Joan Robinson Hill and Dr. John Hill - Part 2 of 3 - Love Marry Kill

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi, I'm Rich and I'm Tina.

Speaker 2 (00:02):
And if there's one thing we've learned in over twenty years.

Speaker 1 (00:04):
Of marriage, some days you'll feel like killing your husband.

Speaker 2 (00:07):
And some days you'll feel like killing your wife.

Speaker 1 (00:10):
Welcome to love, Mary Kill.

Speaker 2 (00:27):
How do you Tina?

Speaker 3 (00:28):
Hey?

Speaker 1 (00:28):
Rich?

Speaker 2 (00:28):
How are you today?

Speaker 1 (00:29):
Great? How are you?

Speaker 2 (00:30):
I'm okay.

Speaker 3 (00:31):
I'm a little bit sad. At the end of part
one of this episode, we talked about the Lions, and
I was really excited about the Lions game, which was
last night. Yeah, and they lost.

Speaker 2 (00:41):
It was a big disappointment.

Speaker 1 (00:42):
It was kind of a huge surprise.

Speaker 3 (00:44):
It was I mean, you know, last year the Lions
exceeded expectations. They went much farther than anyone thought. But
this year everyone thought they were going to go all
the way and not everyone everyone ever, So for them
to lose in their first playoff game was a big disappointment.

Speaker 2 (00:59):
But that's okay.

Speaker 3 (01:00):
I'm gonna move on and I'll be okay.

Speaker 1 (01:02):
Who's the Lion's quarterback Jared Goss? Maybe he should try
to steal Taylor Swift from Travis Kelsey because I think
she's like a good luck charge. She seems to be right,
so I should you know.

Speaker 2 (01:14):
Yeah, it's a great idea.

Speaker 3 (01:15):
Work on that, all right.

Speaker 2 (01:17):
I think he has a.

Speaker 1 (01:17):
Sense some shirtless pics of Jared got to Taylor's.

Speaker 3 (01:22):
Is not sure how Jared Goff's current girlfriend or maybe
wife would feel about that, but yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:26):
You don't know Jared Goss's marital it's a shocked I.

Speaker 2 (01:31):
Know that is shocking.

Speaker 3 (01:33):
The other thing is, as you know, I'm flying to
Paris tonight, and you know how I get on days
that i'm having before I have a big flight, especially
like to Europe or something like that, I just get antsy.
I can't sit still, I can't concentrate on it.

Speaker 1 (01:45):
And you like to leave for the airport at least
six hours early.

Speaker 3 (01:47):
Kind of why I leave earlier is because I just
am antsy and I just want.

Speaker 2 (01:51):
To get on with it.

Speaker 1 (01:53):
I understand.

Speaker 2 (01:53):
Other than that, I'm doing great.

Speaker 1 (01:55):
Well on your trip to Paris is kind of it's
kind of a quick trip. Really, yeah, I'm only going
to be I really do feel empathy for you because
you get there and you're going to be exhausted because
you don't sleep on planes, and then you're expected to
perform and yeah, you only have a couple of well
you have more than a couple of days. But yeah,
by the time you are acclimated, you're going to have
to come home.

Speaker 3 (02:14):
Yeah, I really have two days in the office and
that's it. So it's yeah, it's a little stressful, but
I'll get through it.

Speaker 1 (02:20):
Oh, you'll make the most of it, and hopefully you'll
bring home some yummy Parisian.

Speaker 3 (02:24):
I don't know if I will this time. I'm not
gonna have much time, So just prepare yourself.

Speaker 1 (02:29):
All right, I'll prepare myself. I'll just go get some
Costco with songs.

Speaker 2 (02:33):
There you go.

Speaker 3 (02:34):
I did make you a yummy treat today, though, yummy
another judge of that. Have you ever heard of coolachism?

Speaker 1 (02:42):
Yes, yes I have.

Speaker 2 (02:44):
Well, I made colachis for you.

Speaker 1 (02:45):
Wow, you're such a star, you know.

Speaker 2 (02:47):
I'd like to.

Speaker 3 (02:48):
I like to do it up if I can. Then
I had a little time, so I did. But if
you're not familiar with Colachi's, they are a beloved breakfast
staple in Texas. They're kind of like a pastry. You
can actually fill it with fruit or sausage or cheese.

Speaker 2 (03:03):
I did fruit.

Speaker 3 (03:04):
I've got a blueberry kolachi and raspberry kolachi.

Speaker 2 (03:09):
So yeah, they're originally.

Speaker 1 (03:10):
From Nancy sirch.

Speaker 3 (03:11):
Czecho, Slovakia or check the Czech Republic, I guess. But anyway,
here's your here's your COLACHIESE.

Speaker 2 (03:19):
Wow, enjoy them?

Speaker 1 (03:20):
It was like amazing.

Speaker 2 (03:29):
Did you enjoy your kolachi?

Speaker 1 (03:31):
I truly did. That was really delicious. I thought they
were cookies when you said colachia, I thought that was
like your little jam filled cookie. But this is like
the size of like a bagel, so it's quite an
undertaking you.

Speaker 3 (03:42):
I feel like they might be bigger than they're supposed
to be, like wider maybe the pictures I saw. I've
never seen one in real life, but the pictures I
saw they look a little more compact. And I think
the fruit to bread ratio is a little bit low.

Speaker 2 (03:57):
I think it could.

Speaker 1 (03:58):
It took me a while to get to the jam.

Speaker 2 (04:00):
Yeah yeah.

Speaker 3 (04:00):
But other than that, I think they are really good.

Speaker 2 (04:03):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (04:03):
I hadn't eaten yet today, and that's good because it was.
I mean, yeah, it's pretty. It's a filling snap. Thank
you very much. I would give it a nine out
of ten.

Speaker 2 (04:11):
Nine.

Speaker 1 (04:11):
If you would have used the cream cheese, it probably
would have been a ten out of ten.

Speaker 2 (04:14):
Yeah, I would give it a nine out of ten.

Speaker 1 (04:16):
Good for you. I mean, that's that's a big undertaking.
That's like dough.

Speaker 3 (04:20):
And I made the dough last night and it's kind
of just like bread dough. And it wasn't that hard.
It was a little bit involved kind of assembling.

Speaker 2 (04:28):
The whole thing.

Speaker 3 (04:28):
But thank you, delicious, You're welcome. Well, should we continue
on with the story of Joan Robinson Hill and John Hill.

Speaker 1 (04:34):
Absolutely, But before we start, let me just mention that
I looked up the house on Zillow last night and
the houses for your sale, which is kind of wild.
So we're going to buy it and then we're gonna
air five million.

Speaker 2 (04:48):
Oh so perfect.

Speaker 1 (04:49):
It's a little outside of our budget, but we can
airbnb it. I love Mary Kill.

Speaker 2 (04:56):
Oh my god, that's a great idea.

Speaker 3 (04:58):
Yeah, I have a great idea.

Speaker 1 (04:59):
Sure we would earn our money back.

Speaker 3 (05:01):
Yeah, just a couple of months. Have a Murder Mystery
theme party in the music room.

Speaker 1 (05:06):
Yeah. But I hope you put the link to the
house on the show notes so everyone can see it,
because it's it's a very interesting property. A house is
it's beautiful, but it also has you know, like the
checkerboard tile.

Speaker 3 (05:24):
It's a little dated our style exactly, well.

Speaker 1 (05:27):
Right, I mean our start was like like pottery barn
and this is more like, Yeah, it's very cool. Definitely
you should go look at that. And I also just
googled a picture of Joan and John, and I mean
they are a beautiful couple. Beautiful couple.

Speaker 3 (05:43):
Would you like to give us a recap of part one?

Speaker 1 (05:46):
Absolutely? Joan Robinson was the daughter of a wealthy Texas
oil man, Ash Robinson. Ash was very involved in his
daughter's life, even moving to be close to her while
she was in college and when she got married. Right
Joan met and married John Hill, who was studying to
be a plastic surgeon. They were a beautiful couple and
darlings of Houston's high society, but they were also opposites.

(06:09):
Joan loved her horses, she liked to swear, and she
enjoyed going to parties. John was religious, who loved his
mother and loved to play and listened to music obsessively.
John had an affair with a woman named Anne Kirth,
but was coerced to return to his marriage by Joan's dad,
but he continued the affair. In March nineteen sixty nine,
Joan suddenly got very ill. When we left off at

(06:32):
the end of part one, John had finally decided to
take Joan to the hospital, although she should have gone
to the hospital much much sooner.

Speaker 2 (06:39):
For sure.

Speaker 3 (06:40):
John said that he had arranged for Joan to be
treated at Sharpstown Hospital, claiming that she would be treated
like a queen there. He decided to drive Joan himself
rather than calling an ambulance. The decision to take her
to Sharpstown was puzzling. It was a small suburban hospital
without an emergency room or an intensive care unit, a
far cross from the world class facilities available at the

(07:02):
Texas Medical Center, which was actually closer to the Hill Mansion.
But John insisted that Joan would receive special care at Sharpstown,
and he was a doctor, right, He knew doctors all
over the place, so everyone just trusted him. I don't know, No,
I don't either. The drive there was agonizingly slow. Joan
lay in the back seat, weak and barely conscious, while

(07:23):
her mom, Rhea, sat in the front growing increasingly anxious.
Quote he drove like a snail. Rhea later recalled, I
felt like we were never going to get there. It
was almost as if he didn't want us to. At
one point, Joan's voice broke through the tense silence. Mother,
I'm blind, I can't see you, she said. Rhea turned
to her daughter in alarm, but John dismissed the comment

(07:44):
as a blackout, showing little concern. When they finally arrived
at Sharpstown Hospital, it became evident that John's so called
arrangements were dubious at best. No one seemed to know
that Joan was coming. A nurse eventually assisted Joan into
a wheelchair and took her to a private room. John
had contacted doctor Walter Burtonoe, an internal medicine specialist who

(08:05):
practiced at Sharpstown. Doctor Burtonou was surprised by the call.
He had never treated Joan before and had only met
her briefly at social events. When Burtno asked him why,
John explained that Joan disliked doctors, but had expressed favorable
opinions about Burtono in the past. Again, Burtonou was a
little confused since he really hadn't spent much time with Joan.

(08:27):
John described Joan's symptoms diarrhea, vomiting, and nausea, making the
situation sound routine. As a result, Doctor Burtonoe didn't initially
sense the urgency. However, when a nurse checked Joan's blood
pressure and found it dangerously low at sixty over forty,
she immediately called doctor Burtnoe, who was just a block away.
He rushed over to the hospital. Doctor Burtonou ordered IV

(08:50):
fluids to stabilize Joan's blood pressure, initially suspecting food poisoning
as a possible cause. He also requested ur analysis and
stool cultures. But to say, despite the ivy fluids, Joane's
blood pressure remained perilously low, prompting doctor Burtneau to wonder
if Joan was suffering from septic shock due to a
massive bacterial infection. By late afternoon, a nurse noted that

(09:12):
Joan wasn't producing any urine, an alarming sign of potential
kidney failure. That evening, Ash arrived to see his daughter.
Despite her weakened state, Joan was lucid and managed a
faint smile as ashe promised to fill her hospital room
with yellow roses the next day to cheer her up.
That would be nice, she whispered. Ash kissed Joan good night,

(09:32):
not knowing that it would be the last time he
would ever see her. By eight PM, Joan's condition had
taken a dire turn. A renal specialist was called in
and quickly confirmed severe kidney failure. The medical team debated
transferring her to a hospital across town that had a
dialysis machine, but Joan was deemed too critically ill to
survive the journey. Instead, they opted for peritoneal dialysis, a

(09:56):
procedure less invasive than hemodialysis but still a risk each
other choice given her fragile state.

Speaker 1 (10:02):
So John knew this smaller hospital didn't have the appropriate
facilities to really take care of her.

Speaker 3 (10:07):
I'm sure he must have. I mean, if you're a doctor,
you make your rounds in multiple hospitals. I'm sure he
was familiar with all the hospitals in the area. The
doctors needed John's consent to proceed with the peritoneal dialysis,
but he was nowhere to be found. Although he had
visited Joan a few times earlier in the day, by
this point he had returned home. The hospital called him

(10:29):
at nine to fifteen PM, secured his verbal approval for
the procedure, and informed him of the urgency. Despite this,
John didn't arrive at the hospital until nearly eleven pm.

Speaker 2 (10:39):
What a guy.

Speaker 1 (10:40):
Huh, that's horrible. Why would he even leave her?

Speaker 2 (10:44):
I know exactly.

Speaker 3 (10:46):
When he finally walked into Joan's room, she was lucid
but terrified. Please John, don't leave me, she begged. He
pulled a chair to her bedside and promised to stay.
By twelve thirty am, there was a glimmer of hope.
Joan's condition appeared to stabilize slightly. John decided to step
out and rest on a couch in the patient records
room down the hall. At two thirty am, everything unraveled.

(11:07):
Joanes's vital signs plummeted, signaling sudden heart failure. A nurse
rushed to her side just as Joan suddenly raised her
head and gasped. John, the on call resident, was summoned
immediately In a last ditch effort to save her. He
administered a shot of adrenaline directly to her heart, but
it was too late. Joan Robinson Hill was pronounced dead
at thirty eight years old. When a nurse woke John

(11:30):
to deliver the news, he screamed no, repeatedly, rocking back
and forth in anguish. Suddenly, he said, I need to
call my mother. The statement struck her as odd. Shouldn't
his first call have been to Jones's parents.

Speaker 1 (11:42):
Under Texas law, an autopsy must be conducted by the
county coroner on any individual who dies within twenty four
hours of being admitted to a hospital. The coroner is
required to determine the cause of death before the body
can be released for embalming or cremation. In Jones's case,
this critical procedure was bypassed. After Joan was pronounced dead.

(12:04):
Doctor Burton no informed John that an autopsy was mandatory.
John nodded, saying well, yes, of course. However, while doctor
Burton now began contacting the hospital pathologists to initiate the process,
John made a call of his own to his friend,
doctor Jim Oates. He asked Oates to arrange for the
funeral home to claim Joan's body and began preparing it

(12:26):
for burial. So he knew exactly what he was doing there.

Speaker 3 (12:29):
I mean, I wouldn't say one hundred percent. It could
be just, you know, in the moment he started kind
of making arrangements. But I don't know. I don't know
for sure if he knew what he.

Speaker 2 (12:39):
Was doing or not.

Speaker 1 (12:40):
By six am, a hearse arrived at the hospital's rear entrance.
Two attendants loaded Jones's body and transported it to the
funeral home. By six forty am, the embalming process was
already underway. Meanwhile, doctor Burton no managed to reach the
hospital pathologist at home between four and six am, informing
him of Jones's unexplained death and that her body had

(13:02):
been sent to the funeral home. The pathologist, assuming that
proper protocols were in place and that the funeral home
would hold off on embalming, did not rush. He eventually
arrived at the funeral home around ten am. To his shock,
the embalming process was already in progress. By this point,
all of Jones's blood and vital fluids, the most critical

(13:23):
components for toxicological testing, had been drained and were irretrievably lost.
Despite the setback, the pathologists conducted the autopsy as best
he could. He examined Joanes's body, collected tissue samples, and
inspected her internal organs. Most appeared normal, but he noted
that her pancreas was unusually soft and inflamed, a sign

(13:45):
consistent with acute pancreatitis. Based on this observation, he tentatively
concluded that pancreatitis was the likely cause of death. The
autopsy concluded by eleven thirty am, and Jones's body was
returned to the undertaker to complete the embalming process. The
possibility of uncovering any toxicological evidence was gone forever. In

(14:07):
the early hours of Wednesday morning after Joan's death, John
hesitated to deliver the devastating news to ashen Rhea. His friend,
doctor Oates, finally urged him, John, it's your duty. You
need to tell them. Together, they drove to Jones's parents' home,
where John broke the news. The Robinsons were paralyzed by grief,
ash and Ria Satin's stunned silence, unable to speak, staring

(14:31):
blankly ahead as the weight of the law sank in.
By sundown, more than one hundred of Jones's friends and
neighbors had gathered at the Robinson's home to offer their condolences.
On Thursday, Diane and Eunice made the drive back from
Dallas to Houston, still in disbelief that their vibrant friend,
whom they had just seen days earlier, was gone.

Speaker 3 (14:50):
Diana and Unis were staying with John and Joan the
week before, and they were there when she started to
get sick.

Speaker 1 (14:56):
That's right. Diane was livid and sought out John for
anne answers. Why did Joan die, John, she demanded. He replied,
she died of pancreatitis. I just didn't recognize the symptoms.
I wasn't treating her for that. Diane's anger flared, Why
the hell not? You've been through every goddamn specialty there is.
Ash paid for it. John, on the defensive, claimed that

(15:19):
Joan had refused to go to the hospital, insisting she
hated them. Diane wasn't convinced. Then, answer me this, She said.
If Joan was so sick that she died just hours
after getting to the hospital, why did it take you
so long to get her there? It doesn't add up, John,
None of it does. Later that evening, Diane was seen
in an intense conversation with Ash. As the discussion wore on,

(15:42):
Ash became visibly agitated, his face flushing with barely contained anger. Finally,
he stood abruptly, slammed his stetson onto his head, and
stormed out into the night, leaving a tense silence in
his wake. So Ash was a true Texan and couldn't
go anywhere without his Stepta on his head.

Speaker 3 (16:00):
I think Ash was about as Texan as a Texan Kim.

Speaker 1 (16:03):
Be well poor, Yeah, I mean he just must have
been breathed, yes, but both he and Ria must have
just been so upset. The next day was Jones's funeral.
At nine am, Ash Robinson arrived at the Assistant District
Attorney's office accompanied by his lawyer. Addressing Assistant Daid McMaster
with urgency, Ash declared, I have reason to believe my

(16:24):
son in law murdered my only child. This is going
to sound unbelievable, but it's the truth. Ash laid out
all the troubling facts he had gathered. Joan had been
in perfect health, vibrant and active, before suddenly falling ill.
Her decline began after eating French pastries that John brought
home one evening. John had been laid that night and

(16:45):
presented the pastries as a peace offering. Diane had found
it peculiar that John insisted on deciding who wait which pastry.

Speaker 3 (16:53):
For the record, they were not Colachi's that he brought.

Speaker 1 (16:55):
Yeah, I just started a sweat. I'm like, wait a minute,
but I know you wouldn't do that. Ash continued, describing
John's behavior during Joan's illness. Despite her severe condition, John
delayed calling another doctor and only took her to the
hospital when she was on the brink of death. Worse,
the hospital he chose was ill equipped to handle her case.
To top it off, her body was embalmed before a

(17:17):
proper autopsy could be conducted, a move that, ashe believed,
was intentional. Ash dismissed the pancreatitis explanation as implausible. At first,
McMaster suspected Ash was merely a grieving father looking for
answers in his sorrow, but as ashe spoke, his allegations
piqued McMaster's curiosity. By the end of the conversation, the

(17:38):
assistant DA promised to follow up within the next week. Ash,
a man accustomed to getting his own way, boiled over. No,
that'll be too late. I want you to get the
coroner out here before they close the coffin. Don't you
understand John Hill wants her buried as fast as possible.
McMaster contacted the Harris County Coroner, Josi chickim Min's helped

(18:04):
me out.

Speaker 3 (18:04):
I don't know, I would say just shimsick.

Speaker 1 (18:07):
Okay, we'll go with that. He instructed Jeshiviks to visit
the funeral home and inspect Jones's body if necessary, He
was to halt the funeral. How many times are you
going to make me say this name?

Speaker 3 (18:19):
You could just call him doctor J. That's what That's
what I started writing.

Speaker 1 (18:22):
In my notes. Doctor J quickly gathered some background information.
He contacted Sharpstown Hospital to obtain joones medical records and
spoke with a hospital pathologist who had conducted the autopsy.
The pathologist said his initial conclusion was pancreatitis, but confessed
he wasn't certain. At doctor J's insistence, he agreed to
turn over the remaining tissue samples for further examination. Before

(18:45):
ending the call, Doctor J pressed the pathologist about why
Jones' body had been embalmed before the legally required autopsy.
The pathologists had no explanation. I don't know, he said,
it was just a screw up all around. Later, doctor
J awry at the funeral home, blending in with the
mourners to avoid drawing attention. After discreetly examining Joan's body,

(19:06):
he concluded that the tissue samples would suffice for further
analysis and chose not to delay the funeral. The service
was a massive event. The chapel overflowed with people, with
many standing outside in the driveway. Speakers broadcast the ceremony
to the crowd, while two TV stations and several newspaper
and radio reporters documented the occasion. As the service ended,

(19:29):
Ash and Rhea entered the lead Cadillac limousine to head
to the cemetery. When Ash spotted John approaching, he quickly
told the driver, I don't want him in this car.
Lock the s doors, but John was faster, slipping into
the vehicle before the doors could be secured. At the
graveside ceremony, Ash's grief morphed into rage. As he turned
to walk away, he made a chilling proclamation, loud enough

(19:51):
for others to hear. If the law doesn't get that
son of a bitch, I will.

Speaker 3 (19:56):
Not content to wait for the Assistant DA to do
his job. Ashe launched his own investigation, he hired Clyde Wilson,
the same private investigator who had accompanied John to retrieve
his belongings from Anne's house. Wilson took statements from Diane
in Eunice, documenting their observations from the weekend when Joan
fell ill. Diane had already shared her poison a Claire

(20:17):
theory with others. That was what the pastry was. It
was in a Claire, and the rumor mill was quickly
churning in the town. Ash also spoke with Fie and Archie,
the Hill family's household staff. Their statements saying they believed
that Joan was murdered were written by Ash himself and
left unsigned, raising doubts about their authenticity. The couple had
continued working for John after Joan's death. Ash's dining room

(20:41):
became a chaotic command center for his investigation. Piles of documents,
medical charts, textbooks, and hastily scribbled notes from his discussions
with doctors covered the table. Meanwhile, Assistant d. A. McMaster
grew increasingly frustrated with Ash's constant interference. The old man
called his office man multiple times a day, sharing new
findings or theories. McMaster tried to brush him off, reminding

(21:05):
him that no action could be taken until doctor j
finalized the autopsy report. When the report finally arrived at
the end of March, it was a blow to Ash's hopes.
The conclusion was that Joan had died from acute focal hepatitis,
likely of viral origin. While doctor j conceded that it
was possible Joan had been poisoned, perhaps through a pastry

(21:25):
or her medicine, the report maintained that hepatitis was the
cause of death. McMaster told Ash there was no way
he could make a murder case, but ashe refused to
give up, he hired his own team of medical experts
who reviewed the autopsy results in Joan's medical records. They
found some red flags. Joan's chart showed no signs of
jaundice or elevated billy rubin, two key indicators of hepatitis,

(21:49):
and even the most severe viral hepatitis rarely caused death.
So quickly, frustrated but determined, Ash sought out Frank Briscoe,
the former Harris County DA who had recently transitioned into
private practice. Brisco with his deep knowledge of the legal
system and his connections with the Harris County Justice Department,
seemed like Ash's best hope. John, aware of Ash's suspicions,

(22:12):
knew that it was only a matter of time before
the pressure would mount. One day, he brought Boot over
to Ash and Rhea's house for a visit. When John
extended his hand for a handshake, Ash coldly ignored it.
John tried to make small talk, but Ash swiftly cut
him off. I'm not satisfied with either autopsy, Ash declared,
I want Jones' body exzoomed for a proper autopsy. John

(22:34):
said he didn't want Jones's grave disturbed. Ash's reply was sharp,
Then we have nothing to say to each other.

Speaker 1 (22:40):
Oh wow, we should mention that Boot is the son
of John and Joan. We talked about him last episode,
and he's probably about.

Speaker 3 (22:47):
Eight or nine at this time. Yeah, his real name
was Robert, but they called him Boot.

Speaker 2 (22:51):
Boot.

Speaker 1 (22:52):
Kind of surprised that Ash didn't try to get custody
at Boot.

Speaker 3 (22:56):
Yeah, I'm sure he wanted to get custody, but he
knew without John being convicted of murder, there was no
way he was going to get custody from his dad.
It took ten days after the funeral for John to
finally reach out to Anne. She was livid that he
had not contacted her since Joan's death. John apologized, explaining
that things have been chaotic, but he was dropping off
his son Robert, who we just talked about. The nickname

(23:19):
Boot was actually dropped immediately after Joan passed away. He
was dropping Robert off to see a movie and they
would have a couple of hours to talk before long.
John and Anne's romance was rekindled. On May twenty sixth,
nineteen sixty nine, just two and a half months after
Joan's death, John and Anne went to pick up a
marriage license. Y had two and a half months.

Speaker 1 (23:39):
That's disgusting.

Speaker 2 (23:40):
That's really quick.

Speaker 3 (23:41):
They secretly married and spent their honeymoon in a motel
near six Flags of Texas while their children enjoyed the
amusement part.

Speaker 1 (23:48):
Oh she had three sons.

Speaker 2 (23:49):
Yes. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (23:50):
Ash caught wind of John's quick remarriage from a gossip
columnist who had been tipped off. He was enraged, but
he was also excited. This was potentially explosive of new
information that could damage John's reputation without wasting a moment,
Ash contacted Frank Briscoe. Brisco Like assistant Da McMaster, was
beginning to grow weary of Ash's relentless pursuit, but the

(24:12):
news of John's rapid remarriage struck a nerve. It suggested
a possible motive and gave Ash's suspicions more weight. Risco
decided to reach out to McMaster, who had worked for
him during his tenure as district attorney.

Speaker 2 (24:26):
The two men.

Speaker 3 (24:26):
Discussed the case and agreed that the best course of
action to appease Ash and the public would be to
present the case to a grand jury, which was convened
early in the summer of nineteen sixty nine. Meanwhile, John's
plastic surgery practice began to suffer. The whispers around town
grew louder, and the gossip about his hasty remarriage began
to take a toll on his reputation.

Speaker 1 (24:47):
I was just going to ask about that, because you
had said that John and Joan were sweethearts of the
Houston High society. So they kind of turned their backs
on him then after that quick marriage.

Speaker 2 (25:00):
Yes, very much so.

Speaker 3 (25:01):
John endured Ash's relentless accusations with restraint until he learned
that Ash was now suggesting John's involvement in the tragic
death of his own brother years earlier. That crossed the
line for John. Furious, he contacted private investigator Clyde Wilson,
who was no longer working for Ash. Wilson recommended that
John volunteer for a lie detector test to clear his

(25:23):
name and dispel the cloud of suspicion looming over him.

Speaker 1 (25:26):
We talked about what was his brother's name, Julian, Julian,
and Julian took his own life, allegedly over his frustration
over his sexuality. I think you implied, yep.

Speaker 3 (25:37):
John mulled over the suggestion for several days before making
his decision. He would take the test, but only under
specific conditions. He refused to undergo a standard polygraph examination,
claiming that he had no faith in its reliability. Instead,
he would submit to a sodium pentathal injection, often referred
to as truth serum.

Speaker 1 (25:57):
Oh that's really interesting.

Speaker 2 (25:58):
I know, I've never seen a case where truth series.

Speaker 1 (26:00):
You didn't really know if that was real.

Speaker 3 (26:03):
It was back in the day, so it's not admissible
in court, but sodium pentathal had been used in some
law enforcement circles in the nineteen sixties, despite growing skepticism
about its accuracy in detecting lies. John also stipulated that
the test must take place at a hospital, not the
police station, and that the entire procedure would be recorded. Lastly,

(26:25):
He demanded that both parties swear to keep the details
of the test confidential from the media.

Speaker 2 (26:30):
The proposal was.

Speaker 3 (26:31):
Sent to Assistant DA McMaster, who accepted the conditions. In
early June nineteen sixty nine, John underwent the test at
Sharpstown Hospital. The anesthesiologist who administered the procedure was a
familiar face, having worked on ten to fifteen of John's
surgeries over the years, though none in the past two years.
After making some inquiries, McMaster was satisfied that the doctor

(26:53):
was ethical and unbiased.

Speaker 1 (26:56):
Do you think the sodium pentathal makes you like kind
of drunk and loose life a little bit?

Speaker 2 (27:01):
Maybe?

Speaker 3 (27:01):
I think it's basically it's an anesthesia, And basically the
idea behind using it as a truth serum is that
you give just enough of it through an IV that
the patient is not completely under but they're just scroggy, yeah,
and so they're more likely to tell the truth, I guess.
But again, I think it was I think it's been
largely disproven that it's accurate under the influence of sodium pentathal.

(27:25):
John answered all the questions posed to him. Nickmaster noted
that John appeared almost unnervingly composed his responses came off
as rehearsed, too precise for someone undergoing a supposedly spontaneous examination.
When asked if he had caused Joan to ingest anything,
or had injected anything that could have contributed to her

(27:45):
or worsened her illness, John responded with a firm, unwavering no, sir,
I did not. The interrogators pressed further, not in any way,
shape or form, to which he replied again, without hesitation, no, sir.
We'll be back after a break.

Speaker 1 (28:07):
The grand jury that had convened in early summer nineteen
sixty nine ended without bringing any indictment in the death
of Joan. There was simply no hard evidence. The foreman
of the grand jury later said to a reporter that,
certainly there was evidence that John Hill wasn't a very
good husband, but they couldn't indict someone for adultery. But
you can indict a ham sandwich.

Speaker 3 (28:29):
Well, I I don't believe I know what you're talking about.

Speaker 1 (28:33):
You've never heard that saying before.

Speaker 2 (28:34):
I don't think so.

Speaker 1 (28:36):
Just one of those things that people say, like you
can indict anything you want to.

Speaker 3 (28:40):
Okay, interesting, I've learned something new today.

Speaker 1 (28:43):
That's funny because it's usually the other way around. You
always see these things. They're like, I've never heard that before.
Well that one. Ash was outraged, of course. Assistant Da
McMaster was at the end of his rope with Ash.
He said, show me some evidence and I'll get an
indictment and that is prison. Decisely what ashe intended to
do on the advice of his medical experts, ashe became

(29:05):
convinced that the best chance to uncover hard evidence about
Joan's death was to exhume her body and conduct another autopsy,
this time with the top pathologists in the country, supported
by a team of leading medical professionals. Normally, such a
request would have to come from the next of kin John.
In this case, however, a grand jury could also request

(29:27):
an exhumation, provided a judge approved it. Determined to pursue
this path, Ashe urged his attorney, Frank Briscoe to push
for the exhumation, assuring him that the money was no object.
But Briscoe, worned down by Ash's relentless determination, made inquiries
of his own and concluded that his second autopsy would
likely yield little new evidence. He advised Ashe to let

(29:51):
go of the idea and move on with his life. Ash, however,
refused to back down, and frustration, he fired Briscoe, who
later told a report Ash has had an absolute fixation
on his daughter's death. I've never seen anything like it.
I kind of can't blame Ash. I mean, if you
really know.

Speaker 3 (30:10):
Yeah, if you've got more money than you know what
to do with, and you, you know, think that there's
something suspicious about your daughter's death, why wouldn't you use
every avenue you had to?

Speaker 1 (30:19):
Yeah, I think I get an Ash then turned to
his close friend and fellow Houston businessman, Cecil Hayden for advice.
Hayden suggested that Ash hire the city's most prestigious law firm,
Vincent Elkins, Weem's, Searles and Connolly. Renowned for its influence
and legal prowess. The firm boasted an army of talented attorneys.

(30:40):
I'm surprised Ash didn't hire them. Off the bat. Ash
retained a young, but highly regarded lawyer from the firm,
Richard Keaton. Keaton approached the matter with discretion. He quietly
inquired at the DA's office to gauge District Attorney Carol
Vance's stance on the exhumation. Vance, like his assistant Daid McMaster,

(31:00):
was weary of the Johan Robinson Hill case. However, with
political ambitions of his own, Vance understood the value of
cooperating with a law firm as powerful as Vinson and Elkins.
Buoyed by Keaton's encouragement, Ash launched a strategic campaign to
build support for the exhumation. He persuaded several prominent Houston

(31:21):
physicians to write letters to da Vance urging further investigation
into Jones' death through another autopsy. Ash also wrote directly
to Vance, offering to cover all expenses, including the cost
of securing the best pathologist in the country. Facing mounting pressure,
Vance decided to present the matter to a new grand jury.
After reviewing the evidence, including a heartfelt plea from Ash,

(31:45):
the grand jury voted in favor of proceeding with the exhumation.
Ash hired doctor Milton Helpern, the renowned chief medical examiner
of New York City, often described as Sherlock Holmes, with
a microscope. Widely considered the nation's top coroner. Helpern's expertise
came with a hefty price tech for Ash, rumored to
be in this sixth figure range, though the exact amount

(32:08):
was undisclosed until now. John had not retained an attorney,
but news of the exhumation prompted him to act. He
hired Richard Racehorse Haynes, a legendary trial lawyer whose nickname
stemmed from his high school football days. Racehorse advised John
to assemble a team of medical professionals to observe the
autopsy and safeguard his interests. You can bet your last

(32:31):
dollar ashe will have his own team there, he warned.
On August sixteenth, nineteen sixty nine, jones grave was dog
up in our casket transported to ben Top Hospital for
another autopsy. Doctor Helpern led the procedure, while Ash and
John both had their respective medical teams present. Ash's side
included several prominent physicians, while John's team consisted of three

(32:53):
pathologists and two additional doctors. The moment the casket was opened,
something unexpected was to severed. Dried mud inside. The mud
was old, predating that day's excuamation. This raised an immediate
question had Jones's casket been disturbed before? Shock and confusion
swept through the room as the revelations sunk in. Investigations

(33:16):
quickly uncovered that just three days after Joan's burial, John
had obtained a permit from the health department to have
her grave opened. Yes, oh my gosh. John explained that
he had been searching for a valuable ring he believed
Joan had been buried with. According to cemetery staff, John
personally inspected Joan's body but didn't find the ring. This

(33:37):
process was brief, and Joan's grave was resealed. Wow.

Speaker 3 (33:42):
I know, that's quite a revelation, isn't it. I mean,
I just can only imagine how shocked the doctors were
when they figured that out.

Speaker 1 (33:48):
I just can't imagine. Whoever makes that decision was like,
oh yeah, well, because that's not an easy thing to
get right, passed right.

Speaker 2 (33:56):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (33:57):
To Ash's team of doctors, this incident appeared deeply suspicious.
They speculated that John might have been searching for evidence
of incriminating needle marks rather than a lost ring. Months later,
a college friend of Jones, who had selected her burial dress,
recalled a conversation with John when she asked if Joan
should be buried with any jewelry. John had insisted no,

(34:20):
absolutely not. As the autopsy proceeded, Hulpert identified needle marks
on Joanes's arm, but determined they were consistent with the
ivs she received in the hospital. No unexplained marks were found.
Then came a startling discovery. Jones's heart was missing. That's crazy.
Doctor Morris, the hospital pathologist who had conducted the initial autopsy,

(34:44):
explained that he had removed it for further study. He
defended the decision, stating that proper analysis of the heart
would have been unnecessary if Joan's blood had been available,
but the embalming mishap had rendered that impossible. The shocks
didn't end there. Her brain was also missing. When questioned,
doctor Morris casually admitted, Oh, it's in the trunk of

(35:07):
my car. I'll go get it.

Speaker 2 (35:11):
What the are you kidding, I'm kidding?

Speaker 1 (35:14):
Oh my, oh my god. Disbelief rippled through the room,
but Morris clarified during the original autopsy had preserved Joan's
brain in formulin, a solution used to fix tissue for
microscopic examination. This was common. He claimed it was in
his car because he was in the process of transferring
a number of specimens between labs. True to his word,

(35:35):
Morris retrieved the brain, now sectioned and stored in a container.
Oh gosh, that's crazy. The autopsy lasted seven hours. While
no immediate breakthroughs occurred during this phase, Haulprin collected multiple
tissue samples to analyze further in New York. He assured
everyone that a detailed report would follow soon.

Speaker 2 (35:57):
Holy cow, I know, it's just shocking.

Speaker 3 (36:01):
I remember this whole reading about this whole thing in
the autopsy just blew my mind.

Speaker 1 (36:05):
Yeah. Well, thank goodness they exhumed her body, I guess
to learn all these new things.

Speaker 2 (36:10):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (36:11):
John's troubles didn't stop with the autopsy. His once busy
plastic surgery practice was in freefall. He had gone from
being one of the most sought after surgeons in town
to someone no one wanted near their face, at least
not if they valued their reputation. Sure, people still came
in for consultations, but it didn't take long for John
to realize that most of them were just there to

(36:32):
gawk at the murder suspect doctor. And then there was Ash,
who was running a full blown smear campaign against him.
Ash made sure everyone knew John was under suspicion. Robert's
school was getting anonymous calls accusing John of being a
murderer and warning that his influence wasn't good for the kids.
John's home phone rang off the hook with middle of

(36:52):
the night calls from people telling him to confess, even
as church got dragged into the mess, with the minister
receiving complaints, ended up standing before the congregation apologizing for
the embarrassment he had brought on the church. You would
think his new wife, Anne might have been a bright
spot in all of this, but no. John told his lawyer,
Racehorse Haines that marrying Anne was the biggest mistake of

(37:15):
my life. He claimed she was abusive, verbally, emotional, even physically.
At one point, she allegedly punched him so hard she
broke his nose.

Speaker 1 (37:23):
I'm not mad at that.

Speaker 3 (37:25):
Anne was consumed by jealousy of Joan, and she wasn't
subtle about it. She tore up pictures, smashed Joan's trophies,
scratched up her silver cups, and even threw some of
her things into a bonfire. It was like she was
trying to erase any trace of Joan. But Anne had
her own reasons to be upset. After the wedding, she
found out that John was in serious debt and his

(37:47):
finances were only getting worse as his practice dried up.
On top of that, John's mother, Myra, had moved in
after Joan's death and didn't seem to have plans to
leave anytime soon. By October nineteen sixty nine, John done.
He went to Racehorse and asked him to write up
divorce papers. But Racehorse told him bad idea. If you
divorce Anne now, she'll side with Ash and she could

(38:10):
say a lot of things that might sink you. Plus,
with Helpern's autopsy results still pending, it'll make you look
even guiltier. So John stayed married for now. But make
no mistake, it wasn't out of love. It was pure
damage control. The marriage was a nightmare, but it was
the lesser of two evils, at least for the moment.
While everyone was anxiously awaiting for doctor Helpern's final autopsy

(38:33):
report four months after the exhumation, mind you, other findings
started trickling in. Doctor j who had initially ruled Joan's
death as hepatitis, updated his opinion. Now he was saying
that Joan died from a fulminating infectious process, which is
a fancy way of saying some kind of severe fast
moving infection, but what kind he didn't know. Meanwhile, John's

(38:57):
team of doctors chimed in with their own conclusion, bacterial
meningitis with septocemia. So now we had four different explanations
for Jones' death, pancreatitis, hepatitis, meningitis, and a mysterious infection
no one could pin down. None of it was helpful
for Ash's cause. Ash kept calling doctor Helpern's office, hoping

(39:17):
for answers more useful in his crusade against John, but
all he got was delay after delay. He was used
to pushing people until they gave him what he wanted,
but this time it felt like he was hitting a
brick wall. John had finally reached his breaking point. He
stormed into Racehorse Haines's office and told him, I can't
live with Anne for another day. Racehorse, ever, the voice

(39:39):
of reason, begged him to hold on just a little longer.
He reminded John that as long as they were married,
Anne couldn't testify against him. Let's at least wait for
doctor Helpern's report, Racehorse said. But John wasn't having it.
He was done, so reluctantly, Racehorse started drafting the paperwork
for what he later called the War on Kirby Drive.
And then he and unhatched what might be one of

(40:01):
the worst plans in the history of bad plans.

Speaker 2 (40:04):
Oh wow, here was the idea.

Speaker 3 (40:06):
John would fake a romantic reconciliation with Anne. He would
suggest a spontaneous road trip to Louisiana, turn on the
charm and brace yourself, pull the car over somewhere along
the way to make love to her. Then, in the
afterglow of this manufactured passion, he would drop the bombshell
they had to divorce. But don't worry, it wasn't about her.

(40:27):
It was all because Racehorse believed the divorce would make
it easier to defend John. Meanwhile, back at the mansion,
movers hired by John would be packing up all of
Anne's belongings and shipping them back to her old house,
which she hadn't sold yet. John even went so far
as to break a window at Anne's house so that
the movers could get in, and the plan actually worked,

(40:49):
except that Anne was blindsided. Furious and humiliated, she stormed
back to Houston and drove straight to Ash's house. By
the end of that visit, she had become one of
Ash's his most valuable allies in his crusade against John Oh.

Speaker 1 (41:03):
Wow.

Speaker 3 (41:04):
Looking back on it later, Racehorse admitted quote in retrospect,
this was not one of our better ideas, but that
was the only way we could get control of the castle,
so to speak.

Speaker 1 (41:13):
Do you know how long they were married for?

Speaker 2 (41:16):
It wasn't long.

Speaker 3 (41:16):
I think it was less than a year, maybe even
six months.

Speaker 2 (41:19):
Wow.

Speaker 3 (41:20):
By February nineteen seventy, six months after the autopsy, Doctor
Helpern's report was still nowhere to be found. But Da
Carrol Vance, under constant pressure from Ash Robinson and his allies,
had an idea. Why not assemble a third grand jury
to take another swing at the case. After all, Helpern's
report was supposedly coming any day. Now Here's where things

(41:42):
get really strange. One of the jurors selected for this
new grand jury was none other than Cecil Hayden. We
mentioned him once before. Cecil was Ash Robinson's close friend
and the guy who had originally suggested that Ash hire
the powerful Vincent and Elkins law firm. So this is
a real conflict of interest for reasons that still I

(42:03):
don't understand. Nobody in Houston seemed to think that this
was a problem, not the Houston Bar Association and not
the media. It almost felt like the deck was just
stacked against John Hill. John and Racehorse decided it was
time to fight back. They filed a ten million dollar
lawsuit against Ash Robinson. The claim was that ashe was
conspiring to get John indicted for a crime he didn't commit,

(42:26):
damaging his reputation and causing major financial harm. But the
lawsuit wasn't just about money. The real goal was to
give Racehorse subpoena power. Now he could call the same
witnesses who were testifying before the grand jury and find
out exactly what they were saying. Back in the grand
jury room, it was clear who was really in charge. Officially,

(42:47):
they elected a foreman, but everybody knew Cecil Hayden was
running the show and most of the jurors seemed more
than happy to follow his lead. Then came another twist.
On March twelfth, nineteen seventy, John and Anne's divorce was finalized.
Less than twenty four hours later, Ann walked into the
grand jury room ready to spill everything. Oh boy, and

(43:07):
she told quite a story. She claimed that not only
had John killed Joan, but he had also tried to
kill her three times and she wasn't done. An said
that John's sodium pentathal test was a total sham. She
claimed that he had researched the drug, found an antidote,
and injected himself with it the morning of the test.

(43:27):
She said she saw him giving himself a shot in
the hip that morning.

Speaker 1 (43:31):
Oh my goodness.

Speaker 3 (43:32):
A sodium pentathal was already considered unreliable as a truth serum,
but the idea of an antidote, there's no evidence that
such a thing actually exists. So Anne's story was dramatic,
but it wasn't exactly credible. Still, with Cecil Hayden's steering
the grand jury and Ash Robinson's influence looming large, it
was clear that this wasn't going to be an easy fight.

Speaker 2 (43:54):
For John Hill.

Speaker 1 (43:55):
So Cecil Hayden being on the grand jury? Was that
not a coincidence? I mean someone paid off.

Speaker 3 (44:02):
They looked into it, and everyone involved swore that it
was just it just happened that way. It wasn't anything suspicious,
but yeah.

Speaker 2 (44:12):
You have to wonder.

Speaker 1 (44:13):
Yeah. By April nineteen seventy, the clock was ticking. Da
vance was growing more and more frustrated. It had been
eight months since doctor Helpern performed his autopsy and still
no final report. Meanwhile, the grand jury's time was running out.
They were set to wrap up in a few weeks.
If they didn't indict John Hill before then, the case

(44:35):
might be dead. Vance decided to push things along. He
had one of his assistants called doctor Helpern to check in.
Halpern sounded embarrassed the report still wasn't done, so they
floated an idea. Instead of finishing the report and sending
it over, what if helper In just came to Houston
and presented his findings directly to the grand jury. Helper

(44:56):
And agreed on one condition, someone had to pay for
his time, and of course Ash Robinson was more than
happy to cut that check. Let's talk about Helpern's findings.
Scientifically speaking, there wasn't much in the report that hurt
John Hill. There was no evidence that Jones's body had
been tampered with during the first exhumation when John was

(45:17):
looking for that missing ring, No suspicious injection marks were found,
and toxicology didn't reveal anything criminal. But then Helpern's report
took a strange turn, he started veering off into gossip. Basically,
he brought up the infamous pastries, the Hill's crumbling marriage,
John's affair with Anne, and Effie's claim that Joan had

(45:39):
been left lying in a soiled bed. None of this
was medical evidence. It was like Helpern was trying to
appease Ash with drama and hearsay since he couldn't find
anything solid to pin on John. Eventually, Helpern got around
to his actual conclusion about Joan's cause of death. He
dismissed the previous findings pancreatitis, hepatitis, acute meningitis is wrong.

(46:02):
So what did he think killed Joan? His answer, and
acute inflammation of some sort, the origin of which I
cannot determine, very definitive. He added that the likely portal
of entry was through the elementary track, meaning it must
have been something she ate or maybe not. Helper And

(46:24):
threw in one last bombshell. He believed that the failure
to provide medical attention at home and the resultant delay
in hospitalization for a diagnosis and effective therapy aggravated a
situation which proved fatal. In plain English, he was pointing
the finger at John for negligence. The report was completely inconclusive.

(46:45):
Some people in the Houston medical community thought it was
enough to suggest that John was at least guilty of neglect.
Others blasted Helpern for relying on unverified stories from the
Hills maid and house guests. So here we were eight months,
multiple auto and still no definitive answers. But one thing
was clear. The grand jury wasn't about to let John

(47:06):
Hill off the hook just yet. Racehorse Haines was starting
to sweat. Word had gotten back to him that someone
from the DA's office, after hearing doctor Helpern's report, had
made a cutting remark quote, I wouldn't let a dog
die the way that doctor let his wife die. Not
exactly the kind of sentiment you want floating around the
grand jury room when your client's fate is on the line.

(47:28):
Racehorse knew that he had to do something bold, so
he suggested that John Hill appear before the grand jury himself.
This was risky, very risky, but the idea was to
show that John had nothing to hide. If he came
across as genuine and cooperative, maybe it would sway the
jurors in his favor. Surprisingly, John agreed. John walked into

(47:50):
that jury room and answered every question they threw at him.
And here's the thing. His answers weren't incriminating. He didn't
admit to anything that they could nail him on legally.
But it wasn't what he said that left an impression.
It was how he said it. John came across as cold, emotionless,
like a robot. He spoke about Joan's death in such
a detached, clinical way it was as if he were

(48:12):
discussing the case of a random patient, not his wife.
At one point, when asked if he had any regrets
about how he'd handle things, John said, well, of course,
that's very difficult to say. Then he launched into a
technical explanation that sounded more like a medical defense than
a heartfelt reflection, and it got worse. John contradicted some

(48:33):
key witness accounts. For example, he claimed he'd help Joan
down the stairs when they were taking her to the hospital,
but Archie, Effie, and Rhea, who were all there, had
testified that John had ordered Joan to walk down herself.
To put it bluntly, his attitude rubbed the jurors the
wrong way. They were expecting remorse sorrow, anything to show

(48:53):
he cared. Instead, they got icy detachment. And here's the kicker.
When John walked out of that room, he thought he
nailed it. He genuinely believed he had convinced the grand
jury to see things his way and that there wouldn't
be an indictment. Spoiler alert, John's confidence might have just
been a little misplaced. The day after John testified, the

(49:16):
grand jury asked for a one month extension on their
ninety day term. When a grand jury asks for more time,
it's usually not because they need extra coffee breaks. Racehorse
knew exactly what it meant, and indictment was almost certainly coming.
So in a last ditch effort, Racehorse picked up the
phone and called Assistant da Id McMaster. The message John

(49:38):
was now willing to take a standard police administered polygraph test.
This was a huge gamble, but Racehorse was hoping it
might change the tide. McMaster was open to the idea,
but there was a catch. John would need to stay
in jail for forty eight hours under constant observation. First,
why well, if someone pops a handful of tranquilizers before

(49:59):
a holygraph, it can completely skew the results.

Speaker 3 (50:02):
I didn't know that before, so now I'm going to
keep that in mind if I ever have to take
a Pollycraft.

Speaker 1 (50:08):
I don't think you're going to ever have to take
a polygraph, though, although you always say you want to.
McMaster wanted to make sure John wasn't gaming the system,
but there was no way Resource could agree to that.
Two days behind bars would be a pr disaster for John.
Imagine the headlines. So that plan fizzled out as quickly
as it started. Meanwhile, the DA's office was brainstorming their

(50:30):
next move. McMaster and his colleague Ernie Ernst sat down
with their boss, DA, Carrol Vance. The truth was they
didn't have a slam dunk murder case against John Hill,
but Ernst had a bold idea. He said, quote, look,
we might not be able to prove that John did
something that directly caused Joanes death, but what if we
argue that he's guilty of murder biomission. This was a

(50:54):
long shot. There were maybe twenty cases in US history
where someone had been convicted of murder biomission. But the
law is clear. If you owe a duty to someone,
like say your wife, and you fail to act, and
that failure leads to their death, you can be guilty
of homicide. The argument went like this, John, as Joan's
husband and a doctor, had a duty to provide her

(51:16):
with proper medical care. By withholding treatment and delaying her hospitalization,
he was criminally negligent, and if they could prove that
negligence caused Joan's death, they could charge him with first
degree murder. Vance agreed it was worth a shot. They
took the case back to the grand jury, and guess what.

(51:36):
The grand jury voted to indict.

Speaker 3 (51:40):
John was rattled by the indictment, but racehorse wasn't. He
was confident that they would win at trial, and despite everything,
John had a reason to feel good. There was a
new woman in his life, Connie Losby. Connie was nothing
like Joan or Anne. She was graceful, refined.

Speaker 1 (51:57):
How dare you?

Speaker 3 (51:58):
I felt a little bad writ that. But Joan wasn't graceful.
She was like a you know, she was a horse
scowl and she was a country yell. But the biggest
thing with Connie and John was that Connie shared John's
deep love for music. Connie had been immersed in it
since she was seven, starting with piano lessons and later
adding singing to her repertoire. At age twelve, she even

(52:19):
earned a master's degree in music, flirted with the idea
of an opera career, and eventually found her calling teaching
music at a junior college near Houston.

Speaker 1 (52:27):
Oh my god, you're going to leave me for a
woman like Connie who loves procyl haram aren't real.

Speaker 3 (52:34):
I don't think there are actually any women that loved
prokel arams, so probably not. John and Connie met in
December nineteen sixty nine after she performed in a musical
playing harpsichord and singing. Connie was in a news junkie
and had no idea who John Hill was. After the event,
John invited her to his home for a private concert

(52:55):
in his cherished music room. For months, she attended these
musicals at the mansion, enjoying the music. One day, John
called Connie out of the blue, saying he had a
gift for her. She invited him over, and he showed
up with a record by Elizabeth Schwarzkoff, a singer that
they both admired. From that moment their romance began to blossom.
At first, John was cautious, he knew how it would

(53:17):
look a new romance while his first wife's death was
still under investigation and his second marriage in a shambles.
To keep things under the radar, Connie would visit under
the guise of giving music lessons to John's son Robert.
After the lessons, she would stay for dinner, and their
evenings often ended in the music room, sharing their mutual
love for classical music. For a while, Connie didn't ask

(53:40):
John about Joan's death, but after the indictment she gently
broached the subject. John brushed it off, saying he had
simply made a poor choice in in laws. He told
Connie it had been a difficult time for him and asked.

Speaker 2 (53:52):
For her support.

Speaker 3 (53:53):
Without hesitation, Connie assured him that she would be behind
him one hundred percent. She believed there was no way
John could have been involved in something as awful as murder.
A few weeks later, John proposed Connie. Ever, the pragmatist
said sure, how about tomorrow.

Speaker 1 (54:08):
Oh my gosh, John some prize.

Speaker 3 (54:11):
But John thought he had better run the idea by
his lawyer first. Predictably, Racehorse hated it. He told John,
you might as well drive straight to Huntsville and spend
your wedding night there at least you'd be close to
the state prison.

Speaker 1 (54:24):
I really like or Racehorst too, other than his who
he's defending.

Speaker 2 (54:28):
The message was clear.

Speaker 3 (54:30):
Reluctantly, John agreed to hold off on the wedding for now.

Speaker 1 (54:33):
So they had only known each other for weeks.

Speaker 3 (54:36):
Yeah, I think they just knew, you know, they to
be fair. John and Connie were. They were a lot alike,
and they seemed like they were really perfect for each Well.

Speaker 1 (54:45):
That goes back to our question from last time. You know,
I think it's better not to be so alike.

Speaker 2 (54:49):
Could be, could be?

Speaker 1 (54:50):
In my opinion.

Speaker 3 (54:51):
As the trial loomed, Racehorse Haines felt confident to him
the state of Texas didn't have a murder case. At best,
they had a shaky malpractice claim, and even if John
Hill were somehow convicted, Racehorse was sure he could get
it overturned on appeal, especially since Ash Robinson's buddy, Cecil
Hayden had served on the grand jury. Still, Racehorse made

(55:12):
one last attempt to get the charges dropped. He pressed
Assistant DA's McMaster and Ernst, but they weren't budging. They
believed John was guilty. Plus McMaster had his own ambitions.
He was gearing up to run for district judge and
being tied to a high profile murder case wouldn't hurt
his campaign. Jury selection began on February sixteenth, nineteen seventy one.

(55:34):
The prosecution's strategy leaned heavily on witness testimony, and they
brought in several key players, including jones neighbor Van Maxwell,
and the Hill family's housekeeper e Fie Green. But everyone
was waiting for the star witness, Anne Kerth, John's ex wife.
Racehorse knew that Anne's testimony could be explosive. He had
a strategy ready. He planned to argue that her testimony

(55:56):
wasn't admissible in Texas. Like most states, a spouse case
can't testify about private conversations during a marriage, even after
a divorce. Those are considered privileged. But the judge allowed
Anne to testify with limits. She could only talk about
events before their marriage or incidents involving alleged violence. That
opened the door for Anne to tell the jury her

(56:18):
shocking story, including claims that John had tried to kill her,
and testified that a week before Jones's death, she and
John were at their love nest when she spotted three
Peatrie dishes near the sink. She said they contained something
red with small dots in it. According to Anne, John
told her he was conducting an experiment. Then she opened

(56:39):
the fridge and saw a box of pastries. John warned
her not to eat them.

Speaker 1 (56:43):
I had microbiology back in the day.

Speaker 2 (56:46):
What did the dots mean?

Speaker 1 (56:47):
I wasn't sure he was harvesting. Probably some sort of
harmful bacteria.

Speaker 2 (56:51):
Okay.

Speaker 3 (56:52):
Then came her most jaw dropping allegation and claimed that
on the night of June twenty ninth, nineteen sixty nine,
John admitted to murder Joan. She said that they were
out for a late night drive after an argument, and
John suddenly confessed that he had used cultures from the
Petrie dishes grown from, as Anne put it, every kind
of human excretion he could get his hands on, to

(57:14):
poison Joan, and testified that John then drove toward a
concrete bridge and deliberately rammed the car into the abutment
on her side. She said she only survived because she
wasn't wearing a seatbelt and managed to throw herself toward
John just before the impact, but it didn't stop there.
Anne claimed that John pulled a syringe from his coat

(57:35):
pocket and tried to inject her. She fought him off
until headlights appeared a car pulling up behind them. It
was a woman and her teenage son who.

Speaker 2 (57:43):
Offered to help.

Speaker 3 (57:45):
Police records confirmed the crash, but John had a different explanation.
He told Racehorse that Anne had grabbed the wheel during
an argument, causing the wreck, and when the police showed up,
he said that he had fallen asleep at the wheel,
which seemed like the simplest excuse at the time. Racehorse
was relentless in his objections during Anne's testimony, arguing that

(58:06):
her claims were prejudicial, inflammatory, and impossible to ignore, even
if the judge instructed the jury to disregard certain parts.
At one point, Racehorse demanded a mistrial Judge Huey, of
Judge Huey, it's a great name. He refused, but after
lunch he called the attorneys to his chambers. He had
reviewed Anne's testimony and agreed with Racehorse. The motion for

(58:29):
a mistrial was granted. McMaster and Ernst were stunned. They
pleaded with the judge to reconsider, but it was over.
After ten days of testimony. The trial was scrapped. And
a new one was scheduled. Racehorse celebrated, but John wasn't happy.
His ordeal would drag on even longer now, and on
his way out of the courtroom, two jurors had approached him,

(58:50):
shook his hand and wished him luck. Later, it came
out that the jury had taken an informal poll before
being dismissed, and most of them were leaning toward acquittal.
Ash Robinson was furious. He confided in a friend that
he had poured hundreds of thousands of dollars into seeking
justice for Joan, only to have it all go up
in smoke. His friend tried to reassure him, saying that

(59:12):
there would be another trial. Ash's response, their damn well
better be. With the first trial behind him and the
second one months away. John approached Racehorse with a question,
could he finally marry Connie? Racehors gave him the green light,
this time telling him to go for it. In June
nineteen seventy one, John and Connie tied the knot in
her hometown near Seattle, but their new life together wasn't

(59:35):
exactly off to a fairytale start. Financially, John was in ruins.
The bank had called in the loans he had taken
to keep himself afloat, and he didn't have the money
to repay them. Their plans for a European honeymoon were scrapped.
Connie didn't mind one bit. She was happy simply to
be marrying John. The retrial, however, loomed over their lives.

(59:56):
It kept getting delayed, and Ash Robinson made sure the
DA's office didn't forget about it. He bombarded them with
phone calls demanding to know when the new trial would begin. Eventually,
it was scheduled for November nineteen seventy two, but enthusiasm
for the case was running on fumes. Ernie Ernst had
retired and I. D. McMaster had moved on to his

(01:00:16):
new role as a district judge. The case was shuffled
from prosecutor to prosecutor, none of whom seemed eager to
take it on. Ashe tried to breathe new life into it,
claiming he had found a mystery witness with explosive new
allegations against John. The DA's office dismissed it as just
another entry for the nut call's folder. Meanwhile, John and

(01:00:37):
Connie were quietly building a new life together, Connie opened
a music school, while John's patient roster slowly began to
fill up again. Their social calendar was far quieter than
it had been during John's marriage to Joan. Instead, the
couple spent their evenings at home, often in the music room,
enjoying each other's company and finding solace in their shared
love of music. In September nineteen seventy to, just two

(01:01:00):
months before John's retrial, he and Connie flew to Seattle
for her cousin's wedding. Afterward, they planned to head to
Las Vegas for an annual plastic surgery convention. On their
flight to Vegas, the plane made a stop in San Francisco. Connie,
not usually one for spontaneity, turned to John and said,
why don't we stay here for a day. No one
will miss us at the convention. John didn't need convincing.

(01:01:23):
He hated Las Vegas and he wasn't looking forward to
the conference. What started as a one day detour turned
into four. They embraced the charm of San Francisco, attending
the opera, dining at elegant restaurants, riding the iconic cable cars,
and exploring Golden Gate Park. Eventually, they made their way
to Vegas to catch the final couple of days of
the convention. When they returned to Houston, they hailed a

(01:01:46):
taxi from the airport. As they pulled up to the house,
Connie jumped out, excited to share stories of their trip
with Robert John's now twelve year old son. John stayed
behind to settle the fair with the driver. Connie approached
the front door, ringing the bell well. She pressed her
face against the glass panel behind it, squishing her nose playfully,
hoping to make Robert laugh when he came to the door,

(01:02:07):
but no one came. Myra John's mother was supposed to
be watching Robert, yet there was no sign of her either.
Connie rang the bell again and saw someone approaching the door. Squinting,
she assumed it was Robert in some kind of costume.
The door opened and Connie froze. Standing in front of
her was a strange man pointing a gun. He grabbed

(01:02:28):
the necklace around her neck and said this is a robbery.
Before Connie could react, John appeared behind her. He pushed
her aside and stepped toward the gunman. Panicked, Connie ran
toward a neighbor's house. Just as she reached their property line,
she heard gunshots. My husband's being murdered, she screamed, as
the neighbor opened the door. The neighbor quickly called the police.

(01:02:49):
Another neighbor, hearing the commotion, ran toward the Hills home.
There he found young Robert Hill standing over his father's body, sobbing,
They've killed my daddy. When emergency responded arrived, they found
John Hill lying face down near the front door. Turning
him over, they saw adhesive tape covering his nose and mouth,
with more tape sealing his eyes shut. The paramedics checked

(01:03:11):
for vital signs, but it was too late. John Hill
was dead.

Speaker 2 (01:03:16):
Wow.

Speaker 1 (01:03:16):
I didn't see that coming. What kind of did but
I didn't.

Speaker 3 (01:03:20):
Yeah, I'm afraid that is where we are going to
end part two. Wow, a lot more of this story
to tell.

Speaker 1 (01:03:27):
It's crazy that there's a whole nother episode to go.

Speaker 2 (01:03:30):
Yeah, there is.

Speaker 1 (01:03:32):
I don't want to put the car before the horse,
but I'm guessing that that wasn't a real burglary attempt.

Speaker 3 (01:03:37):
Well, I guess you're gonna have to come back for
part three to find out more about that, which is
not going to happen until I get back from Europe,
so you're gonna have to wait a few days.

Speaker 1 (01:03:44):
Felt like I can't read the script because you have
part three.

Speaker 3 (01:03:47):
Here, I'm gonna take away have permissions right now.

Speaker 1 (01:03:51):
I'm going to share it with the listeners too. We're
not gonna wait.

Speaker 3 (01:03:55):
So we already talked a little bit about if you
were in ashes shoes that you probably would have acted
similarly in trying to.

Speaker 1 (01:04:02):
Get limitless amounts of money. Yeah, I would definitely want
to avenge the death of my child. Sure.

Speaker 2 (01:04:07):
But do you think that John actually killed Joan?

Speaker 3 (01:04:10):
Oh?

Speaker 1 (01:04:10):
Yeah, I think so. I think he had something to
do with it.

Speaker 3 (01:04:13):
If you don't, I don't know, I really to me really,
I mean, we've we've gone through all the medical evidence.
We're going to go through their back, multiple autopsies, so
we're really not going to learn.

Speaker 1 (01:04:22):
And that's the third part has nothing to do with
Joan's death.

Speaker 3 (01:04:25):
No, it's really about finding justice for John's death at
this point. But Jon's death, I don't know. I mean,
it just seems in the fact that.

Speaker 1 (01:04:33):
He took her to the smaller hospital and he's a doctor. Yeah,
you know, if you're a doctor, you know when someone
is on death's.

Speaker 2 (01:04:40):
Door, right you should. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:04:42):
Yeah, so I think he knew how ill she was,
the fact that he left her there and he thought
he was in love with this other woman, I think
the cards are stacked against him. Yeah, And the thing
with that Anne had said with the Peatri dishes is
how he was harvesting harmful bacteria, Like that's one of
the smarter ways that we have heard of poisoning someone.

(01:05:03):
So you know, if if you could introduce I think
like human excrement into your digestive system, I think that
could probably kill you, right.

Speaker 3 (01:05:14):
Yeah, I do think Anne's testimony there, I mean, she
was definitely out to get John. She had an axe
to grind with him. But the fact that she talked
about the Petrie dishes and she had that level of
detail to it kind of makes me think, yeah, maybe
there was something to that because she wasn't really a
medical professional, so she wouldn't have known what that.

Speaker 2 (01:05:32):
Meant or anything like that.

Speaker 3 (01:05:33):
So yeah, that is interesting. I don't know, I have
mixed feelings about it.

Speaker 1 (01:05:37):
But what makes you think that he is Innocent's evidence?

Speaker 3 (01:05:41):
Yeah, the fact that no autopsy found anything really you know,
damaging to him specifically, but I guess if he didn't
have we.

Speaker 1 (01:05:48):
Had tissue samples, but we didn't have blood, right.

Speaker 2 (01:05:51):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:05:51):
I just wish that there was some like smoking gun
in the autopsy that pointed to him. But I guess
at this point John has paid the price regardless. Do
you think that the DA's office acted properly in the
way that they indicted and charged John or do you
think they acted under pressure from Ash and others?

Speaker 1 (01:06:09):
I think there was definitely pressure there Cecil being on
the grand jury was definitely suspicious, right, and he was
a staunch advocate for ashe and the politics too of
the DA. It was at the DA the assistant DA
was running for a judge position.

Speaker 3 (01:06:27):
Yeah, yeah, so I think for him it was the
publicity was not a bad thing. So it does seem
a little shady like it seems like money and politics, kind.

Speaker 1 (01:06:36):
Of local political races really can change the course of
an investigation and a trial.

Speaker 2 (01:06:43):
Yeah, for sure. What do you think is going to
happen from here?

Speaker 1 (01:06:46):
I mean, I think Ash maybe is gonna.

Speaker 2 (01:06:49):
Have to do you think he's behind this.

Speaker 1 (01:06:51):
Well, obviously there's a whole other part, so yeah, so
I think he is behind them and I think, I
mean he.

Speaker 3 (01:06:57):
Had really he really hated John hen to hate him
after a while.

Speaker 1 (01:07:00):
And I don't blame I mean, I don't blame him.
But you can't take justice into your own hands. Yeah,
murder is never okay.

Speaker 3 (01:07:15):
I thought before we close, it would be fun to
share some interesting horse facts since this case revolves around Joan,
who was a champion of question, and since John's lawyer
was named racehorse.

Speaker 1 (01:07:24):
Right, sure, well he wasn't named racehorse because he liked racehorses.

Speaker 2 (01:07:27):
No, he wasn't.

Speaker 3 (01:07:28):
But still it's a tie in, all right.

Speaker 2 (01:07:30):
I've not I didn't.

Speaker 3 (01:07:31):
I never knew much about horses. Have you ever ridden
a horse or been a horse person?

Speaker 1 (01:07:36):
Yes, I have a couple few times. And if you're
not a horse rider, it's I don't think I've ever
been a sore as I was my entire life. Were
you like a teenager it was maybe it was a
long rite, I don't know, but my inner thighs were
just they hurt. Horses in general kind of scare me
because there's they're so large, it's very big. And I

(01:07:59):
had an that was yeh. I can't remember if she
was kicked by a horse or her ankle was stepped
on by a horse and she was never the same again.

Speaker 2 (01:08:07):
Oh wow.

Speaker 1 (01:08:07):
And so when Emma, our daughter, wanted to take she
was really into horse She wanted to be a horse girl,
and she she was a horse girl, except I wouldn't
let her take lessons.

Speaker 3 (01:08:17):
Yeah, she was.

Speaker 1 (01:08:18):
She was really she was really small when she was little,
and I just, I don't know, It's one of the
things I feel kind of bad about. We never said
no to our kids, but that was one thing that
she really wanted to do that, but I just kept
envision her getting kicked or falling off the horse.

Speaker 3 (01:08:32):
So yeah, all right, So here are my interesting horse facts.
There are estimated sixty million horses in the world, combining
wild and domesticated horses. Do you know how many wild
horses there are in the US. I wasn't able to
find a number globally, but twenty thousand, somewhere between seventy
one and ninety six thousand. That number is dropping year

(01:08:54):
over year. The Bureau of Land Management they kind of
managed this sort of wild horse population in the US,
and they're actually they actually want it to decline because
they believe that the amount of like land, public land
that they have to roam on is not big enough
to sustain as many horses as.

Speaker 1 (01:09:10):
There are are They mostly in the West.

Speaker 3 (01:09:12):
Yeah, they're mostly in like California, Oregon, Utah, Montana, and Wyoming,
so pretty much where you would expect. The horses have
near three hundred and sixty degree vision, but they have
their blind spots are directly in front of them and
directly behind them, which is why it's really dangerous to
approach a horse from behind. So you're was it your aunt?

(01:09:33):
So maybe that's what she did, because that's Horses get
really upset if you approach them from behind, and that's
when they kick. Many people pat horses to reward them
for a job well done, but horses do not find
being padded rewarding. They really like to be scratched, not padded.
So remember that if you ever come across a horse.

(01:09:53):
Horse's grades for up to seventeen hours a day.

Speaker 1 (01:09:57):
That's a lot of greasy.

Speaker 3 (01:09:59):
I know, I only grades for like sixteen.

Speaker 1 (01:10:03):
It's got to be a cloak a close time between
you and horse.

Speaker 3 (01:10:07):
But due to their physiology, they have to take in
food constantly.

Speaker 1 (01:10:10):
And small that must be exhausting.

Speaker 3 (01:10:12):
Yes, and they are physiologically incapable of burping or throwing up.

Speaker 1 (01:10:17):
Mmmm. Is that because they have multiple chambers to their
stomach like cows.

Speaker 2 (01:10:20):
I'm not a horse doctor.

Speaker 3 (01:10:22):
I can't explain why they're physically physiologically incapable.

Speaker 2 (01:10:26):
I just know that they are.

Speaker 3 (01:10:27):
But this is why they are prone to getting colic,
because they can't like release gas.

Speaker 1 (01:10:32):
From know they have colic.

Speaker 3 (01:10:34):
Yeah, of courses are prone to getting colic. There are
fewer bones in a horse's body than a human, only
by one. Okay, so it's really close.

Speaker 1 (01:10:43):
Well, they have fewer bones in their feet, probably because
their feet are or their hooks.

Speaker 2 (01:10:47):
I'm not sure I understand.

Speaker 1 (01:10:48):
Well, we have a lot of bones in our hands
and our feet that we articulate for, like you know,
digital movement.

Speaker 3 (01:10:54):
Rights are a little simpler. Maybe I have two more
quick facts. All horses are one of the few mammals
where the males do not have nipples.

Speaker 1 (01:11:04):
Oh, thank you for sharing that.

Speaker 2 (01:11:05):
I know they share.

Speaker 3 (01:11:06):
The other mammals that don't have nipples are mice and rats, right.

Speaker 1 (01:11:09):
Right, I didn't know that. I mean why it is
baffling why male species have but it is it is.

Speaker 2 (01:11:17):
A little odd.

Speaker 3 (01:11:18):
Last fact is horses do doze while they're standing up,
but to get proper deep r em sleep, they need
to lie down. So many a horse owner has actually
experienced people driving by and stopping to tell them that
their horse is dead, but their horse is just lying
down and taking a nap.

Speaker 1 (01:11:36):
I actually thought the horses slept standing up.

Speaker 2 (01:11:38):
I think most people do. Yeah, I thought that as well.

Speaker 1 (01:11:41):
What do you think horse are em sleep looks like?

Speaker 3 (01:11:44):
I bet they have really good dreams of just running
around and being crazy in the wind and grazing, and
they probably dream of burping.

Speaker 1 (01:11:53):
Like I had a dream last night about a person
that I worked with like one hundred years ago, when
I didn't even I didn't like the guy. It wasn't
like a romantic dream or anything like that. It was
just like he was in my dream. And then I
woke up and I was like, why was that guy
in my dream?

Speaker 2 (01:12:09):
Dreams are so weird, so random.

Speaker 3 (01:12:12):
Yeah, I don't remember my dreams anymore, Like, very rarely
do I remember a dream. It kind of makes me sad,
because I like those random things where something pops into
your head and you're like.

Speaker 1 (01:12:21):
Oh, this one, where did that comes from? This one? Really?
I was like, I really actively disliked this guy, so
it's kind of weird.

Speaker 3 (01:12:27):
Yeah, very strange. Well, thank you so much for hanging
out with us. We truly appreciate each and every one
of you.

Speaker 1 (01:12:34):
If you can't wait to hear what happens to Ash
and Part three, you can join us on Patreon. Go
to patreon dot com Slash Love Mary Kill for early
ad free episodes and the multi parts are all available
at the same time, and we give you a monthly
bonus episode. Please rate, review, follow and subscribe, Find us
on social media, or send us an email.

Speaker 3 (01:12:55):
At Lovemarykill at gmail dot com.

Speaker 1 (01:12:58):
And if you want to send us a snack.

Speaker 3 (01:13:00):
LMK podcast po Box one one one, Dexter Michigan four
eight one three zero and a couple.

Speaker 1 (01:13:07):
Of people have sent us snacks that we haven't gotten
to yet. Thank you so much, We really appreciate it.
Until next time, don't kill your wife and don't kill
your husband.

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Joan Robinson Hill and Dr. John Hill - Part 2 of 3

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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;}Joan Robinson Hill and Dr. John Hill - Part 2 of 3