Gilberto Valle: The Cannibal Cop | Fantasy or Felony? - We Saw the Devil: A True Crime Podcast

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Sunny spaces, smiling faces, happy places. But every sunny space
holds a shadow. Behind every smile, our sharp teeth, and
every happy place has something sinister lurking just below the surface.
Welcome to We Saw the Devil, the podcast diving deep

(00:22):
into the chilling realms of true crime. Join your host
Robin as she unravels mysteries that have left investigators baffled
and armchair sleuth's obsessed. Be forewarned, Dear listener, We Saw
the Devil is not for the faint of heart. Our
unflinching exploration will take you to the darkest corners of
the psyche and through the unimaginable depths of human darkness

(00:45):
to unearth stark secrets. To the harsh light of day.
Nothing will be left untouched. Are you ready? Are you sure?
We Saw the Devil? Hello?

Speaker 2 (01:00):
Every one you are listening to We Saw the Devil?
I'm Robin. How is everyone? Did all of you survive
your Thanksgiving? Over the course of my life, I have
been to a variety of Thanksgivings with previous partners or
friends or family, and it seems like it's generally a
mixed bag of how fun it's going to be? Me honestly,

(01:22):
best Thanksgiving I have had in years. I did absolutely nothing.
I had zero plans and did nothing of consequence whatsoever,
and I cannot even articulate how badly that was needed.
No awkward political conversations, no turkey, which, okay, you guys
know how much I abhor the current administration, Trump, Vance, whatever,

(01:46):
but I truly do not understand the hate that Vance
is getting. I mean, other than him being an awkward
freak show for saying that no one really enjoys turkey,
because I have honestly been asking myself and the universe
the same question for as long as I can remember.
Do any of you guys actually enjoy turkey? So Thanksgiving
to me doesn't really have any sort of excitement around it.

(02:09):
There's far better food. When I lived in Maine, I
would never go home for Christmas. My parents would sometimes
come visit me, but on years where they didn't, I
would order from this one Iraqi restaurant. It was an
Iraqi restaurant in Middle Eastern food. It was so good
and that was my Thanksgiving and I prefer to it.
But yeah, no turkey. Sorry. That was a very long
tangent devoted to how much I hate Turkey, but for

(02:32):
real warranted. But yeah, I had an amazing Thanksgiving. There
was no political shittiness, which did you guys have to
deal with that? I'm sure this year in particular was
going to be a pretty bad one in terms of
rival political views. But honestly, honestly, now I can hold
my own in a political conversation. What I cannot handle,

(02:52):
what I absolutely cannot do is you know when Aunt
Becky sells essential oils or something like that, and random
cousin or random aunt just trying to get you embroiled
in their MLM. Can't do that. That That's what sends
me over the edge. So instead, instead for my Thanksgiving
it was just me, the dogs and absolute blissful silence.

(03:16):
It was wonderful. The most drama that I had came
when my dog Jupiter. If you guys know me at all,
you know that Jupiter is the love of my life.
He is a German short haired pointer. I am obsessed
with gsps obsessed. I have two. I've really started trying
to get into baking, specifically learning how to make a bread.
I did the Thanksgiving grocery run. I had an eighteen

(03:38):
count of happy eggs, and Jupiter decided that that eighteen
count box of eggs that I was going to use
just it had to die. It just had to die.
I guess it just needed to die. And what ensued
was catastrophic egg violence. It was carnage, it was egg apocalypse.
It was cleaning eight teen whole ass eggs off of

(04:01):
my hardwood floors. So I spent part of the day
on my knees, not in a good way, and it
was just not fun. But I guess that's on me
because I chose a breed that regularly commits felony level
property crimes. So that being said, how did you guys
do any drama? I love drama as long as it's
not my own. I love hearing the tea. So if
you guys had a rough Thanksgiving, and I mean this

(04:23):
in a serious tone as well, I know that Thanksgiving
can be isolating. You know, I have basically myself and
my wife, and you know, my wife is super, super
super close to her family, but I don't really have
any family myself at all. You know, I lost my
parents during COVID, so I understand how lonely it can be.
All I'm saying is that I understand that we're in

(04:44):
kind of that stretch every year that can be really
lonely and isolating for people who don't have big support systems.
So if anyone needs anything, I'm always here. Feel free
to reach out at any time. But enough with the
Thanksgiving drama and the sappiness, because we are here to
talk about other people's questionable life choices and decisions. Specifically,

(05:07):
for this episode, we are here to talk about the
New York City police officer who spent his free time
on a website called dark fetish Net And if you
guys recall, he was discussing in graphic detail how he
wanted to kidnap, torture, cook, and eat various women, including
his own wife. And his wife was the one who

(05:27):
discovered all of this, and she did what any rational
person would do. She copied everything, called the FBI, grabbed
the baby, and pieced the fuck out. And then after
is when everything got really weird. Because here's the thing,
this cop, Gilberto Valley, he will forever be known as
the cannibal cop. And I don't know if you kind

(05:48):
of gathered, but that's not really a nickname that you want.
But he never actually kidnapped anyone. He never hurt anyone,
He never ate anyone, He never actually attempted to hurt anyone.
He just talked about it online obviously a lot in horrifying,
horrifying detail. And the question that sent him to federal

(06:11):
prison and then eventually set him free, is this, Can
you be convicted of a crime that only existed in
your head? Spoiler alert? The answer is maybe. So today's
episode is going to be the case of Gilberto Valley,
the cannibal Cop, and I think that what really sparked
this episode when it happened years ago. I actually covered

(06:33):
this as kind of a live breaking news item, but
I never actually really did a deep dive on it.
And I've seen the documentary that he did. And what's
been particularly interesting, though, is all of the legal commentary
that's come out of this case. But before we get
into all of that, let's just get really quick housekeeping
out of the way. You are listening to We Saw
the Double. I'm Robin Hi. If you're not, please follow

(06:54):
the show. You can do that on Instagram at We
Saw the Double podcast on Facebook and Twitter at WESA
the Devil, and you can follow me if you want.
If you're bored, care about what I eat, the pets
that I have, the concerts that I go to at
Robin Underscore, WSTD and then also if you want ad
free or Patreon only episodes, there is a Patreon as well.

(07:16):
But let's go ahead and get into it. Our story
begins back in twenty twelve and what I can only
describe as the most nightmare fuel way a marriage can end.
I think it's safe to say we've all been through
our share of breakups. Finding infidelity, that's always my favorite.
Find out they cheated, you know, whatever reason. But picture this.

(07:38):
You're going through your husband's computer. Maybe you're looking for
tax documents, maybe you suspect he's cheating, who knows, But
instead of finding evidence of an affair, you find Well,
how about I read you what Gilberto Valley's wife found.
According to court documents, she discovered thousands of emails in

(07:59):
chat logs were her husband, a decorated NYPD officer, was
discussing in graphic, horrifying detail, how he wanted to kidnap, torture, kill, cook,
and eat various women, including their friends. Now I want
to pause right here because I know what you're thinking, Robin.
That's obviously a crime. Lock his ass up and listen.

(08:20):
I get it. But here's where it does actually get
a little bit complicated. Valley claimed that these were fantasies
role play. He was a member of a website called
dark fetish Net, which, yes, is exactly what it sounds like.
We're users with let's call them, unconventional sexual interests and proclivities,

(08:40):
would share stories and role play various scenarios. Think of
it like fan fiction, but instead of Harry Potter and
Draco Malfoy, it's it's about fucking and cooking people. His defense,
I like to press the envelope. But no matter what
I say, it's all fantasy. And you know what, on
some level that defense actually makes sense, because the Internet

(09:01):
is full of people writing disturbing shit they would never
actually do. There are entire subreddits with tens of thousands
of people dedicated to creative writing about violence. There are
horror authors out there who make Stephen King look like
Doctor Seuss. And while we're at it, how many of
you have listened to a true crime episode? And you

(09:23):
know there are a million memes out there about it
of oh my god, she's so stupid. She left behind
a fingerprint that you know on the door would handle
that way. She didn't think about that. I mean, how
many of you have thought about committing the perfect murder
just based on your interest in true crime and knowledge.
But here's what makes Valley's case different and why his
wife immediately called the FBI instead of just filing for divorce.

(09:44):
These weren't just generic fantasy stories. Valley was using real names,
real photos, his actual friends and acquaintances. He was accessing
police databases to pull up their addresses where they worked
their daily routines. He was sharing the this information with
strangers on the Internet and negotiating prices for kidnapping specific women.

(10:06):
According to the prosecution, one of Vali's chat partners, a
guy in Pakistan named Ali Khan, offered to pay him
five thousand dollars for one of his targets. They discussed
shipping costs for getting a woman from New York to Pakistan.
They debated cooking methods. And this is where I need
to read you some actual excerpts from these chats, because

(10:26):
you need to understand just how detailed and disturbing this
shit was. Vali, using the handle MHL fifty two, told
Ali Khan quote, Yeah, I really want her to be
alive in the oven. I want her to experience being
cooked alive. Con responded, tire in a hogtied position and
put her in an oven. She will be a cool meat. Valley. No,

(10:51):
she'll be trussed up like a turkey, laying on her back,
her hands tied in front of her, her feet crossed
at the ankles and tied up. Then the hands and
feet connected, tied with cooking twine like Jesus Christ. And
then it gets worse. In another chat, Valley discussed one
of his wife's friends, let's call her Andrea, because that's
what the court documents call her, and described in detail

(11:14):
how he would abduct her, where he would take her,
and how long he would keep her alive. He talked
about using chloroform. He talked about sound proofed basements. He
talked about giant ovens and Pulley systems. So when his
wife found all this, she did what any reasonable human
would do. She copied everything, She took it to the FBI,

(11:35):
She packed up their baby daughter, and she got the
fuck out. The FBI moved fast. They analyzed Valley's computer
found approximately forty chats they believed represented actual conspiracy planning,
and then promptly arrested him the charges conspiracy to commit kidnapping.
And here's the kicker on that. Though in federal conspiracy law,

(11:59):
you don't actually have to do the crime, you just
have to agree to do it and take one overt
act in furtherance of that agreement. One act, And according
to prosecutors, Valley had taken plenty of overt acts. He'd
looked up his targets in police databases, he'd visited one

(12:20):
of them at work, he had brunch with another one.
Granted he brought his wife an infant daughter to that brunch,
which seems like a weird move for a kidnapping reconnaissance mission,
but I digress. He'd searched how to make chloroform on
the internet. He'd given some of these women PBA cards,
you know, those little Union cards cops give to friends
so that they get pulled over the officer might go

(12:41):
easy on them. Prosecutors argue that this was to gain
their trust and to make them easier targets. So in
October of twenty twelve, Gilberto Valley was arrested and charged
with conspiracy to commit kidnapping, which carries a maximum sentence
of life in prison, and America collectively lost. It's goddamn mind.

(13:02):
Do you guys remember when this at the news, when
this case happened. I do, and I was absolutely obsessed.
Valley's trial started in February of twenty thirteen, and it
was a media circus from day one. I mean, I mean,
come on the headline of cannibal cop. That is tabloid
heaven right there. The New York Post ran with headlines

(13:23):
like NYPD stew as cannibal cop plots to cook and
eat women. ABC News went with a little bit more
muted Cannibal cop plotted to eat one hundred women. But
beneath the sensational headlines, there was a genuinely fascinating legal
question at the heart of this case. Where's the line
between fantasy and crime. The prosecution's case was simple, Valley

(13:46):
wasn't just fantasizing, he was planning, and they had the
chats to prove it. Their key witness was FBI agent
Corey Walsh, who testified that of the thousands of chats
recovered from Valley's computer, 'BI determined that forty represented actual
conspiracy discussions, while the rest were quote mere fantasy. Now

(14:08):
you might be wondering, like I was, how the hell
did they make that distinction? Well, Walsh explained that they
concluded a chat was fantasy when participants used the word fantasy,
and concluded it was real when they didn't use that word,
and when the two people were sharing real details of women, names,

(14:29):
what appeared to be photographs of the women, details of
past crimes, and saying that they were for real. So
let me just translate that methodology there. We know it's
real because they said it was real, and we know
it's fantasy because they said it was fantasy. Fucking brilliant
detective work there. Guys like, I don't know how this
is going to sound in the mic, but I am

(14:50):
clapping because the defense tore into this logic as they should,
and pointed out that many elements the FBI claimed indicated
real plot, like negotiating prices, discussing chloroform, sharing photos, also
appeared in the chats the FBI dismissed as fantasy. In fact,

(15:10):
one of the chats the FBI categorized as quote near
fantasy involved Valley telling someone he would kidnap that same
woman Andrea that I mentioned earlier and stick her in
the oven while she's still alive at a relatively low heat.
So the exact same crime, the same woman, in the
same method, but one was real and one was fantasy

(15:31):
and based on what overall vibes. And here's where the
prosecution actually had some compelling evidence. It wasn't just the
chats themselves, it was what Valley also did in the
real world, because, don't forget, he'd access the police database
called finest over one hundred times to look up women.

(15:53):
He'd search their addresses, their workplaces, their personal information. And
he wasn't supposed to do that as an NYPD officer.
He was only authorized to access that database for legitimate
police work. He'd physically visited some of these women. He'd
met one for lunch, he'd shown up at another's workplace,
supposedly to say hi. And then there was the chloroform search.

(16:17):
Valley had visited a website. I shit, you not called
how to make chloroform dot net? I mean, come on,
that's not even subtle. That's like googling how to hide
a body and then claiming you were just curious about
forensics of it, all right, Like come on, Well, the
prosecution also showed the jury Valley's Internet history, which, as

(16:39):
you can imagine, was extensive, hours and hours of videos
and images depicting women being tortured, cooked, eaten. Some of
it was real and just straight up snuff film adjacent.
The prosecutor, Assistant US Attorney Randall Jackson, told the jury
gil Valley's fantasy is about seeing women exit. The fantasies

(17:01):
that he's engaging in are about seeing women sexually assaulted, executed,
and left for dead. That's not a fantasy, that is okay.
And you know what, he had a point. Even if
it was all fantasy, it was deeply disturbing fantasy, the
kind of fantasy that makes you want to keep your
children far away from the rest of the world. But

(17:22):
here's the thing, deeply disturbing and illegal are not the
same thing. The defense's case was equally straightforward. This was
all fantasy. Sick fantasy, sure, but fantasy. Nonetheless, Valley's attorney
pointed out the absurdity of the prosecution's real plots. In
one chat Valley allegedly took seriously, he described kidnapping a

(17:45):
woman and taking her to his mountain cabin, where he
had a sound proofed basement with a Pulley system and
a giant oven big enough to roast a human being.
Cool story, bro, except VALLEI didn't have a mountain cabin
or a van, or a basement, or a Pulley system
or a giant fucking oven. In another real chat, Valley

(18:05):
promised to deliver a woman to his chat partner in Pakistan.
But neither Valley nor his supposed co conspirator ever bought
plane tickets, never made hotel reservations, never even discussed actual
logistics behind fantasy role play. And here's what really undercuts
the prosecution's theory. Valley and his chat partners would set

(18:26):
specific dates for these kidnappings. We'll do it on October twelfth.
Then October twelfth would come and go, and nothing, no
follow up, no hey what happened, No complaints that Valley
failed to deliver. Instead, they just move on to the
next fantasy plot with the next woman, like the previous
conversation had never even happened. The defense also tried to

(18:48):
normalize what Valley was doing by showing the jury what
Dark fetish Net actually looked like. They played a deposition
from the website's founder, Sergei Merinkov, who testified that the
site was created for fantasy roleplay and had tens of
thousands of members. They even had their paralegal give the
jury a video tour of the site to show them

(19:08):
that Valley's behavior, while extreme, wasn't unique. There were hundreds
of users engaging in similar conversations just about cannibalism, kidnapping, torture,
and all of it claimed to be fantasy. The defense's
argument was essentially, yeah, our client is a fucking freak. Yeah,

(19:29):
yeah he is, But being a freak isn't a crime.
After twelve days of testimony, and I can only imagine
how those jurors felt sitting through twelve days of this shit,
the case went to deliberation. Sixteen hours later, the jury
came back with a verdict guilty. Gilberto Valley was convicted
of conspiracy to commit kidnapping and faced up to life

(19:51):
in prison. The legal community and civil liberty's advocates went
ape shit because here's what just happened. A man was
convicted of conspiracy to commit a crime based entirely on
his online conversations and Google searches. No actual victim, no
actual crime, no actual attempt at a crime beyond accessing

(20:13):
a police database he wasn't supposed to use and having
lunch with a friend. The ACLU and other First Amendment
groups started raising alarms about thought crime. I mean, as
you guys already know. The documentary about this case is
called thought crime. Op Eds appeared asking whether we'd entered
an Orwellian future where the government could prosecute you based

(20:34):
on your fantasies. One columnist wrote, it's time to defend
the cannibal cop. He's a weirdo, not a monster, and
the US Attorney's office means to roast him on the
spit of prudery and overcaution. The case even inspired a
Law and Order SVU episode, because of course it did.
If you didn't follow this case, I know you saw
it on SVU. But for Gilberto Valley, this wasn't theoretical.

(20:58):
This wasn't a debate about free speed the limits of
government power. This was his life, and he was facing
life in federal prison for conversations he claimed were all fantasy.
So Valley's attorney filed a motion for acquittal. Basically, he
asked the judge to overrule the jury and throw out
the conviction. These motions almost never work like federal judges

(21:21):
do not enjoy telling twelve citizens, Hey, I know you
spent weeks listening to evidence and deliberating, but you're wrong.
Just you know, thanks though, thanks for your time. Though
that doesn't happen frequently at all. But in June of
twenty fourteen, over a year after Valley was convicted, the
judge did exactly that. In a stunning one hundred and
eighteen page opinion, the judge granted the motion and acquitted

(21:44):
value of the conspiracy charge. Let me read you part
of this decision. The judge wrote, despite the highly disturbing
nature of Valley's deviant and depraved sexual interests, his chats
and emails about these interests are not sufficient standing alone
to make out the elements of conspiracy to commit kidnapping.

(22:05):
There must be evidence that Valley intended to act on
these interests. The judge went through every single chat the
prosecution claimed was real and systematically explained why the evidence
was insufficient to prove Vali actually intended to kidnap anyone.
He pointed out that Valley lied constantly in these chats
about his own identity, about the women's identities, about having equipment,

(22:30):
and locations he didn't actually have. If you're seriously planning
a kidnapping, why would you lie to your co conspirator
about basic facts. The judge noted that the so called
overt acts, the lunches, the workplace visits, the PBA cards
were all equally consistent with innocent conduct as with conspiracy.

(22:50):
I mean, think about it. If I meet you for
brunch and bring my wife and baby and you're a friend,
am I really scouting for your kidnapping? Or are we
just having brunch together. But here's the part of the
opinion that I think is the most important quote. The
court is mindful of the unique circumstances of this case,
a conspiracy alleged to have taken place almost exclusively in

(23:13):
cyberspace and in a context in which the defendant engaged
in countless fantasy role playing conversations. In determining whether the
government proved beyond a reasonable doubt values criminal intent his
specific intent to actually kidnap a woman, the fact that
no kidnappings took place and that no real world, concrete

(23:33):
steps toward committing a kidnapping wherever undertaken is significant. In
other words, if you're going to convict someone of conspiracy
based on internet chats. You need some actual evidence they
intended to follow through, not just disturbing conversations, not just
Google or database searches. You need evidence of intent to

(23:54):
actually commit the crime, and the government and the government
didn't have that. Now, the government did appeal this decision,
because of course they did. The prosecution had invested significant
resources in this case and they were not about to
let it go without a fight. But in twenty fifteen,
the Second Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the acquittal. The

(24:15):
appeals court agreed that Vallei's conviction couldn't stand because the
evidence was insufficient to prove he actually intended to kidnap anyone.
They wrote that the case presented a fact pattern that
lies at the border of criminality. Translation, this was close, fam,
but ultimately you can't send someone to prison for life
based on fantasies alone. So Valley walked free after spending

(24:37):
twenty one months in federal custody twenty one months for
a crime he was ultimately found not to have committed.
So happy ending, right guy, wrongly convicted. Justice system corrects itself.
Everyone goes home a happy day. Not quite. Gilberto Valley's
life was completely destroyed by this. He lost his job

(25:00):
with the NYPD, obviously as he should have. His wife
divorced him and has full custody of their daughter. His
name is now permanently associated with being the cannibal cop.
I mean, just google Gilberto Valley and see what comes up.
None off. It's good, I assure you. In a twenty
eighteen interview, Velly said he still visits dark fetish net.

(25:22):
He's unapologetic about his fantasies, which I mean, I guess,
good for him, Like, that's probably not how I would
have played it, but Okay, the court found him not guilty,
and he has every right to his private sexual interest,
no matter how disturbing other people find them, I guess.

(25:43):
But he also said something that I think gets to
the heart of why this case matters. He said, I
want a new life. I want to contribute to society.
I want to have a job, I want to have
a family. I want to be a dad. The problem
is that even though he was acquitted, he's still the cannibal.
That stain will never wash off. And then here's a

(26:03):
fun PostScript. In twenty twenty one, Valley published a horror novel,
because if you're already infamous for your disturbing, fucked up fantasies,
you may as well monetize it. Right. It's called a
gathering of evil, and it's about it's about, wait for it,
a serial killer who kidnaps and murders women. I have
not read it, and I'm going to be completely blunt,

(26:26):
I will not be reading it. But according to reviews,
it's apparently not terrible, which is somehow even more disturbing.
But let's talk about why this case actually matters, because
the legal questions here are so fascinating to me, because
what is the line between fantasy and criminal conspiracy. Well,
the law says that conspiracy requires an agreement to commit

(26:48):
a crime plus one over to act in furtherance. But
when the agreement happens in a fantasy roleplay forum, and
the avert act could be anything from buying rope to
googling chloroform to just having lunch with someone, where is
the actual line. I read a really fascinating journal article
by a Duke law and it makes a really compelling

(27:09):
argument that conspiracy laws requirements are way too weak to
protect against exactly this kind of case. The overt Act requirement,
and conspiracy law is supposed to ensure that bad thoughts
only become crimes when they pose an actual threat to society,
But in practice, almost anything can count as an overt act,

(27:30):
making a phone call, driving to another city, googling something.
So if the overt act requirement is basically meaningless and
agreement can be inferred from context, so what you're left
with is thought crime. You're prosecuting someone based on what
they intended, with very little evidence of actual intent to
commit a crime. I mean, secondly, what about the First Amendment.

(27:54):
The government has always maintained that conspiracy agreement isn't protected
speed because it's not really speech, it's conduct. It's an
act of agreeing to commit a crime. But in the
context of online roleplay, how do you distinguish between I'm
agreeing to commit a crime and I'm engaging in dark

(28:15):
sexual fantasy with another consenting adult. The prosecution in Valley's
case argue that they could tell the difference based on
whether the participants use the word fantasy and whether they
shared real details. But that's a really fucking arbitrary distinction.
I mean, consider consider that there are hundreds of thousands,
maybe millions of people engaging in similar conversations online, people

(28:39):
writing violent fan fiction, people role playing, people role playing
rape scenarios, people discussing murder and the abstract. Are we
going to start prosecuting everyone who writes disturbing fiction, everyone
who roleplays dark scenarios with other consenting adults, everyone who
googles something disturbing? Because if we are, we're going to

(29:02):
need a lot more prisons. Right Like, if we are, i'd, like,
I know, I'd be in prison. We're gonna have to
build quite a few more. And then, lastly, what about
the fact that Valley was a cop? You know, I
glossed over this earlier, but let's be honest. The fact
that Valley was an NYPD officer with access to weapons,

(29:23):
police resources, and detailed information about potential victims. I mean
that absolutely colored how this case was perceived, probably the
biggest factor of this case. If Valley had been some
random it guy, would the FBI have pursued this case
as aggressively as it did, Would a jury have been
as quick to convict? The prosecution repeatedly emphasized that Valley

(29:48):
was a police officer walking around New York City every
single day with a loaded weapon who had a primary
sexual fantasy of seeing women mutilated and harmed in specific ways,
horrific ways. And you know what, that is scary The
idea that someone with that kind of power has access
and someone like that who could harbor these type of fantasies.

(30:10):
I mean, it's legitimately horrifying and concerning, but it's also
not a crime. We can't start convicting people for being scary.
And there's also a darker question here about kink shaming
and moral panic too. Look, and I'm not gonna sit
here pretend that cannibalism fantasies are normal or healthy. They
are not, and they are objectively disturbing as hell. But

(30:32):
the reality is that human sexuality is weird and complicated
and often doesn't make logical sense. There are people with
rape fantasies who would never want that to happen to
them in real life. There are people with kidnapping fantasies
who would never want to be kidnapped. There are people
with vre fantasies. Yes, that's what cannibalism fetishes are called,

(30:52):
and these people have zero interest in actually being cannibalized.
Fantasy is not reality, and when we start proscuting people
for their fantasies. We are entering dangerous territory because whose
fantasies are acceptable and whose aren't? Who gets to decide?
Who gets to decide that? The government argued in Valley's

(31:13):
case that his fantasies crossed the line because they involved
real people, real names, real photos. But people write fan
fiction about celebrities, real celebrities all the time. Some of
it is disturbingly violent. Is that prosecutable? What about people
who fantasize about killing their boss or their ex or
that asshole who cut them off in traffic? Is eminem

(31:35):
going to go to prison if thinking about violence as
a crime. We're all criminals. But what happened to everyone
involved in this case? As a couple years have passed now,
while Gilberto Valley, as I mentioned, published his horror novel
and has done occasional media interviews, he's largely disappeared from
public life otherwise, which honestly, I don't blame him. His

(31:58):
ex wife has maintained primary custody of their daughter and
has stayed completely out of the media. Smart woman that
FBI agents and prosecutors involved in the case have gone
on to other cases no one got in trouble for
pursuing what ultimately turned out to be insufficient evidence for conviction.
And the co conspirators, well, that's where it gets interesting.

(32:19):
Do you guys remember Michael van Hyes, one of Valley's
chat partners. He was also arrested and tried, but unlike Valley,
his conviction was not overturned. He served a seventy month
sentence over five years for conspiracy to commit kidnapping. And
why did van Heis's conviction stand when Gilberto Valleys didn't?

(32:42):
Good fucking question. The evidence against both men was similar,
like disturbing chats, some Google searches, accessing information, etc. The
difference seems to be that Van Heys's judge wasn't as
willing as Gilberto's to second guest the jury's verdict, which
really drives home how arbitrary all of this was. Valley

(33:02):
and Van Hies engaged in similar conduct on the same website,
in some cases discussing the very same women. One walks free,
one serves five years in federal prison. And that's just
a coin flip. And what's also terrifying is that I
did read up on Van Hies's case and that's what
this again, why this is also arbitrary and so weird.
Like I have zero down in my mind that Van

(33:23):
Heyes actually would have killed and eaten someone like I
have zeroed out in my mind that he actually would
have done that and was actively working towards that goal,
whereas with Gilbert A. Valley, I really don't believe that
he actually would. I do believe that it was all
talk and fantasy for him, But for Van Hies, I
don't believe that it was, even though both men largely
took the same steps. Does that make sense? Absolutely crazy.

(33:47):
But there are some really fascinating academic papers written about
this case. Again, the one from Duke Law Journal that
I cited earlier I highly recommend reading because it argues
for strengthening conspiracy laws overt act requirement to prevent exactly
this kind of case from happening in the future. And
the author of that also proposes that we need to
do that because you know, with online and more people

(34:10):
able to form communities and so on and so forth,
that this could be a reoccurring theme potentially in law.
There's also another paper from Stanford Law School that basically
examined how juris process evidence in cases like these and
found that a lot of people tend to conflate disturbing
with criminal, which I mean, no shit, first of all.

(34:32):
But you know, if you put a jury in a
room and show them twelve days of evidence about someone's
cannibal fantasies, they're going to convict. They're going to think, Wow,
this person is dangerous and needs to be locked up,
off the streets, throw away the key. That's human nature,
and it's exactly why we have requirements like proof beyond
a reasonable doubt or innocent until proven guilty. The system

(34:54):
is supposed to protect us from our own worst impulses,
including the impulse to punish people for being weird or scary.
In tying all of this up, you guys, I guess
to take away from this particular case is that GILBERTA.
Valley is not a sympathetic figure. He has deeply disturbing fantasies.

(35:15):
He accessed information about women he shouldn't have accessed. He
engaged in role play that, if you didn't know it
was role play, would absolutely indicate someone planning some serious
hannibal lecter kind of crimes. But he never actually did
hurt anyone. He never attempted to hurt anyone, never took
any concrete steps toward actually committing a kidnapping beyond the

(35:38):
kind of steps anyone could take, like googling stuff, meeting
people thinking about it. This case represents everything wrong with
how we prosecute conspiracy in the Internet age. The overt
act requirement is meaningless. The agreement element can be inferred
from almost anything. Injuries are asked to determine intent based

(35:58):
on their gut feelings about just content. That's not a
criminal justice system. That's a panic system. And the scary
part is that this case could happen to anyone. You
might not have cannibal fantasies yourself, but you probably have
some fantasy or interest or search history that taken out
of context and presented to a jury could make you

(36:20):
look dangerous. Maybe you googled how to get away with
murder because you're, you know, into true crime listening to this.
Maybe you wrote violent fiction. Maybe you're an author. Maybe
you painted something and you know, looked up something violent.
Maybe you've engaged in role play with a partner that
involves scenarios you'd never actually want to happen. Should you

(36:42):
go to federal prison for that. According to the logic
of Valley's prosecution. Maybe the Second Circuit got it right,
in my opinion when they said this case lies at
the border of criminality. But here's the thing about borders,
they are supposed to protect both sides. The government should
absolutely investigate when someone appears to be planning a serious

(37:03):
violent crime, absolutely, but investigation is not the same as prosecution,
and prosecution should require actual evidence of actual intent to
commit an actual crime, not just disturbing fantasies, not just
weird google searches, and not just being a creepy fuck
with a badge. Because if we start locking people up

(37:23):
for their thoughts, even their most disturbing, most uncomfortable, most
socially unacceptable thoughts, we're not fighting crime, We're creating it.
This case has always fascinated me in a very similar
way to the Michelle Carter case out of Massachusetts, where
if you recall, she's the girl who was convicted of
texting her boyfriend at the time to get back in

(37:45):
the car and finish the job and kill himself, so
she was charged for that. I really love comment sections
like I love comment sections just to read and see
how other people are feeling about things. I never comment
on anything myself, I am. I'm purely a lurker, but
especially when it comes to criminal cases and stuff like that.

(38:05):
I love comment sections, and I recall back in twenty twelve,
twenty thirteen, when this case hit the fan, I loved
the comment sections because they were so deeply divided. So
I went and I looked at some comment sections, especially
after the documentary aired, which is still available. I think
it's on Peacock, either Peacock or Paramount or was it Hulu.
I don't know, I can't remember. I love y'all, but

(38:27):
I'm not going to google that right now. People are
very deeply divided on this case, like not just in Oh,
I see both sides kind of divided. I mean genuinely
polarized in a way that tells you a lot about
how we think right about crime, punishment and what people deserve.
So I've noticed what this case. There are multiple camps.
A lot of people believe he's obviously guilty. He was

(38:48):
planning to kill someone and he got away with it.
And this is probably the most common take, and I
get it. One commenter wrote something like, if your husband
is googling how to make chloroform and discussing cooking you
alive was strangers on the internet. You don't need a
conviction to know you married a psychopath. And that is
absolutely a fair point, random internet person, you know. And
Valley's wife absolutely did do the right thing by taking

(39:10):
their daughter and getting the fuck out of Dodge, no question.
Another person in the comments section said, just because he
didn't succeed doesn't mean he wasn't planning it. We arrest
people for attempted murder all the time. Why is this different?
And I get that too. And here's the problem with
that logic, though, is that we don't arrest people for
attempted murder when they never attempted the murder. We arrest

(39:31):
them when they, you know, attempt it when they buy
the gun, show up at the place, pull the trigger.
And miss Valley never bought a rope, he never rented
a van, he never scouted at a location, never make chloroform.
He just googled it, which is something someone will probably
thousands of people do every day, probably even thousands of
breaking bad fans alone have done. On a post about

(39:54):
this case on Reddit, one user said, if we're going
to convict people for Google searches and disturbing conversations. We
better start building a lot more prisons because half the
internet is guilty, I mean fair someone else. He's completely innocent,
and this is Orwellian, you know. And what's interesting is
on the flip side, you've got the hardcore civil libertarians
who think that Valley is like a martyr for free speech.

(40:17):
One person said, this is literal thought crime. He never
hurt anyone, he never tried to hurt anyone. He had
disturbing fantasies, and the government sent him to prison for it.
That's fascism. And I have sympathy for this argument, I
sincerely do. The idea that the government can read your
private conversations, decide your fantasies are too fucked up, and
luck you out for life like that is genuinely terrifying.

(40:39):
But here's where this camp loses me. They are ignoring
the fact that Valley was a cop. He wasn't just
some random joe on a fetish forum. He was a
police officer with a gun, a badge, and access to
detailed information about potential victims, which he utilized, which he utilized.

(41:01):
He was using police resources. The finest database to stalk
women and share their information with strangers online. You know,
one person pointed out, people keep saying he didn't take
any steps towards committing the crime, but accessing restricted databases
to get women's addresses and sharing that information with people
who claim they want to kidnap them. That's a step,

(41:22):
that's multiple steps, And honestly, that is true. Even if
you don't think it rises to the level of conspiracy,
it's definitely a fireable offense and probably illegal misuse of
police resources. And I'm going to go one step further here.
I'm going to go one step further here, and I'm
going to be completely honest. Had I been on that jury,

(41:46):
I probably would have convicted as well. And I think
that the step what I would have considered an over
to act would have been him using the police database
to run the private details, but it would have been
sharing it with the other people that I've discussed the
women with, which legally, obviously that is not an overt act,

(42:06):
but in my mind it should be because imagine, guys,
imagine your husband, right, Like, imagine you go to your
husband's computer, you pull it up, you see the chats,
and that he pulled all of the personal information about
your lifelong best friend. You know, you have a close
best friend that you're friends with, and he all used
the police database to pull up all of her personal information, address, workplace, pictures,

(42:31):
everything and sent it to other strangers on the internet
who were also talking about raping and cooking and killing
and eating her. That is just too much for me.
And then a lot of people do talk about the
fact that he is a cop. You know, one commentor said,
if you're a kindergarten teacher with a sexual attraction to children,
even if you never act on it, you shouldn't be
a kindergarten teacher. Same logic applies here. If you're a

(42:54):
cop who fantasizes about kidnapping and eating women, you shouldn't
have access to a police database and a gun. And
I think that's probably right. You know, there's a difference
between you should go to federal prison for life and
you should not be allowed to be a police officer anymore.
The problem is that our criminal justice system doesn't really
have a middle setting. It's either completely innocent or decades
in prison, and there's no hey, you're a criminal, Hey

(43:17):
you're not a criminal, But you're definitely too dangerous for
this job option, you know. And then you've obviously got
the folks that, you know, usually people in the king communities,
who argue that Valley's prosecution was fundamentally about punishing unconventional sexuality.
People went off about the rough the rape fantasies, BDSM

(43:39):
role play, kidnapping, stancenarios, and all of that. The prosecution
definitely weaponized Vallee's sexuality against him for this, because I mean,
there's a difference between again, you know my opinion here,
but there's the difference between rape fantasy role play and
then detailed plans to kidnap real people who didn't consent
to that, or having their shared. But my take is

(44:02):
that everyone's right and everyone's wrong. I do believe I
think the jury was right that Valley's behavior was deeply
concerning and probably indicated some level of intent beyond pure fantasy.
The evidence wasn't nothing, you know, the chats were pretty
freaking detailed, the database searches were real, the patterns were there.
But the judge was also right that it wasn't enough

(44:22):
for conspiracy conviction because conspiracy requires proof beyond a reasonable doubt,
and that you entered into an agreement to commit a crime,
and the evidence just didn't get there either. You know,
what we needed and what the system that we have
couldn't provide was something in between, like some legal mechanism
that says we're not sending you to federal prison for life,
but we're absolutely watching you. You're losing your job, and

(44:44):
you're going on some kind of registry because what you
did was pretty fucking alarming, even if it wasn't criminal.
But we don't have that. I think this case is
so uncomfortable for so many people because the reality of
it is that it doesn't fit neatly into any specific narrati. Simultaneously,
Valley can be a creepy weirdo who absolutely should have

(45:05):
lost his job, someone whose First Amendment rights were violated,
a person who may or may not have had genuine
intent to harm, someone who served nearly two years for
a crime he ultimately didn't commit, someone whose acquittal might
embolden actual predators, and someone whose conviction would have set
a terrifying precedent for thought crime had it stood. All

(45:27):
of these things can be true at once. And one
Reddit comment stuck with me on this case, and someone
wrote The scary thing about this case isn't the verdict.
It's the fact that we have no idea what the
right answer is. And that is exactly right, because this
case does sit at that intersection of free speech, public safety,

(45:49):
sexual deviance, police accountability, and the limits of criminal law.
You know, there's no clean answer. There is no solution here,
at least one that's simple. He tried to protect public
safety and probably convicted an innocent man. The judge tried
to protect civil liberties and probably freed someone who is
actually dangerous. Both outcomes are defensible, and both outcomes are troubling.

(46:14):
And that's why this case matters, not because it gives
us answers, but because it shows us how broken the
questions are. We're using eighteenth century legal frameworks to prosecute
twenty first century digital behavior, and we're asking twelve random
citizens to draw lines that legal scholars can't even agree on.
That's not a justice system, that's a fucking legia board.

(46:38):
And where does that leave us now? I genuinely do
not know. I know that Valley's wife did the right thing.
I know that Valleys should not have been a cop,
and I'm very happy that he lost his job. I
know that the original conviction was legally unsound, and I
know that the acquittal feels kind of unsatisfying, but that
was also the right thing to do. And I also

(46:59):
know that somewhere in America right now, someone else is
having a conversation just like Gilberto Valleys. And we have
no idea if it's fantasy or planning. We have no
idea if we should intervene. We have no idea where
the line is. And until we figure that out, until
we develop better legal tools for dealing like cases that

(47:19):
live here in this odd gray area between thought and action,
we are going to keep getting results like this. You know,
everyone's angry, everyone's unsatisfied, and no one knows where to
go from here. And if you want to read some
of the debates on this, just google Cannibal cop specifically
read it or anywhere else any article on this you

(47:42):
will see. Prepare to lose several hours of your life
watching strangers argue they are bless their hearts. They are
going hard on constitutional law and sexual ethics. But that
is it for today. Guys, again, you've been listening till
we saw the devil. I'm Robin. If you enjoy the episode.
Feel free to follow. You can do so at We

(48:03):
saw the Double podcast on Instagram, we saw The Devil
on Facebook, Twitter, website, we saw thedouble dot com and
if you're interested, there is also a Patreon as well
for ad free episodes and Patreon only episodes, and you
can assist in picking show topics. That's it for today
all until next crime

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Gilberto Valle: The Cannibal Cop | Fantasy or Felony?