the
video footage from El's camera, you can see her tangled
main chute partially open and a smaller red piece of

(01:26:13):
fabric caught about halfway up the cords leading to the
main parachute. She struggles to untangle the lines, but quickly
realizes that she's doomed. She screams for help during the
last twenty seconds of her fall, followed by the sound
of a thump and then silence. A woman in Ope

(01:26:33):
Lebeque was peacefully hanging her clothes in the backyard when
she heard a strange flapping sound and then a loud thud.
To her, it sounded far away. She glanced toward the
heavens and spotted a parachute in the distance. This was
a familiar sight given their proximity to the parachute club.
It was something she'd seen many times before. Nonchalantly, she

(01:26:57):
turned to resume hanging her laundry, but when she did,
a white cloth on her shrubs, no larger than a
pillow case, caught her eye. She thought maybe a neighbor's
laundry had blown into her yard, so she walked over
to pick it up, but as she drew closer, she
saw a leg and a foot protruding from her shrubbery.

(01:27:17):
In a state of disbelief, she screamed, calling her husband
from the garden. He rushed to her side and tried
to comfort her and calm her down. They hurried to
the phone and called for help. Only a few minutes
passed before emergency services arrived, but their efforts were in vain.
Else Van Doren could not be saved. Marcel Somers had

(01:27:40):
watched as his friend had struggled to release her parachute.
He had watched her crash into the earth before he
was able to land safely. Once on the ground, he
let loose a guttural scream, which echoed through the streets.
He began running up and down the street near where
he thought Else had landed. He cried for help and
called for her. A minute or so later, he saw

(01:28:02):
an ambulance, lights flashing and sirens blaring, which he followed,
running behind it. When he arrived at the ambulance location,
he ran to the back yard where he saw Else
lying dead. He started crying and screaming uncontrollably. He pushed
towards her body, but people stopped him, holding him back.

(01:28:23):
He kept screaming, don't touch her parachute. This isn't normal,
this shouldn't happen. There has to be something wrong with
her parachute. In shock, he kept crying her name over
and over. In time, he was allowed to get to
her parachute bag. He pulled out her phone and called
Elle's husband Yan to tell him what had happened. The

(01:28:44):
police then took the phone and told Yan that his
wife couldn't be saved and that she had died on
the scene. Yan was heartbroken and beside himself. He certainly
wasn't in a state to drive, but he wanted to
get to Else as soon as possible. He called her
sister and her husband, who drove him to the parachute club. Meanwhile,

(01:29:05):
Tom and Babs who had landed safely in the designated
parachute landing area, were picked up and transported back to
the club and a van used for this purpose. When
they arrived back at the club, the owner called everyone
together to share the news that Marcel had called him.
Elle's main parachute and reserve parachute didn't open. While everyone

(01:29:27):
tried to process the news, Babs fell to the ground
and started crying hysterically. The members began working to calm her.
A few minutes later, they learned that Els had died.
The club members began grieving, but a short time later
they turned their attention to Jan, who had just arrived
at the club looking for answers and for any of

(01:29:49):
his wife's belongings. Babs, seemingly recovered from her shock, offered
to help Yan gather ELL's things back at the scene
of the accident, The police carefully packed away the faulty parachute,
and they took the film from the helmet camera as
the coroner hauled ELL's body away. An autopsy would determine

(01:30:10):
that she had not been under the influence of drugs
or alcohol. Her body wasn't punctured in any external way.
She died due to multiple bone fractures and internal bleeding.
It was discovered that a critical component of Elle's parachute,
a pilot chute, was missing. The pilot chute is a
small parachute that opens first and pulls out the main parachute.

(01:30:34):
As I understand it, there are two pilot chutes in
each bag, one attached to the main parachute and another
attached to the reserve parachute. Such a vital piece of
equipment could not have simply vanished. It had to have
been removed from the larger parachutes somehow. At this point,
ELL's death was ruled either a homicide or a suicide.

(01:30:57):
The police decided to keep the missing pilot shoot to
themselves for the time being. In the days following her death,
Elle's family was torn apart by grief, suspicions ballooned, and
club members came under scrutiny. Investigators first looked at the
people who had been on the plane with Els, Tom, Marcel,
and Baths. It was less than a day before investigators

(01:31:21):
had their first lead. Marcel had quickly admitted that he
and else had begun having an affair. It had actually
been going on for years. What began as a mutual
interest in skydiving had grown into a romance. All the
time spent training and traveling to compete and put on
shows gave them the opportunity to act on their growing attraction.

(01:31:43):
Quite frankly, the affair wasn't much of a secret at
the club. Many of the members either knew about it
or didn't know that Else was married at all. They
didn't know she had two children at home. She told
the club members that she was separated, and she told
the club manager that she had a nice time with
Marcel on the week ends, and during the week she
enjoyed her time with her family. She had compartmentalized her

(01:32:07):
two lives. Yan didn't need to know about her life
with Marcel, and Marcel didn't need to know about her
life with Yan. The missing pilot chute, the signs of sabotage,
and the long standing extramarital affair between Else and Marcel
ignited the flames of a complex case. Allegations swirled, friendships

(01:32:27):
were strained, and everyone wondered who wanted Else dead or
had she done this to herself?

Speaker 2 (01:32:34):
Well.

Speaker 14 (01:32:34):
There were no signs that ELL's was suicidal, so police
focused on the possibility of murder and murder it was,
but I have to stop there. There are a few
more twists to this story and the identity of the
murderer might surprise you. You can listen to the rest
of this story on Twist to Travel and True Crime.
The episode was released in November of twenty twenty three.

(01:32:56):
It's called The Last Fall the Murder of Else van Dor.
Thank you so much for listening and Happy New Year.

Speaker 1 (01:33:10):
And that's a wrap on New Year, New Binge twenty
twenty five. Thank you for starting your year with me
and with these phenomenal podcasters. If you want to hear
more from the incredible podcast who took part in this episode,
be sure to check out the show notes. Remember every
show you listen to supports the incredible work these podcasters
do to share important stories and keep victim's memories alive.

(01:33:35):
Until next time, Cheers to twenty twenty five.

Speaker 2 (01:34:00):
He

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