February 29, 2024 • 53 mins
June 29th, 1978. Phoenix Arizona. Hogan Hero's beloved actor Bob Crane was found murdered in his Phoenix apartment. Bob Crane was known for his charm and an undeniable quick wit. Investigators would discover there was more to Bob then his lovable personality and successful career. Pack up that bowl and join us while we discuss the murder of American actor Bob Crane.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Happy 420, I'm Kai and you are listening to Stone Cold Murder.
(00:09):
Thanks for tuning in for season 2 episode 4, The Murder of Bob Crane.
Just a PSA, if you have any information to help solve a crime, you can go to www.crimestoppers.com
to report any information anonymously.
This podcast contains material that may not be suitable for all audiences.
(00:31):
Listener discretion is advised.
Hello everyone.
Hi.
Hi.
It is your friendly neighborhood stoners here bringing you another unfortunately horrible
case.
Today we have one of the homies on the podcast, we have Nicole and Maddie.
Hi.
Hi, I'm Nicole.
(00:52):
Hi, I'm Maddie.
Thank you guys for being on the pod.
How are you guys today?
Pretty good.
Pretty good.
Good.
Have you ever heard of the Bob Crane murder?
It doesn't really mean that for me.
No?
I feel like the name is like familiar in the back of my mind, but I have no context.
Yeah, fair.
Do you listen to a lot of true crime?
(01:15):
Yeah.
I used to just like draw and listen to true crime dance for hours.
I used to listen to it when I was a teenager.
Not as much anymore, but I still find myself doing that.
Yeah.
I listen to a lot of morbid at work.
I have to take breaks though, but I grew up with the ID channel on all the time with my
(01:37):
mom.
Me too, like forensic files and stuff.
Oh my god, Jo Kenda.
My mom calls me and she's like, you gotta stay the fuck out of Colorado Springs.
My mom is being obsessed with that channel specifically.
Yeah, and for some reason, like going to sleep with it, it's just like so many people have
(01:57):
that same story.
You wake up and there's like crime scene photos on the screen.
It's good.
Yeah, and it's always gruesome ones.
It's never just like blurred, just like dead body bloody, nasty.
Yeah.
And you're like, oh fuck.
I think the stuff that they're allowed to show on those shows is pretty surprising.
It is, yeah.
(02:17):
Yeah.
Yeah, especially for back then too.
I feel like a lot of that stuff was taboo.
Tell you what, it made my ass stay home.
Fuck yeah, dude.
Well, I am very excited, well not excited to share this episode with you, but excited
to share the case and get some, I don't know, more traction on it, I guess.
(02:40):
Because it wasn't one that I had heard of.
Like I had heard of Bob Crane, but I wasn't really like you.
I wasn't really sure where I had heard it.
But as we get through this case, we'll figure out why.
Because it's kind of, it's not like everybody will know it, but I feel like our grandparents.
(03:00):
It's like a household name for our grandparents and stuff like that.
So maybe that's where we're familiar with it.
So you guys nice and hi before we start?
Yeah.
Okay.
Great, okay.
And we'll have smoke breaks throughout the episode, but if you guys feel the need to
smoke again, just let me know and we'll stop and take another break.
Our story takes place on a hot summer day in Phoenix, Arizona.
(03:25):
It's June 29th, 1978.
Police are called to Winfield Place Apartments responding to a phone call they received from
a woman named Victoria Ann Berry.
She had discovered her friend's mutilated body in his home.
His walls, the ceiling, and the furniture were just covered in blood.
(03:47):
The ceiling.
The ceiling, yeah.
Wow.
Which, yeah, definitely indicates very brutal.
His bed was blood soaked, the sheets, and he was barely recognizable when she saw him.
The body was 49-year-old Bob Crane.
He was shirtless and sprawled out on his bed with an electrical cord wrapped tight around
(04:11):
his neck.
His head was so severely damaged on one side of his face, it was like completely unrecognizable.
Bob Crane's autopsy began in kind of like an unusual way at this time, see?
His autopsy was actually performed on the bed where he was killed.
Um, what?
(04:31):
That's crazy.
That's no?
Which is a big no-no.
I'm not really sure why they decided to just go ahead and do that, but they thought that
was like a chill thing to do, which is never a chill thing to do.
Yeah, no, what?
Like, you're totally gonna fuck everything else up in that crime scene.
(04:52):
Yeah.
Like, no.
And we'll see, this is not the only thing that they fucked up in the crime scene.
This is just like one of many things they fucked up in the crime scene.
Unfortunately, Bob Crane was an actor, so that's where we may have heard of his name.
He worked with the woman who found his body, who was Victoria Ann Berry.
(05:13):
Victoria and Bob had plans to meet for lunch that afternoon, but when Bob didn't show up,
she got worried, of course, and she went over to his apartment at Winfield Place, and that's
when she found him and called the police.
I know, it would be a terrible thing to find your friend or coworker that way.
Yeah, and you're just like, God, they're running late.
(05:35):
Yeah, what the fuck's happening?
I'm kinda hungry, like...
Then you get worried and you're like, fuck, and then you find that, like, no.
So what happened to Bob, and why would someone want him murdered in such a horrific and brutal
way?
We'll have to go back to his life before the murder.
So Bob graduated from Stanford High School in 1946, and in 1948 he enlisted for two years
(06:02):
in the Connecticut Army Guard, and he was honorably discharged in 1950.
So he didn't serve that long, but he did serve in the Army for a little bit, and while he
was in the Army, he married his high school sweetheart, who was Ann Tazeran.
The couple had three children, Robert, David, Deborah, and Kara, and like I mentioned earlier,
(06:28):
Bob was an actor at the time of his death, but Bob started his career out in broadcasting.
He started at WLEA in Hornell in New York in 1950.
Bob moved his way to a more popular station throughout New York until he eventually landed
a gig in 1956 as a morning host for CBS radio station in Los Angeles, California.
(06:54):
So he moved from New York to Los Angeles, and when he did that, the radio station that
he went to be the morning host at, they wanted him specifically to come out there to kind
of like re-energize the morning and try and get people more into the morning show, get
their stats up, and just get a new like face to the morning show.
(07:19):
And they were hoping like his bubbly, energetic personality would help boost those ratings
a little bit.
Bob did excel in his new position, and he was sly, witty, and his charismatic personality
allowed him to interview famous guests such as Marilyn Monroe, Frank Sinatra, and Bob
Hope.
(07:39):
All right, all right.
Right?
So he was interviewing some cool people and doing his thing.
People were really enjoying him and liking his morning show.
So Bob's show quickly topped the morning ratings with adult listeners in Los Angeles, and Bob
Crane became the king of Los Angeles Airways.
Oh yeah.
(08:00):
He was really doing good for himself.
Bob soon started thinking about expanding his career into acting, and his ambitions
led into guest hosting for John Carson on the daytime game show, Who Do You Trust?
Have you ever heard of that?
It sounds familiar, yeah.
Yeah, I've never heard of it, so.
(08:21):
Yeah.
You?
No.
Me either.
And he did appear on The Twilight Zone, actually.
And Channing, which I've never heard of, Alfred Hitchcock, presents in General Electric Theatre.
Hmm.
So, yeah, I definitely know The Twilight Zone.
(08:43):
Yeah.
Twilight Zone.
Yeah, that's the only one I know.
Bob Crane knew how to play the game, and after Carl Reiner appeared on the radio show, Bob
persuaded Carl to book him as a guest appearance on The Dick Van Dyke Show.
So he was getting, he was moving around.
Moving up in the world, yeah.
(09:05):
Yeah.
After Bob's appearance on The Dick Van Dyke Show, Donna Reed offered him a guest spot
on her show, The Donna Reed Show, in 1963.
We all have very, just unique names for the air show.
Yeah, very much so.
Leads nothing to the imagination.
At least you know who the host is.
Right, yeah.
Hmm, no wonder.
No, you know.
(09:29):
After his episode aired as character Dr. David Kelsey, he was such a hit, they ended up writing
him as a regular on the show, so.
Nice.
Yeah.
He did a pretty good job.
Secured that spot.
Yep, he did.
He continued to work and host his morning show and act until December of 1964, when
(09:49):
he eventually left The Donna Reed Show.
And in 1965, Bob was offered the starring role in a CBS television sitcom set in a World
War II POW camp called Hogan's Heroes.
So this is Bob's like most famous role in his career.
This is what he's like most known for.
(10:11):
This is like a role that women just like flocked to him for.
They just loved him because he was like this hero that's big.
Yeah, they just loved him.
And apparently it like kinda actually bothered him because he would like meet a woman and
she would be like, oh me.
I think his name was Hogan something on the show, but she, you know, they would like play
(10:36):
it up in the bedroom and he'd be like, no, like I'm not about it.
We just have sex.
Yeah.
He was not about it.
He was like, bitch, no.
The show was an immediate hit and it ended up finishing at the top 10 in its first year
on the air.
Just like hit after hit.
(10:57):
He's got what happened?
Where did it all go wrong?
I know, he seemed so nice.
Who did he piss off?
Like, I don't know.
Maybe we'll find out.
The series lasted for six seasons on CBS and Bob Crane was nominated for an Emmy award
in 1966 and 1967 for the show.
(11:20):
So now Bob's career is really taken off and along with his popularity, he's a handsome
guy and his betrayal of Colonel Hogan, that's the name, the Hogan's hero, he really started
to attract the ladies.
Bob and his co-star, Cynthia Lynn, who played Helga, started having an affair while he was
(11:41):
on the show.
So he's married to a high school sweetheart still.
Oh, that's right.
Yeah.
Yeah, which sucks.
Bob, what the hell, man?
It's like, oh, you coulda.
So that lasted for a while and then Cynthia left the show in 1968 and then Bob started
(12:02):
seeing her replacement, Pajit Saak Olsen, who played Hilda, which is like such a close
name and they were like this, almost the exact same character.
Oh my god.
So he had a thing for his co-stars apparently.
In 1968, Crane appeared with Elk Summer in a feature film, The Wicked Dreams of Paula
(12:24):
Schultz.
I've never heard of it, but.
Yeah.
I think it was a good one.
And in 1969, Crane starred in Abby Dalton's dinner theater production of Cactus Flower.
Nice.
Yeah, so he's just going, he's just doing shit.
He's doing shit.
He's having fun and doing it.
(12:46):
Bob did eventually divorce his wife and in 1970, just before their 21st anniversary,
which is sad.
Damn.
Yeah, he's dead timing, unfortunately.
But he and Teresa Olsen, which was his co-star, got married on the set of the show later that
(13:06):
year.
On the set?
Yeah.
Wow, all right then.
What a fuck you.
I'm just going to get married on the show and maybe you'll see it.
Maybe not.
But later, yeah, he got married later that year with actually the co-stars, Richard Dawson
as his best man.
(13:26):
I saw this show.
Yeah, he's going.
Good God.
He's going all the...
Their son Scotty was born in 1971 and they later adopted their daughter Anna Marie.
Hover Crane Jr. later revealed that his father Bob was not actually his biological father
(13:47):
and none of the Olsen children actually were Bob's kids.
Oh.
I don't know.
I guess maybe they had an arrangement because Bob had a vasectomy in 1968 when he was still
married to his wife.
But he adopted all the children as his own.
Okay.
Well, fair enough.
(14:07):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Which is nice.
I think that's nice.
So after the cancellation of Hogan's Heroes in 1971, Crane appeared in two Disney films
actually.
Oh.
So Super Dad in 1973.
Super Dad.
Super Dad.
And a small role in Gus, which was in 1976.
(14:29):
Gus.
Yeah.
I've not heard of either of those.
Sorry Bob.
I've not seen any of your stuff.
But in 1973, Bob purchased the rights to a comedy play called Beginner's Luck and began
touring it as its star, of course, and director.
That's never a good combination.
(14:50):
No, you get a hot head every time.
Yeah.
You know?
Like they never just are like, yeah, let's see what you have.
Give me some feedback, you know?
And they're like micromanaging everything.
Of course.
Like why wouldn't they?
Yeah.
There's a star and the director.
So yeah, so he purchased the rights to the comedy play and he would perform this at the
(15:13):
Showboat Dinner Theater in St. Petersburg, Florida, and the L.A. Miranda Civic Theater
in California, the Windmill Dinner Theater in Scottsdale, Arizona, and other dinner theaters
around the country.
So I guess this play was good too.
I know.
Busy.
(15:34):
Busy bee.
Prane guest starred in a number of television shows like Police Woman, Givesville, Quincy,
M.E., and Love Boat, which I know that one.
And in 1975, the Bob Crane Show aired on NBC, but it was canceled after 13 episodes.
(15:55):
Oh damn.
Yeah.
We didn't get the season.
Got 13 episodes in you, Bob.
Sorry, bud.
Bob and his wife, Patricia, separated in 1977 and they were just weeks away from finalizing
their divorce at the time of Bob's death in June of 1978.
So that's kind of like the timeline of his life up until his murder.
(16:20):
So in 1978, Bob taped a travel documentary in Hawaii, like just on his own.
He just, you know.
He just went out there with a camera.
Yeah.
And he's like, I'm going to make this documentary in Hawaii.
And he recorded an appearance in a Canadian cooking show.
All right.
(16:41):
And it was like a Canadian celebrity cooking show.
And neither of these aired in the U.S. after his death in June, but they did appear, or
the celebrity cook show did broadcast in Canada in late 78.
Oh, okay.
But I don't know.
It was weird that he went and just decided to film himself in Hawaii.
(17:02):
Yeah.
He's like, I'm just going to Hawaii.
Everybody wants to know what I'm doing.
Of course.
So, right.
Yeah.
Everybody wants to see me just like swim and lay here and enjoy my life while you have
to do your mediocrity like work.
I have to work for a living.
(17:22):
I can just tape myself in Hawaii.
Yeah.
So Bob seems like a great guy.
He's like focused on his career.
And besides his little extramarital affairs, it seems like he's well-liked.
And why would someone murder him?
Yeah.
Do you have any ideas?
I don't know.
Well, he did have an affair.
(17:45):
Yeah.
It's always like when...
Two affairs?
Yep.
Yeah.
True.
They were about to be settled though.
Was she going to get a raw deal?
She actually was.
She got a good deal.
She got a good deal.
Would she have gotten a good deal if he didn't die?
Did she get like life insurance or something?
She got a good deal either way.
(18:06):
She got a good deal either way?
Yeah.
She was like set.
And also because she's also like his co-star.
So she was pulling in.
I mean like money is always a big motivator for everybody.
It is.
Well, he had some skeletons in his closet.
And people think this could be like the reason why he was murdered.
(18:30):
Okay.
And what were those skeletons?
I'm going to tell you, but after a quick smoke break.
Okay.
And we're back.
So during Bob's time on Hogan's Heroes, he was introduced to John Henry Carpenter.
John was a regional sales manager for Sony Electronics and he helped famous clients with
(18:53):
their like video equipment.
So he was well versed in the celebrity community and he helped a lot of people, I guess with
movies and TV shows and things like that.
So they started a friendship and the two began visiting bars and nightclubs together.
And Bob obviously attracted a lot of women due to his celebrity status and his looks.
(19:18):
And Bob would start introducing Carpenter to women at the bar as his manager, even though
he wasn't his manager.
Like the main man in it?
Yeah, he was the main man in it.
But it was kind of like an alternative motive.
So Bob and John would bring women back to Bob's place and they would videotape a joint
(19:42):
sexual encounter with the women.
Oh, no, no.
So he was like thinking of women for both of them, basically.
So Bob's son Robert later insisted that all of the women were aware of the videotaping
and like consented to it.
But several of them claimed that they had no idea actually that they were being videotaped
(20:03):
and recorded until they were informed by Scottsdale police after Bob's murder.
So, yeah.
So somebody's lying.
Which is not good.
So the two of them would continue this little routine of going to the bar and picking up
(20:25):
women for the threesome and then videotaping it.
And John would eventually become the regional sales manager at IKEA.
Not IKEA.
IKEA.
And this job, I don't know what that is, but he would become the regional sales manager
(20:45):
at this place.
And the job would require lots of travel, obviously.
So he arranged his business trips to coincide with Bob's dinner theaters so that they continued
their little...
So now we're taking this shit.
It's a mobile...
Yeah.
They're taking this on the road.
Mobile creepshow.
(21:05):
Apparently, two days before his death, he called his son Robert.
And Robert said that he was two weeks shy of his 50th birthday.
And he said, I'm making changes.
I'm divorcing Patty.
And that he wanted to lose people like John Carpenter.
So he was feeling either some type of way, maybe feeling a little guilty for what he
(21:31):
was doing, perhaps.
And he kind of wanted to cut ties with his past and start over.
So Carpenter had become kind of like a pain in the butt to him and he wanted a clean slate.
But that never got to happen.
And Robert believes that when his dad tried to pull away from John Carpenter, that he
(21:53):
became enraged and it was kind of like a breakup of sorts.
Oh yeah.
I mean, I wouldn't be surprised if there was some weird sexual thing between the two of
them.
Right.
Because they're...
Yeah.
You don't fuck a woman together over and over again and not be a little homo about it.
(22:15):
I'm saying.
I feel like, yeah.
Yeah.
You're going to get some feelings involved there.
And especially because I don't think John was able to be picking up women too.
Well, on his own, he wasn't like...
He's like, damn it.
Yeah.
He wasn't really great in that area.
So he was losing all of that all at once.
(22:37):
So it's kind of like a breakup.
And Robert claims that John lost it and he was being rejected and he was being like,
sworn like a lover.
So there are eyewitnesses actually that night before his murder at a Scottsdale club that
(22:59):
they said he had an argument with Bob.
After that, a few hours later, he was dead.
So it was an eyewitness.
They had a fight.
He had this call from his son.
Somebody caught hands.
Scottsdale Detective Barry Vassal was in Phoenix with a colleague on June 29th, 1978.
(23:23):
What was his name?
Barry Vassal.
I thought you said buried asshole.
Detective buried asshole.
That would be a horrible name.
No, Barry Vassal.
(23:43):
He was a Phoenix detective and with a colleague on June 29th in 1978, he was called out to
the unit of 132A of the Winfield Apartments.
Several cops were already present when he arrived along with Victoria Barry who called
the cops.
So Detective Vassal was reported to then drive to the airport to pick up Robert.
(24:08):
So like he was called out to the crime scene and then they were like, nah, go pick up Robert,
which is called.
And also Bob's business manager and Lloyd Vaughn, who's an attorney, and Bill Goldstein
and bring them to the crime scene.
So he picked these men up from the airport, brought them to the crime scene, and on the
(24:31):
afternoon of June 29th, the county medical examiner, Dr. K, arrived at Bob's apartment
at about 4 p.m.
And by this time, Bob had already been dead for 12 hours and like rigor mortis had already
set in his body and all that kind of stuff.
So there's like a lot of trampling in the crime scene.
(24:53):
They're not really getting there on.
Shit's all fucked up.
Yeah, they're not getting there quick.
Like they're just kind of, I guess, nonchalant about it, which is yucky.
I don't know.
I don't like the thought of that at all.
I mean, this man was like a celebrity.
Yeah, you would think that.
Like doing shit like maybe a little bit later in his career, it seems, but like not like
(25:19):
a not peak, you know, his own traveling show.
He's doing shit.
So I don't know.
And he was in Disney.
You would think.
Yeah.
You would think it would be a little quicker than this.
But 12 hours passed by and the crime scene, crime scene photographers were there taking
pictures in the apartment.
(25:41):
And Scottsdale PD also took like a detailed video, which is just like a crude black and
white video, which you can see online if you want.
But it's pretty gruesome.
And Dr. K began like a little look at the body and he was observing the blood spatter
on the wall and above the bed and the blood soaked sheets, the pillows and partially like
(26:05):
pushed back from Bob's head.
So they were like his head was on the bed and the pillows were like pushed back towards
the wall.
He immediately noted that there was an electrical cord wrapped around his neck.
And then Dr. K took a weird step and he just started getting right into the autopsy right
(26:25):
on the crime scene.
What the fuck?
Which is like unheard of in my...
I've never heard of that happening in a crime scene.
Or like ever.
Yeah, no.
It's weird.
It's weird.
Yeah, that's really weird.
Could they like...
I mean even with rigor mortis having said it, there's no way there's like they wouldn't
(26:49):
be able to get him out of there.
No.
Yeah.
No, no.
There's really no reason to do it.
Yeah.
I mean I would think like a squishy bed wouldn't be the right surface to do an autopsy.
Yeah, I feel like they just make it harder.
Yeah, I don't see it being any good in doing it there.
(27:10):
But yeah, I'm not the doctor.
I don't know.
So he started doing his autopsy thing.
He's cutting him open and looking at the body and he just kind of like wanted to get a better
look at the left side of his face, which is where the fatal wound was.
And he took out a straight razor and there on the blood soaked bed he shamed like a four
(27:35):
inch semi-circle around Bob's left ear just to get a clearer idea of what kind of weapon
could have been used.
Alright so just putting hair everywhere on the crime scene.
Like I...
It's atrocious.
(27:56):
So yeah, this obviously introduced issues of contamination and like possible cross contamination
of the crime scene that would like get me in for finding stuff like moving forward.
So that's great.
He did a good job.
So June 30th, Deputy Medical Examiner Dr. Thomas Jarvis performed a mother autopsy on
(28:20):
Bob Crane.
He was just 49 years old and he would have just turned 50 in two weeks from the time
of his death.
So the type of death was listed as violent in the manner by blood forced instrument and
cord.
The abnormal findings were dried blood on his face and hair, upper chest and the autopsy
(28:46):
report also noted a flaky white dry material on the pubic hair area and like lower abdomen
and like interior right thigh.
And they thought it was likely semen though it was never tested.
Okay.
In the back of my mind I was kind of wondering if he had been maybe assaulted.
(29:07):
Right.
Yeah.
Right.
It took place during the 70s.
I think that forensics were a lot less advanced.
Totally.
I mean definitely.
Did that kind of thing?
Yeah.
Absolutely.
DNA didn't super take off until the 90s and like they didn't even really start collecting
it for future testing until like the 80s.
(29:31):
Like at least from what I've heard.
Yeah.
Yeah definitely in most cases.
Because I mean yeah they don't really have any use for it you know.
Yeah.
Here and there but.
I gotta be honest Carpenter is looking super good for this.
I know I need to do that too honestly.
I was thinking the wife but like maybe she I don't think she's involved.
(29:53):
She's probably just out of the house because they're getting divorced.
She's getting all the money.
It's like it's weird that so many people were brought to the crime scene like.
I know.
Like the lawyer I kind of get I guess to verify like okay this guy's dead we can close I can
start all this extra paperwork.
Whatever I guess like maybe as a courtesy but and also to identify the body.
(30:16):
But even though what's her face that called the cops probably already identified.
Yeah like she knew for sure.
But like maybe a lawyer identification is more credible.
But that's giving a lot of credit to people who can't lock down a crime scene for shit.
It seems.
It's a shame.
It's a shame because like definitely they knew better.
(30:39):
At least they knew better to not do that.
But why they do these things on the bed.
I thought autopsy on the bed is egregious.
It's awful isn't it.
I was just like ew.
Could you imagine.
I mean like you're just making it harder on yourself number one and number two.
Just is there something wrong with you?
(31:01):
Like.
Right.
Clearly not a good doctor.
Dr. K we have problems.
So they found that like white dry material on him and police later just like had a theory
that the killer had masturbated over his body after killing him as like a final fuck you
(31:23):
to the victim.
It was just a theory but the scene was never tested and according to former Scottsdale
police officer Dennis Borkehagen which is a name.
Borkehagen.
It's a long one.
He was a president for the autopsy along with Lieutenant Ron Dean and he asked for the semen
(31:48):
to be collected and according to Borkehagen Jarvis.
I can't even say that with a straight face.
Borkehagen.
I like it actually.
Borkehagen.
Jarvis dismissively said what's that going to tell you.
(32:08):
So they weren't really into.
Alright just ignore.
I mean like they could still test to see what it was.
They couldn't see who it was related to but they could look at that shit under a microscope
and see a bunch of dead sperms and be like oh shit it's semen.
It's not like they're stupid.
He said what's that going to tell you that he had a piece of ass before he was killed.
(32:33):
What?
That was the end of that and the semen was never collected.
Robert, Bob's son believed that what happened at the crime scene completely compromised
the hunt for the killer obviously.
And Von Goldstein who was one of the guys that they picked up from the airport.
(32:53):
He walked through the apartment examining and touching and handling all sorts of items
and plain view of Vassel who was the detective and Robert who was Bob's son wrote in his
book.
We added all of our fingerprints and hair samples to an already compromised lackadaisical
investigation and that was like a casually considered murder scene.
(33:15):
So like he didn't think that they took very much consideration.
Corruption of a large life.
Yeah this guy, shit he's dead as fuck.
What do we do now?
What do now?
Yep.
Do we clean up?
Is it time to clean up yet?
I want to go home.
They said can you do the autopsy here?
(33:37):
Yeah.
It's a lot to ask to move the body and stuff.
Yeah they suck.
Clearly.
So Vassel is now retired from the force and he's a private investigator in the Scottsdale
area.
He sees it of course differently.
And he said in a perfect world you have a crime scene that nobody's allowed in and nobody's
(33:59):
allowed out.
You only have one or two people in there.
But that doesn't always happen.
And I don't think there was any contamination of the crime scene.
Which is what you are really worried about.
So he clearly doesn't see any wrong here.
The Scottsdale Police Department had no homicide division in 1978 so it wasn't necessarily
(34:23):
equipped to handle such a high profile murder investigation.
And the crime scene itself had very few clues and no evidence was found of forced entry
into his apartment and nothing of value was missing.
So that took a lot of motive out of it too.
Investigators examined Bob's extensive videotape collection which of course led them to John
(34:48):
Carpenter who had flown to Phoenix on June 25th to spend a few days with Bob.
So that was a few days before the murder.
So John's rental car was impounded and searched and several blood smears were found that matched
Bob Crane's blood type.
But no one else of that blood type was known to have been in the car.
(35:11):
So including Carpenter so he doesn't have the blood type.
Yeah but DNA testing wasn't available like you guys said at the time and the county attorney
declined to file any charges against John at that time.
I feel like that is circumstantial but I feel like it's enough to get him and question him
(35:34):
at least.
Right.
I need some too.
And like a warrant to maybe search his home.
A little lumpy.
Maybe because he lived in a different state.
No.
Yes.
And he would travel a lot.
So I think he lived in Arizona but he would travel the country because he was the regional
(35:54):
manager for a company.
So but just like people just not wanting to do what they need to do.
Let's take a little bit of imagination here.
Yeah DNA testing wasn't available in 1978 but all the roads led to Carpenter obviously.
(36:15):
And not only did the cops know that the pair had been fighting but there was also no sign
of forced entry into Bob's apartment which suggested that the victim knew his assailant.
But there was even more damning evidence than that.
At the scene there was blood everywhere.
There was some traces of blood on the back of the exit door and the front door and the
(36:39):
doorknobs like everywhere.
It was just everywhere.
There was red stains on the curtains and we found blood he said in Carpenter's rental
car on the passenger's door.
Hmm.
And it was Crane's blood type obviously like we said.
Nobody else handled the car and nobody else had the same blood type as Bob which was tight
(37:01):
bleat uh bleat type B blood.
All of it was.
All of it was the B blood.
But what cops found in Carpenter's Chrysler wasn't enough and without a murder weapon
detectives couldn't persuade the county attorney to issue a theorist warrant.
Really?
(37:21):
Yeah.
That's yeah.
What?
Yep.
So then we fast forward all the way to 1990.
It's forever.
Scottsdale police detective Barry Bessel and the county attorney of the office investigator
Jim Rines reexamined the evidence from 1978 and persuaded the county attorney to reopen
(37:45):
the case at the time.
DNA testing was inconclusive on the blood found in Carpenter's rental car but they
did discover evidence of a photograph of the car's interior that showed a piece of brain
tissue in the car.
What?
Yes.
(38:06):
What?
Like.
Did they collect it?
Yeah.
Unfortunately though the actual tissue samples recovered from the car have been lost.
Oh lost my ass.
But an Arizona judge ruled that the new evidence was admissible.
(38:29):
So in June of 1992 Carpenter was arrested and charged with Bob's murder.
But prosecutors definitely had a tough case ahead of them because Carpenter's attorneys
attacked the prosecution's case as circumstantial and inconclusive obviously.
Because it was just based off a big picture and they didn't really have any like physical
(38:54):
things anymore to test you know.
It would be different if they had the tissue.
Yeah.
Big fuck up on the police case.
Oh again.
So they presented the evidence that Carpenter and Crane were still on good terms including
eyewitness from the restaurant where the two men had died the evening before the murder
(39:14):
saying that they weren't fighting they were doing great.
Like nothing happened here.
But prosecutors tried to point to a missing tripod as the murder weapon.
So they were trying to say that he got beaten in the head with the tripod.
You know that makes sense.
Honestly.
Honestly.
But Carpenter's attorney.
(39:34):
Oh.
Attorney.
Just fuck it up some of these words.
What the fuck.
John Carpenter's attorney.
His attorney shot down the speculation that a missing tripod could have been the murder
(39:56):
weapon.
So he's like nuh uh.
And he reminded the jury that there was no proof of even the existence of a tripod.
They were just pulling it from thin air.
Which I think we could put two and two together.
Well like yeah I mean if someone who knew him said he has a tripod and they did not
find a tripod in his house.
(40:19):
It's missing.
Like.
Let's put that in the calculator.
Yeah.
Two plus two equals four.
It works.
I don't know.
So they noted that the murder weapon had never been identified or found and the prosecution's
camera tripod theory was sheer speculation.
And they said based solely on Carpenter's occupation is where they pulled this from.
(40:46):
But like you said we knew he was videotaping people in his room more often than not.
So like they disputed the claim that the newly discovered evidence photo showed brain tissue
and they alleged that the police work had been sloppy.
Which it was.
And such that the mishandling and the misplacing of the evidence including the crucial tissue
(41:08):
sample itself was enough to just like dismiss John.
And they pointed out that Crane had been videotaped and photographed in sexual relations with
numerous women implying that any one of those women might have been the killer.
(41:29):
Which like I mean get on their case because like they're trying to get him off.
So at points I guess you are a defense attorney.
But the blood in the car the fact that that's just not considered more than circumstantial
(41:49):
especially with the blood type matching and then their close relationship.
Yeah and that he had flown there to like hang out with him.
Yeah specifically to visit him.
Like I.
It's adding up.
Yeah.
Adding up for us if it's not.
They're playing the devil's advocate too well you know.
Yeah.
And they thought that maybe Bob's private life gave the defense plenty of stuff to play
(42:15):
with obviously and they suggested that an enraged husband or maybe a boyfriend could
have attacked him.
And you know the detectives definitely doubt this was a motive.
Like they're like no we don't think the infidelity was the motive.
So they are not in agreeance with the defense but they did say Bob was a non confrontational
(42:40):
guy and that these women did like him.
And I don't think that I have ever interviewed one of these women that disliked him or was
mad at him.
So that was from the detective.
At the 1994 trial Crane's son Robert testified that Bob had repeatedly expressed a desire
(43:01):
to sever his friendship with Carpenter in the weeks before his death.
And he said that Carpenter had became like a hanger on and a nuisance to the point of
being obnoxious.
So clingy I think.
It seemed like he maybe had like developed a little bit of feelings.
Yeah.
You know what I mean.
(43:21):
Yeah.
I think something more was there that...
I think the theory of like him doing the deed over his dead body and like related to all
that it's just all...
I think so too.
It really does make sense.
Yeah.
Very much a jilted not lover situation.
(43:42):
Yep.
Those love triangles.
Sometimes they work out.
But they...
Not in this case.
Not in this case is the case.
Robert said my dad expressed that he did not need Carpenter or any kind of people like
Carpenter hanging around him anymore.
(44:02):
And he testified that Crane had called Carpenter the night before the murder and ended their
friendship.
But after all of that Carpenter was eventually acquitted and he continued to maintain his
innocence until his death in 1998.
After the trial Robert speculated publicly that his father's widow, Patty Olson, might
(44:25):
have had a role in instigating in the crime.
He said nobody got a dime out of the murder, he said, except for one person.
Bob's will excluded him, his siblings, and his mother with...
Yeah.
With Crane's entire estate left to Patty Olson.
I didn't hear about any child estrangement back in that timeline, so...
(44:52):
And she was...
They were just a couple days away from their divorce when he died, so...
He repeated his suspicions in his 2015 book, Crane.
Sex Celebrity and My Father's Unsolved Murder.
The county district eternity...
I said it again, what the fuck?
(45:13):
The eternity?
Rick Romley, what the fuck?
He responded, we never characterized Patty as a suspect, adding, I am confident John
Carpenter murdered Bob.
Officially, Crane's murder remains unsolved.
He said we did the best we could.
We went through all the evidence, we talked to all the witnesses that we could, and we
(45:38):
came up with what we came up with.
A lot of times, when you have an old case like this, it is very difficult to get a conviction,
and it would have been a slam dunk if the DNA testing would have worked.
John Hook, a Phoenix TV reporter, convinced a county DA to allow him to access the old
(45:58):
blood samples so that he could send them to a different forensic lab to get them tested.
And this guy that was going to test the blood samples actually worked on the John Vanay
Ramsey case and the O.J. Simpson case.
Which is interesting.
And it is also absolutely unheard of that the county's attorney office would allow a
(46:21):
reporter to reopen a gold case with no police background, but they did.
And in November of 2016, county attorney's office permitted him to submit the 1978 blood
samples from John's rental car for retesting using a more advanced DNA technology than
(46:44):
used in the first one.
And two sequences were identified, one from an unknown male and the other was too degraded
to reach a conclusion.
Which is a bummer.
And this test consumed all the remaining evidence from the rental car, making further tests
impossible.
(47:05):
Damn.
Yes.
Okay, so I am formulating kind of a theory in my brain.
So Patty, that was her name, right?
She made out well.
She did.
And then we have Carpenter, who's pissed off because he got broken up with, you know, pretty
(47:30):
much.
I wonder if he went to her, maybe?
Kind of like a wild theory.
Yeah.
And you know, I was thinking, he's got to have someone to drive that car and the blood
evidence was on the handle of the passenger side door, right?
It was.
Yeah.
So it was a rental.
I wouldn't be surprised if maybe she drove the car.
(47:50):
Yeah.
Hmm?
Yeah.
Maybe they like lured him in for like a...
Maybe planned it for a long time, got the will changed.
Yeah.
I like your theory.
So Hook, who is the reporter who got the blood retested, he believes that John Carpenter
(48:11):
obviously was also the killer.
In death, Bob Crane got the Hollywood treatment.
About 150 mourners attended his funeral at St. Paul's Apostle Church in Westwood, California,
including Patty, Patty Duke, John Austin, Carol O'Connor, and his Hogan's Hero cast
(48:33):
mates.
In the years since, the Starrs family members have battled grief and apparently each other
over all of this.
And before her death, Patty Austin moved her husband's body from its original resting place
to another cemetery without telling Bob's family first.
(48:53):
No.
Yeah.
That's fucked up.
I know.
And then she just went ahead and set up a memorial website with her son Scott that peddled some
of Bob's amateur pornos.
That's super fucked up.
She's a great woman.
I know.
Yeah.
(49:14):
Patty is a real swell gal.
Oh no.
That's so fucked up.
I know.
But Robert Crane does not speak to his step siblings and his mother and his sister refuse
to talk about what happened all those years ago.
He said, it's bizarre to me.
I'm not expecting a like, let's hold hands at the table, but we've just like never talked
(49:36):
about it.
I don't know what else to do, he says.
Mother's dead, Patty's dead and time is just taking people away.
You know?
It's sad.
You know?
Yeah.
After all that, all this time has passed.
Yeah.
No closure.
Yeah.
And people were just greedy, it seems like, you know?
Yeah.
It's terrible.
(49:57):
Yeah.
So before we end here, I'll just tell you a little bit about Bob and then making it into
like our final theory.
Bob Crane was born July 13th, 1928.
He was born in Waterbury, Connecticut, and he was the youngest of Rosemary and Alfred
Thomas Crane's children.
He spent his childhood and teenage years in Stamford and Bob began playing drums at the
(50:21):
age of 11.
And by junior high school, he was organizing like local drum and bugle parades, you know,
like with his neighborhood friends.
They would like walk around the neighborhood and beat on drums and, you know, probably
annoy the neighbors, but be super duper cute, I'm sure.
Yeah, it was adorable.
(50:43):
He was known as the class clown and an intense music lover.
He joined his high school orchestra and his marching band and jazz band.
Bob played for the Connecticut and Norwalk Symphony orchestras and as part of their youth
orchestra program.
(51:03):
He's very musically talented on top of like all of his acting stuff, which is crazy.
It's all around gifted.
He graduated from Stamford High School in 1946 and in 1948 he enlisted two years in
the Connecticut Army National Guard and he was honorably discharged, like we said, in
(51:24):
1950.
He married his high school sweetheart and has a ran and the couple had their three children.
And in 1956, Bob and his family left the East and moved out west to California where he
began his lengthy and successful career in radio.
He worked at KNX radio and became the care, the king of the airways in Los Angeles and
(51:47):
his radio program became a huge success.
The most listened to on the air.
This was due to his personality and his humor.
He had charm and understandable quick wit.
He was a beloved son, father and actor and his case still remains unfortunately unsolved
to this day.
(52:08):
Any final thoughts on this case?
It's too bad that like he got up to so many shenanigans.
I know.
Yeah, cause you guys cool.
He was kind of like a cool guy, like a good guy outside of that.
I'll show you a picture of him too.
I mean, a lot of these women, like all of them did like all of them they weren't aware
(52:34):
or some of them weren't aware.
It says just some of them.
Like I think people were aware cause like it was out in the open.
Like he had that tripod thing.
Yeah, I recognize this man.
Right?
This picture was the one I recognized for sure.
Damn.
Yeah.
Interesting.
Well, thank you guys so much for being on the pod and getting high with us.
(52:57):
Of course.
Yes.
Yes, this was awesome.
Yeah, so fun.
I appreciate it.
RIP Bob.
RIP Bob.
We're doing radio in heaven.
Yeah.
Maybe like interviewing Marilyn Monroe.
There you go.
Yeah.
Well, until next time, stay high, stay safe and thank you for listening.
Happy 420, I'm Kai and you are listening to Stone Cold Murder.
(00:09):
Thanks for tuning in for season 2 episode 4, The Murder of Bob Crane.
Just a PSA, if you have any information to help solve a crime, you can go to www.crimestoppers.com
to report any information anonymously.
This podcast contains material that may not be suitable for all audiences.
(00:31):
Listener discretion is advised.
Hello everyone.
Hi.
Hi.
It is your friendly neighborhood stoners here bringing you another unfortunately horrible
case.
Today we have one of the homies on the podcast, we have Nicole and Maddie.
Hi.
Hi, I'm Nicole.
(00:52):
Hi, I'm Maddie.
Thank you guys for being on the pod.
How are you guys today?
Pretty good.
Pretty good.
Good.
Have you ever heard of the Bob Crane murder?
It doesn't really mean that for me.
No?
I feel like the name is like familiar in the back of my mind, but I have no context.
Yeah, fair.
Do you listen to a lot of true crime?
(01:15):
Yeah.
I used to just like draw and listen to true crime dance for hours.
I used to listen to it when I was a teenager.
Not as much anymore, but I still find myself doing that.
Yeah.
I listen to a lot of morbid at work.
I have to take breaks though, but I grew up with the ID channel on all the time with my
(01:37):
mom.
Me too, like forensic files and stuff.
Oh my god, Jo Kenda.
My mom calls me and she's like, you gotta stay the fuck out of Colorado Springs.
My mom is being obsessed with that channel specifically.
Yeah, and for some reason, like going to sleep with it, it's just like so many people have
(01:57):
that same story.
You wake up and there's like crime scene photos on the screen.
It's good.
Yeah, and it's always gruesome ones.
It's never just like blurred, just like dead body bloody, nasty.
Yeah.
And you're like, oh fuck.
I think the stuff that they're allowed to show on those shows is pretty surprising.
It is, yeah.
(02:17):
Yeah.
Yeah, especially for back then too.
I feel like a lot of that stuff was taboo.
Tell you what, it made my ass stay home.
Fuck yeah, dude.
Well, I am very excited, well not excited to share this episode with you, but excited
to share the case and get some, I don't know, more traction on it, I guess.
(02:40):
Because it wasn't one that I had heard of.
Like I had heard of Bob Crane, but I wasn't really like you.
I wasn't really sure where I had heard it.
But as we get through this case, we'll figure out why.
Because it's kind of, it's not like everybody will know it, but I feel like our grandparents.
(03:00):
It's like a household name for our grandparents and stuff like that.
So maybe that's where we're familiar with it.
So you guys nice and hi before we start?
Yeah.
Okay.
Great, okay.
And we'll have smoke breaks throughout the episode, but if you guys feel the need to
smoke again, just let me know and we'll stop and take another break.
Our story takes place on a hot summer day in Phoenix, Arizona.
(03:25):
It's June 29th, 1978.
Police are called to Winfield Place Apartments responding to a phone call they received from
a woman named Victoria Ann Berry.
She had discovered her friend's mutilated body in his home.
His walls, the ceiling, and the furniture were just covered in blood.
(03:47):
The ceiling.
The ceiling, yeah.
Wow.
Which, yeah, definitely indicates very brutal.
His bed was blood soaked, the sheets, and he was barely recognizable when she saw him.
The body was 49-year-old Bob Crane.
He was shirtless and sprawled out on his bed with an electrical cord wrapped tight around
(04:11):
his neck.
His head was so severely damaged on one side of his face, it was like completely unrecognizable.
Bob Crane's autopsy began in kind of like an unusual way at this time, see?
His autopsy was actually performed on the bed where he was killed.
Um, what?
(04:31):
That's crazy.
That's no?
Which is a big no-no.
I'm not really sure why they decided to just go ahead and do that, but they thought that
was like a chill thing to do, which is never a chill thing to do.
Yeah, no, what?
Like, you're totally gonna fuck everything else up in that crime scene.
(04:52):
Yeah.
Like, no.
And we'll see, this is not the only thing that they fucked up in the crime scene.
This is just like one of many things they fucked up in the crime scene.
Unfortunately, Bob Crane was an actor, so that's where we may have heard of his name.
He worked with the woman who found his body, who was Victoria Ann Berry.
(05:13):
Victoria and Bob had plans to meet for lunch that afternoon, but when Bob didn't show up,
she got worried, of course, and she went over to his apartment at Winfield Place, and that's
when she found him and called the police.
I know, it would be a terrible thing to find your friend or coworker that way.
Yeah, and you're just like, God, they're running late.
(05:35):
Yeah, what the fuck's happening?
I'm kinda hungry, like...
Then you get worried and you're like, fuck, and then you find that, like, no.
So what happened to Bob, and why would someone want him murdered in such a horrific and brutal
way?
We'll have to go back to his life before the murder.
So Bob graduated from Stanford High School in 1946, and in 1948 he enlisted for two years
(06:02):
in the Connecticut Army Guard, and he was honorably discharged in 1950.
So he didn't serve that long, but he did serve in the Army for a little bit, and while he
was in the Army, he married his high school sweetheart, who was Ann Tazeran.
The couple had three children, Robert, David, Deborah, and Kara, and like I mentioned earlier,
(06:28):
Bob was an actor at the time of his death, but Bob started his career out in broadcasting.
He started at WLEA in Hornell in New York in 1950.
Bob moved his way to a more popular station throughout New York until he eventually landed
a gig in 1956 as a morning host for CBS radio station in Los Angeles, California.
(06:54):
So he moved from New York to Los Angeles, and when he did that, the radio station that
he went to be the morning host at, they wanted him specifically to come out there to kind
of like re-energize the morning and try and get people more into the morning show, get
their stats up, and just get a new like face to the morning show.
(07:19):
And they were hoping like his bubbly, energetic personality would help boost those ratings
a little bit.
Bob did excel in his new position, and he was sly, witty, and his charismatic personality
allowed him to interview famous guests such as Marilyn Monroe, Frank Sinatra, and Bob
Hope.
(07:39):
All right, all right.
Right?
So he was interviewing some cool people and doing his thing.
People were really enjoying him and liking his morning show.
So Bob's show quickly topped the morning ratings with adult listeners in Los Angeles, and Bob
Crane became the king of Los Angeles Airways.
Oh yeah.
(08:00):
He was really doing good for himself.
Bob soon started thinking about expanding his career into acting, and his ambitions
led into guest hosting for John Carson on the daytime game show, Who Do You Trust?
Have you ever heard of that?
It sounds familiar, yeah.
Yeah, I've never heard of it, so.
(08:21):
Yeah.
You?
No.
Me either.
And he did appear on The Twilight Zone, actually.
And Channing, which I've never heard of, Alfred Hitchcock, presents in General Electric Theatre.
Hmm.
So, yeah, I definitely know The Twilight Zone.
(08:43):
Yeah.
Twilight Zone.
Yeah, that's the only one I know.
Bob Crane knew how to play the game, and after Carl Reiner appeared on the radio show, Bob
persuaded Carl to book him as a guest appearance on The Dick Van Dyke Show.
So he was getting, he was moving around.
Moving up in the world, yeah.
(09:05):
Yeah.
After Bob's appearance on The Dick Van Dyke Show, Donna Reed offered him a guest spot
on her show, The Donna Reed Show, in 1963.
We all have very, just unique names for the air show.
Yeah, very much so.
Leads nothing to the imagination.
At least you know who the host is.
Right, yeah.
Hmm, no wonder.
No, you know.
(09:29):
After his episode aired as character Dr. David Kelsey, he was such a hit, they ended up writing
him as a regular on the show, so.
Nice.
Yeah.
He did a pretty good job.
Secured that spot.
Yep, he did.
He continued to work and host his morning show and act until December of 1964, when
(09:49):
he eventually left The Donna Reed Show.
And in 1965, Bob was offered the starring role in a CBS television sitcom set in a World
War II POW camp called Hogan's Heroes.
So this is Bob's like most famous role in his career.
This is what he's like most known for.
(10:11):
This is like a role that women just like flocked to him for.
They just loved him because he was like this hero that's big.
Yeah, they just loved him.
And apparently it like kinda actually bothered him because he would like meet a woman and
she would be like, oh me.
I think his name was Hogan something on the show, but she, you know, they would like play
(10:36):
it up in the bedroom and he'd be like, no, like I'm not about it.
We just have sex.
Yeah.
He was not about it.
He was like, bitch, no.
The show was an immediate hit and it ended up finishing at the top 10 in its first year
on the air.
Just like hit after hit.
(10:57):
He's got what happened?
Where did it all go wrong?
I know, he seemed so nice.
Who did he piss off?
Like, I don't know.
Maybe we'll find out.
The series lasted for six seasons on CBS and Bob Crane was nominated for an Emmy award
in 1966 and 1967 for the show.
(11:20):
So now Bob's career is really taken off and along with his popularity, he's a handsome
guy and his betrayal of Colonel Hogan, that's the name, the Hogan's hero, he really started
to attract the ladies.
Bob and his co-star, Cynthia Lynn, who played Helga, started having an affair while he was
(11:41):
on the show.
So he's married to a high school sweetheart still.
Oh, that's right.
Yeah.
Yeah, which sucks.
Bob, what the hell, man?
It's like, oh, you coulda.
So that lasted for a while and then Cynthia left the show in 1968 and then Bob started
(12:02):
seeing her replacement, Pajit Saak Olsen, who played Hilda, which is like such a close
name and they were like this, almost the exact same character.
Oh my god.
So he had a thing for his co-stars apparently.
In 1968, Crane appeared with Elk Summer in a feature film, The Wicked Dreams of Paula
(12:24):
Schultz.
I've never heard of it, but.
Yeah.
I think it was a good one.
And in 1969, Crane starred in Abby Dalton's dinner theater production of Cactus Flower.
Nice.
Yeah, so he's just going, he's just doing shit.
He's doing shit.
He's having fun and doing it.
(12:46):
Bob did eventually divorce his wife and in 1970, just before their 21st anniversary,
which is sad.
Damn.
Yeah, he's dead timing, unfortunately.
But he and Teresa Olsen, which was his co-star, got married on the set of the show later that
(13:06):
year.
On the set?
Yeah.
Wow, all right then.
What a fuck you.
I'm just going to get married on the show and maybe you'll see it.
Maybe not.
But later, yeah, he got married later that year with actually the co-stars, Richard Dawson
as his best man.
(13:26):
I saw this show.
Yeah, he's going.
Good God.
He's going all the...
Their son Scotty was born in 1971 and they later adopted their daughter Anna Marie.
Hover Crane Jr. later revealed that his father Bob was not actually his biological father
(13:47):
and none of the Olsen children actually were Bob's kids.
Oh.
I don't know.
I guess maybe they had an arrangement because Bob had a vasectomy in 1968 when he was still
married to his wife.
But he adopted all the children as his own.
Okay.
Well, fair enough.
(14:07):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Which is nice.
I think that's nice.
So after the cancellation of Hogan's Heroes in 1971, Crane appeared in two Disney films
actually.
Oh.
So Super Dad in 1973.
Super Dad.
Super Dad.
And a small role in Gus, which was in 1976.
(14:29):
Gus.
Yeah.
I've not heard of either of those.
Sorry Bob.
I've not seen any of your stuff.
But in 1973, Bob purchased the rights to a comedy play called Beginner's Luck and began
touring it as its star, of course, and director.
That's never a good combination.
(14:50):
No, you get a hot head every time.
Yeah.
You know?
Like they never just are like, yeah, let's see what you have.
Give me some feedback, you know?
And they're like micromanaging everything.
Of course.
Like why wouldn't they?
Yeah.
There's a star and the director.
So yeah, so he purchased the rights to the comedy play and he would perform this at the
(15:13):
Showboat Dinner Theater in St. Petersburg, Florida, and the L.A. Miranda Civic Theater
in California, the Windmill Dinner Theater in Scottsdale, Arizona, and other dinner theaters
around the country.
So I guess this play was good too.
I know.
Busy.
(15:34):
Busy bee.
Prane guest starred in a number of television shows like Police Woman, Givesville, Quincy,
M.E., and Love Boat, which I know that one.
And in 1975, the Bob Crane Show aired on NBC, but it was canceled after 13 episodes.
(15:55):
Oh damn.
Yeah.
We didn't get the season.
Got 13 episodes in you, Bob.
Sorry, bud.
Bob and his wife, Patricia, separated in 1977 and they were just weeks away from finalizing
their divorce at the time of Bob's death in June of 1978.
So that's kind of like the timeline of his life up until his murder.
(16:20):
So in 1978, Bob taped a travel documentary in Hawaii, like just on his own.
He just, you know.
He just went out there with a camera.
Yeah.
And he's like, I'm going to make this documentary in Hawaii.
And he recorded an appearance in a Canadian cooking show.
All right.
(16:41):
And it was like a Canadian celebrity cooking show.
And neither of these aired in the U.S. after his death in June, but they did appear, or
the celebrity cook show did broadcast in Canada in late 78.
Oh, okay.
But I don't know.
It was weird that he went and just decided to film himself in Hawaii.
(17:02):
Yeah.
He's like, I'm just going to Hawaii.
Everybody wants to know what I'm doing.
Of course.
So, right.
Yeah.
Everybody wants to see me just like swim and lay here and enjoy my life while you have
to do your mediocrity like work.
I have to work for a living.
(17:22):
I can just tape myself in Hawaii.
Yeah.
So Bob seems like a great guy.
He's like focused on his career.
And besides his little extramarital affairs, it seems like he's well-liked.
And why would someone murder him?
Yeah.
Do you have any ideas?
I don't know.
Well, he did have an affair.
(17:45):
Yeah.
It's always like when...
Two affairs?
Yep.
Yeah.
True.
They were about to be settled though.
Was she going to get a raw deal?
She actually was.
She got a good deal.
She got a good deal.
Would she have gotten a good deal if he didn't die?
Did she get like life insurance or something?
She got a good deal either way.
(18:06):
She got a good deal either way?
Yeah.
She was like set.
And also because she's also like his co-star.
So she was pulling in.
I mean like money is always a big motivator for everybody.
It is.
Well, he had some skeletons in his closet.
And people think this could be like the reason why he was murdered.
(18:30):
Okay.
And what were those skeletons?
I'm going to tell you, but after a quick smoke break.
Okay.
And we're back.
So during Bob's time on Hogan's Heroes, he was introduced to John Henry Carpenter.
John was a regional sales manager for Sony Electronics and he helped famous clients with
(18:53):
their like video equipment.
So he was well versed in the celebrity community and he helped a lot of people, I guess with
movies and TV shows and things like that.
So they started a friendship and the two began visiting bars and nightclubs together.
And Bob obviously attracted a lot of women due to his celebrity status and his looks.
(19:18):
And Bob would start introducing Carpenter to women at the bar as his manager, even though
he wasn't his manager.
Like the main man in it?
Yeah, he was the main man in it.
But it was kind of like an alternative motive.
So Bob and John would bring women back to Bob's place and they would videotape a joint
(19:42):
sexual encounter with the women.
Oh, no, no.
So he was like thinking of women for both of them, basically.
So Bob's son Robert later insisted that all of the women were aware of the videotaping
and like consented to it.
But several of them claimed that they had no idea actually that they were being videotaped
(20:03):
and recorded until they were informed by Scottsdale police after Bob's murder.
So, yeah.
So somebody's lying.
Which is not good.
So the two of them would continue this little routine of going to the bar and picking up
(20:25):
women for the threesome and then videotaping it.
And John would eventually become the regional sales manager at IKEA.
Not IKEA.
IKEA.
And this job, I don't know what that is, but he would become the regional sales manager
(20:45):
at this place.
And the job would require lots of travel, obviously.
So he arranged his business trips to coincide with Bob's dinner theaters so that they continued
their little...
So now we're taking this shit.
It's a mobile...
Yeah.
They're taking this on the road.
Mobile creepshow.
(21:05):
Apparently, two days before his death, he called his son Robert.
And Robert said that he was two weeks shy of his 50th birthday.
And he said, I'm making changes.
I'm divorcing Patty.
And that he wanted to lose people like John Carpenter.
So he was feeling either some type of way, maybe feeling a little guilty for what he
(21:31):
was doing, perhaps.
And he kind of wanted to cut ties with his past and start over.
So Carpenter had become kind of like a pain in the butt to him and he wanted a clean slate.
But that never got to happen.
And Robert believes that when his dad tried to pull away from John Carpenter, that he
(21:53):
became enraged and it was kind of like a breakup of sorts.
Oh yeah.
I mean, I wouldn't be surprised if there was some weird sexual thing between the two of
them.
Right.
Because they're...
Yeah.
You don't fuck a woman together over and over again and not be a little homo about it.
(22:15):
I'm saying.
I feel like, yeah.
Yeah.
You're going to get some feelings involved there.
And especially because I don't think John was able to be picking up women too.
Well, on his own, he wasn't like...
He's like, damn it.
Yeah.
He wasn't really great in that area.
So he was losing all of that all at once.
(22:37):
So it's kind of like a breakup.
And Robert claims that John lost it and he was being rejected and he was being like,
sworn like a lover.
So there are eyewitnesses actually that night before his murder at a Scottsdale club that
(22:59):
they said he had an argument with Bob.
After that, a few hours later, he was dead.
So it was an eyewitness.
They had a fight.
He had this call from his son.
Somebody caught hands.
Scottsdale Detective Barry Vassal was in Phoenix with a colleague on June 29th, 1978.
(23:23):
What was his name?
Barry Vassal.
I thought you said buried asshole.
Detective buried asshole.
That would be a horrible name.
No, Barry Vassal.
(23:43):
He was a Phoenix detective and with a colleague on June 29th in 1978, he was called out to
the unit of 132A of the Winfield Apartments.
Several cops were already present when he arrived along with Victoria Barry who called
the cops.
So Detective Vassal was reported to then drive to the airport to pick up Robert.
(24:08):
So like he was called out to the crime scene and then they were like, nah, go pick up Robert,
which is called.
And also Bob's business manager and Lloyd Vaughn, who's an attorney, and Bill Goldstein
and bring them to the crime scene.
So he picked these men up from the airport, brought them to the crime scene, and on the
(24:31):
afternoon of June 29th, the county medical examiner, Dr. K, arrived at Bob's apartment
at about 4 p.m.
And by this time, Bob had already been dead for 12 hours and like rigor mortis had already
set in his body and all that kind of stuff.
So there's like a lot of trampling in the crime scene.
(24:53):
They're not really getting there on.
Shit's all fucked up.
Yeah, they're not getting there quick.
Like they're just kind of, I guess, nonchalant about it, which is yucky.
I don't know.
I don't like the thought of that at all.
I mean, this man was like a celebrity.
Yeah, you would think that.
Like doing shit like maybe a little bit later in his career, it seems, but like not like
(25:19):
a not peak, you know, his own traveling show.
He's doing shit.
So I don't know.
And he was in Disney.
You would think.
Yeah.
You would think it would be a little quicker than this.
But 12 hours passed by and the crime scene, crime scene photographers were there taking
pictures in the apartment.
(25:41):
And Scottsdale PD also took like a detailed video, which is just like a crude black and
white video, which you can see online if you want.
But it's pretty gruesome.
And Dr. K began like a little look at the body and he was observing the blood spatter
on the wall and above the bed and the blood soaked sheets, the pillows and partially like
(26:05):
pushed back from Bob's head.
So they were like his head was on the bed and the pillows were like pushed back towards
the wall.
He immediately noted that there was an electrical cord wrapped around his neck.
And then Dr. K took a weird step and he just started getting right into the autopsy right
(26:25):
on the crime scene.
What the fuck?
Which is like unheard of in my...
I've never heard of that happening in a crime scene.
Or like ever.
Yeah, no.
It's weird.
It's weird.
Yeah, that's really weird.
Could they like...
I mean even with rigor mortis having said it, there's no way there's like they wouldn't
(26:49):
be able to get him out of there.
No.
Yeah.
No, no.
There's really no reason to do it.
Yeah.
I mean I would think like a squishy bed wouldn't be the right surface to do an autopsy.
Yeah, I feel like they just make it harder.
Yeah, I don't see it being any good in doing it there.
(27:10):
But yeah, I'm not the doctor.
I don't know.
So he started doing his autopsy thing.
He's cutting him open and looking at the body and he just kind of like wanted to get a better
look at the left side of his face, which is where the fatal wound was.
And he took out a straight razor and there on the blood soaked bed he shamed like a four
(27:35):
inch semi-circle around Bob's left ear just to get a clearer idea of what kind of weapon
could have been used.
Alright so just putting hair everywhere on the crime scene.
Like I...
It's atrocious.
(27:56):
So yeah, this obviously introduced issues of contamination and like possible cross contamination
of the crime scene that would like get me in for finding stuff like moving forward.
So that's great.
He did a good job.
So June 30th, Deputy Medical Examiner Dr. Thomas Jarvis performed a mother autopsy on
(28:20):
Bob Crane.
He was just 49 years old and he would have just turned 50 in two weeks from the time
of his death.
So the type of death was listed as violent in the manner by blood forced instrument and
cord.
The abnormal findings were dried blood on his face and hair, upper chest and the autopsy
(28:46):
report also noted a flaky white dry material on the pubic hair area and like lower abdomen
and like interior right thigh.
And they thought it was likely semen though it was never tested.
Okay.
In the back of my mind I was kind of wondering if he had been maybe assaulted.
(29:07):
Right.
Yeah.
Right.
It took place during the 70s.
I think that forensics were a lot less advanced.
Totally.
I mean definitely.
Did that kind of thing?
Yeah.
Absolutely.
DNA didn't super take off until the 90s and like they didn't even really start collecting
it for future testing until like the 80s.
(29:31):
Like at least from what I've heard.
Yeah.
Yeah definitely in most cases.
Because I mean yeah they don't really have any use for it you know.
Yeah.
Here and there but.
I gotta be honest Carpenter is looking super good for this.
I know I need to do that too honestly.
I was thinking the wife but like maybe she I don't think she's involved.
(29:53):
She's probably just out of the house because they're getting divorced.
She's getting all the money.
It's like it's weird that so many people were brought to the crime scene like.
I know.
Like the lawyer I kind of get I guess to verify like okay this guy's dead we can close I can
start all this extra paperwork.
Whatever I guess like maybe as a courtesy but and also to identify the body.
(30:16):
But even though what's her face that called the cops probably already identified.
Yeah like she knew for sure.
But like maybe a lawyer identification is more credible.
But that's giving a lot of credit to people who can't lock down a crime scene for shit.
It seems.
It's a shame.
It's a shame because like definitely they knew better.
(30:39):
At least they knew better to not do that.
But why they do these things on the bed.
I thought autopsy on the bed is egregious.
It's awful isn't it.
I was just like ew.
Could you imagine.
I mean like you're just making it harder on yourself number one and number two.
Just is there something wrong with you?
(31:01):
Like.
Right.
Clearly not a good doctor.
Dr. K we have problems.
So they found that like white dry material on him and police later just like had a theory
that the killer had masturbated over his body after killing him as like a final fuck you
(31:23):
to the victim.
It was just a theory but the scene was never tested and according to former Scottsdale
police officer Dennis Borkehagen which is a name.
Borkehagen.
It's a long one.
He was a president for the autopsy along with Lieutenant Ron Dean and he asked for the semen
(31:48):
to be collected and according to Borkehagen Jarvis.
I can't even say that with a straight face.
Borkehagen.
I like it actually.
Borkehagen.
Jarvis dismissively said what's that going to tell you.
(32:08):
So they weren't really into.
Alright just ignore.
I mean like they could still test to see what it was.
They couldn't see who it was related to but they could look at that shit under a microscope
and see a bunch of dead sperms and be like oh shit it's semen.
It's not like they're stupid.
He said what's that going to tell you that he had a piece of ass before he was killed.
(32:33):
What?
That was the end of that and the semen was never collected.
Robert, Bob's son believed that what happened at the crime scene completely compromised
the hunt for the killer obviously.
And Von Goldstein who was one of the guys that they picked up from the airport.
(32:53):
He walked through the apartment examining and touching and handling all sorts of items
and plain view of Vassel who was the detective and Robert who was Bob's son wrote in his
book.
We added all of our fingerprints and hair samples to an already compromised lackadaisical
investigation and that was like a casually considered murder scene.
(33:15):
So like he didn't think that they took very much consideration.
Corruption of a large life.
Yeah this guy, shit he's dead as fuck.
What do we do now?
What do now?
Yep.
Do we clean up?
Is it time to clean up yet?
I want to go home.
They said can you do the autopsy here?
(33:37):
Yeah.
It's a lot to ask to move the body and stuff.
Yeah they suck.
Clearly.
So Vassel is now retired from the force and he's a private investigator in the Scottsdale
area.
He sees it of course differently.
And he said in a perfect world you have a crime scene that nobody's allowed in and nobody's
(33:59):
allowed out.
You only have one or two people in there.
But that doesn't always happen.
And I don't think there was any contamination of the crime scene.
Which is what you are really worried about.
So he clearly doesn't see any wrong here.
The Scottsdale Police Department had no homicide division in 1978 so it wasn't necessarily
(34:23):
equipped to handle such a high profile murder investigation.
And the crime scene itself had very few clues and no evidence was found of forced entry
into his apartment and nothing of value was missing.
So that took a lot of motive out of it too.
Investigators examined Bob's extensive videotape collection which of course led them to John
(34:48):
Carpenter who had flown to Phoenix on June 25th to spend a few days with Bob.
So that was a few days before the murder.
So John's rental car was impounded and searched and several blood smears were found that matched
Bob Crane's blood type.
But no one else of that blood type was known to have been in the car.
(35:11):
So including Carpenter so he doesn't have the blood type.
Yeah but DNA testing wasn't available like you guys said at the time and the county attorney
declined to file any charges against John at that time.
I feel like that is circumstantial but I feel like it's enough to get him and question him
(35:34):
at least.
Right.
I need some too.
And like a warrant to maybe search his home.
A little lumpy.
Maybe because he lived in a different state.
No.
Yes.
And he would travel a lot.
So I think he lived in Arizona but he would travel the country because he was the regional
(35:54):
manager for a company.
So but just like people just not wanting to do what they need to do.
Let's take a little bit of imagination here.
Yeah DNA testing wasn't available in 1978 but all the roads led to Carpenter obviously.
(36:15):
And not only did the cops know that the pair had been fighting but there was also no sign
of forced entry into Bob's apartment which suggested that the victim knew his assailant.
But there was even more damning evidence than that.
At the scene there was blood everywhere.
There was some traces of blood on the back of the exit door and the front door and the
(36:39):
doorknobs like everywhere.
It was just everywhere.
There was red stains on the curtains and we found blood he said in Carpenter's rental
car on the passenger's door.
Hmm.
And it was Crane's blood type obviously like we said.
Nobody else handled the car and nobody else had the same blood type as Bob which was tight
(37:01):
bleat uh bleat type B blood.
All of it was.
All of it was the B blood.
But what cops found in Carpenter's Chrysler wasn't enough and without a murder weapon
detectives couldn't persuade the county attorney to issue a theorist warrant.
Really?
(37:21):
Yeah.
That's yeah.
What?
Yep.
So then we fast forward all the way to 1990.
It's forever.
Scottsdale police detective Barry Bessel and the county attorney of the office investigator
Jim Rines reexamined the evidence from 1978 and persuaded the county attorney to reopen
(37:45):
the case at the time.
DNA testing was inconclusive on the blood found in Carpenter's rental car but they
did discover evidence of a photograph of the car's interior that showed a piece of brain
tissue in the car.
What?
Yes.
(38:06):
What?
Like.
Did they collect it?
Yeah.
Unfortunately though the actual tissue samples recovered from the car have been lost.
Oh lost my ass.
But an Arizona judge ruled that the new evidence was admissible.
(38:29):
So in June of 1992 Carpenter was arrested and charged with Bob's murder.
But prosecutors definitely had a tough case ahead of them because Carpenter's attorneys
attacked the prosecution's case as circumstantial and inconclusive obviously.
Because it was just based off a big picture and they didn't really have any like physical
(38:54):
things anymore to test you know.
It would be different if they had the tissue.
Yeah.
Big fuck up on the police case.
Oh again.
So they presented the evidence that Carpenter and Crane were still on good terms including
eyewitness from the restaurant where the two men had died the evening before the murder
(39:14):
saying that they weren't fighting they were doing great.
Like nothing happened here.
But prosecutors tried to point to a missing tripod as the murder weapon.
So they were trying to say that he got beaten in the head with the tripod.
You know that makes sense.
Honestly.
Honestly.
But Carpenter's attorney.
(39:34):
Oh.
Attorney.
Just fuck it up some of these words.
What the fuck.
John Carpenter's attorney.
His attorney shot down the speculation that a missing tripod could have been the murder
(39:56):
weapon.
So he's like nuh uh.
And he reminded the jury that there was no proof of even the existence of a tripod.
They were just pulling it from thin air.
Which I think we could put two and two together.
Well like yeah I mean if someone who knew him said he has a tripod and they did not
find a tripod in his house.
(40:19):
It's missing.
Like.
Let's put that in the calculator.
Yeah.
Two plus two equals four.
It works.
I don't know.
So they noted that the murder weapon had never been identified or found and the prosecution's
camera tripod theory was sheer speculation.
And they said based solely on Carpenter's occupation is where they pulled this from.
(40:46):
But like you said we knew he was videotaping people in his room more often than not.
So like they disputed the claim that the newly discovered evidence photo showed brain tissue
and they alleged that the police work had been sloppy.
Which it was.
And such that the mishandling and the misplacing of the evidence including the crucial tissue
(41:08):
sample itself was enough to just like dismiss John.
And they pointed out that Crane had been videotaped and photographed in sexual relations with
numerous women implying that any one of those women might have been the killer.
(41:29):
Which like I mean get on their case because like they're trying to get him off.
So at points I guess you are a defense attorney.
But the blood in the car the fact that that's just not considered more than circumstantial
(41:49):
especially with the blood type matching and then their close relationship.
Yeah and that he had flown there to like hang out with him.
Yeah specifically to visit him.
Like I.
It's adding up.
Yeah.
Adding up for us if it's not.
They're playing the devil's advocate too well you know.
Yeah.
And they thought that maybe Bob's private life gave the defense plenty of stuff to play
(42:15):
with obviously and they suggested that an enraged husband or maybe a boyfriend could
have attacked him.
And you know the detectives definitely doubt this was a motive.
Like they're like no we don't think the infidelity was the motive.
So they are not in agreeance with the defense but they did say Bob was a non confrontational
(42:40):
guy and that these women did like him.
And I don't think that I have ever interviewed one of these women that disliked him or was
mad at him.
So that was from the detective.
At the 1994 trial Crane's son Robert testified that Bob had repeatedly expressed a desire
(43:01):
to sever his friendship with Carpenter in the weeks before his death.
And he said that Carpenter had became like a hanger on and a nuisance to the point of
being obnoxious.
So clingy I think.
It seemed like he maybe had like developed a little bit of feelings.
Yeah.
You know what I mean.
(43:21):
Yeah.
I think something more was there that...
I think the theory of like him doing the deed over his dead body and like related to all
that it's just all...
I think so too.
It really does make sense.
Yeah.
Very much a jilted not lover situation.
(43:42):
Yep.
Those love triangles.
Sometimes they work out.
But they...
Not in this case.
Not in this case is the case.
Robert said my dad expressed that he did not need Carpenter or any kind of people like
Carpenter hanging around him anymore.
(44:02):
And he testified that Crane had called Carpenter the night before the murder and ended their
friendship.
But after all of that Carpenter was eventually acquitted and he continued to maintain his
innocence until his death in 1998.
After the trial Robert speculated publicly that his father's widow, Patty Olson, might
(44:25):
have had a role in instigating in the crime.
He said nobody got a dime out of the murder, he said, except for one person.
Bob's will excluded him, his siblings, and his mother with...
Yeah.
With Crane's entire estate left to Patty Olson.
I didn't hear about any child estrangement back in that timeline, so...
(44:52):
And she was...
They were just a couple days away from their divorce when he died, so...
He repeated his suspicions in his 2015 book, Crane.
Sex Celebrity and My Father's Unsolved Murder.
The county district eternity...
I said it again, what the fuck?
(45:13):
The eternity?
Rick Romley, what the fuck?
He responded, we never characterized Patty as a suspect, adding, I am confident John
Carpenter murdered Bob.
Officially, Crane's murder remains unsolved.
He said we did the best we could.
We went through all the evidence, we talked to all the witnesses that we could, and we
(45:38):
came up with what we came up with.
A lot of times, when you have an old case like this, it is very difficult to get a conviction,
and it would have been a slam dunk if the DNA testing would have worked.
John Hook, a Phoenix TV reporter, convinced a county DA to allow him to access the old
(45:58):
blood samples so that he could send them to a different forensic lab to get them tested.
And this guy that was going to test the blood samples actually worked on the John Vanay
Ramsey case and the O.J. Simpson case.
Which is interesting.
And it is also absolutely unheard of that the county's attorney office would allow a
(46:21):
reporter to reopen a gold case with no police background, but they did.
And in November of 2016, county attorney's office permitted him to submit the 1978 blood
samples from John's rental car for retesting using a more advanced DNA technology than
(46:44):
used in the first one.
And two sequences were identified, one from an unknown male and the other was too degraded
to reach a conclusion.
Which is a bummer.
And this test consumed all the remaining evidence from the rental car, making further tests
impossible.
(47:05):
Damn.
Yes.
Okay, so I am formulating kind of a theory in my brain.
So Patty, that was her name, right?
She made out well.
She did.
And then we have Carpenter, who's pissed off because he got broken up with, you know, pretty
(47:30):
much.
I wonder if he went to her, maybe?
Kind of like a wild theory.
Yeah.
And you know, I was thinking, he's got to have someone to drive that car and the blood
evidence was on the handle of the passenger side door, right?
It was.
Yeah.
So it was a rental.
I wouldn't be surprised if maybe she drove the car.
(47:50):
Yeah.
Hmm?
Yeah.
Maybe they like lured him in for like a...
Maybe planned it for a long time, got the will changed.
Yeah.
I like your theory.
So Hook, who is the reporter who got the blood retested, he believes that John Carpenter
(48:11):
obviously was also the killer.
In death, Bob Crane got the Hollywood treatment.
About 150 mourners attended his funeral at St. Paul's Apostle Church in Westwood, California,
including Patty, Patty Duke, John Austin, Carol O'Connor, and his Hogan's Hero cast
(48:33):
mates.
In the years since, the Starrs family members have battled grief and apparently each other
over all of this.
And before her death, Patty Austin moved her husband's body from its original resting place
to another cemetery without telling Bob's family first.
(48:53):
No.
Yeah.
That's fucked up.
I know.
And then she just went ahead and set up a memorial website with her son Scott that peddled some
of Bob's amateur pornos.
That's super fucked up.
She's a great woman.
I know.
Yeah.
(49:14):
Patty is a real swell gal.
Oh no.
That's so fucked up.
I know.
But Robert Crane does not speak to his step siblings and his mother and his sister refuse
to talk about what happened all those years ago.
He said, it's bizarre to me.
I'm not expecting a like, let's hold hands at the table, but we've just like never talked
(49:36):
about it.
I don't know what else to do, he says.
Mother's dead, Patty's dead and time is just taking people away.
You know?
It's sad.
You know?
Yeah.
After all that, all this time has passed.
Yeah.
No closure.
Yeah.
And people were just greedy, it seems like, you know?
Yeah.
It's terrible.
(49:57):
Yeah.
So before we end here, I'll just tell you a little bit about Bob and then making it into
like our final theory.
Bob Crane was born July 13th, 1928.
He was born in Waterbury, Connecticut, and he was the youngest of Rosemary and Alfred
Thomas Crane's children.
He spent his childhood and teenage years in Stamford and Bob began playing drums at the
(50:21):
age of 11.
And by junior high school, he was organizing like local drum and bugle parades, you know,
like with his neighborhood friends.
They would like walk around the neighborhood and beat on drums and, you know, probably
annoy the neighbors, but be super duper cute, I'm sure.
Yeah, it was adorable.
(50:43):
He was known as the class clown and an intense music lover.
He joined his high school orchestra and his marching band and jazz band.
Bob played for the Connecticut and Norwalk Symphony orchestras and as part of their youth
orchestra program.
(51:03):
He's very musically talented on top of like all of his acting stuff, which is crazy.
It's all around gifted.
He graduated from Stamford High School in 1946 and in 1948 he enlisted two years in
the Connecticut Army National Guard and he was honorably discharged, like we said, in
(51:24):
1950.
He married his high school sweetheart and has a ran and the couple had their three children.
And in 1956, Bob and his family left the East and moved out west to California where he
began his lengthy and successful career in radio.
He worked at KNX radio and became the care, the king of the airways in Los Angeles and
(51:47):
his radio program became a huge success.
The most listened to on the air.
This was due to his personality and his humor.
He had charm and understandable quick wit.
He was a beloved son, father and actor and his case still remains unfortunately unsolved
to this day.
(52:08):
Any final thoughts on this case?
It's too bad that like he got up to so many shenanigans.
I know.
Yeah, cause you guys cool.
He was kind of like a cool guy, like a good guy outside of that.
I'll show you a picture of him too.
I mean, a lot of these women, like all of them did like all of them they weren't aware
(52:34):
or some of them weren't aware.
It says just some of them.
Like I think people were aware cause like it was out in the open.
Like he had that tripod thing.
Yeah, I recognize this man.
Right?
This picture was the one I recognized for sure.
Damn.
Yeah.
Interesting.
Well, thank you guys so much for being on the pod and getting high with us.
(52:57):
Of course.
Yes.
Yes, this was awesome.
Yeah, so fun.
I appreciate it.
RIP Bob.
RIP Bob.
We're doing radio in heaven.
Yeah.
Maybe like interviewing Marilyn Monroe.
There you go.
Yeah.
Well, until next time, stay high, stay safe and thank you for listening.
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