Murder at Greystone Mansion - with Dearly Departed’s Scott Michaels - A Study of Strange

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:01):
February 16th, 1929,
Beverly Hills, California.
Ned Doheny, son of an oiltycoon, is visited by
his personal secretary,Hugh Plunkett, at Doheny.
His massive and breathtaking mansion
known today as Greystone.
After a few hours of conversingand drinking,

(00:23):
two gunshots ring out through the mansion
and both men are found dead.
The police were not immediately calledwhen they did show up.
They would quickly concludethat this was a murder suicide.
Case closed.
Over the years, rumors and speculationhave led most

(00:43):
to believe the murder suicidewas more than meets the eye.
From no fingerprints found on the gun,the bodies being moved
gossiped that this was a lover's quarrelgone wrong.
Not to mention that both menwere in the middle of a political scandal.
The deaths at GreystoneMansion is a case for the ages,
and anyone who may have knownthe truth is probably long gone.

(01:07):
This is a study of strange.

(01:28):
Well, welcome to the show.
I'm Michael May.
And joining me today is Scott Michaelsof the dearly departed Tours.
Scott,I don't know if you're even aware of this,
but you actually are a little bitof like a local L.A.
celebritybecause a lot of people have been such
fans of your tours over the years.
Were you aware of that?
Am I incorrect in even calling you a localcelebrity?

(01:50):
Well.
I well, I can say that people
will come to me because I can stringa sentence or two together.
And I know a bit about Hollywood.
So I have become part of the landscapein Hollywood,
despite the fact that I'm no longer in it.
But yeah, I was around.
I've done I've been in the darktourism business for over 25 years,

(02:10):
and I had my own museum, so I was at theforefront of all that stuff for sure.
Mm hmm.
Is it specifically kind of like the darkside of Hollywood that intrigues you?
Or is it just are you a fan of kindof mysteries and true crime in general?
Like, what got you into that?
Well, the stories I gravitate
towards are peoplethat I know a little bit about.

(02:32):
I use the analogy like, if I wanted to
if I was walking past, say, a dead body,as you do,
I you know, I wouldn't need to look.
But if it was MarilynMonroe, I'd want to look.
It's sort of you needI need that association not just as a
you know, I'm reading a storyjust because of the murder.
I want to know more about the peoplebehind the murder.

(02:54):
That's always been my.
But I also am interestedin a whole lot of different things.
I always said
it was sort of a light heartedlook at the dark side of Hollywood right.
Right. And because of that,you've gotten involved.
I know you've worked on some moviesand consulted on some various projects
and things.
Do you want to talk a little bitabout that at all or kind of
let people know where they might be ableto see some of your work?

(03:15):
Sure.
Well, probably when Mike Dorsey and I,who was a mutual friend of ours,
he reached out to me to make a documentaryand we put a couple
we put three together, actually,
and the most well known is calledthe Six Degrees of Helter Skelter.
And I've always been sort ofwhen they say obsessed by
but I've always been very interestedand studied the Tate-LaBianca murders.

(03:37):
And Mike saw that in me.
And between the two of us, really,we put this thing together
and I had a tour devoted strictly
to the Tate-LaBiancamurders called the Helter Skelter Tour.
Now, that documentarygot a lot of attention,
and it brought me to the attentionof the people who produced the TV show
Aquarius that was looselybased on the Tate-LaBianca murders.

(04:00):
And ultimately,Quentin Tarantino saw the documentary
and hired me to consult on OnceUpon a Time in Hollywood
with the history of the victimsin the crimes themselves.
Although the crimes weren't,I shouldn't say I want to be a spoiler,
but he wanted to know moreabout the victims and their lives,
and I was happyto provide those details. Yes.

(04:21):
And I know that he strivedfor a lot of authenticity
and sort of the locationsand the characters in that movie.
And it might be my favoriteTarantino movie.
Honestly, I really like that movie.
I yeah,I can't say I was a huge Tarantino fan.
I liked his meat.
I liked his movies.
But this one, of course,I have a huge emotional attachment,
not just because the involvement,but because I've studied those people

(04:42):
for so many yearsand to see them come to life and be happy.
And that was a real that was very moving.
And it was the closestI'd ever get the time travel.
Well,thank you so much for doing this show.
I thought of you because of Mike Dorsey,who has been on my show before.
Everybody can listen to his BiggieSmalls episode,
but he he and I talked a bitabout dearly departed,

(05:04):
and I've listened to your podcast,the dearly departed podcast as well.
And I was like,Oh, you know, I should reach out to you.
If I'm doing a story that eithertakes place in Hollywood or L.A.
or someone that basically find somebodythat has some knowledge
about local, you know, mysteriesor murders or anything like that.
And so today I am lucky enough to have you

(05:25):
because we are covering the Greystonemansion, the murder suicide side with E.L.
Doheny, his son Ned.
And this is a it's just a strange story.
And I first came across itbecause I used to go visit
the Greystone mansion in Beverly Hillsbecause it's a park nowadays.
When I first moved to L.A.
and I would bringwhenever I had family visiting,

(05:45):
I would take them to the Greystone mansionjust because it's beautiful.
You get to walk around,you can bring food and have a picnic
and see the mansion in the grounds.
And that's
when I first learned of this story, whichwe'll we'll dive into here in a second.
It is an odd one.
And it does involve a political scandal.
It involveslots of rumors and conjecture nowadays.

(06:06):
And what I thinkI'm going to do to start us off
is give a very brief synopsisof the murder suicide.
Like the night of the murder suicideand then go back in time
and kind of fillin some historical details and the who,
what, when, where,how all those kind of questions.
And the reason I'm going to do that isbecause as I was researching this story,

(06:29):
there very much is a like commonly held
story of what happenedthat night at the Greystone mansion.
And then when you research it, some ofthose details are actually incorrect.
And listeners know that I lovekind of like the common story
and comparing it to somethingthat has more detail, I don't want to say
comparing it to the true story,because there still is
there's a chance of some coverup in this in this murder suicide.

(06:54):
So I am curious
and you've told me, you know, a little bitabout this story, if I was to ask you
and I don't want to put you on the spotso you don't have to do this.
But if I was to say,
could you explain what happenedthat night in 1929, on February three,
and I can't find the date, but in 1929,could you, like, do a brief
hey, here's what happenedor here's what I remember of this story.

(07:16):
You're going to think I'm an asshole,but I can't.
I guess my work as a tour guide, as atour guide, you know, going by the place,
as most of them do, while actuallymost of them probably don't.
But you would point out the mansionbecause of the movies
that were filmed there.
And then they would they would say,
you know,in the 1920s, they wouldn't even say 1929.

(07:36):
But they would say, you know, thethe Ned Doheny, who was the son of
Doheny of the Teapot Teapot Dome scandal,
was murdered by his boyfriend,Hugh Plunkett, who then turned
the gun on himself and so died inas a sort of lover, spurned.
I guess you would. Yes. Yes.
Oh, that's perfect. I'm glad.
I'm glad that's even your brief synopsis.

(07:56):
So, yeah, I'll I'll kind of fillin a couple of little holes
and then I'lland then we'll start at the beginning
and kind of do some historybecause we got to explore.
E.L. Doheny, Ned's father,the Teapot Dome scandal.
They all kind of connected with thisin really interesting ways.
So the characters of of that murdersuicide you just mentioned, Ned Doheny.
He was 36 at the time of this.

(08:17):
He worked for his father,a very prolific oil
man, guy who was going to try to dothe voice from There will be Blood
and his kind of peoplerefer to the other guy.
His name is Hugh Plunkettas Ned's personal secretary.
Sometimes you read that it says Chauffeur.
Chauffeur?
Yeah, that's the one I've heard the most.

(08:39):
He's actually just an old friend.
They had been friendssince they were like teenagers.
And I would call him more of just a do iteverything guy.
Like he worked for his friend
and would just do whatever he askedbecause that was his job.
Kind of like today.
We'd probably call itlike an executive assistant, you know,
somebody that's running errandsand doing anything that's asked of him.

(09:01):
And on the night of February 16th, 1929,Hugh Plunkett,
the secretary, arrives at the Greystonemansion around 9:30 p.m..
He had his own key.
People knew him on the propertieswho was able to get through the gate.
He let himself in andwent into a guest room in the East Wing.
He called insort of the internal communication

(09:22):
of some kind, whether it be likean intercom system or a phone.
It calls up to Ned Doheny and says,Can you come talk to me?
Ned comes down to the guest room.
They talk for a few hoursand around 11 p.m., Lucy,
Ned's wife, hears a gunshotand she's in the library.
And she doesn't call the cops.
She calls the family doctora guy named Dr.

(09:44):
Fischbach.
Dr. Fish Ball comesis, you know, 30 minutes or so later,
he arrives at the house and they head tothe East Wing where she heard the gunshot.
And they're coming out of a doorto the bedroom is Hugh Plunkett.
They see him holding a revolver.
He goes back into the room, slamsthe door.
They hear a gunshot again.
They enter the roomand they find Ned Doheny shot.

(10:07):
He's on the ground like he was in a chairwhen he was shot.
He's toppled over.Blood is everywhere out of his head.
There's a whiskey glass next to his body.
And Hugh Plunkett is sort ofin the doorway to the bedroom face.
First gun is underneath him,cigaret in his left hand,
which is actually burning his fingersafter he got shot.
And the cops don't come for like

(10:30):
two or 3 hoursbecause Lucy calls family members first.
So family comes over and is traipsingaround the scene before cops ever show up.
The cops show up and they kind of brieflyjust go murder suicide.
They go by the bank by the boom.
Case closed. See you guys later.
And that's where a lot of rumorsand speculation and conjecture
and all this kind of stuff come into play

(10:51):
because the cops shut down the casevery quickly.
And we're dealing with the dodgy knees,which are very rich and powerful.
And this is in the midst of the Teapot
Dome scandal,which again, I'll get into in a second.
But there are some some rumorsthat these two guys were killed
because killed or killed each otheror Hugh shot Ned or Ned shot Hugh.

(11:11):
There's debate all around itbecause they were both having to testify
to the to the Senateabout the Teapot Dome scandal.
So that's again, the common story.
And you even put it
wisely as well of the rumorI always heard is that they were lovers
and that had something to do withwhat happened that night.
And as I said, I actually foundsome more information to this story

(11:34):
that does put some of that into doubtand even the events
of the night into doubt as well.
So, yeah, yeah, it's going to be fun.
I'm glad I'm going to.
Let the truth ruin a good story.
Mike. Honest to God.
Right.
Well, because it's still really strange.
Like it doesn't ruin the story
because it really stillcould be any of these things.

(11:58):
And the, the biggest question aboutthis is why did the police
I think it was two days laterthat they closed the case
and there's evidencethat the bodies were moved.
There's strange thingsabout gunpowder residue,
which I'll get into that was notatedright away in the newspapers.
And the cops still just closed the casesuper quick.

(12:18):
Do you know if it was?
I know BeverlyHills has only been incorporated a
about 102 years maybe.
So, yeah, I guess they would have hadtheir own police department at that point,
but it could very big because it's ownedso much of Beverly Hills at that point.
They did as they did, in fact,the mansion, Greystone, it's the land

(12:41):
it was built on, which today is it'sjust just north of Sunset
Boulevard in Beverly Hills.
And if people listeninghave not been to Beverly Hills,
whatever you imagine,the hills of Beverly Hills being,
that is what it's like today.
It's mansions and beautiful propertiesand movie stars and those kind of people.
But at that time that the hills inthat area were owned by the Doheny,

(13:02):
and they used it as a ranch, they wouldhike there, they would ride horses.
There were no houses built.
Sunset Boulevard, was it dirt roadat that point in time in that area?
And I'll give
myself a little a little props hereif you want to know more
about the history of Sunset Boulevard,watch Autobiography of Motortrend TV
with myself as we havean episode called Deadman's Curve,

(13:25):
where we actually do talk aboutthe history of Sunset Boulevard.
So yeah, it was just Fields and dirtand ranches.
Beverly Hills was there.
They did have their own police department,but it was very tiny.
And most of the wealthy peoplein Los Angeles at the time
lived kind of southwest east of downtownBrentwood, Beverly Hills.
Those places were not developed.
They weren't you know,they weren't what they are today.

(13:46):
So that is a very that'sa very good point, Scott.
I think they were just hunting off theirbalcony, You know, I mean, they were out
you know, they were they just
were I mean, they had so much landit wouldn't even true.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Right.
So to really understandthe depths of this mystery,

(14:06):
we do have to start with Ned Doheny,his father, E.L.
Edward Lawrence Doheny.
He was an oil man.
And it's funny that this murdertakes place in the Greystone mansion
because Doheny is thea little bit of an inspiration
for There Will Be Blood,the Paul Thomas Anderson movie.
Not fully.
It's loosely, looselybased on Edward Lawrence Doheny.

(14:29):
And they even shot the bowling alley scenefor that movie in the Greystone mansion.
So that's just a fun, funbit of Hollywood history there.
So EdwardLawrence was born in Wisconsin in 1856,
and when he became an adult,he was trying to prospect and mine
and find his fortunethroughout the Southwest,
the United States,specifically Arizona and New Mexico.

(14:51):
That's where he met his business partner,Charles Canfield.
And also he met a guy named Albert Fallwho would later be involved
with the TeapotDome scandal, which we'll get to as well.
E.L. Doheny moved to Los Angeles
in the 1890s because his business partnerhad moved out first.
Canfield and Earl kind of followed him.

(15:12):
And in 1892, they discovered oiljust north of downtown Los Angeles.
And by 1900 they were making half 1000000
to $1000000 a year just on that oil field.
But like all other good oilmen,
they had bought other oil fieldsand they were growing very quickly.
He even had oilfieldsin a company in Mexico.

(15:32):
And by the 1920s, his only rivalwas really John DRAKA Rockefeller.
So Doheny was one of the richest menin the world by the 1920s.
And L.A.
was his home like he washe was an L.A. guy.
And he did have a daughter out in 1893,but she died very young.
And then he had his son, Edward Jr,or as they called Ned.

(15:55):
That's in our story.
And Ned's mother,she and Yale actually got divorced,
I think it was in the 1890swhen they got divorced.
But this is just a little,
little piece of informationto keep in the back of your mind.
She actually committed suicidewhen he was still very young.
She drank battery acid, which just thatdoes not sound like a fun way to go.

(16:16):
It wasn't to be my first choice.
Yeah. Oh, no, I'm glad to hear that.
So there's a lot of stories
and details about Edward Lawrence Doheny
for the sake of our story,it's just safe to say he's very,
very, very, very rich and very powerful
and lusted for more moneyand more land and more power.

(16:36):
And Ned,his son, was kind of his pride and joy.
And like a lot of tropes about kidsgrowing up
with these super wealthyindustrialist guys,
Ned was a bit spoiled and was heavy
into drinkingeven as a young man throughout his life
and basically just worked for his dadand had it had it rather easy.

(17:00):
Now the mansion Graystonethat we keep talking about,
which I definitely recommendif you come to L.A., please go visit it.
It is open.
You can not
you can't go inside the mansionunless you're there for a
for a private event,but you can go to the grounds.
And it is amazing.
I always I don't knowif you had the same experience, Scott,
but I kept thinking that E.L.
Doheny built the mansion, but it was Ned,and I wasn't even aware of that

(17:24):
until recently. Did you?
Oh, did you think Bill?
I hadn't heard that.
Oh, well,we know it was built for his son.
For their wedding. Wasn't a wedding.
It was a gift. Wedding present.
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah.
So it was a gift for the land was a gift.
But E.L.
didn't design the home or have it built,so Ned had it built. E.L.
paid for it, obviously, but.

(17:45):
But itwas Ned's kind of dream to have it built.
And what they did
is when theywhen they first decided to build this
and they get the landas a wedding gift, Ned
actually hired a guy named WallaceNeff to design the home.
And then for some reason,they didn't like the design.
They fired him.
They hired Gordon Kauffman, who designeda lot of other famous buildings

(18:08):
and things around Southern California.
And the Doheny sent peopleto Europe to find designs and furnishings.
They even went to Europe themselvesto, like, get inspired.
And they would hire craftsmen from Europeto come to L.A.
to build this house.
And by the time it was done, it was

(18:28):
they had spent around $500 millionin today's money.
No one knows for sureit could have been more than that.
And Ned Doheny moved in with his wife,Lucy, their five kids, in 1928.
Late 1928,
it was the second largest housein California after only the Hearst Castle
in San Simeon, which is another placeeverybody should go visit.

(18:48):
It's so cool.
And the mantra was 46,000 square feet.
So just a little bit bigger than my house.
Just a tad. Just a very small amount.
Now, while
this home is being dripped upand built this little
a little tiny thing,little tiny political event in U.S.
history, a thing called the Teapot Domescandal was going on, which is the biggest

(19:13):
political scandal in the 20th centuryuntil Watergate in the 1970s.
And every single one of our characterstoday is caught up
in that scandal in one way or another.
And I'm a big Downton Abbey fan.
I came into it late.
I actually just started watching itthis year.
But they even talk about the TeapotDome scandal and in one of the episodes

(19:33):
of Downton Abbey. So that's fine.
So, yeah, the scandal.
Do you know much about the TeapotDome scandal?
You know, I didn't retain itbecause I was Hollywood person.
And it's like,
yeah.
No, me neither.
I mean, I kind of write about itbecause of this story,
because I honestly couldn'tremember much about it at all.

(19:55):
So it involves President Harding'spresidency and basically
a lot of corruptioncharges, bribery charges,
specifically aroundHarding, secretary of the Interior,
a guy named Albert Fall, who I mentioneda little earlier, was friends with E.L.
Doheny.
They met when they were prospectorsand miners in Arizona
and Albert Fall.

(20:18):
The gist of it is, is he took money
to give land leases to oil guysfor super cheap.
They didn't compete.They didn't take other bids.
He just took federal landand gave it to these oil men,
including held Doheny for a placecalled Elk's Hill, California.
It was the Teapot Dome scandalsnamed after another area that was given
to a different oiltycoon called the Teapot Dome in Wyoming.

(20:42):
Mr. Doheny gave Albert Hall $100,000
cash for the rights to the land
and the way that he paid for it,the way that he got the money to Albert
Fall is Ned Doheny, his pride and joy son
and Ned's best friend, slashsecretary slash chauffeur.

(21:03):
Q Plunkett went to the East Coast,went to New York.
They walked into a bank.
They got $100,000 cash out of an account.
They put it in a black briefcaseor attache case or something like that,
and they took it to Albert Fall directly.
And I think this is in 1921when the payoff actually happened.
So Ned and Hugh,are people from the murder suicide

(21:27):
are the ones that actually handedthe money over in the Teapot Dome scandal.
So that's that's huge, huge news.
And I was reading old newspaper articlesabout the scandal
and one of them quoted as sayingthat Albert Fall was paid and quote
unquote, knew bills, whichI just love that imagery of like this
crisp, clean, you know, dollar bills.

(21:48):
And I'm like, you're like an attaché case.
That sounds so it's.
Yeah, that's what I really hope it was.
And I hope they worked like gloveswhen they delivered it.
I don't know.I would do it up. Do it up, guys.
So in 1927, the Supreme Court
ruled that these leases onthese lands were improper,
and they they took the land backand gave it to the government.

(22:10):
And Albert Fall actually went to jailfor taking these bribes.
However, the rich guys that bribedAlbert Vol, they didn't get
even get a slap on the wristbecause that's the way the world works.
And however, in 1929
it was still being investigatedby the Senate because politics.
So politicians are trying to use it to

(22:31):
evadeall their different ways of politics.
Do politicking.
And they were still bringing in Hughand Ned for questioning later
on to testify more about the bribery.
So Hugh Plunkett being an employee,a lot of people
assume that he might have being set upto take a fall.

(22:51):
Yeah, Yeah, that'swhat I've always understood.
Yeah. It's a very wise
thought or theory, and I
don't have an answer to any of that,but it's definitely worth keeping
keeping in the back of your minds as youas you hear the story.
So Hugh Plunkett, again,just kind of refresh
for the night of the murder suicide.

(23:11):
He's the one that supposedly shot Nedand then shot himself.
And there's a story I came acrossthat is actually there's a lot more to it
than I initially read,but apparently the day or two
before the murder suicide, Lucyand Ned went to Hugh Plunkett's apartment
and had what they were calling heralcohol and intervened gin.

(23:34):
And they were like,You're acting weird, you're stressed, you
drinking too much, you're taking pills,you've got to get some help.
You've got to go to like a sanatorium.You've got to go to a hospital.
You've got to calm down and get some helpand apparently keep.
Your mouth shut.
Right? Right.
And that's that's the secret to
this is where are they doing it to say,keep your mouth shut. And

(23:55):
yes, so that'sgoing on in the background of all of this.
And the family doctor, Dr.
Fischbach, he after the murder suicide,he kept talking to the authorities about
they're saying that Hugh was taking,I think, ten times
the recommended doses of whateversort of pills he was taking at the time.
And he also was having teeth, painand back pain and all this kind of stuff.

(24:20):
When you look into this, though,as much as
I keep wanting to gokind of down that alley of like,
keep your fuckin mouth shut, Hugh, look,go to a hospital.
You're you're going through something.
Let'sjust get you away from this testimony.
He actually was going through a divorce,and the doctor told authorities
that the divorcewas really having a huge impact on Hugh.

(24:43):
So that's just somethingthat's that's where, again, these rumors
and things, there's like one side of likeor the dany's doing all of this
to to make sure that they're protectingthe Teapot Dome scandal Or is Hugh
actually really going through somethingafter experimenting
and not experimenting after investigatinga lot of crazy stories in my life?

(25:04):
I kind of think there's probably truthto both of those.
Like he probably was dealingwith a lot in his divorce,
but he was also possibly very stressedabout testifying
and knowing what happened and knowingabout the bribery, etc., etc., etc..
Sure.
I mean, I agree, but I think I think moreso because they were throwing him
under the bus and he was like,What do I do here?

(25:26):
Here's Ned, my friend,or however their relationship is,
and they were like, No, we got to get it.
We got to get out of this.
And it's like, Yeah, well, you mentionedearlier, he's like the easy fall guy.
Let's pin it on him.
Absolutely. And it does make sense.
Yeah, it really does. Itit all kind of ties together.
So yeah, and we already mentioned this.

(25:47):
I highlighted this in my notes becauseI really want to make sure to say it.
But if he actually goes to a sanatoriumor a hospital or something to get help,
he would not have to go testify.
So that is that definitely lines upas like
there's probably some influenceupon him to go get help,
not just for his own mental health,but also we don't want you to testify.

(26:10):
And so all of this is leading upjust days before the murder.
And now we're going to go backto the night of the murder suicide.
And I'm going to fill in detailsthat we didn't talk about earlier.
And this is all just important toto kind of understand the evening.
And a lot of the information I found
is from reading old newspapers,which you can't fully trust.
However, I did find a book calledBeverly Hills Confidential

(26:33):
A Century of Star Scandals and Murdersby Barbara Schroeder and Clark Fog.
And they actually were able to accessBeverly Hills police records that no one
had looked at in the hundred years
of this case having been going on.
And there weren't superlike they didn't really definitively solve
the case or anything,but it definitely shed

(26:54):
some light into some activity and morewitness statements from that evening.
So, yeah, so here we are.
So it's February 16th, 1929.
It was a Saturday, and Hugh Plunkett,Ned and Lucy and Dr.
Fish Ball actually all had lunch togetherthat morning
or day or afternoon at the Greystonemansion.

(27:16):
Now, according to the doctorswitness statements,
he was therebecause they were trying to get him to,
like we've already said,to go somewhere to get help.
And they were all discussing itbecause Hugh didn't want to go get help.
They leave lunch,
specifically the doctor and Hugh,They're leaving lunch.
And on the way out, the Doheny Hotel. Dr.

(27:37):
Fish Bar,
make sure we can contact you later,because
he was definitely going through something.
So would you want to make sure,
like you're on call page,you just in case something happens
and the doctor's like, of course.
So that night around nine, 930,Hugh comes back to the Greystone mansion,
and this is where our first little scenecomes in.

(27:58):
ScottWhat I'll do is I'll read the narration
or the scene descriptions,and let's have you read.
Hugh okay.
Hugh Plunkett rolls up to the gatesof the Greystone mansion in his car.
It's around 9:30 p.m..
He cranks his window downas the guard approaches evening. Mr.
Plunkett didn't expect you back tonight.
Hi, Will.

(28:20):
The guardopens the gate and waves you through.
Have a good one.
Moments later, Hugh is walkingto the entrance of the mansion
when he stumbles upon NightwatchmanEd McCarthy.
Mr. Plunkett. Hello.
Evening, Ed.
I supposethey've all turned in for the night.
I don't think so.
Not as far as I can tell, anyway.

(28:41):
I see Hugh not say
good to Ed and continues into the mansion.
I find it really interesting that
there were more witnessesthan I ever expected.
Because there was Nightwatchman.
There was the gatekeeper also.
There was a live in like writinginstructor who lived at the mansion
that heard Hugh come in with his carand go to a

(29:04):
like a storage closetwhere he kept fishing equipment,
which is an interesting commentbecause I wonder if that's where a gun was
and because I don't know,because I cannot find information
about the gun in anything I've read,because that's
that's a big piece of evidencethere in like, whose gun was it?
And I can never I can not find anythingabout it being he was Gunner Ned Scott.

(29:26):
And Barbara and Clark didn'thave that information in their books.
No, no, they did not.
So it's. Yeah.
So if anybody knows whose gunthat was right.
In a study of strange at gmail.com.
I would love to to find that out.
Now when Hugh went into the mansion,

(29:48):
he turned towards the East Wingwhere there were a couple of guest rooms.
And now I have a question for you, Scott,because you've been inside these rooms.
The stories talk about himclosing the door
to the bedroom,but he was found in the hallway
in front of the bedroom, sort ofin between the bedroom door and a hallway.
So I think there's a door in the hallwaylike I think when they talked about him

(30:12):
closing the door,
it was a door from the hallway, intellect,the main area of the house.
Do you remember that?
I guess the room that the insidethe inside the place.
I mean, I didn't have a map of the housefrom the
you know, of an overhead viewof which room was which room.
But the room that is commonly referred toas the murder room
is actually a really modest little,tiny room.

(30:34):
I mean, it's almost
like they would say the servants quartersor something like that.
It's it's not big.
So they might have a if I remember,they might have a little sort
of sitting room in between the bathroomand the room itself.
But, but otherwise, No, it'sa very small room.
Yeah. It's not, it's not big.

(30:55):
And what I wishbecause I wish I, I'd been to the mansion
a bunch of times,I've never been inside of it.
So I really want to seewhat the set up is,
because I have seenan overhead map of the home
and it looks like there's two guest roomsacross the hallway from one another.
And then the hallway, the main hallwaygoes out to like a four yea
or bigger area.
So I think there's a door that blocks offthat hallway to the two guest rooms.

(31:19):
And I think that's where Hugh slammeda door.
Yeah, it's interesting.But yeah, it was not a big room.
It was, it was just a little guest room
and you can actually pull upcrime scene photos online.
I'll provide some links in my show notes.
So yeah.
So Ed enters the home and heads to that
that modest guest bedroom where apparentlyhe would stay from time to time.
It was kind of like his room.

(31:40):
If he's staying at the house that heI think I said, Ed, a second ago I met
you, Hugh actually was in chargeof the building of the Greystone mansion.
So he not only works for Ned,he knows the house intimately
because he was the oneoverseeing the building.
He knew everybody that worked there.
He had his own key.
He would even sign checks in Ned's nameduring the building of the home.

(32:03):
So he was that close with the family.
And once he's in that room, asI mentioned earlier, he can contacts Ned.
Ned comes down to talk to onnet is in slippers, a coat, his underwear
like a robe and they start talkingand they also start drinking.

(32:24):
There is whiskey that was foundin the room in whiskey glasses.
Now where things get differentfrom the common story,
remember that Lucy apparentlyhears a gunshot and then calls Dr.
Fishbowl,according to all the witness testimony. So
when Ned was
talking to Hugh, Ned called Dr.

(32:46):
Fischbach.
It was before a shot ever happened.
He called Fischbach because he said,Hugh's back, he's still having issues.
He doesn't want to go to the sanatorium.
Can you come up here and talk to him?
So the doctor left.
He was actually at a movie.
He leaves the movies, Page contacted,he comes up to the house,
he arrives around 11 p.m.

(33:09):
and there's some inconsistenciesof what I've read at this point.
Some of the reports say that basically
the minute before he arrives at the house,there's a gunshot.
Some say the gunshot happened right ashe showed up at the house, the first one.
So this brings us to our second scene,which just takes
some assumptions to that setup.

(33:29):
So if you have thatdocument open again, Scott.
I do you mean a second when you set.
So it's around 11:30 p.m.
and Lucy opens the front door for Dr.
Fischbach.
Doctor, thank you for coming therein the East Wing.
Lucy and Doctor walk
toward the guestrooms of the East Wingand suddenly there's a gunshot.

(33:50):
They both freeze.
What was. Oh, no.
They both runtowards the direction of the gun.
They're running towards the guestrooms.And Lucy calls out as they run.
Ned Hugh, a door opens and Hugh Plunkettemerges.
He shouts at Dr.
Fishbone.
Lucy.
Oh, do you mind reading Hugh here as well?
Oh, sure. Okay. Yeah.Stay out of your back.

(34:13):
Get back.
Lucy sees that Hugh is holding a revolver.
Q What's going on?
Hugh goes back into the room and slamsthe door.
Shut the doctor and Lucylook at each other,
and they both slowlycreep towards the door.
Then, after a long moment of silence.
Stay here.
The doctor approaches the door.

(34:33):
It's Dr. Fischbach.
I'm coming in.
He opens the door and entersthe guest room, leaving Lucy
alone in the hallway.
Good times. Good times.
Now remember, the common story hereis that the gunshot happened
a solid 30 minutesor more before the doctor even came in.
The doctor was calledafter the first shot.

(34:55):
It does not appear that that is the case.
Again, we cannot fully trustall these witness statements for reasons
we will talk about in a minute.
But but it does seemlike all the news reports
and all the witness statementshave the gunshot happening after Dr.
Fischbach has been called to the house.
There is.
Can I ask you, Michael, please,if Lucy's alone

(35:16):
in the hallway,how can there be other witness statements?
All the people that work there.
So the the gay guy at the gate,the the worker, the gay guy,
The gay guy, The gay guy, the gay.
Which I did not mean to sayhe could have been.
I don't know. We have we have no clue.
So, yeah.
And also, I will say this.

(35:36):
There's so much
there's so many problems,which is why so many rumors
and things are around this case.
Most of the the information the policewent off of is from the family doctor.
I don't even thinkLucy really talked to the cops much.
I think they mainly talked to people
that worked at the house and the doctor,and they left everybody else alone.

(35:57):
And the doctor might have his own motives,being the family doctor
to one of the wealthiest peoplein the world at the time.
So, yeah, Drew,just remember all that, too.
I am going to read a quotefrom the doctor, Dr.
Fishbackfrom one of his witness statements.
So here it is.

(36:17):
He said, I asked Mrs.
Doheny to wait and open the doorto find Plunkett's cross sprawled.
There we go, sprawled on the floor
in the hallway, motionless bloodwas streaming from his head.
When entering the guestroomchamber, the body of Mr.
Doheny Junior was found lying
sprawled on the floornear the foot of the bed, still breathing,
but blood flowing profuselyfrom both sides of his head.

(36:41):
Mr. DohenyHis pulse was still faintly perceptible.
He was lying on his backand froth and blood
were gurgling from his mouthin order to relieve the breathing.
He was turned over on his right side by meuntil the blood and froth
cleared out of his mouth and throat,
after which he was turned back in tohis original position where he remained.
He stopped breathing in about 30 minutesafter coming out of the guestroom,

(37:03):
I met Mrs.
Doheny, who had been waiting
and told her that both were shot,that Plunkett was dead, and that Mr.
Doheny was still breathing.
She burst into tears and said, Oh,how horrible.
And rushed to the telephoneto call her sister.
It was decided to call Mr. and Mrs.
Doheny Senior.
They arrived in about 20, 30 minutes uponhis arrival, they notified the police.

(37:25):
So again, they call family members.
They do not call the cops.
They call family members.
This this also backs up mymy thinking that I think they're correct
and that the first gunshot happened after
the doctor was calledbecause Ned was still breathing.
And I don't really have a reasonto question that.
Like why like he still died?

(37:46):
Like, I don't really doubt thatthat that situation happened
where the doctor went in and he was kindof breathing and he tried to clear them.
And this is actually where one of the bigmisconceptions of the case happens.
The doctor admitted to the policethat night when the police showed up
that he had moved the bodies, butonly so much to check if they were alive.

(38:07):
And for him to clear Ned's like breathingpassages and stuff of blood.
He did not move the bodies.
When you read about this, people were likethe bodies were moved.
They were moved.
And it's like,But how much were they moved?
It turns out they were really just moved.
And those very kind of minorways still very important
when you're investigating a crime scene.

(38:28):
But they were not like dragged aroundthe rooms or the hallways or anything.
They werethey were moved for the doctor or by.
Right.
Yeah.
I mean, you know, it'sI don't know how far ahead
you want to get, but it's commonlyknown back then, especially that,
you know, the law enforcementweren't the first people to be called.

(38:49):
It happened with Marilyn.
It happened with Lana Turner.
And, you know, Cheryl Crane and JohnnyStompanato, the first person you call
is the attorney,or in Marilyn's case, the doctor.
So so it was and PaulByrne, MGM Scandal with Louis B Mares.
Another one, you know, you callthey come and clean up the scene and
and then you call law enforcementand also enforcement's

(39:11):
notoriously crooked in Lausanne.
Yeah, in Los Angelesespecially at that time.
Yeah.
And yeah,this is where rumors happen though.
This is where a lot of thesemisconceptions of the case comes from is,
is those little detailslike calling the doctor
and not calling the policeand calling the family and
saying the body has been moved.

(39:31):
And by the time the police arrived,there were relatives in the house
and there the bodies had been obviously,like we said, moved, maybe not moved
as much as some people like to saywhen they tell that story now.
But the bodies had still been touchedand moved
and Hugh was found with a cigaretin his left hand.
It was burned all the way downand actually burned his fingers,

(39:53):
which a lot of people point outis that's weird
if you're committing suicidewhere you smoking and holding a cigaret.
The gun is commonly saidthat it was found under his body.
It wasn't.
It was found very close to his body,just sort of like
on the right side of his bodyby his right hand.
And also you've readthere's this weird thing

(40:13):
where you constantly read that HughPlunkett was shot in the back or the
back of the head, which doesn't make senseif you're committing suicide.
However, there are photographs of himat the morgue.
He was shot in the templeon his right side.
So I'm looking at the crime scene photosright now, and it's
I can kind of see the gunjust to the right of him.

(40:34):
And and also a massive amount of blood.
Blood? Yeah.
Coming from the left side of his head.
Well, that's where he's lying, so. Yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
So. Andthere are more at the morgue photos.
I think I've only found maybe in the book
that I read, I think that's the only placeI saw a Hughes morgue photo.
But yeah, you can see the bullet holein his right temple,

(40:56):
which would match up with himshooting himself with his right hand.
So evidence is not super clear.
Yes, he was shot in the templeand on the back of the head.
However, powder burns were found on Ned's
head like the gun was rightup against his head.
On Hugh, though they did not findthe same kind of powder burns,

(41:16):
meaninghe could have been shot from farther away.
And that is a piece of evidencethat they found that night
that the newspapersdid get a hold of right away.
So that it has been reported onsince this case came out.
However, police wrap things up very quick.
Two days done, murder, suicide.

(41:36):
That's what you know, Mr. E.L.Doheny says.
So that'swhat the police are going to say.
And the newspapers claim that Hugh died
because of quote unquote, sudden insanity.
And they talked a lot about him goingthrough all these psychological issues
that he was going through,which, again, only come from

(41:57):
the family doctor pretty much.
And the DOE, he knows there is a
a friend of Hugh Plunkett's
that talked to a newspaper in Long Beach
who was a police detective,but not for Los Angeles, and I believe
who did tell the police thatthat he was dealing with a lot of problems

(42:19):
because of his divorceand his fine wife, Billy, who he missed.
And he was drinking a lot.
So, yeah, this is just weird stuff
and I'm not sure how to actually navigateall of it, even telling it
so after.
No, no, you're right.
I mean, it's it's, it's, it'svery complicated.

(42:39):
And yeah, because people are scrambling
to cover up and save their own asses. But.
Yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
So after the afternoon,after the murder, suicide,
Ned was buried
at Forest Lawn,the famous cemetery in Los Angeles,
which I imagineyou probably did tours there, did you not?

(42:59):
Oh, we never toured cemeteries,but I go through them a lot of my own.
Yeah, we never.
We never did that as an official thing.Right.
So, yeah.
Ned is buried at Forest Lawn Cemeteryin this
very ornate, large structure.
And it's actually an altar from Italythat the Doheny Library, right?
Yeah. Oh, you do that. Okay. Yeah.

(43:21):
No, no, but I didn't write downwhat it was called,
so I wasn't going to say it.
So I'm glad you brought it up.
And Hugh Plunkett, his mayor, is buriedjust maybe like, 100 feet away.
It's just kind of, like,slightly down the hill and a and obviously
a not as ornate burial site.
And this bringsa lot of conjecture in its own right,

(43:41):
because the Doheny were very Catholic,super Catholic,
donated tons of money to Catholic churchesand causes and everything else.
And the Doheny is had a family plotand a Catholic
Church cemeterythat Ned was not buried in.
He was buried at Forest Lawn.
And so some people think that this pointsto a question of the evening

(44:05):
that maybe Hugh did not kill Nedand then kill himself.
Maybe it's the other way around.
Maybe Ned killed Hughand then killed himself because committing
suicide, you're not supposed to be buriedin a Catholic cemetery.
So I do not know the answer for that.
Obviously, like you said,he was buried in this,
you know, amazing altarthat was brought over.

(44:26):
So maybe that's the reasonhe was buried there.
Maybe they couldn't have put that inat the Catholic Church cemetery.
But that is definitely one ofthe main questions that people bring out.
I mean, I'm looking at the photographI took one of of the Doheny grave via,
you know, with Hugh Plunkett's in view,and it's about six or seven
rows from from the Doheny grave

(44:49):
are memorial amazing sarcophagus thing.
And and it does seem to me that
that would meanthey felt some sort of obligation to him
because very easily could have said nowe don't want him anywhere near there.
Forest Lawn is a big cemetery.
They could have put Hugh Plunkettanywhere.
Yeah, absolutely.
And now after this as well,

(45:13):
the newspapers obviously catchwind of this story very quickly
and they start reporting on it immediatelybecause Earl Doheny is a very
major character in the United States andthe Teapot Dome scandal is still going on.
So the name is in the news all the time.
And It is very inconsistent with which

(45:34):
all the reportsare very inconsistent on this case.
I was going to write down a bunchof examples, but it was like so many.
I was like,I'm not going to go through all this.
But it's like some people claimthat they were killed
in Ned's bedroom, not the guestroom.
Some people claim that Ned invited
Hugh up to his room to stay the nightso he could calm down.

(45:54):
I think that's where a lot of the rumorsand speculation that they were lovers
comes from is some of these newspaperreports that reported that right away.
There's also
inconsistencies about what Hugh was goingthrough.
And again, we have these storiesthat the doctor was called
after the first shotand he was at the moot like there's
just so many inconsistenciesof the newspaper reports that it just gets

(46:18):
it makes a complicated situationeven more complicated.
I think that's my point.
Yeah.
You know, insinuating thatit was a gay thing.
It spells a lot of things outbecause it was on the ground floor.
And I'm sure that those dodgy kneeswere upstairs and Ned Doheny was in.
Is know, pajamas and underwear.

(46:40):
And they were in this nondescript roomjust off, you know, off the main hallway,
because I was lookingat the pictures again.
And it appears that Nedwas killed in the main room.
But there's not a hallway from,you know, from the main hallway.
It's like, oh, straight off thehallway. So it looks as if
Hugh Plunkett's
lying in between in the doorwayof the main hallway.

(47:01):
So it's not it's not within the room.
Interesting.
So, yeah, and everybody out there,if you're interested in this,
pull up the crime scene photos.
They are you know, if you
if you're okay looking at stuff like thatbecause it is gory.
But yeah,it is interesting to see the layout
and to see that he is in his robeand his underwear.

(47:22):
Ned is in his robe and underwear.
They've been drinking because there iswhiskey in a whiskey glass next to Ned.
They were, yeah.
So the rumors about the lover thing,I was trying to pinpoint
where that started because.
It is not in the newspaperarticles of the time, and that is because
newspapers didn't really do theydidn't really report on that in the 1920s.

(47:46):
So, you know, there might be little secretinnuendos of things.
Can. Can I point one more thing out?
Sorry, Michael.
As I was going over my
my pictures next to HughPlunkett is his mother.
Now, generally,if people are going to be buying a grave
at the hall at need, it'sthe next available spot.

(48:06):
But clearly the Doheny is
maybe they owned a lot of property,maybe they own a lot of their property
on the Hill.
But his mother, Plunkett's mother died in1931 and she is buried next next to him.
So it would have been
there would have been a line of plotsthat were owned by one person.
Yeah, yeah.
And something else just came to mind.

(48:27):
I think there are more Doheny on thathilltop, not just Ned at the very top,
but I think there are other Dohenyrelatives in the vicinity.
So I think it's quite likely that DaleHeaney just owned that whole hill
and provided the graves.
So I'm going to I'm going to go a littleout of order for what my notes were here.
I'm going to share my own personal theory,and I've changed my mind multiple times.

(48:51):
So if something comes up, even today,I'm happy to always change my mind
about this kind of stuff.
I think there was a cover up that night.
I don't think it's who shotwho or why people were shot necessarily.
I think I think Hugh shot Nedand then shot himself.
I think he was going through a lot.

(49:11):
I think it wasa combination of divorce, plus
the pain, plus the testimony.
And so I don't thinkthe murder was covered up
because the Doheny didn't wantNed to be known as committing suicide,
because a lot of people thinkthe Doheny is just
don't want their son to sound likehe killed somebody and committed suicide.
I actually think it happenedthe way the police say it happened,

(49:33):
which is you killed them.
I think the cover up just comesfrom the fact that the Doheny were worried
this would affect the testimony,the scandal, the bribery.
I think they just wanted that to be openand shut.
You know, like, this is a huge crazy man.
He's he was going through a lot. He's had
emotional breakdowns and obviouslydoing a lot because of his divorce.

(49:57):
So that's what happened.
Yeah, it does.
It does. That makes sense.
And what you're saying about the gravesis the reason I wanted to bring this up,
because like, if there's other Dohenyis there, that means they were
there's no big conspiracy aroundNed committing suicide.
Does that make sense?
I suppose so. I can't.

(50:18):
I don't see to me, I cannot fathom
that the Doheny has had empathyfor anybody.
You know, it's like, oh, if you killedmy son, come here, be buried with us.
It doesn't make sense to me.
I feel it was some kind of obligationto them.
Ah, guilt. Oh, Oh.
To provide for them. Oh, I did this.

(50:39):
You killed my son. Here, here's a grave.It doesn't.
That doesn't that, you know.
Yeah, that is. I see.
I didn't think about it that way.
That is really interesting.
That is it.
So do you have anydo you have a theory on this at all?
Have you has anything changed your mindabout anything or giving you ideas today?
I you know, personally,
I you know, I'm not desperateto believe in a sexual scandal.

(51:03):
And I don't necessarilyI wouldn't consider it a sexual scandal,
but I think that Ned possiblyhad some sort of relationship very close,
if not sexual.
Very,very close relationship to Hugh Plunkett.
I think Hugh Plunkett was getting thrownunder the bus by the DOE hands,
and he was desperate becausehis personal life was falling apart.
And probably on that night he,he just like I'm fed up.

(51:24):
I'm going to talk to Ned now.
And, and it was trying toit was damage control by the Doheny
you have that have him eradicated.
And maybe that's why they feel guiltand put him put him there. But
going through the murder suicide,I don't know.
It doesn't it makes more senseif they got rid of him and felt a little.

(51:47):
But it's a very public wayto do that, too.
So that makes. Yes. Yeah.
But it was being that their son was,you know,
they tried to hang it on Plunkettand provided a space for him.
It's a bit.
And his mother, it's, it, it,it certainly confuses things further.
It does.
But you hit upon somethingthat I think is very clear,

(52:08):
but it's still worth saying,which is the murder scene.
Even if things were moved or placeinfluenced or all those kind of things,
it was a highly emotional scene.
Like it was not
you know, it's not a set up to,get rid of Plunkett or anything else.
Like, there's a lot of emotionwent into the events of that night.

(52:29):
In my opinion, it doesn't seem likethis is a preplanned situation.
Something came to a head that evening and.
Yeah, yeah.
Now I'm glad I had you onbecause I actually really like everything
you just said about it,So I'm just going to latch on
to all of your theories from now on.
Scott

(52:50):
So there's one more thing I want to read
that I found really interesting.
So Raymond Chandler, the famous,
famous authorof a lot of great noir mystery books,
his famous detective, Philipmarlowe, talks about a case

(53:11):
because the Cassidy case in the bookThe High Window,
and this is a fictional account
of the Doheny case,it was inspired by the Doheny case.
So this is Philip marlowe in that book.
I'm going to make a point,and it's an important point.

(53:31):
Just look at the Cassidy case.
Cassidy was a very rich man,a multimillionaire.
He had a grown up son.
One night the cops were called to his homeand young Cassidy was on his back on
the floor with blood all over his faceand a bullet hole in the side of his head.
His secretary was lying on his backin an adjoining bed bathroom
with his head against the secondbathroom door leading to a hall

(53:52):
and a cigaret burned outbetween his fingers on his left hand.
Just a short burned out stuff that hadscorched the skin between his fingers.
A gun was lying by his right hand.
He was shot in the head,not a contact wound.
A lot of drinking had been done.
4 hours had elapsed
since the deaths and the familydoctor had been there for three of them.
Now, what did you do with the Cassidycase?

(54:14):
Breeze,which is a detective he's going to says
Murder and suicideduring a drinking spree.
The secretary went haywire and shotyoung Cassidy.
I read it in the papers or something.Is that what you want me to say?
You read it in the papers,I said, but it wasn't.
So what's more, you knew it wasn't so.
And the D.A. knew it wasn't so.
In the daysinvestigators were pulled off the case,
within a matter of hours,there was no inquest.

(54:35):
But every crime reporter in town andevery cop on every homicide detail knew
it was Cassidy that did the shooting,that it was Cassidy that was crazy drunk,
that it was his secretarywho tried to handle him and couldn't.
And at last tried to get away from himbut wasn't quick enough.
I know it's a fictional inspiration,but it's interesting that he proposes here

(54:56):
that what would be the NED in that story
shot his friend first and then may havecommitted suicide after that.
And that's as much as II don't fully believe that.
I wouldn't be surprised if one daywe were able to piece this together.
And that was true, you know?
Yeah, it's it's it's very interesting.

(55:18):
And again, every theory makes sense,you know?
Yeah, yeah.
That's the problemwhen all this stuff gets,
you know, not investigatedwell and all this,
you know, craziness happens around it,it makes it really tough.
Now, the the Greystone mansion,
because that is a huge characterin this case and just a place that I love.

(55:39):
It is worth notingthat Lucy continued to live in it.
She got remarried a year later.
She lived there for for a very long time.
Then she ended up movingin basically across the street
in another house built in the area,and it went through a few other owners.
And then the city of Beverly Hills
bought it in 1965and they opened it to the public.
And I think 1971, they opened it upas a park called Greystone.

(56:03):
Yeah.
And that's that's kind of it.
There's so many other details in this casethat I feel like I'm I'm having to over,
but just for the sake of trying to tell it
in a slightly entertaining manner.
Do you have any other questionsor thoughts on this?
Before we finish up?
I wish you know, I'm sitting herescrambling around to to my files

(56:25):
because I'm looking at a mapthat I got from
now. It's not that one.
I went through the the mansion.
They had a reenactment,a very loosely based reenactment of the
the Doheny scandal called the Manorthat they did in the house.
I saw that a couple of times, too.

(56:47):
And that was very,very trippy to be in the rooms,
although they'll use all the roomsexcept for the one
where the murder happenedwould be disrespectful is so typical.
So typical people.
But but, you know,it just it's a great story.
It's and what's kind of fun is that thethe the mansion itself has been used,
you know, in horror moviesand things like that.

(57:09):
So it just lendsmore more fun to the story.
And it's it's far enough removedthat it is a fun story to theorize.
But but you know, it'sjust it's unfortunate
that these two guys,you know, ended the way they did.
And it has to do with money.
I'm sure all boils down to money.
Absolutely.

(57:29):
Ultimately.
But but, you know, you say emotion.
I think their relationships, be
it sexual or even platonic,but certainly very deep.
Absolutely.That certainly contributed to it.
Yeah. Yeah.
And it can't be easy to be again,this is basically like
a glorified assistant,but it's also probably your best friend.

(57:50):
And that is a weird, weird relationshipto be and where someone has
the sort of the money and businesspower over
such a good friend or boyfriend,you know, whatever their relationship was.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I mean, they clearly it didn't,they didn't ban him from the property,
you know.
Yeah.
He, they,

(58:10):
they waved him in and he went right inand got to the intercom or whatever.
So, so he, it wasn't, they didn't see himas a as a, as a threat at that point.
So that's just more of a more fuelto the more gossipy end of things.
Yeah. Yeah, absolutely.
I wish investigatorswould have taken a little more time.
I have so many episodes that I've donewhere at the end of it I'm like,

(58:31):
I just wish the police just spenta little more time on this.
Yeah, I mean, it was also New back then
because West Hollywoodwasn't incorporated yet, so it was in
no man's land of Yeah,of liquor bootlegging.
And then and then Beverly Hills,which was orange groves
lime are being fields at that point.
So and I think the only thingwithin a mile of the Beverly Hills Hotel

(58:54):
aside from probablyGreystone was was orange groves and and so
so they were you know it was it was quiteout in the woods at that point,
I think it was before Pickfordand Fairbanks even built Pickford.
Yeah.
So it was it was is a different time.
It was.
It was. And I think Pickford

(59:15):
lived down off Wilshire at that time,if I remember correctly.
Anyway, that's not that's not important.
Just me thinking of L.A.,because I love L.A.
Hollywood history.
Well, thank you so much, Scott,for doing this.
Do you want to tell peoplewhere they can find your digital tours
or your podcast or anything elseyou want to give any tours?
Well,we have done since we since COVID and,

(59:37):
you know, we've shut down the businesscompletely.
Everything that we had on displayin our museum, including like the man's
Jayne Mansfield car and Mae West'sdentures and all sorts of things,
everything's been put into storageuntil we find a new home.
So we've left Los Angeles now.
I live near Palm Springs and.
I completely do all my work onYouTube now.

(59:59):
So if you look at dearly departed tourson YouTube,
instead of taking people around in my vanand pointing cool things out,
which a lot of them are now gonefrom L.A., you know, slowly but surely,
so many people, so manythings are being wrecked and torn down.
I do everything virtually.
I can go all over the worldand show people.
So that's that's what I do. Yeah.

(01:00:22):
Do you know much about the Robert Blake?
Uh, when he when he shot? Was it his wife?
Yeah. Bonny Lee Bakley. Yeah.
It wasn't his wife.Well, no, not actually.
They were married,I think, because she was pregnant or she
she had the daughter that.
Yeah, that's a. Story was.
Yeah, that's a story I want toI want to know more about.

(01:00:42):
Mainly because where that happenedis a restaurant
that myselfand my family go to at least once a month.
Yeah, Bonny Lee Bakley.
You know, people were scramblingfor alibis at that point.
So many people who wanted her gone.
And she was a piece of work.
She was a piece of work.
Yeah. Yeah, I can imagine.
Well, cool.
I didn't mean to go on a tangent there.

(01:01:02):
I just like I like your workand I like the, you know, a lot of things,
so I really appreciate you coming onand providing the information
and joining me on this weird story
of the Doheny murder suicide at Greystone.
Dale, thanks for asking.
I will I will look forwardto talking to you in the future.

(01:01:23):
Thanks. I appreciate you asking.
This has been fun to sort of stretchmy tourism muscles again, as it were.
Yeah. No, I it was.
I love that you had files to look at.
I love that you wanted to see the scenes.Yeah.
You know, there was something else that.
That was interesting,I think, to mention about the mansion.
So it became while it was actually like
a monastery for a while,there were nuns living in it.

(01:01:44):
Yeah.
And then it became the home of the
American Film Institute for a while,and that's when it really went to hell.
You know, the students were like,carving up the banister and.
Imagine, Yeah. Yeah.
So then the city. City got it.
I don't knowin what particular order, but, but they,
they have to open itlegally as a museum to keep it,

(01:02:04):
you know, under their ideaof some sort of charitable foundation.
So you, you know,if you keep your eyes open,
they do an art, an art thing,designer thing,
at least they used to every year wherethere would be a dozen designers and they
each designer designed a particular room,including the murder room.
So there you can get in there sometimes.

(01:02:25):
And they do that reenactment play well, loose reenactment play called the Manor. So
definitely I would I would recommendchecking out,
you know, signing up at their websiteto get to get updates.
But that's a really interesting storyabout the nuns living there, which,
you know, it makes sensebecause they were such a Catholic family
and then ended up,you know, just being in the city.

(01:02:47):
So and movedAnd you seen so many cool movies.
I mean, so many movies. Yeah. Yeah.
Just it was so many part of me
when I was researching this, I was like,I'm going to list all the cool movies.
I was like, Nowpeople can just look it up.
Just know it's it's in a lot.
You will recognize it from so many thingsand TV shows, I think, and.
The interior to this very distinctivecheckerboard hallway

(01:03:08):
I've seen and I see it so many movies.
Yeah, Yeah.They're they're obviously open to that.
Absolutely. Yeah.
And I think people you can get marriedthere you there
they do a lot of thingsand it's definitely worth checking it.
I need I need to do it more and actuallyI think I'm going to go tomorrow morning.
We're recording this the week beforeChristmas and I may go tomorrow morning

(01:03:28):
just to like filmsome videos and stuff with my son.
And because I haven't been there probablyfour or five years, I haven't visited.
So I want to go back and check it out nowafter I've been reading all about it.
Yeah, take your map and you can probablypeek in the windows window.
Yeah, that's a good idea.
And it's a very good idea.
All right. Well, thank you so much, Scott.
I will talk to you soon.

(01:03:51):
Thank you for tuning inand happy holidays.
This episode comes out two daysafter the Christmas holiday.
I hope everybody's holidayseason is glorious and amazing
and you're spending it with peoplethat you love and enjoy
and want to correct an end or mentiontwo details about tonight's episode.
One I kept sayingthe guest bedroom was in the East Wing.

(01:04:15):
Looking at the map again, I thinkit's on the west side of the house.
So I may have just been flipped aroundat my brain, so I apologize about that.
Also, I never got to mention,
because there's a lot of strange detailsabout the night of the murder.
I forgot to mention that they never foundfingerprints on the gun.

(01:04:35):
And there's variouskind of anecdotal stories around that.
I don't know if that helps push one theoryor the other,
but it's definitely strange.
So that'll do it.
Thank you for tuning in again.
Thank you for your support for this show.
I started thisjust a handful of months ago.
It's been a dream of mineto have a podcast like this.

(01:04:57):
I cannot thank you enough for the supportand I'm really looking forward
to moreas study of Strange in the New Year.
Make sure to subscribe rate and review.
Follow us on Instagramat a study of Strange.
Check out our patron, which you can findin our website a study of strange Rt.com
and feel free to email me comments,

(01:05:17):
notes ideas,also UFO stories. I'm going to.
I'm still compiling personal UFO storiesfor a future future episode.
So if you have a UFO story, pleaseemail me a study of strange at gmail.com.
Again, happy holidays.
Thank you and good night.

All Episodes

Murder at Greystone Mansion - with Dearly Departed’s Scott Michaels

Episode Transcript

Popular Podcasts

24/7 News: The Latest

Therapy Gecko

The Joe Rogan Experience

.css-15opob5{left:0;position:absolute;top:0.8rem;} All Episodes

.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Murder at Greystone Mansion - with Dearly Departed’s Scott Michaels