Season One: Black Widows Marathon, Part Two

Join us as we walk back through Season One Black Widows in this part two marathon.

Episode Transcript

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Welcome to Tales from the Dark TrueCrime and enjoy this part two marathon of
season one Black Widows. Make sureyou guys stay tuned for tomorrow for the
release of season two Episode one,where we dive into the history's horrors of

(00:23):
cannibals. Are you enjoying the seasonof Black Widows? How many have been
misjudged? How many have left youquestioning those around you? Be sure to
leave us a five star review onwhatever platform you prefer, and if you're

(00:43):
interested in add free true crime episodes, head over to patreon dot com slash
Tales from the Dark. Our fivedollar tier or up not only gets you
access to add free episodes, butto many other types of content from Tales
the Dark. Who knows what you'llfind yourself obsessed with. Thank you for

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tuning in and enjoy this next episodeof Tales from the Dark True Crime.
A Burnett County woman who sent textmessages to her friends about how she wanted
to kill her husband hours before shefatally shot him, was sentenced to life
in prison. In her text,she told her friends that she wanted to

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kill Brian, feed him to thehogs, and laugh all the way to
the bank. She texted Brian thatshe hoped he would crash and die before
he got home. She indeed triedto make everything look like self defense.
She claimed she was in an abusivemarriage, but the truth is why did

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she stay? Was it love ormoney? You'd actually feel pity for her,
But honestly, things they're not alwayswhat they seem, which brings us
to this case. Continuing on withour season of black Widows, she not
only fits the bill, but dueto her crime, she was sentenced on

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the same day and was given aterm of life imprisonment in twenty fifteen.
This is the case a black widow. Kara Trichelle Alan this his Tales from

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the Dark. Brian was a wellknown Bertram businessman. Before starting his own
construction company, Metalworks, he hadfirst worked for a phone company. He
rapidly reached the top ranks thanks tohis diligence and hard work. He and
Kara Allen, his wife of sevenyears, cared for her two sons from

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a previous relationship. It was saidthat Brian was a kind and humorous person
who constantly gave to those in need. The affluent and successful businessman's murder in
Bertram, Texas shocked the small butclose knit community. The thirty eight year
old Brian Allen was well lanked andwell known by many individuals in the city.

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On July first, twenty thirteen,police arrived on the scene quickly in
response to a nine one one callplaced at about ten thirty p m.
Brian Allen was discovered dead on thefloor, having been shot twice, with
one bullet passing through his shoulder andanother on the left of his spine.
He had been hit in the back. Trachelle placed the call. He apparently

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chased her with a gun, soshe said that she shot him in self
defense. She claimed to have forcedthe gun from him. Her account of
the events did not appear to besupported by the evidence discovered nor the subsequent
investigation. Trachelle acknowledged shooting Brian,but it was now up to the detectives

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to determine whether it was a caseof self defense or murder. They discovered
that the pair had a tumultuous relationshipas a result of their investigation into their
background. Between the two, therehad been numerous disagreements before the murder.
Trachelle allegedly picked fights with Brian whileshe drank. According to Brian's brother.

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Additionally, he claimed that she hadonce stabbed him with a wineglass and assaulted
him with a wine bottle. Inaddition, Brian received a two year probationary
period after being found guilty of assaultingTrachelle in two thousand and four. The
police found a flurry of unsettling textwhen they examined Trachelle's phone records. She

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texted her pals several times about wantingto murder Brian between twelve forty pm and
five pm on the day of hisdeath. In one of the communications,
she threatened to mutilate him. Inanother, she said she would shoot him
and throw him to the hogs,and in another text message, Trachelle expressed

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her wish that Brian would crash anddie before he got home. Brian Allen,
who ran his own metalworking company,was visiting one of his employees who
resided in a trailer on his property. Before he was killed. Ian allegedly
told the employee that he wanted adivorce and was prepared to offer his wife,

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the defendant, fifty percent of thecompany in exchange. Around the time
Brian Allen returned to the residence atabout ten o'clock, the defendant called nine
one one and reported shooting her husbandto the dispatcher. The prosecutor gave the

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jury recordings of two nine one onecalls that the defendant made. She didn't
realize that she had connected with anine one one dispatcher when she made the
statements. On the first tape,the victim was overheard in the audio being
called a piece of crap and toldto die, knowing that by the defendant.

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The defendant then ended the connection anddialed nine one one again, informing
the operator that her husband had beenshot. The defendant claimed to the operator
that she jumped at Brian and grabbedthe gun away from him. Then she
claimed that she shot him because hekept advancing on her. Evidence recovered from

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the crime scene contradicted with the defendant'saccount of what happened by demonstrating that Brian
Allen was shot twice in the back, with the fatal shot striking his heart.
According to the defense, the defendantshot Brian Allen out of fear and
self defense because Brian and Kara hadpreviously assaulted each other. The detectives focused

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on the decisions the defendant made throughouther life and in the days leading up
to the gun shot which resulted inthe murder. During the closing argument for
the jury, he played the nineto one audio on which Trichelle had advised
Brian to die, knowing that thestatements of the defendant, according to McAfee,

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were not those of fear, butof rage, wrath, and malice.
Furthermore, according to McAfee, thedefendant ambushed Brian as he entered the
house that evening. The defendant allegedlyfired a total of seven shots, five
of which struck Brian Allen. Thejury took about twenty minutes to find the

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defendant guilty of murder after hearing testimonyfrom the prosecution and defense for ten days.
Following more testimony in the trial's punishmentphase, the jury decided that Kara
Trichelle Allen should be given a lifesentence. After deliberating for over an hour,
Judge Allan Garrett gave the defendant's punishment, which was in line with the

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jury's decision, and remanded her intothe Burnett County Sheriff's cussody. Although a
just sentence can never undo the devastationcaused by this defendant, at least we
know she will be unable to harmanybody again, set Assistant District Attorney Peter
Keene, who was pleased with thejudgment and sentence. The jurors paid serious

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attention to the evidence, which frequentlyfeatured some ugly facts, according to McAfee,
who agreed, they sent a clearmessage to this defendant and the neighborhood
that they would not tolerate any violentcrime and would bring those responsible for it
accountable. This was a multi jurisdictionalinvestigation, involving many months of diligent work

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from countless law enforcement agents, investigators, ems personnel, and many others to
collect and present the evidence needed todeliver justice for the victim's family and our
community. McAfee added, in praiseof everyone who contributed to the investigation and
prosecution of the case, I can'texpress my gratitude to everyone enough for their

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commitment. Trichelle said during an interviewthat she loved her husband, but that
he would tell me that I drovehim to the point of hitting me because
I knew he and control his temper. Doctor Phil asked her about the shooting,
saying, did you ever think itwould get to that point? I
didn't, she said, I alwaysthought He'd be sitting here telling his story,

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and I'd be in the morgue.She also said that she is not
the type of woman who belongs injail. I like to host parties,
she said. I like to wearhigh heels. I like to get dressed
up. What are your guys thoughtson this case? Was Kara tired of

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the abuse and thought killing him wasthe only way to save herself or did
she enjoy killing him? Be sureto let us know, because for tonight,
for now, I think we're goingto have to add the story of
Kara Trishelle Allen to our never endingbut are always growing tales from the Dark

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alone. An intriguing murder mystery weekendturned deadly as a surgical technician poisoned her

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husband and then set his body onfire in order to collect his life insurance.
She was cheerful and an efficient surgicaltechnologist and her husband had a cozy,
middle class life, but on Valentine'sDay weekend in nineteen ninety eight,
they took a romantic retreat to agolf course in maryland Eastern Shore, and

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their cheery suburban image disappeared in smokeand flame. The resort put on a
murder mystery play as part of thespecial Valentine's Day package, inviting guests to
witness the stage who done it,and then try to figure out the mystery.
The plot, however, became morecomplicated after the play when her husband's

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burned body was found in a hotelroom floor and the couple's room had caught
fire. Despite her claims that herhusband had consumed alcohol before passing away from
the smoke, the ensuing autopsy revealedno evidence of either. This is the
Case a Black Widow Kimberly Rico Thisis Tales from the Dark. Stephen and

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Kimberly Rico had been married for nineyears, but their family was unhappy the
domestic skies had formerly been brighter.Stephen and Kimberly Rico's closest friends from the
beginning of their courtship were Mike andMarine Miller. Three of the four best
friends were both State College, Pennsylvaniaresidents and penn State students in the town

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of State College's seventh grade. StephenRico and Mike Miller grew up to be
each other's best friends, and theyremained so until the day Stephen's murder.
When Marine was a freshman at pennState in nineteen eighty four, Mike Miller
had already met the woman who wouldbecome his wife. After that, they

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continued to date. Marine first encounteredKimberly when she was serving customers at a
steakhouse in State College. Then StephenRico was introduced to Kimberly by both Mike
and Mariene Miller. They introduced them, took them on a double date,
and after that they just seemed toclick. Steve fell in love with kim

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right away. Mike Miller served asStephen's best friend, and Marine Miller served
as Kimberly's maid of honor when theygot married in March of nineteen eighty nine.
A few months later, Stephen Ricowas Mike's best man and Kimberly Rico
was Marine's maid of honor when theygot married. Stephen and Kimberly gave birth

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to Anna less than a year afterbeing married. She was nine years old
when her father was killed. MikeMiller and Stephen Rinco both chose work as
golf course supervisors and maintainers. StephenRico oversaw golf courses in western Pennsylvania,
Dundock, Maryland, and starting inearly nineteen nineties at the Pentatuch's Greens.

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After leaving State College, the firststop on Mike Miller's professional journey was New
Jersey, and in October nineteen ninetythree he arrived at Harbortown Golf Course in
Saint Michael's. The two spouses stayedin close contact with one another during the
subsequent years, especially after they bothmoved to Maryland. Kimberly Rico worked in

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the operating room as a certified surgicaltechnologist, initially at Holy Cross Hospital from
nineteen ninety five to December nineteen ninetyseven, and then at a suburban hospital.
She had a dispose of all unusedmedications and drugs after the operation as
part of her duties as a surgicaltechnician in the operating room. On that

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Faithful Saint Valentine's Day, Mike Millerwas in charge of transporting the Ricos to
Harbortown. On the phone, Stephenhad told him that they were looking to
go somewhere with Kim to have aromantic evening in January to work on the
marriage was the goal of the meeting. Mike proposed it since he was aware
that Harbortown, where he worked,was doing a Valentine's getaway on the weekend

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with the Dinner Theater and put iton the table as an option. Mike
stepped in to ensure that the Recoswould have one of the finer cottages with
a view at the Miles River whenStephen seized the opportunity. Even though they
offered Mike and Marine Miller's offered towatch the nine year old Anna never materialized.
Giving Stephen and Kim this time awaywas their clear goal, Mike Miller

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stated in court on January thirteenth,nineteen ninety nine, after he and his
wife attended a murder mystery play performedfor the guests. Last year, a
man was discovered dead in a smokefilled hotel room. The case is not

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a whodunne it, a prosecutor informedthe jury yesterday. After being accused of
killing her husband, Stephen, whileon what was intended to be a romantic
weekend getaway for Valentine's Day, KimberlyRico went on trial. Prosecutor Robert Dean
stated in his opening remarks that thedefendant had discussed killing her husband to end

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their boring marriage and was poised toget payment on a two hundred thousand dollars
life insurance policy. Nothing was moreimportant to Kimberly Rico than getting rid of
her husband, according to Dean,The defense argued that the evidence was ambiguous
and that Stephen was at risk dueto his depression. The young couple,

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who had been having marital issues,went on a romantic weekend retreat that included
a campy mafia wedding where the groomdrinks poisoned champagne and passes away during a
toast as the audience tries to solvethe mystery. Stephen Rico, a thirty
five year old superintendent of a golfcourse, was discovered dead several hours later

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and the early hours of February fifteenth, after they went back to their room,
Kimberly Rico, thirty three, reportedto the police that her husband started
drinking heavily and tried to coerce herinto having sex. According to her,
she set out to travel to afriend's house in Easton by car, but

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got lost around one in the morning, she came back. She rushed to
the front desk for assistance when sheobserved the smoke. Rico's body was hauled
out of the cottage after a hotelpatron and a staff member broke in.
Stephen was dead, but the fire, which looked to have begun on or
near the bed, had already goneout. A fresh pack of cigars was

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missing one. According to Kim,her husband smoked cigarettes after drinking. Stephen
did not smoke or drink. Accordingto family and acquaintances who spoke with the
police, Stephen had no carbon monoxidean's blood, and an autopsy revealed no
soot or burns in his lungs ortrachea, indicating that he stopped breathing prior

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to the fire. The investigation indicatedthat Stephen most likely died from poisoning,
although it did not specify what poisonor how it entered his system. The
Recos marriage, according to the prosecution, was in turmoil. The couple,
who were raising a daughter who wasnow nine years old, had been going

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to counseling. Kim reportedly requested adivorce from her husband, but he refused.
According to court records. In earlynineteen ninety eight, surging Kim rinco,
a technician, offered a co workerfifty thousand dollars to arrange for his
murder, and a few weeks later, she told a friend that she was

(21:17):
preparing to give her husband a medicinethat would paralyze him. Dean claimed he
claimed that she was gradually sinking herselfinto a hole of violence. The prosecution
moved on without any concrete proof thatKim had drugged and killed her husband or
started the fire. They made acall to Kim's coworker, Ken Burgess.

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In his testimony, Ken said thatKim had paid him to assassinate her husband.
He couldn't recall if she had offeredfive thousand or fifty thousand dollars.
However, he also acknowledged that hewas caught and penalized in Virginia for benefit
fraud. According to police records,Ken dialed Kim three times under a wire

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in an attempt to get her totalk about Stephen's disappearance. Other important witnesses,
including Kim's ex boyfriend and girlfriends whoclaimed to have overheard her discussing killing
Stephen, took the stand. Evenwhile none directly connected her to the crime,
they were exceedingly damaging to Kim's reputationand may have had a significant impact

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on the jury's verdict on the adviceof her lawyer, Kim Rinko refused to
speak with the media. She claimedin written contact while writing a letter that
she can't help but cry. Shesays, I'm really frustrated. I am
innocent and I'm serving a life sentenceplus thirty years in prison. The injustice

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in Kim's conviction might not be theonly one here. What type of life
is in store for ten year oldAnna Rico who nearly lost both her parents
due to the actions of the statewhere she resides, and one of her
parents in a devastating fire. Whatdo you think of this case? Do
you think we'll ever find out ifKim actually killed her husband? Be sure

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to let us know, because fornow, for tonight, I think we're
going to have to add this casea black Widow Kimberly Rico to our never
ending but are always growing tales fromthe dark alone more Colombian drug lord Black

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Widow, often known as La Madrina, began dealing cocaine in early nineteen seventies
when a teenage Pablo Escobar was stillboosting vehicles. Pablo would later rise to
prominence as the nineteen eighties greatest Kingpin, but she was possibly the biggest queen

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pin Pablo is supposed to have beenmade possible by her. However, it
is unknown how intimately the two wereconnected. Pablo was allegedly her ward,
according to some others have contested thisand asserted that the two were savage rivals.

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There is no doubt that she beganher career as a human trafficker in
the nineteen seventies. She later roseto prominence in the Miami drug warfare in
the nineteen eighties. She created agreat number of enemies in both Columbia and
the United States during her reign ofterror, and she would do whatever it

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would take to get rid of them. This is the case a black widow
Griselda Blanco. This is tales fromthe Dark. Griselda Blanco was born in

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nineteen forty three, and she beganher criminal career at a young age.
When she was just eleven years old, she was accused of kidnapping a ten
year old boy, killing him afterhis parents refused to pay ransom, and
then shooting herself. Blanco was soonforced to leave cat'a Ginen and live on

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the streets of Madalen after experienced severeviolence at home. There, she made
a living by pickpocketing, hand sellingher body. When Blanco met and eventually
married Carlos Trujillo, a smuggler ofunauthorized immigrants into the United States, at
the age of thirteen, she hadher first taste of turning crime into a

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lucrative business. Despite having three boystogether, their marriage was short lived.
Carlos would subsequently be assassinated by Blancoin nineteen seventy, when he was the
first of her three husbands to suffera violent demise. Griselda Blanco was exposed
to the cocaine trade by Alberto Bravo, her second husband. They relocated to

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Queens, New York in early nineteenseventies, and there their business took off.
They had a direct path to thewhite powder in Columbia, which significantly
reduced the Italian mafia's prophets. Atthis point, Blanco earned the nickname the
Godmother. Blanco devised a cunning planto bring cocaine into New York. Young

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ladies were forced to board airplanes whilecarrying cocaine concealed in bras and underwear that
Blanco had specifically made for that purpose. Bravo returned to Columbia to reorganize the
export since the business was expanded.In the meantime, Blanco grew his empire
in New York, but everything brokedown in nineteen seventy five. Operation Banshee,

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the largest at the time, wasa combination of NYPD and d E,
a sting operation that caught both Blancoand Bravo. However, Blanco was
able to get away and traveled toColumbia before she could be charged. She
is accused of killing Bravo there ina shootout over stolen millions. Bravo is

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said to have fired around from missUzi into Blanco's stomach as she retrieved a
pistol from her boots and shot himin the face. Others, however,
think that her husband's murder was committedby Pablo Escobar. Griselda Blanco's autopsy would
subsequently show that she did in facthave a bullet scar on her torso,

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regardless of which account is accurate,Grisselda Blanco acquired a new moniker after the
passing of her second husband. Herdrug enterprise was now entirely under her control.
Even after the bust, Blanco continuedto operate her operation out of Columbia

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and send cocaine into the United States. In nineteen seventy six, Blanco was
accused of smuggling cocaine on board theGloria, a ship that the Colombian government
brought to the United States for arace commemorating the country's bicential in New York
Harbor. She wed Dario Sepelveda,a bank robber, as her third spouse

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in nineteen seventy eight. Her fourthchild, Michael, was born in the
same year. She presumably thought itwas appropriate to name her son after the
character played by al Pacino in TheGodfather, because she had taken on the
role of Godmother herself. The Queenof Cocaine would subsequently become well known as

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she set her sights on Miami.Blanco, a forerunner in the Miami based
cocaine trafficking, used her outstanding commercialacumen to spread the drug to as many
people as she could, and itwas profitable for a while. She had
a wealthy lifestyle in Miami. Shehad everything, mansions, pricy cars,

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and a private jet. There wereno restrictions. She also held crazy parties
that were frequented by all the keyfigures in the drug industry. However,
just because she was enjoying her newfoundfortune did not imply her aggressive behavior had
ended. She allegedly used a gunto coerce both men and women into having

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X with her. Blanco also developeda dependence on smoking massive quantities of buzuka,
an unrefined form of cocaine. Thisprobably fueled her growing paranoia. She
did, however, live in aperilous environment. The Medalin Cartel, which

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at the time was bringing plainloads ofcocaine into Miami, was one of the
factions that was facing rising rivalry.Conflict broke out shortly on July eleventh,
nineteen seventy nine. The first bulletswere fired. A rival drug dealer was
murdered by several of Blanco's hitman atthe Crown Lequer outlet in the Dandelion Shopping

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Mall. The hitman then pursued theliquor store employees throughout the mall while firing
their weapons into the air. Fortunatelythey only hurt the employees, but the
harm was significant. The assassins hadarrived at an armored delivery van with the

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words happy Time, Complete party supplywritten on the side, looking like something
out of the Joker's playbook. Blancowe need to find a more effective escape
vehicle for a headman, because thewar wagon ended up in the hands of
the police. She is credited withinventing the use of motorbikes during killings,

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which they frequently ended up doing onthe streets of Madalin. Miami was the
gateway for seventy percent of the cocaineand marijuana sold in the Americas during the
early nineteen eighties, which coincided withthe city's rapid increase in fatalities, and
Griselda Blanco was involved in every aspectof it. Miami recorded seventy five homicides

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in the first five months of nineteeneighty there were one hundred and sixty nine
throughout the previous seven months. Inby nineteen eighty one, Miami had not
only become America's capital of murder,but the worlds. The majority of the
city's homicides occurred during the era ofcoking cowboy drug warfare, in which Colombian

(34:19):
and Cuban dealers frequently murdered one anotherwith submachine guns. However, this time
period might not been as bad ifit hadn't been for Blanco. Many people,
including her fellow drug lords, wereterrified of Blanco. Other offenders were
killed with intent, said one expert. Before they killed, they would make

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sure Blanco would murder first, andthen claimed the victim was innocent. It
was unfortunate, but he's passed awaynow. Orge reve Ayela was a hitman
that Blanco trusted the most. WhenBlanco ordered a strike, according to what
he later recalled and meant that everyonenearby was to be slain, women,

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kids, and innocent bystanders, Blancowas unconcerned. Then, in the later
part of nineteen eighty three, Blanco'sthird spouse was under attack. Michael,
her son was abducted by Sepelveda andtaken back to Columbia with him. He

(35:29):
was caught by La Madrina as hershocked kid looked on, She allegedly hired
hitman to shoot him to death.She might have been able to get her
kid back, but Paco and Sepelveda'sconflict broke out shortly after his murder.
Blanco regarded it as only as achallenge to be overcome, but soon some

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of Blanco's allies, including a crucialsupplier, decided to support Poco. Early
in nineteen eighty four, Blanco decidedto relocate to California since the heat had
become intolerable. She was able tohide out there and elude both Bravo's nephews
and the d EA, but byNovember, Bravo's nephews had been detained because

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the da might have been able tocatch Blanco without him. After the nephews
were removed from the situation, thed EA was able to approach Blanco.
At the age of forty two,she was also detained in nineteen eighty five.
She ultimately received a nearly twenty yearprison term for distributing drugs. Blanco

(36:42):
had escaped being executed. She laterconsented to a plea agreement. La Madrina
was also freed and returned back toColumbia in two thousand and four. Despite
her lucky break, she had alreadyamassed too many enemies to be warmly welcome
to home. At that point,Griselda Blanco sixty nine, suffered a terrible

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death in twenty twelve. Blanco waskilled in a motorbike drive by shooting outside
a butcher's shop and Medalin, Columbia, using the same assassination technique that she
had invented years before. Who killedher is still a mystery. What do
you think of this case? Wasthis one of Pablo Escobar's associates from decades

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earlier with a grudge or an angryfamily member of someone she had killed.
Blanco had so many enemies it's toodifficult to determine. Be sure to let
us know because for now, fortonight, I think we're going to have
to add the case of black WidowGriselda Blanco. Two our never ending but

(37:54):
are always growing tales from the Darkwant Mylone. At the age of seventy

(39:36):
five, Esau kakahe was in goodhealth, happy and in love. It
was twenty thirteen and he was ina new relationship with this black widow,
who at the time was a sixtyseven year old widow he had met through
a Japanese matchmaking agency. The twofell in love instantly, and within two

(39:59):
months they were married, living togetherand beginning a seemingly blissful life in Kyoto's
Muka City. The two were makingplans for the future while making rice cakes
for their New Year's celebrations, butsadly, Esau did not live to see
the next year, and on Decembertwenty eight he became the fourth and final

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victim of Japan's black widow killer.This is the case of black Widow Chisako
Kakahi. This is Tales from theDark. Even with having the title of

(41:12):
Japan's most infamous black widow killer,there is little publicly known about her personal
life. She was born on Novembertwenty eighth, nineteen forty six, in
Kita, Kushu City, Fukioka,Kakaihi and is said to have grown up
in a middle class family where shewas good at academics, but was not
permitted to pursue higher education because herfather wanted her to get married and settled

(41:37):
down instead. She did just that, and after working as a bank teller,
she met and married her first husbandin nineteen sixty nine. Her husband
owned a successful fabric printing company,and the couple seemed happy having two children
together, while he provided a comfortableand quiet life for her and her children.

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In nineteen ninety four, her fiftyfour year old husband suffered from heart
attack and was rushed to the hospital. After spending a few days there recovering,
he was deemed fit to leave andwas discharged. However, within a
few days of him returning home,he died, and it was thought to
have been related to his previous heartcondition. After her husband's death, Chisako

(42:25):
took over her husband's company, butunder her inexperienced leadership, the company would
collapse, and less than one yearlater, she had lost all of the
wealth her late husband had accumulated anddeclared bankruptcy, losing her home and her
business. Fast forward to two thousandand seven, Chisako had met a new

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lover, Toshiaka Suhiro, aged seventyeight, who many thought would be the
end of her troubles and would finallymake her happy. The two were engaged
to be married, but one afternoonon December eighteenth, two thousand and seven,
Chisako was having lunch with Toshiaka andhis children when he collapsed. It

(43:14):
was later discovered that he took dailyhealth supplements due to his age, and
that made it very easy for Chisakoto disguise a cyanide capsule as one of
his pills. Less than fifteen minutesafter lunch, he collapsed unconscious in the
street, seemingly out of nowhere.By the time the ambulance arrived, it

(43:36):
was said that he was gasping andon the verge of stopping breathing. Chisako
accompanied him to the hospital, andthat's where things began to get strange.
She gave the hospital a fake name, called herself Hiroco when talking to the
ambulance staff and his family. Uponarrival at the hospital, the doctor's fund

(44:00):
that he was close to death aftersuffering from extended extreme internal asphyxiation. However,
he would survive, and he wasone of the only victims to do
so, but he was left withincurable higher dysfunction along with visual impairment.
He would go on to die ayear and a half later from an unrelated

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illness. Years later, in Chisako'smurder charl, it was ruled that she
had given her partner cyanide in aneffort to kill him, and she had
disguised them as health supplements. Intwenty eleven, Chisako would try again for
love. This time was seventy oneyear old Massa Nori Honda, who was

(44:45):
described as frequenting sports clubs and wasin love with his motorcycle, as he
wrote it everywhere that he went.The two had what friends described as a
whirlwind romance and they were quickly inlove, announcing their engagement very shortly after
they met, but the two wouldnever reach their wedding day, as Honda

(45:07):
came to his untimely end in Marchof twenty twelve, when Chisako struck again.
On March ninth, she briefly metHonda at a store to do some
shopping and to see one another,and just hours later he was dead.
He had driven off from the storeon his motorcycle, but lost consciousness while

(45:28):
riding and fell off. He wouldbe rushed to the hospital, but died
just two hours later. Later,evidence would reveal that Chisako had been unfaithful
to Honda in the months leading tohis death, and had already started dating
other men in January of twenty twelve. One of those men was Minoru Hyoko,
who was a seventy five year oldand was recovering from lung cancer.

(45:52):
When they began dating. He hada relapse of the disease and was fearing
for his life, but when itseemed like his he was working, he
was in high spirits and undoubtedly happyabout his new love. The two became
instantly close and stayed over at oneanother's homes on most nights, but on

(46:14):
September twentieth, Ioki's happiness was broughtto an abrupt end after dinner with his
partner. Ioko also took daily healthsupplements and had taken some just before dinner.
Shortly after eating, he collapsed.When the ambulance arrived, Ioko was
breathing painfully and gasping, while Chisakospun a massive web of lies to attempt

(46:37):
to cover up her own tracks.With the paramedics, she told them that
her lover had no family and insistedthat he had terminal cancer, when in
reality was recovering and had several children. But most chilling of all was that
she refused to give permission to resuscitateHyoko, and only two hours later he

(46:59):
was dead. Only two months later, she had met and married her final
husband, esau Ka Kahi. Policebelieved that she targeted her victims for only
two reasons, that they were elderlyand had significant financial assets. In two
thousand and seven, when she attemptedto murder Suhiro, she was in hundreds

(47:20):
of thousands of dollars in debt andbelieved that she killed him she could avoid
the repayment. After Honda's motorcycle death, she inherited sixteen million yen from him,
and while it would never be confirmed, it was thought that she had
earned over five hundred million yen fromall of her partners. When questioned about

(47:44):
her crimes, Chisako ka Kahi hadboth confessed to murder and protested her innocence,
changing her story multiple times. Duringthe trial, her lawyers attempted to
offer the defense that she was sufferingfrom dementia and therefore could not be tried
for the crime she was accused of, but during one of the longest trials

(48:04):
in Japan's history, the court ruledthat she was guilty of murdering three men
and attempting to murder a fourth.By the end of the trial, she
had been dubbed the Black Widow andwas sentenced to death for her crimes.
Chisako would never offer a full explanationfor her crimes, but on several occasions

(48:27):
she would admit to them. Whenthe judge sentenced her, he was quoted
as saying, it is a ruthlesscrime based on a planned and strong murderous
intention. She was sentenced to hangingand at the time of this podcast,
is still on death row in Japan. What do you guys think of this

(48:50):
case? Did Chisako really commit thesecrimes for money? Will we ever know
the real reason behind her horrific crimes? Should to let us know? Because
for now, for tonight, Ithink we're going to have to add this
case a black widow Chisako kakahi toour never ending but are always growing tails

(49:16):
from the dark. Caught in thelore of money, this black widow brought

(50:55):
her crimes public for the chance ofa wrongful death of lawsuit as well as
life insurance money on her late husband. After two victims of her cyanide poisoning
disguised as ecctern medicine, she landedover two hundred years of sentenced jail time.
This is the case of black WidowStella Nickel. This is tales from

(51:54):
the Dark. Stella Nickel was bornStella Maudine's Stevenson and Colton Organ to Ava
Georgia Joe and George Stephenson and grewup in poverty. By age sixteen,
she was pregnant with her daughter.By age sixteen, she was pregnant with

(52:17):
her daughter, Cynthia Nikel, thenmoved to southern California, married and had
another daughter. She began to havevarious legal troubles, including a conviction for
fraud in nineteen sixty eight, anothera charge for the following year for beating
Cynthia with a curtain rod, andthen another conviction for forgery in nineteen seventy

(52:40):
one. She served six months injail for the fraud charge and was ordered
into counseling after the abuse charge.Stella met Bruce Nichelle in nineteen seventy four.
Nickel was a heavy equipment operator witha drinking habit, which suited Stella's
lifestyle, and the two were marriedin nineteen seventy six. In the course

(53:05):
of their twelve year marriage, Bruceentered into rehab and gave up drinking.
Reportedly, Stella resented this. Herbar visits were cut short by Bruce's sobriety,
and Stella cultivated a home aquarium asa new hobby. On June fifth,
nineteen eighty six, the couple wereliving in Auburn, Washington, when

(53:27):
Bruce Nkeel fifty two, came homefrom work with a headache. According to
Stella, Nchell took four extra strengthetcan capsules from a bottle in their home
for his headache and collapsed minutes later. Michell died shortly thereafter at Harbor View
Medical Center, where treatment had failedto revive him. His death was initially

(53:52):
ruled to be by natural causes,with attending physicians citing emphysema. A second
death less a week later forced authoritiesto reconsider the cause of Nikel's death.
On June eleventh, Susan Snow,a forty year old Auburn bank manager,
took two extra strength Etcteran capsules foran orderly morning headache. Snowe's husband,

(54:15):
Paul Webking, took two capsules fromthe same bottle for his arthritis and left
the house for work. At sixthirty am, the Snow's fifteen year old
daughter found Susan Snow collapsed on thefloor of her bathroom, unresponsive and with
a faint pulse. Paramedics were calledand transported Snow to Harborview Medical Center,

(54:39):
but she died later the same daywithout regaining consciousness. During an autopsy on
Susan Snow, assistant medical examiner JanetMiller detected a scent of bitter almonds and
odor distinctive to cyanide. Test faithat Snow had died of acute cyanide poisoning.

(55:04):
Investigators examined the contents of the Snowweb King household and discovered the source
of the cyanide the bottle of extrastrength et cetera capsules that both Snow and
web King had used the morning ofSnow's death. Three capsules out of those
remained in the sixty capsule bottle werefound to be laced with cyanide in toxic

(55:24):
quantities. A murder by cyanide wasa sensational news in Washington when another tainted
bottle from the same lot was foundin a grocery store nearby Kent, Washington.
The manufacturers of ETCA Bristol Myers respondedto the discovery with a heavy publicized

(55:45):
recall of all extra etc. Productsin Seattle, Washington area, and a
group of drug companies came together tooffer a three hundred thousand dollars reward for
the capture of the person responsible.In response to the publicity, Stellen Nickel
came forward on June nineteenth. Shetold police that her husband had recently died

(56:08):
suddenly after taking pills from a fortycapsule bottle of extra strength etctern with the
same lot number as the one thatkilled Susan Snow. Test by the FDA
confirmed the presence of cyanide and BruceNickel's remains, and in two Ecctern bottles
that Stella Nickel had turned over tothe police. Initial suspicions were directed at

(56:31):
the manufacturers of the Etcetern capsules.Both Paul Webb King and Stelen Nickel filed
wrongful death lawsuits against Prinstol Myers andthe FDA inspected the Mooresville, North Carolina
plant where the Ecctern Lot five Hone O two had been packaged, but
they found no traces of cyanide toexplain its presence in the Washington bottles.

(56:55):
On June eighteenth, Bristol Myers recalledall Etcetern capsules in the United States,
pulling them from store shelves and morningconsumers not to use any that they have
may already have bought. Two dayslater, the company announced a recall of
all their non prescription capsule products.On June twenty fourth, a cyanide contaminated

(57:17):
bottle of extra strength Anison three wasfound at the same store where Susan Snow
had bought hers. On June twentyseventh, Washington State put into effect a
ninety day band on all the saleof non prescription medication in capsules. Examination
of the contaminated bottles by the FBIcrime Lab found that, in addition to

(57:40):
containing cyanide powder, the poison capsulesalso contained flex of an unknown green substance.
Further tests show that the substance wasat algaecide, used in home aquariums
sold under the brand name Algae Destroyer. With a contamination of the etc.

(58:00):
The source having been ruled out,investigators began to focus their investigation on the
end of sale of the product.The FBI began an investigation into possible product
tampering, having been the source ofthe poison at the time, Excterrin was
packaged in plastic bottles, with themouth of the bottle sealed with a foil

(58:22):
and the lid secured to the bottlewith a plastic wrap. Both Paul Webking
and Stella Ekel were asked to takea poligraphy examination. Webbking did so,
though he complained in subsequent press aboutthe treatment by the FBI. Michael,
however, declined to take a poligraphyexam, and her lawyer, who was

(58:44):
representing her in the wrongful death suit, said that she was too shaken up
to be subjected to examination. Investigatorsuspicions began to turn to Stella when the
discovery that she claimed that the twocontaminated Excterrin bottles that she had turned over
to the police have been purchased atdifferent times and different locations. A total

(59:07):
of five bottles had been found contaminatedin the entire country, and it was
regarded as suspicious that Nickel would happento acquire two of them purely by chance.
But the investigation now turned to Stella, detectives uncovered more circumstantial evidence pointing
to her as the culprit. Nikeelhad taken out a total of about seventy

(59:28):
six thousand dollars in insurance coverage forher husband's life, with an additional payee
of one hundred thousand dollars if hisdeath was accidental. She was also known
to have, even before Susan Snow'sdeath, reportedly disputed doctor's ruling that her
husband had died of natural causes.Further FBI investigation showed that Bruce Nichel's purported

(59:52):
signatures on at least two of theinsurance policies in his name had been forged.
Investigators were also able to verify thatNickel had purchased algae destroyer from a
local fish store. It was speculatedthat the algaecide had become mixed with the
cyanide when Nickel used the same containerto crush both substances without washing it before

(01:00:17):
uses. Stella finally consented to polygraphexamination in November nineteen eighty six. She
failed it, and investigators narrowed theirfocus to her even farther. However,
concrete evidence proving that Nickel had everpurchased or used cyanide was lacking, and
despite their relative certainty that Stella hadorchestrated the poisonings as either an elaborate cover

(01:00:43):
up for an insurance motivated murder ofher husband or as a desperate attempt to
force her husband's death to be ruledas an accident to increase her insurance payout,
they were unable to build a strongenough case to support the arrest.
In January nineteen eighty seven, Stella'sadult daughter, Cynthia Hamilton, approached the

(01:01:06):
police with information Stella had spoken toher daughter repeatedly about wanting her husband dead.
He was a bore, she said, who, after having gotten sober,
preferred to stay home and watch televisionrather than go out to bars.
Stella, Hamilton claimed, had eventold her that she had tried to poison

(01:01:27):
Bruce previously with foxglove. When thatfailed, she had begun library research into
other methods and hit upon cyanide.Cynthia also claimed that Stella had spoken to
her about what the two of themcould do with the insurance money if Bruce
were dead. Records from the AuburnPublic Library when subpoena showed that Nickell had

(01:01:52):
checked out numerous books about poison,including human Poisonings from Native and cultivated Plants
and Deadly Harvest. The former wasmarked as overdue in library records, indicating
that Stella had borrowed it but neverreturned it. The FBI identified Stella's fingerprints

(01:02:13):
on cyanide related pages on the numberof works that she had checked out from
the library in this period. Bythe summer of nineteen eighty seven, even
Stella's attorney acknowledged that she was theprime suspect of the case. On December
ninth, nineteen eighty seven, StellaNickell was indicted by a federal grand jury

(01:02:35):
on five counts of product tampering,including two of which resulted in the deaths
of Susan Snow and Bruce Nickell,and she was arrested on the same day.
She went on trial in April nineteeneighty eight and was found guilty of
all charges on May ninth, afterfive days of jury deliberation. Despite Nickel's

(01:02:55):
legal team's claims of jury tampering andjudicial misconduct having occurred. A motion for
mistrial was denied, and Nickel wassentenced to two ninety year terms for the
charges related to the deaths of Snowand Bruce Nickell, and three ten year
terms for the other product tampering charges. All sentences were to run concurrently,

(01:03:20):
and the judge ordered Nickel to paya small fine and forfeit her remaining assets
to the families of her victims.Nickel continued to maintain her innocence after her
trial. An appeal based on jurytampering and judicial misconduct issues was rejected by
the United States Court of Appeals forthe North Circuit in August nineteen eighty nine.

(01:03:45):
A second appeal, beginning in twothousand and one, with the assistance
of Innocent Projects and private detectives,al Far and Paul Celino, requested a
new trial on the basis of newevidence having been discovered that the FBI may
have withheld documents from the defense.The appeal was denied, though Stella and

(01:04:05):
her team continued to assert her innocence. She claims that her daughter Cynthia,
lied about Stella's involvement in the casein order to reap the three hundred thousand
dollars of reward money being offered.Cynthia eventually collected two hundred and fifty thousand
of that money. Nichel also allegesthat the testimony of various smaller cogs in

(01:04:29):
that case, such as the storeowner who testified about her having purchased Algae
destroyer, was influenced by the promisesof pavement. After the nineteen eighty two
Talon All Murders, FDA regulations wentinto effect that made it a federal rather
than just state or local crime totamper with consumer products. Local and state

(01:04:50):
authorities are not, however, preventedfrom also filing charges in such cases.
Under this law, Stella's crime wasprosecutable by as a federal product tampering case
as well as a state murder case, and she was convicted not of murder
but of product tampering that caused death. The possibility of state charges for the

(01:05:12):
actual murders of Susan Snow and BruceNakel continues to exist. Stella became eligible
for parole in twenty seventeen. However, documents show that Federal Parole Commission denied
her parole in twenty seventeen and recommendedthat she served the remainder of her sentence.
Her petition, filed in the courtof US District Judge James Robart,

(01:05:38):
said that the warden and Federal CorrectionInstitution in Dublin, California, also denied
her plea for release in June oftwenty twenty one, stating that she's an
eligible for parole. Stella argued thatthe federal rules make her eligible for release
after serving one third of her sentence, which is set to end in July
twenty forty. Stella said in herpetition that she had several health issues related

(01:06:02):
to her elderly age and that theFederal Bureau of Prisons can't provide her the
medical care she needs now. Intwenty twenty two, Stella had maintained her
innocence during trial and through her appeals, but after her petitions to get parole.
She casts those claims aside. She'squoted as saying, I'm accused of

(01:06:25):
not knowing the moral wrong I committed. She wrote, nobody knows better than
I the depth of my heinous offenseand how deeply it goes against the accepted
standards of conduct. I'm most remorsefulfor being responsible for the loss of two
human lives. What do you guysthink of this case? Did Stella actually
commit these crimes or did she claimremorse as a way to get parole.

(01:06:50):
Be sure to let us know,because for now, for tonight, I
think we're going to have to addthis case a black widow stolen account to
our never ending but are always growingtails from the dark. For nearly a

(01:08:45):
decade and mid Victorian era, thisblack widow poisoned a string of her husband's
for their insurance money, as wellas anyone else who got in her way,
including eleven of her own children.Dubbed Britain's first serial killer, she
was suspected of poisoning as many astwenty one people, but was only ever

(01:09:08):
convicted of one murder. This isthe case of black Widow Mary Anne Cotton.

(01:09:50):
This is Tales from the dark.Mary Anne was born on Halloween October
thirty first, eighteen thirty two,at Low Morrisley, which was a small
village in northeast England, to MichaelRobson and Margay Lundsale, who were committed
members of the local Methodist church.When Mary Anne was around five years old,

(01:10:12):
her family moved to the village ofMurton, a rural agricultural hamlet in
County Durham. During her childhood,mary Anne was described as exemplary and regularly
attended the West Sylvian Sunday School inMurton. It was also said that she
was regarded as a girl of innocentdisposition an average intelligence. Five years after

(01:10:35):
the family moved to Murton, herfather died in a work accident in February
of eighteen forty two, and dueto the cottage where his family lived belonging
to the mining company, her motherwas forced to marry another miner in the
company to avoid being homeless. Itwas said that mary took this very hard,
and several experts say that this iswhere her trouble truly began. When

(01:11:00):
Maryanne was sixteen, she left homeand became a nurse in a nearby village
of South Heaton, working for EdwardPotter. She also trained as a dressmaker
at this time. Then, ineighteen fifty two, at the age of
twenty, mary Anne married a laborernamed William Mowbray. They moved to southwest

(01:11:23):
England and had five children. Tragedywould quickly strike the young family. In
eighteen fifty six, four of theirchildren would die of gastric fever, which
prompted William to take out a lifeinsurance policy on both himself and their remaining
children should the unthinkable happen again.A short few years later, in the

(01:11:45):
eighteen sixties, William and two ofhis children passed away from the same gastric
fever, leaving Mary Anne a considerableamount of money from the life insurance policy.
This would leave mary with one childfrom her first marriage, who she
left with her mother, stating thatthe nightmare of raising a child after what
she experienced was just too much tohandle. After her first husband died,

(01:12:11):
Marianne moved to Seaham Harbor, CountyDurham. This is where she had a
relationship with a man named Joseph Natras. However, she eventually returned to Sunderland
and met and married her second husband, George Ward, in August eighteen sixty
five. He was an engineer atSouthernland Infirmary. Shortly after meeting, Mary

(01:12:32):
insisted that, given her history,George should take out a life insurance policy
so should something happen, she wouldnot have to start over from nothing.
He obliged, and was even quotedas saying it only makes sense in this
crazy world. Those who knew thecouple said they were happy and had even

(01:12:54):
begun planning a family of their ownwhen tragedy would strike again. On October
twentieth, eighteen sixty six, Mary'ssecond husband would die after suffering several months
of a bizarre illness that caused bothparalysis and intestinal problems. George would pass
away from what the coroner called typhoid, and Mary yet again collected a life

(01:13:18):
insurance payout. A month after Ward'sdeath, James Robinson, a shipwright,
hired Mary Anne as a housekeeper.There were rumors that the two had much
more than a professional relationship, andthis was confirmed when she announced that he
got her pregnant. During this time, Mary Anne's fifty four year old mother

(01:13:40):
fell ill in the spring of eighteensixty seven with hepatitis. Mary Anne immediately
went to Seaham Harbor to help her, and although her mother began to recover,
she complained of stomach paints and thendied nine days after mary Anne's arrival.

(01:14:00):
After the death of her mother,Mary Anne would marry a third time
at Saint Michael's Church on August eleventh, eighteen sixty seven, this time to
James Robinson. Their first child wasa little girl who they named Margaret Isabel.
She was born in November, butbecame ill and died in February eighteen
sixty eight. Distraught, the couplewould try again and succeed in having another

(01:14:25):
child, named George, who wasborn on June eighteenth, eighteen sixty nine.
After the birth of their second child, Mary Anne began to insist that
Robinson get a life insurance policy.This made him suspicious, and then he
discovered that she had run up debtsof sixty pounds and that she had stolen

(01:14:46):
more than fifty pounds from him.In addition, he learned that she had
been forcing his older children to pawnhousehold valuables. That was the last straw,
and he threw her out and retainedcustody of their son, George.
At this point, mary Anne wasdesperate. She had nowhere to go and

(01:15:11):
was homeless. Fortunately for her,a friend named Margaret Cotton introduced her to
her brother, Frederick Cotton Senior,who was recently widowed and made a good
living as a pitman. Margaret hadbeen playing the part of mother for his
children, Frederick Junior and Charles,but then she fell ill from an undetermined

(01:15:32):
stomach disease. This is when maryAnne stepped in to console the grieving Frederick,
and that is when he got herpregnant. She was now carrying her
twelfth child. On September eighteenth,eighteen seventy, she married Frederick at Saint
Andrew's Church, even though she wasstill legally married to James Robinson. She

(01:15:56):
would give birth to their son,Robert a few months later in eighteen seventy.
Shortly after his birth, mary Annelearned that her former lover, Joseph
Natross was living in County Durham villageof west Auckland and was no longer married.
She wanted to rekindle their old relationshipand persuaded her new husband to move
to west Auckland, where the twowould be seeing each other once again in

(01:16:19):
secret. Fast forward to December eighteenseventy one, and Frederick Senior would die
of gastric fever. After his death, Joseph became mary Anne's lodger, along
with gaining employment as a nurse workingfor a government worker named John quick Manning

(01:16:40):
who was recovering from smallpox. Marywas more than John's nurse, though,
and it was discovered that she hadbecome pregnant by him shortly after the job
begun. Like with her previous husbands, Mary had taken out life insurance policies
against Frederick Junior and his sons.Frederick Junior died in March of eighteen seventy

(01:17:03):
two, and her infant son Robertsoon followed. Joseph Natross also became ill,
and he passed away shortly after,leaving Mary Anne to collect multiple life
insurance policies. At this time.The only remaining life insurance policy that was
not collected was for her stepson,Charles Cotton. Shortly after Joseph's death would

(01:17:30):
begin the downfall of Mary Anne.She was asked by a local official named
Thomas Riley to help nurse a womanwho was ill with smallpox. At the
time, Thomas was also serving asthe parish's coroner. Mary Anne told Thomas
that the only way she could nursethe woman back to health was if he

(01:17:51):
agreed to commit her stepson to aworkhouse. She complained to Thomas several times
that she had no way toward thechild and could not concentrate on her work
if she was forced to also bea mother. She was even quoted as
saying, I could have married mylate husband's brother, but he won't live

(01:18:11):
long enough, and neither were aboy. They will go like the rest
of the Cotton family. Thomas wenton to ask her, you don't mean
to say that a healthy boy likehim would die? Would She responded,
oh, yes, he will.Five days after this conversation, Marianne informed

(01:18:32):
Thomas that her son Charles had died. This made him very suspicious, and
he reported it to the village police, while also convincing the attending doctor to
delay writing a death certificate until aninvestigation took place. Marianne was unaware of
this and went to the insurance officeto collect her late son's policy. This

(01:18:57):
is when she was made aware thatno money would be hade out until they
received a death certificate. Shortly afterThomas had raised suspicions with authorities about Charles's
death, an inquest was held.Mary Anne Cotton claimed during the inquest that
she used error root to relieve herstepson's illness, and in addition, she
alleged that Thomas Riley had made falseaccusations against her because she had rejected his

(01:19:21):
advances. Her story seemed credible andthe jury returned a verdict of natural causes.
However, Riley continued to insist thatmary Anne Cotton was guilty of murdering
her stepson. During the inquest,A local paper became interested in the story

(01:19:42):
and began their own investigation. Theyquickly discovered that mary Anne Cotton had moved
around northern England. They also learnedthat she had suffered many losses, including
three husbands, her mother, afriend, a lover, and eleven childre
Moreover, nearly all of those haddied did so from some sort of stomach

(01:20:05):
related illness. Suspicion and rumors thenprompted a scientific investigation by doctor William Buyer's
Kilburn. Doctor Kilburn was one ofCharles's doctors when he was ill, and
had kept several samples taken from hisbody. Those samples were tested and it

(01:20:26):
was discovered that they contained arsenic.The doctor went to police with the evidence
and Mary Anne Cotton was arrested andcharged with murder. After her arrest,
authorities exhumed Charles's body and a trialdate was set. Her trial began in
eighteen seventy three, after she gavebirth to her last child in prison.

(01:20:51):
During the trial, the prosecution laidout the evidence that Charles Cotton died of
gastric fever due to a stepmother's poisonedtee. Mary's defense was that Charles must
have died from arsenic in the wallpaper, but that led to the next question,
what about the others? Police hadalso exhumed the body of her lover,

(01:21:14):
who also showed unmistakable signs of poison. Despite all the evidence, Mary
Anne Cotton maintained her innocence. Iam not guilty. I have been misled,
she wrote in one note. Thejury spent one hour deliberating before finding
her guilty. Nonetheless, on Marchtwenty fourth, eighteen seventy three, Mary

(01:21:40):
Anne Cotton, Britain's first reported serialkiller, was hanged for her crimes.
A journalist described the scene as thefollowing missus Cotton, who scowled fiercely and
with the air of defiance at thecrowd, and who muttered constantly but indistinctively,
took her place upon the draw withremarkable composure. The wretched woman was

(01:22:02):
launched into eternity. What do youguys think of this case? Do you
think Mary really killed all of thosepeople or was it simply bad luck?
Be sure to let us know,because for now, for tonight, I
think we are going to have toadd the case of black widow Mary Anne

(01:22:25):
Cotton to our never ending but arealways growing tales from the darklon Have you

(01:24:09):
ever seen a murder mystery that hasit all from something interesting intriguing to something
horrible and terrifying? Still unsure?Well, what if I told you in
that today's case involved a woman whowas a savage criminal and a beautiful show
girl. It was the start ofa murder mystery that had it all sex,

(01:24:32):
lies and greed. It's up foryou to decide what you believe.
But this is the case a blackwidow, Marjorie orban This is tales from

(01:25:20):
the dark. At eighteen, Iwas told that I could not have children,
so I consciously decided that I wouldonly be accountable to myself at that
particular time in my life. Itraveled and I danced. I put in
a lot of effort, had alot of fun, and had several marriages.

(01:25:41):
By the time she was thirty five, Marjorie had been married seven times.
She admitted, I entered every relationshipI had searching for Prince Charming.
In between Prince Charming's Marjorie's fairy talessometimes took an x rated detour. She
became a stripper. I never feltdisrespected, and I didn't do anything that

(01:26:05):
I wouldn't be afraid of telling mymother. It was one of the strip
joints that Marjorie got to know oneof the regulars a gregarious, bighearted,
twenty six year old named Jay Orban. He did possess a really positive personality.
He was also humorous. He wasafter me, and I could see

(01:26:27):
he was interested in me. Finally, Marjorie consented to date Jay. We
went dancing and had several beers andthey were having a great time. It
was quite romantic and he was extremelypassionate. Jay completely collapsed, but Marjorie,

(01:26:47):
who was only twenty four years old, desired a more glitzy existence.
He was an upright man. Ialso wanted to avoid hurting him. However,
I had to go immediately, soI went. Marjorie returned to Florida
and reconnected with a man who wasour key to a fast paced lifestyle,

(01:27:13):
she claimed of Michael J. Peter, a multi millionaire who founded expensive stroke
clubs all over the world. I'veknown about him since I was seventeen,
and when I got back to Florida, I started working for him. We
went everywhere in the world. Weaccomplished many things together, Marjorie laporting.

(01:27:33):
Marjorie was included in Peter's film NoMore Dirty Deals, and he appointed her
his leading dancer and choreographer in hisclubs. We were engaged and had lived
together for a while. The marketis really challenging. Van Saint was warned
by Marjorie, it's hard to handlewhen someone you love has girls fawning over

(01:27:59):
them instantly and giving him everything.Marjorie took her talents back to Las Vegas
after the separation was brought on byPeter's wondering eye. A salesman on the
road from Phoenix called in nineteen ninetythree. She hadn't seen Jay Orban in
ten years, but it was him. He claimed that when passing through Vegas,

(01:28:23):
he seen my photo on a billboardthat was located across the strip.
I'm here in town. Would youwant to meet up for a drink?
She said. I decided to joinhim for a drink after we had a
long conversation. The entire evening wasspent conversing while enjoying nibbles and beverages here
and there. We were engaged inconversation until dawn. If Marjorie would marry

(01:28:46):
Jay and relocate to Phoenix, Jay, who was by this time the proprietor
of a flourishing Native American arts business, offered to pay for Marjorie's fertility treatments.
Joanne Orban, though, wasn't persuadedthat this was the right girl for
her son Jay. I couldn't believemy son was bringing her inside and telling

(01:29:09):
her he was engaged. At theLittle White Wedding Chapel on Las Vegas Boulevard.
We exchanged fowls and that was lovely. Jake, Jay's older brother,
remembered, he calls me up andhe says, I met the love of
my life and we got married afew months later. Jake Orban, who

(01:29:32):
was then residing in San Diego,paid a visit. They are in love
with one another, he said.She was the ideal homemaker, cleaned the
house and prepared the mills, tookcare of all the household chores that needed
to be done. However, Marjoriewas frequently becoming ill as a result of
the reproductive treatments. Finally it tookplace. They referred to the boy born

(01:30:00):
to Marjorie as their miracle child.His name is Noah. They appeared to
be the ideal family, but theneverything was different. Unbeknownst to Jay Orban,
Noah's eighth birthday celebration on August twentysixth, two thousand and four,
would mark the final time he wouldever see his son. Marshall Russon,

(01:30:23):
a close friend of Jay's, waspresent for that day. Jay left on
a sales trip to Florida not longafter the candles were blown out. The
trip was doomed from the beginning.Francis, a hurricane, was wreaking havoc
on the state. Jay made thedecision to give up and go home,

(01:30:44):
not realizing he was actually heading intoa center of an even more catastrophic storm.
In a phone conversation to her sonJay. On September eighth, joe
Ane Orban wished him a happy fortyfifth birthday. He had just entered Phoenix
by car. He promised to speakwith us later. He never communicated with

(01:31:06):
us, She added, Joanne wasbecoming anxious she recalled, and Marjorie was
acting like I was being crazy forbeing scared. As a week went by
with no word, Jay's anxious friendsand relatives persuaded Marjorie to call the police.
After another week had passed, sheinformed everyone that he had returned from

(01:31:30):
Florida and left on another sales trip. Marjorie became a target very fast.
Butcher left at least three messages onSeptember twenty eighth before Marjorie eventually returned his
calls. The talk was recorded bydetective. Marjorie then shocked Butcher by revealing

(01:31:53):
that although they had divorced for taxpurposes, they were still cohabitating as husband
and wife. According to Detective Butcher, she was using Jay's money for something.
She spent several thousand dollars in ashort period of time. Marjorie stole
forty five thousand dollars from Jay's businessaccount and spent over twelve thousand on a

(01:32:16):
baby grand piano. Marjorie and aproduction manager she met at the gym were
embroiled in a love triangle. Sixweeks after going missing. On October twenty
third, two thousand and four,authorities think they have finally located Jay Orban,
or at least what was left ofhim. David Barnes, a detective,

(01:32:41):
was called to the site. Youcould smell death in the air as
we approached. Once you smelled it, you always know what it is,
said he. I've never seen somethinglike it before where it was just a
piece of body. The witness said. A rubber maid cant was neatly filled
with a body, a bundle ofcash, and a solitary expended gunshot.

(01:33:06):
Later, DNA test verified what Jay'smother was already worried about. The missing
people investigation ended with Marjorie Orban andthe murder investigation began there. Barnes claimed
that Marjorie dump Chase Torso not farfrom her own house because she was so

(01:33:27):
fixated on getting her hands on Jay'smoney, but she was still having issues
because of Marjorie's brazen attitude. Policeabrehended Marjorie for faking Jay's signature at a
Circuit City store three weeks after discoveringhis death. She said all she was
doing was swapping out the compensated companycomputers. The interrogation was taken over by

(01:33:50):
Detective Barnes, who had a surprisefor Marjorie. He confronted her with a
picture of Jay's butcher Torso, whichshe had never seen for She immediately began
crying while denying knowing anything about itor anything related to it. Later that
evening, Marjorie was released, butthe evidence kept accumulating. Receipts from mobs

(01:34:16):
and cleaning supplies about the day afterJay went missing were discovered by investigators.
But this is the most devastating pieceof evidence available. Marjorie was captured on
camera visiting a Low's Hardware store onSeptember tenth, two days after Jay vanished.
On footage, she can be seenusing Jay Orban's American Express card to

(01:34:41):
purchase two containers. Here she waspurchasing the container that contains Jay Van Saint
heard from Barnes, this was asclose to the smoking gun as you could
get. At that point, wethought case closed. It appeared. Marjorie,
however, argued the wrong person wasthe target of the smoking pistol.

(01:35:03):
There was, in fact a secondperson of interest. Larry Weisberg, Marjorie's
boyfriend, was made a suspect inthe investigation. He is the person who
challenged the swat team and yelled obscenitiesat Detective Butcher over the phone. In
Jay Orban's home, police discovered someof his clothing in a drawer. Wiseberg

(01:35:27):
had access to Jay Orban's garage,which had an intriguing discovery made by police
after searching his home in car.Police detained Marjorie Orban on Decemmer six,
six weeks after the discovery of herhusband's mutilated body, and they accused her
of killing Jay. Noah was sentto live with Jake Jay's brother. In

(01:35:49):
the end, the prosecution offered LarryWeisberg use immunity, which meant that nothing
he said could have been used againsthim in court. Marjorie was aware that
she was about to engage in thebattle of her life and that the death
penalty might be an option. It'sjust another one of Marjorie Orban's lies,

(01:36:10):
according to prosecutor Trina Kay. Kayinformed Van Saint that all the forensic evidence
pointed to Marjorie Orban. Larry Weisbergwas really just another pond for Marjorie,
another someone to control. He isn'tinvolved at all. In my opinion,

(01:36:30):
Trina Kay is a piece of artbecause she presents the most vile interpretation of
events. Marjorie was depicted by Kayas a stripper who was in need of
a child. Kay claimed that Marjorieblew him away when she finally got what
she desired. Kay said Jay Orbanwas someone she hated. She thought he
was repulsive and wanted him killed becauseshe wanted his money. One of the

(01:36:55):
most devastating witnesses for the prosecution wasSophia Johnson, Marjorie's former cellmate. Johnson
stated she started going off about him, how he's a beast, he's horrible.
There were some repulsive characteristics about Jay, they existed. His dining manners
were appalling. Then she begins todescribe how I accomplished it. I finished,

(01:37:19):
I've never said anything like that,never to anyone. She reported that
he was shot, frozen, defrosted, and had his arms, legs and
head severed. Marjorie was found guilty. We're glad we got justice for Jay.
Today. Joey and Orban said,we knew she did it. If

(01:37:42):
she gets life in prison, Idon't care. Jake Orban said, as
long as we got her guilty.What do you guys think of this case?
Do you think Marjorie is innocent andshe was forced to cover up her
husband's death or do you think shecommitted it? Be sure to let us
no because for now, for tonight, I think we're going to have to

(01:38:04):
add the case of black widow MarjorieOrban to our never ending but are always
growing tails from the dark. Continuingon with our season of black Widows.

(01:39:54):
This woman killed her husband, herson, and her boyfriend with no remorse
ever displayed, with claims of abusefrom her childhood, can she hide her
atrocious crimes behind the trauma? Thisis the case of black widow. Judy
Bueno Agno. This is tales fromthe dark. Born at Quana, Texas,

(01:40:54):
on April fourth, nineteen forty three, Judius Wealthy was the daughter of
a farm worker named after her mother. In years later, Judy would describe
her mother as a full blooded memberof a non existent Mesquite Apache tribe,
but in fact they hardly knew eachother. The elder Judius wealth he died

(01:41:18):
of tuberculosis when her daughter was barelytwo years old. In the family disintegrated,
Judy and her infant brother, Robertwere sent to live with her grandparents,
while the other two siblings were placedfor adoption. It was all downhill
from there in terms of Judy's familylife. Reunited with her father in Roswell,

(01:41:41):
New Mexico, at the age often years old. After his next
marriage, she found herself the targetof abuse from both parents, beaten,
starved, burned with cigarettes, forcedto work slave hours around the house.
At the age of fourteen, heranger finally exploded. Judy scouted two of

(01:42:01):
her stepbrothers with hot grease and lither parents with flying fist, fee and
any object she could lay her handson. The episode cost her sixty days
in jail, confined with adult prostitutes, but when the judge asked if she
was ready to go home, Judyopted for reformed school. She remained at

(01:42:25):
Foothills High School, a girl reformatoryin Albuquerque, until her graduation in nineteen
fifty nine at the age of sixteen, and she would despise her family from
that day on. Of her brotherRobert, she once said, I wouldn't
spit down his throat if his gutswere on fire. The year nineteen sixty

(01:42:45):
found Judy back in Roswell, workingas a nurse's aide under the pseudonym Anna
Schultz. She gave birth to anillegitimate son, Christian Michael Schultz, on
March thirtieth, nineteen, at theage of seventeen, and ever after a
refused comment on rumors that his fatherwas a pilot from a nearby Air Force

(01:43:09):
base. Soon after, she metAir Force Sergeant James Goodyear, a young
airman, and struck up a romancewith him right away. In nineteen sixty
two, they got married, anda few years later, James and Kimberly
two more children joined the family.The family relocated to Orlando, Florida in

(01:43:32):
the late nineteen sixties, mostly asa result of Goodyear being transferred to McCoy
Air Force Location Strategic Air Command Base, which is now the Orlando International Airport.
Goodyear stayed in Vietnam for nearly ayear before returning home in nineteen seventy
one. When he returned, though, strange things started to happen. The

(01:43:59):
healthy man's start to have strange symptoms. Within a few months after his may
return. Then he passed away inSeptember. After Goodyear's unfortunate death, his
widow received about sixty four thousand dollarsin VA benefits in addition to twenty eight
thousand dollars in life insurance policies.Judy also made the decision to relocate to

(01:44:26):
Florida's Pensacola, and it was therethat she started dating a new man in
nineteen seventy two by the name ofBobby Morris. Judy and her kids relocated
to Colorado when Morris did, buta few years later, Morris started displaying
odd symptoms that were very similar tothose Goodyear had. Morris passed away in

(01:44:48):
nineteen seventy eight. Strangely, doctorsfelt that Goodyear and Morris had both passed
away from heart attacks. Judy's secretcollected on three different life insurance policies taken
out on Morris's life as his commonlaw wife. After that, she went
to Pensacola, Florida. She changedher last name to Bueno Anyo at this

(01:45:13):
time, which is a grammatically erroneousSpanish translation of the English word good Year.
By nineteen seventy nine, Bueno Anyo'sgrown son, Michael had enlisted in
the United States Army, maybe asa result of the Late Good Year.
As Michael grew increasingly unwell, troublingsymptoms started to surface once more. After

(01:45:39):
some time, a diagnostic of arsoningpoison, which had effected his limbs and
legs, were made. After beingreleased from the Army, he soon needed
to wear strong metal leg braces.Judy later brought Michael canoeing in Florida's East
River in nineteen eighty. During thisernie, the canoe capsized at some time.

(01:46:03):
Judy made it back to shore withoutincident, but Michael perished after his
bulky braces dragged him underwater. Hisdemise was initially classified as unintentional drowning.
Judy continued to stealthily take money fromher son's life insurance coverage as well.
Judy had been murdering covertly until thispoint, feeding her lover's arsenic and drowning

(01:46:29):
her son in a remote location,but she adopted a much less subtle technique
the following time. She tried tomurder someone, which caught the attention of
the authorities. Judy started seeing JohnGentry after Michael passed away. Later,
he remembered bitterly. How he firstsaw her, Judy was standing at the

(01:46:54):
bar all dressed in black. Shefrequently wore black. In fact, I
believe that speaks a lot about herpsychologically. Gentry, her future husband,
was persuaded by Judy that they oughtto get life insurance on one another.
If Gentry passed away, Judy wouldget five hundred thousand dollars instead. The

(01:47:17):
black widow then began to work.When he had a cold, she initially
attempted to kill him by giving himvitamin C tablets. Because of the drugs,
Gentry became very ill, and heultimately needed to go to the hospital
to treat his symptoms. After receivingtreatment, he felt better, but he

(01:47:39):
soon had to go back to thehospital since his automobile had been firebombed in
nineteen eighty three. Gentry miraculously escapedthe blast. However, as soon as
the investigators learned what occurred, theystarted to doubt Judy. Ted Chamberlain,
a detective in Pensacola, claimed thatJudy had committed one murder too many.

(01:48:03):
She possibly could have avoided the othermurders if she had just left the final
boyfriend alone. Goodyear, Morris andher kid were all exhumed as a result
of Chamberlain's inquiry, which also resultedin Judy's arrest. All three of them
had been poisoned with arsenic It waslater discovered one of the most clever American

(01:48:29):
serial killers of the nineteen seventies andthe nineteen eighties was Judy bueno' agno.
Despite not having the most victims,she nevertheless gained notoriety for murdering individuals who
were close to her for insurance money. She killed her son, her husband,
her boyfriend, and even herself.Judy secretly amassed large sums of money

(01:48:55):
after each death, using the moneyto launch a salon by Pricy Jewels and
to get a new car. Nobodyknew she was in Florida living the high
life, but she was. Judywas convicted of trying to kill Gentry in
nineteen eighty four. Soon after that, detectives discovered information that led them to

(01:49:15):
believe that Judy was also responsible forGoodyear's murder and Michael's drowning. Only when
her previous fiance's automobile inexplicably exploded innineteen eighty three did the police really start
to wonder what was going on.Further investigation by the authorities led to the

(01:49:36):
discovery of even more terrible crimes.The Black Widow had received a death sentence
by nineteen eighty five, despite thefact that she was suspected of being behind
Morris's killing. Colorado prosecutors decided notto charge her with murder because she had

(01:49:56):
already received the death penalty in Floridain nineteen eighty five. The atrocities committed
by Judy lasted twelve years due tothose offenses, she had received a total
of around two hundred and forty thousanddollars in life insurance proceeds, and she
made no admissions of any oven,not even when the formalde hide was discovered

(01:50:19):
in the vitamins she had been giving. Gentry Russell Edgar, the prosecutor in
Pensacola, gave her a sinister Monikerbecause of her callous disregarden court. He
said, she's like a black widow. She thrives off of her young and
her mates. Judy made an effortto appeal, but all of her arguments

(01:50:42):
were finally dismissed, and on Marchthirtieth, nineteen ninety eight, she consumed
her final supper, steamed veggies,fresh strawberries, and hot tea were all
favorites of the fifty four year old. She was then made ready for the
death row by prison staff, andshe passed away in the chair at seven

(01:51:04):
thirteen am. Judy resisted making anyadmission until the very end. When asked
if she had any last words,Judy murmured, no, sir. She
died as she lived quietly, witha twisted story hidden beneath the surface.

(01:51:27):
Compared to more prolific serial killers,Judy is still relatively unknown today. Despite
this, her story continues to drawattention due to the horrible motives behind the
killings. Judy also made history bybeing Florida's first woman to be put to
death in the electric chair and thefirst woman to be executed in a hundred

(01:51:49):
and fifty years. Judy never confessedto any of the murders. She was
also the third person to be putto death in the US since the capital
penalty was reinstated in nineteen seventy six, and the first woman to be put
to death in Florida since eighteen fortyeight. The first woman to get the

(01:52:11):
electric chair in America was Judy BuenoAgyo. What do you guys, think
of this case. Do you thinkJudy's upbringing affected her and turned her into
the murderer she became. Be sureto let us know, because for now,
for tonight, I think we're goingto have to add the case of

(01:52:32):
black widow Judy Bueno Agyo to ournever ending but are always growing tales from
the dark. Cold hearted and consumedby greed, this black widow killed hundreds

(01:54:24):
of children born through illegitimacy. Horrifiedby the true nature of her adoption agency,
local police were desperate for answers.To this day, no one truly
knows the number of children she killedas she took her secret to the grave.

(01:54:45):
This is the case of black WidowAmelia Dyer. This is tales from

(01:55:27):
the dark. While growing up,Amelia learned how to read and write,
and in the long run, shedeveloped a love for literature and poetry.
Even after her mother's mental illness causedby typhus, marred her childhood and she
was obliged to care for her eventhough she had violent fits. Her mother

(01:55:50):
died in eighteen forty eight, afterwhich she was made to live with her
aunt in Bristol, and there sheserved as an apprentice with a corset maker.
When her father died in eighteen fiftynine, her eldest brother, Thomas,
inherited the family business, and bythe age of twenty four she became

(01:56:13):
permanently estranged from him and began lodgingin the trendy street at Bristol. A
few years later, she married GeorgeThomas, who was fifty nine years old,
but the couple did a crazy thingdue to their large age difference.
They lied about their age in themarriage certificate, whereby George deducted eleven years

(01:56:34):
from his age and Amelia added sixto hers. But when it was discovered
that they had lied about their agemany years later, it caused a lot
of confusion. After their marriage,Amelia got trained as a nurse by a
midwife named Ellen Dane, and shelearned an easy and cruel way of earning

(01:56:55):
a living by using her home toprovide lodgings for young women that can see
ved illegitimately. Then she would farmoff their children for adoption or allow the
children to die of neglect and malnutrition. Unfortunately, in eighteen sixty nine,
George Thomas died and Amelia began searchingfor extra income. Then she began the

(01:57:19):
baby farming business, but later leftthe nursing business when she gave birth to
her daughter, Ellen Thomas. Howthis all began was with unmarried mothers during
the Victorian period, struggling greatly toearn an income. Since the eighteen thirty
four Poor Law Amendment Act removed thefinancial obligation from the fathers of illegitimate children

(01:57:43):
while bringing up the children in acountry where illegitimacy was greatly stigmatized, they
began practicing baby farming businesses, abusiness in which individuals can act as an
adoption agent or fostering agents. Thenin return they would pay money for the
upkeep of the children. So alot of women that gave birth illegitimately subsequently

(01:58:08):
gave up their unwanted babies to belooked after as nurse children. But the
women were most often exploited for theirfinancial gain. If the child was birthed
by a well off parent, theywould pay as much as eighty pounds.
However, if they were impoverished,they would be charged five pounds, and

(01:58:30):
some of the nursing mothers often starvedthe farmed out babies to save money,
and after a while the children endedup dying. While advertising and during her
meetings with clients, Amelia often assuredclients that she was a respectable and married
woman and that she would provide acheering and loving home for the children.

(01:58:53):
So in eighteen seventy two she quicklywent to Mary William Dyer, who was
a brewer slaborer from Bristol. Theyhad two children together and they were named
Mary Anne and William Samuel, butafter some years Amelia left her newly wedded
husband. Amelia continued to run herbaby farming career this time around, though

(01:59:17):
she did not allow the children todie of starvation. Instead, she would
kill the children and take all ofthe money fees for herself. Amelia began
abusing alcohol and opium based products duringher killing habit, and her mental instability
could be related to the abuse ofthe substances that she was taking. In

(01:59:42):
eighteen seventy nine, she was caughtby the police when a doctor reported her
agency because he was suspicious of thenumber of children that had died under her
care that he was called upon tocertify. Instead of Amelia being convicted of
mur or manslaughter, the court sentencedher to six months of hard labor,

(02:00:08):
staying in prison almost destroyed her mentalstate, even though others complained about the
leniency of the sentence she was givenwhen compared to those that had committed lesser
crimes, and when she got released, she resumed her nursing career. Later,
she began having spells and mental hospitalsdue to her mental health and her

(02:00:30):
suicidal tendencies, But with the frequenciesof her stays, she knew how to
behave to ensure that she was releasedand had a comfortable stay. After this
incident, she realized the consequence ofinvolving doctors and issuing death certificates, so
she began disposing of the children's bodiesherself. In eighteen ninety, a governess

(02:00:56):
gave Amelia her illegitimate baby to nurse, and when she came to visit the
child, she immediately became suspicious andthen stripped the baby's bodycloth to see if
he had a birthmark on one ofhis hips, but alas the birthmark wasn't
there, she reported the case andthis further prolonged the authority's suspicion of Amelia,

(02:01:19):
but she feigned a breakdown in ordernot to be jailed. At a
point she committed a serious suicide attemptby drinking two bottles of laudanum, but
her long term tolerance to opium productsmade her survive, and once again her
ugly behavior began promoting undesirable attention toherself, but she was aware of the

(02:01:44):
police suspicions. She began relocating withher family to different towns and cities to
escape everyone's suspicion and to start upher business. In eighteen ninety three,
she got discharged from her final commitsat Somerset and Bath Lunatic Asylum close to
the Wells, but unlike her previousbreakdowns, she had the worst experience to

(02:02:09):
date and never went to another asylumagain. Two years later, she moved
over to Caversham in Berkshire, butshe was accompanied by a person that didn't
suspect her, Jane Smith. Janewas a person Amelia had recruited from a
brief spell at a workshop she iswell. Moved with her daughter Mary Anne

(02:02:32):
and her son in law, butafter staying for a few months, they
moved over to forty five Kinsingdon Roadat Berkshire. However, this time around
Amelia persuaded Smith that she should actas the owner of the agency so that
they could handle the children and couldcreate a reputable agency. In January eighteen

(02:02:56):
ninety six, Evelina Marmon, whowas a popular twenty five year old barmaid,
gave birth to her illegitimate daughter,who was named Doris, at the
boarding house in Cheltenham. This younglady quickly sought adoption for her child,
but policing an advertisement in the Miscellanesesection of the Bristol Times, a mirror
newspaper. She had hopes to giveup the child because of her work,

(02:03:20):
but she would eventually go back toreclaim her child. She made a post
that she needed a respectable woman andnext to her post was Amelia's post.
In this she said that they havea caring and reputable family and they are
willing to adopt a healthy child froma nice country home with a large sum

(02:03:42):
of money. Evelina responded to Amelia'spost and a few days later she received
a reply from Amelia and she hadwritten I would be glad to have a
dear baby girl, a child thatI can bring up and call my child.
She further stayed in we are plainand homely people and fairly good circumstances

(02:04:03):
I wouldn't want a child for allmoney's sake, but due to the company
and home comfort, it would requiremoney. I and my husband are very
fond of children, and we haveno child of our own, so when
you leave your child in my care, they will have a good home and
motherly love. Evelina wanted to payan affordable weekly maintenance fee for her daughter,

(02:04:26):
but Amelia insisted on it being aone time payment in advance, so
she reluctantly agreed and paid the money. Then a week later she went to
Cheltenham. When Evelina saw her,she was surprised by Amelia's age and stocky
appearance, but she acted caring towardsthe lady, so she handed over her

(02:04:48):
daughter to Amelia, a cardboard fullof clothes and the agreed fee. But
she was sad at the fact ofgiving up her child, so she accompanied
Amelia to the Shettleham station and shereturned to her lodgings. A few days
later, Amelia sent a letter toEvelina that her child was faring well.

(02:05:11):
Evelina responded, but never got aletter back from Amelia. After collecting the
child, Amelia did not go backhome. Instead, she went to seventy
six Mayle Road, Willie's Den,London, where her twenty three year old
daughter Polly was living, and thenshe searched from some white edging tape that

(02:05:34):
was used in dressmaking. She woundedit twice around the baby's neck and tied
a knot. The child did notdie immediately, but after some moment she
would get strangled to death. Ameliaand her daughter then wrapped up the dead
baby body in a napkin so theywould dispose of the body. They then

(02:05:58):
packed some of the cloth that shewas brought in and sold off the rest
to a pawnbroker. From the moneyshe received, Amelia paid her landlady her
rent fee and also gave a pairof child boots for her little girl.
And on the following day, onWednesday, April first, eighteen ninety six,
they took the life of another child, a little boy whose name was

(02:06:21):
Henry Simmons. On April second,she stacked the two bodies inside a carpetbag
with bricks for additional weight. Thenshe headed for Reading to dispose of the
body, and at a secluded spotshe threw the bodies near a well at
Caversham Lock by forcing the carpetbag throughthe railing that led to the River Thames,

(02:06:47):
but unknown to Amelia, the disposalof the bodies would be retrieved by
a bargeman because the bodies were notadequately weighted and they were easily spotted.
Later on, one of the bodieswould be identified as a baby girl whose
name was Helena Fry. In asmall detective force available to Reading Borough Police,

(02:07:10):
Detective Constable Anderson used microsoftic analysis tothe cipher a faintly legible name and
they noticed missus Thomas in an addresswritten on the paper. This discovery made
the detective have a breakthrough. Theevidence led the police to Amelia, but

(02:07:30):
they did not have strong enough evidenceto accuse her of such a severe crime.
But later they got additional evidence froma witness that was obtained from Bristol
Police, and this further increased theirconcern. Then d C. Anderson,
along with Sergeant James, placed Amelia'shome under surveillance, but they quickly realized

(02:07:51):
that if they attack her, Ameliawould notice suspicion and flee. The officers
then used a young woman as adecoy. The woman met up with Amelia
and discussed her service. Their plotwas designed in a way to help the
detectives positively link Amelia to her crimesso they could arrest her. Amelia was

(02:08:18):
waiting for her new client to comeover, but instead she found detectives waiting
for her at her doorstep. Then, on April third, eighteen ninety six,
the police raided her home, butafter entering the home, they were
hit with the stench of human decomposition. This caused them to check out all

(02:08:39):
rooms, but they couldn't find anyhuman remains. They did, however,
discover evidence relating to other crimes thatshe had committed by using the white edging
tape, telegrams regarding adoption arrangements,pawn tickets for the children's clothing, receipts
for advertisements, and letters her mother'sinquiring about their children's well being. They

(02:09:05):
calculated their findings and they noticed thatin just a few months, at least
twenty children placed in her care hadbeen killed, and she was about to
flee by moving to Somerset. Thepolice then calculated the murder ray and they
discovered that over the decades, aMiliader had killed over four hundred and nine

(02:09:26):
babies and children. She is oneof the most notorious and hardened murderers of
all time. On April fourth,she was charged with murder, while her
son in law, Arthur Palmer,got charged with accessory and later on the

(02:09:46):
police discovered six more dead babies,including Doris Marmon and Harry Simmons, her
last victims. Each baby was foundto be strangled today with white tape.
When asked to confess, she toldthem that the white edge tape was her
sign on each child. After hearingthe crime that she had committed, eleven

(02:10:13):
days later, Evelina Marmon ran overto check and see if her baby was
alive. She saw the clothes thatAmelia hadn't disposed of. The police them
further investigated the death. In earlyMay, they discovered that Amelia's child nor
her son in law had acted withher. Then Amelia confessed and the reading

(02:10:35):
gal that she had written, andshe said, sir, will you kindly
grant me the favor of presenting thisletter to the magistrates on Saturday. I
made this statement for I may nothave another opportunity, but I must relieve
my mind. I know that mydays are numbered on this earth, and

(02:10:56):
I feel it is awful and drawinginnocent people into my trouble. I know
that I will have to answer beforemy maker in Heaven for the awful crimes
that I've committed. As God Almightyis my judge in heaven. I have
contemplated doing such a wicked act,but is too late. I am speaking
of truth and a hope to beforgiven. I alone will stand before my

(02:11:20):
maker in Heaven, and I willanswer to all the witness passed through my
hand. On May twenty second,eighteen ninety six, Amelia appeared at the
Old Bailey Court and she pleaded guiltyto one murder, the child of Doris
Marmon, but her family and associatestestified against her in court that they were

(02:11:41):
growing suspicious of her activities. Shehad mostly escaped the police on several occasions,
but the evidence from the man whohad seen the body she disposed of
further proved their claim. Her daughterthen provided graphic evidence to ensure her conviction.

(02:12:01):
The only defense she had was thatshe had twice been committed to asylums
at Bristol. However, the policeclaimed that they had framed mental instability to
avoid suspicion. It took the juryfour and a half minutes to find her
guilty of the charges and then shewas sentenced. Amelia was sentenced to death.

(02:12:24):
After staying in the cell for threeweeks, she filled out her five
exercise books with her last true confession. A night to day of her execution,
a chaplain visited her and asked herif she had anything to confess.
She then gave him the book thatshe had written. However, it was
discovered by the court that she hadonce been declared legally dead, so her

(02:12:48):
execution was delayed further. On Junetenth, eighteen ninety six, she was
hanged by James Billington at Newgate Prison. While on the scaffold, she was
asked if she had anything to say, and she said that she had nothing
to say. Amelia Dyer was hanged. The police were quite uncertain of the

(02:13:11):
total number of children that she hadkilled. Further inquiries and evidence pointed to
a higher number. After her death, her case caused a great scandal and
she became known as the Ogress ofReading. Her actions made adoption laws stricter,

(02:13:33):
whereby the police began to arrest thosethat were caught in the baby farming
business and hope of stamping out abuse. Despite all of the effort. Trafficking
and abuse of infants did not stop. Inside a parcel, a three year
old baby was found cold and wet. When traced, it was discovered that

(02:13:54):
the baby was given to missus Stewart, who is Polly, the daughter of
Amelia Dyer. What do you thinkof this tragic event? Do you think
that Amelia was mentally unstable or wasshe pretending to avoid suspicion? How many

(02:14:16):
died at the hands of Amelia Dyarbe sure to let us know, because
for now, for tonight, Ithink we're going to have to add the
case of black widow Amelia Dyer toour never ending but are always growing tails

(02:14:37):
from the dark more alone more.She wanted everyone to believe that she regretted

(02:16:22):
what she did, that she reallydid take responsibility for the two innocent lives
that she took. She wanted everyoneto see that even if she couldn't bring
them back, she could still savelives if she was given another chance.
After a long life of drug andalcohol abuse, it all caught up to

(02:16:43):
this black widow. Desperate to getoff death row, she converted to Christianity
and pleaded to be put on alife sentence instead. This is the case
of black widow Carla they Tucker.This is Tales from the Dark. On

(02:17:37):
November eighteenth, nineteen fifty nine,Carla Faye Tucker was born in Houston,
Harris County, Texas. For thedoll faced little brunette with almond shaped eyes
and dimples on her cheeks, lifebegan fairly normal when she was born.

(02:17:58):
The Tuckers already had two Carrie Anne, who was one and Kathy Lynn,
who was two, as well asa child friendly German shepherd. Her mother,
Carolyn, stayed at home while herfather, Larry, worked as a
longshoreman in the Gulf of Mexico.Early life was the happiest time for Carlo

(02:18:20):
Fay. The Tuckers frequently took familyvacations in their modest cottage on Caney Creek
in Missouri, Texas. She recalledto former Miss America Terry Moossine during a
Christian Broadcasting Network interview in the nineteennineties, I was an intybaty girl.

(02:18:41):
We were family, and we usedto go to the bay house and do
neat things with a boat and thedog and water skiing and fishing and stuff.
But it didn't last very long.The marriage of mister and missus.
Tucker was literally one that was offand on. They attempted to succeed by
getting divorced and getting back together severaltimes. Each time they fell backwards.

(02:19:07):
Every time adultery was to blame.The three daughters experienced the pain of the
split ups. They were joiced atthe reunions before being torn apart once more.
Carlo Faye's final dissolution occurred when shewas ten years old. It was

(02:19:28):
untidy, she stated to LifeWay Churchmagazine, which published her account in nineteen
ninety issue. I didn't know whymy parents divorced. I was too young
to know. We all wanted togo with mother. When my dad gained
custode of us girls, my fatherstruggled to effectively discipline us. He attempted

(02:19:48):
to correct us, but we weresimply too much. The numerous personal issues
Carlo Fay was already dealing with atsuch a young age were only made worse
by a divorce. She had alwaysfelt like the ugly duckling in the family
of two siblings, with blue eyes, blonde hair, and fair skin.

(02:20:09):
She was also very self conscious dueto the prominent birthmark on her arm.
She struggled to interact with children atschool and those playing on Heatwood Street,
where she lived. During the finaldivorce proceedings, which seemed like an eternity
to the young child. Caught upin the midst of the battling, Carla

(02:20:30):
found out exactly why she did notlook like Carrie or Cathy. Her mother
admitted to her that she was theresult of an extramarital affair, even though
her father accepted Carlo Fay as hisown the third daughter. From that moment
on, never psychologically could convince herselfthat she belonged to the Tuckers as real

(02:20:52):
kids Kathy and Carrie belonged. WhenCarlo Faye Tucker realized she wanted a family
but couldn't define on her own,she did what every other child does.
She started looking for one elsewhere.Had been smoking marijuana as a pastime since
she was ten years old. Encouragedby her sisters, she tried the harder

(02:21:16):
stuff. After realizing that Mary Janewas insufficient as a companion to give her
the feeling of the person she desired, she was using heroine before she turned
eleven. Carlo Fay informed missus Muissonthat peer pressure was a result of external
influences. My sisters hung out witholder people because they were drug users and

(02:21:39):
had an older friend. There weremany drugs present at a time when other
girls were still playing with dolls.There was also sex. She started hanging
out with the same crowd because shewanted to follow her sisters wherever they went.
The clique was primarily made up ofbikers, with the Banditos local gang

(02:22:00):
as the leader. This club frequentlyheld drug parties that collimated in orgies.
Carlo Fay, who was present andsome of those gatherings, even though she
wasn't initially a participant, took mentalnotes while wide eyed and discovered that the
birds and the bees could make forsome fascinating research. In the process,

(02:22:24):
she experienced sex for the first timewhen she was twelve. She happened to
visit one of the member's homes oneevening while looking for her sisters, but
soon she realized they weren't there.She was persuaded by the member to ride
with him. Following their altercation,he took her for a bike ride to
her remote location where he had hisway with the preteen. She then discovered

(02:22:48):
that sex while high was the ultimatehigh and liked it. She discovered a
family, she experienced vivid colors,a buzz in her head, a warm
sensation all over her body. Asa result, and a feeling of inclusion,

(02:23:09):
dysfunction erupted. Carlo Fey was underher father's care and was expected to
follow the rules, but he wasrarely home to keep an eye on her.
He worked two shifts and was goneuntil late at night, and his
daughters made the most of their freedomwithout much parental disapproval. Carlo Fey left

(02:23:33):
school in the middle of seventh grade. The straightened narrow frequently curved while she
was under her mother's supervision, suchas when she caught her daughter sneaking marijuana
into her bedroom. Unlike her father, who would have lectured the team,
Missus Tucker reprimanded her for her inabilityto pack a smooth joint and then gave

(02:23:56):
her instruction on a finer points ofrolling. Missus Tucker also stumbled into prostitution
after the divorce, albeit reluctantly atfirst, to make ends meet. She
discovered her position as a call girlto be a lucrative one. Because she
was still in her twenties and stilldeveloping as a noble housewife, she was

(02:24:16):
the neighbor girl who exuded seduction.Initially, Caroline Tucker was worried about how
she could conduct her profitable business fromher Guinoa, Texas apartment and the presence
of a teenager when she inherited CarloFay since her ex husband could no longer
manage. Evidently, according to CarloFay, her mother came up with a

(02:24:41):
workable solution. Later, Carla wasto give testimony. My mother wanted to
teach me the ropes of being acall girl, so she took me to
a place where it was all men. I was so eager to win my
mother's approval. She needed to bepleased with me. Therefore I tried to
comply with her request rather than simplysaying no. The truth is that I

(02:25:07):
intuitively understood what I was doing waswrong. At age fourteen, Carla Tucker
started working as a prostitute. Ittook some time before it seems sortid,
especially when she went on concert tourswith her mother, a die hard fan
of rock bands during this time,meeting the Allman Brothers, Marshall Tucker Band,

(02:25:31):
and Eagles in person was a highlight. Life was enchanting for a teenager
who didn't know how to handle it, and hadn't heard the word moderation,
regardless of the possibility that the speedand alcohol would catch up with them.
Carla Faye married Stephen Griffith, amechanic, when she was sixteen years old.

(02:25:52):
The marriage seemed to be a happyone on the surface. Stephen believes
so fired his wife's tomboy's traits andfeastiness. Despite their frequent arguments, he
always treated her more like a friend, which he believed was healthy in any
marriage. She didn't tend to suppressher emotions and he liked that, he

(02:26:16):
admitted to The Houston Chronicle, wefist fought a lot. She hit me
harder than any man has ever done. She had my back covered, so
I never had to be concerned whenI entered a bar. But his wife
twitched underneath. She considered the activitiesthat she and Stephan engaged in routine,

(02:26:39):
including using drugs, drinking alcohol,making love, and fighting. She needed
to be unrestricted so that she couldlet the cult run, possibly encircles until
it became absurd, but at leastshe would have a say in the outcome.
She left Griffith. She met ShaunDeane, a friend of hers,

(02:27:00):
at that time, and he laterintroduced her to Danny Garrett. Carla Fay
discovered that Garrett to be simple companionWhile working late shifts as a prostitute in
Quay Point, she was free toroam those circles as she pleased. Garrett
moreover, showed respect to her forher career by not interrogating her. Even

(02:27:22):
better, he continued to support herwith a powder and pills. She started
dating Daniel Garrett, who was fourteenyears older than her. Dean and Tucker
had a history of conflict despite Seanand Tucker's relationship. Sean and Carla had
a history of conflict despite their friendship. When he rolled his motorcycle into the

(02:27:48):
center of Carla's apartment, spewing oiland exhaust fumes everywhere, she asked him
to leave, and he did.Tucker then struck Dean once more, this
time in the eye. After aweekend spent abusing drugs, Carlo fe Tucker,
Garrett, and James Lybrand broke intoSean's home in the evening of June

(02:28:11):
thirteenth, nineteen eighty three, withthe goal of stealing a motorcycle that Sean
had been repairing in his garage.They divided up to search the apartment,
but when Sean awoke and called outto them, things went wrong and altercation
started. When Garrett and Tucker enteredinto his bedroom. As Sean lay on

(02:28:31):
the ground, Garrett picked up aballpeen hammer and struck him in the head.
He recoiled and started gurgling. Ashe did so, Tucker hit him
with a pickaxe. She discovered leaningagainst the wall. Because she wanted him
to stop making that noise, shestruck him repeatedly until he stopped talking.

(02:28:56):
She then spotted a figure in thebed hiding against the wall under the covers.
Deborah Ruth Thornton had slept over withDean the previous night. Thornton and
Tucker engaged in a brief struggle beforeTucker won and killed her by repeatedly hitting
her with the pickaxe. She waslater caught on camera claiming that every pickaxe

(02:29:18):
blow caused her to experience an orgasm. Tucker and Garrett fled with the boxes
of motorcycle parts and some cash thatthey had taken from them, leaving the
bodies and the murder weapons behind.When Gregory Scott Travor, a co worker
of Dean's, arrived, at Dean'sapartment on the following morning to get a

(02:29:41):
ride to work. He found thebodies of Thornton and Dean. On July
twentieth, nineteen eighty three, asDaniel Garrett was leaving his house to get
to work, he was detained asa result of a tip. That same
day, Albert Shaneen a third suspectin Carlo, were both taking into custody.

(02:30:01):
On April eleventh, nineteen eighty four, Carla Fey was found guilty by
a jury of eight women and fourmen who were chosen by a female judge.
Albert Shannon acknowledged visiting Dean's apartment,but refuted any involvement in the killings.
He provided testimony against each defendant.Carlos found guilty after just seventy minutes

(02:30:26):
of jury deliberation, during which nowitnesses were called by the defense. The
defense called a female psychiatrist who testifiedthat Carla had told her she been using
drugs since the age of nine andhad become addicted to heroin at the age
of ten. As the trial movedinto punishment phase, she explained Carla's mental

(02:30:48):
state to the judge, saying thatshe hadn't slept for three days and had
been using drugs and alcohol the nightof the killings, even though Carla had
posted about doing so on the wiretape. The psychiatrist told the jury that
she didn't believe it was likely thatshe enjoyed the killings in a sexual manner.

(02:31:09):
It didn't seem likely to her thatit was her only genuine sexual satisfaction
that she had ever known. Carlagave her version of events on the witness
stand and informed a jury that shedid not believe the killings were real.
I missed the bodies. I don'trecall seeing any blood or holes. On
April twenty fifth, nineteen eighty four, the jury recommended that Carla Fey Tucker

(02:31:33):
be given a lethal injection as punishmentafter deliberating for nearly three hours. After
Tucker and Garrett were charged with thekillings and put on separate trials in September
of nineteen eighty three, Tucker entereda not guilty plea and was detained in
jail while awaiting trial. Tucker tooka Bible from the prison ministry program shortly

(02:31:58):
after being imprisoned and read it inher sale. Later, she remembered I
was reading without understanding. Before Iknew it, I was kneeling in the
center of myself floor. I wasmerely pleading with God to pardon me.
In October nineteen eighty three, Tuckerconverted to Christianity. Later, she wed

(02:32:22):
the Reverend Dana Lane Brown, theprisons minister, and had her Christian wedding
ceremony there. Carlo wrote a letterto Texas Governor George W. Bush on
January eighteenth, nineteen ninety eight,from which some experts were made public.
I'm not trying to downplay how brutalmy crime was in any way. It

(02:32:45):
was obviously awful, and I doaccept full responsibility for what occurred. I
also understand that two innocent lives Ibrutally murdered. That evening, justice and
the law demand my death. Iaccept that if my execution is the only
thing that can satisfy the demand forjustice and reparation in any way that our

(02:33:07):
law requires, I will be madeto pay for what I did. Three
months after being imprisoned, my ministryvisited the jail and I attended the services
that evening. I accepted Jesus intomy heart. As soon as I did
this, the enormity and The realityof what I had done struck me.

(02:33:28):
That evening. I cried for thefirst time in a long time, and
the tears are still part of mylife today. In the past fourteen years,
I contributed to the answer. Iam now a contributor to the answer.
For the past fourteen years, Ihave made it my goal to act
morally, not because I'm incarcerated,but rather because my God expects it of

(02:33:52):
me. I'm aware of right andwrong, so I must act right.
If you commute my death sentence tolife in prison, I'll continue to reach
out to people and should try andprove their lives with the rest of my
time on earth, even though Idon't really understand the rules for are doing
so. In the prison where Iam, I see inmates who have committed

(02:34:15):
horrible crimes. I can try tochange these girls before they leave this place
and hurt someone else by reaching outto them. Please commute my sentence so
I can give back to society byhelping others. The lives I took cannot
be recovered by me, but ifI am allowed, I can contribute to

(02:34:35):
saving lives. I can only offerthat as true reparations. I had no
intention of going there that particular nightand killing someone in the apartment. But
that is unimportant. The truth isthat when we went there, entered the
apartment, brutally killed two innocent people, and then fled while bragging about what

(02:34:58):
we had done for over month.Additionally, I attempted us some money to
a member of my victim's family.It was intended for Deborah's son, who
needed it for school. I toldRon Carlson that I was trying to get
money for his nephew. When hecame to me in nineteen ninety two and
said that he had forgiven me forwhat I had done to his sister,

(02:35:20):
he warned me against it. IfI did send him the money, it
would only be hurting him. Furthermore, he assured me that his nephew would
not be receiving the money from mebecause he had no desire to interact with
me. I did not push becauseI am aware of the pain. The
parole board did not budge Bush.The governor was unmoved. Carlo Fey Tucker's

(02:35:46):
appeals court was denied clemency on Januarytwenty eighth, nineteen ninety eight. The
following week, on February third,she was supposed to have been put to
death. Stay officials flew Tucker toHuntsville unit and Huntsville on a t DCJ
plane on February second, nineteen ninetyeight, after removing her from the unit

(02:36:09):
in Gatesville. The last meal CarliFay Tucker requested was a garden salad with
ranch dressing, a banana, anda peach. She chose five people to
witness her execution, including Thornton's brother, Ronald Carlson, who opposed the execution
and had been converted to Christianity aftera meeting Tucker on death row, as

(02:36:31):
well as Thornton's husband Richard, histwo stepchildren, and the death penalty supporting
death row inmate Richard. Her finalphrase was, yes, sir, I
would like to say to all ofyou, the Thornton family and Jerry Deane's
family, that I am so sorry. I hope God will give you peace

(02:36:52):
with this. She looked at herhusband, Baby, I love you.
She looked at Ronald Carlson, rongive Peggy a hug for me. She
looked at all present, weeping andsmiling. Everybody has been so good to
me. I love all of youvery much. I'm going to be face

(02:37:13):
to face with Jesus now Warden Baggett, thank all of you so much.
You have been so good to me. I love all of you very much.
I will see all of you whenyou get here. I will wait
for you. She was put todeath by lethal injection. She was praising

(02:37:33):
Jesus Christ as the deadly chemicals wereadministered to her. At six forty five
pm CST. Eight minutes after receivingthe injection, she was declared dead.
She was the state of Texas's firstwoman to be put to death and one
hundred and thirty five years She isburied in Houston's Forest Park Lawndale Cemetery.

(02:38:00):
What do you think of this case? Did Carlo fay Tucker really not see
any blood? Did she really regrether actions? Be sure to let us
know, because for now, fortonight, I think we're going to have
to add the case a black widowCarlo fay Tucker to our never ending but

(02:38:22):
are always growing tails from the darkworld more. From momster wife to armed

(02:40:05):
robber, this black widow led alife of carelessness. What ultimately got her
caught was the murder of her secondhusband in her home on his day of
leave. But this black widow swearsit was not her but her lover instead,

(02:40:26):
with two possible endings, who willyou believe? This is a case
of black widow, Linda Calvey,this is tales from the dark. These

(02:41:18):
days, all I can do isreminisce and wonder was that a genuine person.
My characters are loosely based on peopleI've met or are acquainted with,
even the bad ones, the peopleI've encountered throughout the years, and every
character in my novel are all basedon real people. Maybe twenty percent of

(02:41:41):
it is about the individual. Theeighty percent of it is fiction based on
them, so there's a mix.She claims. Unfortunately, I have a
lot of life experience to fall backon. I used to be a gangster's
mall. I'm no longer one.Linda Welford, who was given the name

(02:42:03):
Linda Calvey in nineteen forty eight,grew up in a tight knit working class
district of Stephanie Green and East London, which was home to many of the
city's jellied ale eating, rhyming slingspeaking cockneys. Her adolescence was largely uneventful.
She was a receptionist at a paintfactory and frequently watched her cousin's children.

(02:42:28):
When her cousin invited her to aparty for a legendary bank robber,
Mickey Calvey, who was on homeleave, all of that normalcy was shattered.
Mickey was granted permission to visit hisfamily and friends for short periods of
time towards the end of his eightyear stint in prison. Linda immediately fell
head over heels for Mickey. Shehad no false hopes about his way of

(02:42:50):
life. He described her to howhe was raised in an unstable, impoverished
home with little love. Mickey desiredmore out of life than his father,
who was employed by the London Docks. He went to robbery since he could
think of no other way to obtainhis goal. For a while, Mickey
bought Linda all that his stolen moneycould afford. He continued to live a

(02:43:15):
life of crime despite their developing affection, and by the time she gave birth
to their first child, he wasback in jail. Despite this, Linda
got married to him while he wasincarcerated. Less than two years after he
was given his freedom back, Lindaand Mickey welcomed their second child, and
Mickey started robbing banks once more.When their kids were four and eight years

(02:43:41):
old. In nineteen seventy eight,Mickey laughed on a significant job that he
claimed could give their family a solidfoundation for the future. On de Summer
ninth, nineteen seventy eight, theFlying Squad, a division of the London's
Metropolitan Police Service trained to look intoarmed Robert, shot and murdered him during

(02:44:01):
an armed raid. Mickey, whowas attempting to flee and was in possession
of a loaded sod Off shotgun,was shot by Detective Sergeant Michael Banks and
the abdomen outside of the store.According to the coroner's findings. Painter and
decorator was identified as Mickey's line ofwork in the coroner's report, Linda firmly

(02:44:22):
believes that the murder was unjust.He had been shot in the back,
not in the front, she said. She disputes the police accusation that Mickey
would have intimidated them with his gunby claiming it wasn't even loaded in front
of everyone. Linda pledged that thepolice won't get away with this. She

(02:44:43):
claimed to have engaged one of thetop pathologists in the world and that they
had discovered damning proof. She toldthe media that the autopsy had disproved the
official account that Mickey had died froma gunshot wound to the stomach, and
revealed that he had actually been shotthrough the back, but the general public

(02:45:03):
was never informed of this knowledge.For some time, Linda only wore black,
earning from the police the nickname BlackWidow. In court, Banks claimed
that he had shot Mickey Calvey todefend my life and the public safety.
I think I would have died ifI hadn't done it. The jury found

(02:45:26):
Banks not guilty of justified homicide beforeeven leaving the courthouse. According to the
reports at the time, Linda recalls, Mickey died trying to give us everything.
I touched his toes as he laidin his open casket and vowed to
exact revenge by doing what you did. Linda met her second partner at fundraisers

(02:45:48):
held by the Underworld to help herafter his passing. Ronnie Cook worked with
Freddie Foreman and was a buddy ofRonnie and Reggie Cray. After he passed,
Mickey's friend and fellow gang member,Wrong Cook paid a visit to Linda,
who was grieving. Cook gave hercash so she could live Linda,

(02:46:11):
who was grieving and distraught, soonstarted dating Cook, but a wife and
kids of his own. Linda claimsthat Cook quickly became a domineering person who
dictated what she should wear, stalkedher when she went out with friends,
and even threatened the life of herson. Although he was endearing, he

(02:46:33):
was also a vicious psychopath who tookanything he wanted, including women. People
warned me to use caution, buthe persisted. It was very apparent that
we were dating. He lavished mewith presents. She claims he purchased me
a ring and said I was his. When he said your son stook gorgeous

(02:46:56):
boy, I knew he was referringto my son, and I was trapped.
Linda did not know where to go. She claims that Cook's pals were
terrified of him. They've since admittedto me that they were all aware of
what was going on in our relationship, but were unable to intervene because he
would have turned on them. WhenRon Cook received a sixteen year term for

(02:47:20):
his role in an armed robbery,Linda managed to escape, but she continued
to lead a life of crime.Linda soon moved from her prior position as
a gangster's wife to assuming the lead. Between visits to see Cook in prison,
she transitioned from working as a getawaydriver to receiving robbers in her home

(02:47:41):
as they plotted their upcoming heist,to becoming an armed robber targeting security vans
and post offices. When it firststarted, she claims it was retaliation,
but eventually it became a way oflife. It was normal. Mickey's death
had such an impact on my brain. When Linda's group was apprehended attempting to

(02:48:05):
rob a post office in Stephanie Greene, she was given a seven year prison
term, Linda remembers, I vowednever to do another crime. The murder
occurred eighteen months after I returned homehere. One version of the story splits
in two. However, wrong Cookis fatally murdered in Linda Calvey's kitchen.

(02:48:28):
In both stories, Linda is avictim twice over. In her opinion,
her small boy was in danger,first from years of an emotionally abusive relationship
and later from police corruption. Cookassigned his friend Brian thorough Good to take
care of Linda while he was imprisoned. The two quickly began a relationship,

(02:48:52):
and when Brian himself was taken toprison. He in turn introduced Linda to
his friend Danny Reese, who wasalso in prison for armed robbery. His
son had died in a car accidentwhile Reese was behind the wheel, so
he asked Linda if she could spendtime with Reese. Reese and Linda became
friends, and their connection quickly grewfrom that bond. When Reese was on

(02:49:16):
day release in December nineteen ninety,Linda picked him up from the prison and
took him back to her house beforecontinuing to his place. Day release is
a frequent procedure in England where prisonersare permitted to leave for the day before
returning to prison. That evening,she informed Reese that Cook would be visiting
on a day off. The nextday, she brought up Cook from jail

(02:49:39):
the following day. Linda claims thatReese sneaked in and shot Cook dead as
she cowered in the corner. Rightafter they got home. I recognized him
when he turned to face me.He fired Cook while grinning at me and
saying this one's for Mickey Calvey.Linda claims that she phoned the police and

(02:50:01):
reported what had occurred. Although shedid not first identify Reese as the murderer.
Linda explains he subsequently told me Ishould have said it was him,
but I couldn't, given that Cookhad participated in Mickey's disastrous last robbery and
had hinted at intentionally pleasing Mickey indanger. Linda claims Reese committed the crime

(02:50:26):
in order to exact revenge on Mickeyand to defend Linda's son. He claimed
that after Cook threatened to kill myson, Reese arrived to shoot Cook in
order to protect my son. Accordingto Linda, the police interviewed her again
a few days later and detained herafter conducting gunshot residue tests on her hands

(02:50:48):
and face and ruling her out asa suspect. Because it is their policy
not to comment on close cases,the Metropolitan Police declined to comment on any
of these specifics. She claims thatthe police questioned her about why she didn't
identify herself as Linda Calgary. Iquestioned what difference that made, and they

(02:51:09):
replied it made a huge difference,and that I was now a suspect.
According to the alternative version of theseevents, Linda Calvey was a cunning and
deadly lady, who hired Reese tokill Cook for ten thousand pounds. When
Reese couldn't finish the shot in Cook'selbow, Linda grabbed the gun and shot

(02:51:30):
him in the head. In hisautobiography, notorious criminal Frankie Fraser said that
Linda killed Cook so he wouldn't learnwhat she had been up to while he
was in jail. According to Fraser, she had been minding his money and
when he came out it wasn't goingto all be there. She asked her
new boyfriend to kill him, buthe couldn't bring himself to shoot Ron,

(02:51:52):
so she took care of the situationherself. John Beavan, the prosecuting attorney,
claimed that during e Linda's trial,Linda wanted to simplify the fairly perilous
and complex situation of her personal affairs, including her relationship with Rees. According

(02:52:13):
to Detective David's, a former policeofficer who worked on the case for the
Flying Squad at the time of Calvey'sarrest and who agreed to speak in depth
about the case on the condition thathis real name not be used in order
to protect his privacy, Reese hungaround on a grass area outside of Calvey's
house, wearing black clothes and pretendingto be a jogger. A few minutes

(02:52:35):
after she Uncook entered the house,Calvie entered since he had left the door
open. The one person Riese trustat the time, the private investigator,
Reese, went back to prison andconfessed to According to Detective David's, Reese
wasn't cunning, he was a straightforwardperson. He claimed that Calvie finished the

(02:52:58):
job by stealing his gun. Accordingto Reese, Linda instruct a Cook to
kneel before firing the fatal shot throughhis head. Reese allegedly told the investigator
this. Reese later walked back thisemission. David's claims that a different witness
why danity is kept private, claimedto have heard Linda Calvey yell Neil.

(02:53:24):
Reese, according to Calvie, allegedlykicked open the front door as she was
yelling for her son Neil. BothReese and Calvie were found guilty of killing
Cook. Later, while they wereboth incarcerated, the two were married.
The most exciting thing to occur inLinda's jail unit in a long time convinced

(02:53:46):
her to go through with it,despite her mother's last minute pleadings for her
not to. In twenty thirteen,Danny Reese was charged for gagging and sexually
assaulting a fellow prisoner. He contestedthe charges and was found not guilty.
Reese had previously served time in prisonfor abusing a fifteen year old kid and
a woman in her house. Thejury in the case was informed Linda was

(02:54:11):
given a sentence that would prevent herfrom being eligible for parole for at least
seven years. She served eighteen years, and she feels that for many years
she was denied release because she wouldnot confess to the murder. Following her
eventual release from prison in two thousandand eight, she divorced Reese and remarried

(02:54:33):
to George Caesar, a millionaire whohad made his fortune selling bleach. Appeared
to have led a morally upright lifefree of crime. While Linda was on
day release from prison, the couplemet at a cafe in two thousand and
nine. They were wed in asmall country chapel. Today, Linda Calbey

(02:54:54):
has been out of prison for fourteenyears, as currently seventy four. She
has a emma of seven and agreat grandmother of five. The mother of
two adults in their forties. Sheresides in a four hundred year old cottage
that was purchased for her by herdeceased third husband, who passed away from
cancer in twenty fifteen. Linda spendsher day is having family dinners and going

(02:55:18):
to meet in Greek book signings atstores all throughout London. She attends boxing
events, hangs out with Freddie Foremanand Billy Bluedell, another ex gangster,
and gives signed copies of her booksto neighborhood celebrities, including former gang members.
The Blind Beggar Barr, infamous forbeing the scene of rival mobster George

(02:55:41):
cornell nineteen sixty shooting by Ron Cray, served as a setting for the book
launch for her memoir The Black Widow. She grins and says, of course
I had to conduct the launch there. Critics claim that Calvine glamorizes her life
of crime. She provided at acontroversial museum that was showcased on the Netflix

(02:56:01):
series Dark Tourist with one of herbras, in addition to memorabilia that she
had gathered from a number of otherinfamous convicts. The Black Widow is how
she signed each item. She haseven offered a complimary keychain decorated with brass
knuckles as a particular incentive to buycopies of her book, Linda wants to

(02:56:26):
clear her identity. Despite all ofthe celebration of the underworld she formerly called
home, the reputation that I'm amurderer has been endured by my family.
I'm not. I committed all otheroffenses, but not the one that landed
me in jail for so many years. Linda insisted, Mum, please,

(02:56:46):
everyone writes a bunch of crap aboutyou. My son and daughter said to
me, will you finally explain yourside of the story. As a result
of the book's exposure, Linda saysthat she hopes someone who has involved in
her case at the time, possiblya police station employee or even a cleaner
who may have heard something, wouldpublicly support her account of the events.

(02:57:09):
Linda won't ever lose hope that someonewill come forward. According to Mel Samble's
director of communication from Mere Books,the company that published Calvie's memoir, no
one has as of yet. Theterms of Calvie's parole include that she might
be sent back to jail if she'sever found to have profited from her crime.

(02:57:30):
Despite detective David's conviction that Calvie wroteher book for the money. Sambal's
claims that Linda has not compensated formedia appearances and that all book royalties go
to Linda's children. Although lie detectivetests are not considered to be valid evidence
in the English criminal prosecution system,Calvie hopes to take one now that the

(02:57:50):
attention around the book has subsided.She explains, I'm doing it so I
can prove to everyone that what Isay is true. Regarding her book itself,
it's revealing, but only to theextent that Calvi intends it to be.
She writes about the good and theterrible, but not the ugly.

(02:58:13):
She avoids the grid of it.She acknowledges wanting a luxurious lifestyle and knowing
she can manipulate guise to acquire whatshe wanted. But many significant aspects of
her story, like the reason shemarried Rhese while he was incarcerated, remained
unanswered. Before going to prison,Calvie claims that she was a different person,

(02:58:35):
but now she is back to whoshe always was. The person I
was then is so alien to me. Now people who know me say it
wasn't like me. She adds,they know no one more polite and caring
than me. They don't recognize theperson I was, and neither do I.
Julian Hardy, her attorney, claimsas she appeared to be well liked

(02:58:58):
in prison, even by the guard. She attempted to make the best of
the situation she found herself in andis obviously intelligent. She has consistently shown
respect, according to Hardy. Ina radio appearance for the book's promotion,
Calvie defended herself consistently against being wrongfullycharged with Cook's murder. She replied,

(02:59:20):
I was in my own home.I had just had the carpets done.
Why would you want to murder someonein your own home? The bathroom suicide
narrative in her book was subliminal indicationto the reader that she would never commit
a crime in her own home.It's a small point, but it serves

(02:59:41):
as a reminder that she is anexpert manipulator. What do you think of
this case? Do you think we'llever know if Linda truly killed her husband,
Ronald Cook, or was it bythe own volition of Reese? Be
sure to let us know, becausefor now, for tonight, I think

(03:00:03):
we're going to have to add thecase a black widow Linda Calvy to our
never ending but are always growing tailsfrom the dark. She had a reputation

(03:01:52):
for being a poisoner and an adulteress, along with claims of an incestuous relationship
with her brother and her father.Surrounded by gossip and rumor mongering, this
black widow would be married off toany wealthy and powerful family her father could
find. After all, being apope surrounded by controversy, her father needed

(03:02:18):
all the allies he could find.This is the case of black Widow Lucretia
Borgia. This is tales from theDark. Lucrezia Borgia was the third child

(03:03:07):
of Cardinal Rodrigo Borgia and his favoritemistress Vanoza de Catani. At her birth,
her father consulted an astrologer who foretoldof a remarkable future. Born in
fourteen eighty, her name and thatof her family would be vilified down the
centuries. The Borgia's originally came fromSpain and were seen by the Italian noble

(03:03:31):
families as outsiders, which made themnatural targets of suspicion and rumor. They
disapproved of the fact that outsiders heldsuch a sway over their nation. The
majority of rumors, gossip, anddownright lies about the Borgias that still exists
today are the result of jealousy,hatred, and vengeance for actual and imagined

(03:03:52):
misdeeds. They did terrible things.One of the most divisive popes was Rodrigo,
later known as Pope Alexander the sixth, whose pontificate was marred by numerous
affairs, children born out of wedlock, nepotism, and scandal. His uncle,

(03:04:16):
Pope Calixus the third created him acardinal in fourteen fifty six, and
he was chosen as pope in Augustof that same year. These were the
days of the anti Christ, becausethere were no bigger opponent of God,
Christ and religion than this guy,who lived more like a royal than a
member of the clergy. According toa contemporary source, although sexually active popes

(03:04:39):
were not in common, Lucretia wasone of Alexander's five offspring, whom he
acknowledged as his own. They lookedafter them and showed that a lot of
interest in their education and growth.This was a contiguous move for God's agent
on earth. Lucretia was raised inAdriana Orsini's home and received her education in

(03:05:01):
Latin, Greek, Italian and French. She adored dance, poetry, and
music. She had no trouble movingup the social ladder and was so well
respected for political skills that she wasfrequently given control of papal papers while her
father was gone. This worried alot of clergy, who thought a woman

(03:05:22):
much less a pope's daughter had noplace in the palpacy. She was renowned
from being one of the rare individualswho had genuine power and influence over her
father. Growing up, Lucretia andher brutal brother Caesar were the closest of
siblings. This connection was rumored toexist after her father assumed the throne,

(03:05:48):
she was used as a tool toforge relationships. The offer of marriage drew
a lot of aristocratic families in theItalian nations to the woman, who was
described as a graceful beauty with goldenhair. Alexander established and dissolved a number
of engagements for Lucretia before her firstmarriage was chosen. This was the first

(03:06:11):
of mysterious deaths. La Borgia hasbuilt advantageous connections by marrying her into other
affluent and important families. Much likethe majority of wealthy and powerful families of
the time. Giovanni Sforza, theLord of Pizarro and the nephew of the
Duke of Milan, was chosen byAlexander as Lucretia's first spouse because he wanted

(03:06:33):
to have a strong ally in northernItaly. When she married the twenty six
year old in fourteen ninety three,she was only thirteen years old. According
to accounts from the time, therewere lavish celebrations that lasted well into the
night. The family was already makingheadlines after the wedding festivities for the wrong

(03:06:54):
reasons. According to Joanne Butcherd,a chronicler and Papa master of ceremonies during
the reign of Pope Alexander, hesaid, many other things are being said,
but I am not reporting them becausethey are not true, and if
they were true, they would inany case be unbelievable. Birchard would subsequently

(03:07:18):
pen a description of the scandalous banquetof chestnuts, a notorious orgy that the
Borgias are alleged to have tended,but this is debatable. Lucretias struggled to
adapt to the simple life of herhusband because she was so used to the
splendor of the Vatican. Francis,King Charles the Eighth sent troops into Italy.

(03:07:39):
The uncle of Lucrezia's spouse, LuvicoSforza, joined up with the French
troops to oppose Lucretia's father. Giovanniwas stuck in Rome, torn between his
wife and the powerful Borgias on onehand, and his uncle and his wife
on the other. It's an impossiblesituation. He ultimately refrained from siding with

(03:08:03):
his uncle by standing up for Juanand Caesar, the brothers of Lucretia.
Caesar informed Lucretia that her husband wouldneed to be executed as a result of
his choice. As time went on, Alexander's value of the relationship with Milan
decreased, which meant that that Giovanniwas no longer required and marriage to Lucretia

(03:08:26):
was no longer useful. A common, though unconfirmed explanation for Giovanni's disguised flight
to Pesaro in February fourteen ninety sevenduring his time in Rome is that Alexander
and Caesar planned to assassinate him,but Lucretia forewarned him. Alexander made the

(03:08:46):
decision to dissolve his daughter's marriage inorder to form a more advantageous connection to
the shock and the rage of theDuke. He did so by asserting that
Giovanni was impotent and that the marriagehad not been sealed. It was blatantly
false because everyone knew that Giovanni's firstwife had passed away while giving birth.

(03:09:09):
Giovanni dissimulated as a beggar and fledto Milan. The Borgias then started to
protract it at legal procedure of tryingto have the marriage dissolve on the grounds
that Giovanni was impotent and hadn't actuallymarried anyone. These rumors set off centuries
a vile conjecture about Lucretia's sexual history, including one set Giovanni himself promoted.

(03:09:35):
The annulment proceedings made lucretius virginity atopic of public attention. Few Rome based
rumor mongers thought that the marriage hadnot yet been formally consummated, thus her
sexual life would continue to be ahot issue. Giovanni falsely accused Lucretia of
having sex with both her father andher brother when she was asked to consent

(03:09:56):
to the dissolution of the marriage.Yet this accusation would follow the Borgia family
for generations. While the talks weregoing on, Lucretia was transferred to a
covenant where her father pleaded for hervirginity while family enemies spread rumors that she
was pregnant. Giovanni finally gave inan agreed. The dowry Lucretia left behind

(03:10:22):
was his to retain. Scandal followedLucretia as a boy with unknown parentage was
born into the Borgia family around thesame time, Alexander proclaimed Giovanni to be
Caesar's illegitimate son. Both failed tostop the rumors that the infant belonged to
Lucretia and may have been the resultof an incestuous relationship. The body of

(03:10:46):
Pedro Caldron, one of Alexander's valets, was discovered on the banks of the
Tiber in February fourteen ninety eight.He was another candidate for the father of
a rumored child and was said tobe a favorite of Lucretius. Although Pedro's
death is still unknown, lucretius brotherCaesar, was thought to be the perpetrator

(03:11:09):
the second of mysterious deaths. Lucretiawithdrew to Rome's San Sisto Monastery. During
the duration of the annulment discussions,even the cloister was unable to protect her
from the Cunning family's schemes and tragedies. One Lucretius brother was found dead in
the Tiber in fourteen ninety seven.Caesar, her brother, was experiencing a

(03:11:33):
dramatic assent to prominence. At thetime. He had lately been named military
head of the Papal States. Theregion of central Italy around Rome was directly
under papal rule. His father hadmade him the cardinal in his late teens.
Lucretius alone at San Sisto came toan end when the family, as

(03:11:56):
always looking out for itself, beganlooking for a new husband. This time
the suitor was Alfonso of Oregon,the vast monarchy that ruled southern Italy,
and was an illegitimate son of theKing of Naples. His union with Lucrezia
would make it easier for her brotherCaesar, to wegg Carlotta, the Princess
of neopolitan who was a major foein the Pope's main enemy, France.

(03:12:22):
In July fourteen ninety eight, Lucretiawas married to Alfonso. They seemed to
enjoy a happy, yet brief marriage. She may have been married off for
politics, but she found love thistime. The bride groom appeared to have
sincerely wanted to get married. Alfonso, who was a year and a half

(03:12:43):
younger than Lucrezia, was thought tobe both attractive and intelligent. The marriage
seemed to be going well, eventaking her husband's side against her father during
a dispute on the legality of themarriage of Alfonso's cousin, Patrese, Queen
of Hungary in honor of his paternalgrandfather, Rodrigo. Alfonso and Lucretia's son

(03:13:05):
was born in fourteen ninety nine,but before she had time to enjoy herself,
her family's plotting would ruin it.His attitude towards Naples changed when the
alliance with France started to take shapecourtesy of Caesar's marriage to Charlotte de Albrett,
a French king's cousin, in Mayof fourteen ninety nine. Alexander understood

(03:13:28):
that a better connection with France wouldbenefit him greatly because France was a threat
to Naples. Another husband of Lucretia'shad outlived his usefulness Alphonso briefly left Rome
after sensing a change and sentiment towardshim. He was attacked on the Saint
Peter's Asilica steps on July fifteen hundred. His guards managed to repel what the

(03:13:52):
would be assassins, but he sustainedserious injuries. While speculation about who might
have been responsible for the assault spread, Lucretia personally attended to her devoted husband.
Alfonso made a lot of enemies,but many people, including himself,
appeared to be suspicious of Caesar.Alfonso was killed by a servant of Caesar's

(03:14:16):
a month later while he was stillrecovering. Even though Caesar was never formally
charged with ordering his execution, theBorgias were now regarded as a family to
be wary of. At the ageof twenty, Lucretia was left a distraught
widow. After achieving the intended rupturewith Naples, Lucretia was once more free

(03:14:39):
to act in her family's best interest. Lucretia gained a reputation as a poisoner
about this time, and her family'sadversaries loved to create fresh scandalous rumors to
propagate. She allegedly kept poisonous itemsin the ring she wore. According to
rumors, has frequently been said thatwomen would prefer to use poison as a

(03:15:03):
weapon of choice because it was acommon way to murder someone in the Renaissance
Europe. Although Lucrezia is not knownto have poisoned anyone, it is known
that adversaries of her family sometimes vanishedwithout a trace. Nevertheless, it became
strangely connected with her. In Decemberfifteen oh one, Alfonso di Estate,

(03:15:24):
the Duke of Ferrara's heir, waschosen to be Lucretia's third husband. It
was a game that, due tothe fact it would put her in a
position of advantage, Lucretia herself wasactively involved. Given that Lucretia's reputation was
allegedly tarnished by tales of incest,poisoning, and the gruesome death of her

(03:15:46):
last husband, a large dowry ofone hundred thousand ducats was ultimately agreed upon.
Lucretia was forced to leave her sonRodrigo behind, at the request of
her new husband's family, so thathe might be reared by them. She
would never see him again. Throughthe opening of the Road to Tuscany,

(03:16:07):
a crucial commercial route at the time. Lucretia's third marriage assisted in strengthening her
brother Caesar's power in Rome. Shegave birth to six children for Alfonso during
her third marriage, which turned outto be a successful one. Despite Caesar's

(03:16:28):
enormous influence, the Borgia's dynasty wasswept away with the death of her father
in fifteen oh three. Despite beingcritically ill, Caesar was plotting the invasion
of Tuscany, but was unable toproceed without continuing papal support. Though Pious
the Third, the new Pope,supported him, his time in office was

(03:16:48):
brief, and Julius the Second,a dangerous foe at the Borgia family,
took his place. Lucretia rose toprominence as a duchess and an arts page
after her husband was made a dukein fifteen oh five. The most celebrated
writers and painters of the day wereall present in her court, notably the

(03:17:09):
poet Pietro Bembo, who was frequentlyreferred to as Sucretia's greatest love. Rumors
about her scandalous past started to fadeor her followers simply ignored them. Only
four of the eight children born toLucretia and Alfonso's court would live to adulthood,
but their court was well respected.Caesar was captured and held captive close

(03:17:35):
to Porgia as he moved to Rometo put an end to a rebellion.
The Papal States later purchased all Borgialands. Caesar joined his brother in law,
King John the third of Navarre afterbeing exiled to Spain in fifteen o
four, being imprisoned there, thenescaping and dying in his service during a

(03:17:56):
military expedition in fifteen oh seven.Lucretia actively participated in the defense of Ferrara,
her new home. Alfonso was excommunicatedin fifteen ten by Pope Julius the
Seca as a result of his schemesto incorporate Ferrara into the Papal States.
The city was put under interdict,which prohibited people from her taking in rituals

(03:18:20):
and sacraments. The French troops,said aided Ferrara were entertained by Lucretia,
who was hailed for a poise andbravery during the crisis. She also pawned
her jewels to obtain money for defense. Despite her family's reputation for brutality,
Lucretia displayed mercy by defying her husband'sinstructions to torture individuals who had been captured.

(03:18:48):
One of the authors who praised Ferrara'sadored duchess in glowing terms was poet
Aristo Lucretia Borgia, who will graduallyincrease in beauty, virtue, chastity,
and riches to the point where theywill sprout like young plants whose roots have
beenetrated by fertile soil. Lucretia,who has not seen her twelve year old

(03:19:09):
son Rodrigo for several years, wasshocked to learn of his unexpected death in
fifteen twelve. She supposedly fled toa convent for a while after becoming too
distraught to continue, and from thatpoint on she lit a more religious and
reclusive existence. After experiencing difficulties givingbirth, in fifteen nineteen, Lucretia passed

(03:19:35):
away at the age of thirty nine. She was deeply mourned by the citizens
of Ferrara, but she had madesure that the Borgia dynasty would continue through
her offspring and the clergy and theiraristocracy. Her son Epolito would become a
cardinal and heir. Cole assumed therole of duke after his father's passing.

(03:19:56):
After she passed away, her reputationwas reviewed. The notion that she was
a villainous figure resurfaced. Victor Hugo, a writer from the nineteenth century,
wrote a play about her that waslater adapted into an opera. This helped
perpetrate the myth of murdering and sstuousseductress who assisted her filthy family's crimes.

(03:20:18):
In her brief life, Lucretia Borgiawas admired for her beauty. A courtier
from her early twenties said of her, of middle height and graceful in shape.
Her face is very long, asis her nose, her hair golden,
her eyes of no special hue.Her mouth is fairly large, the

(03:20:39):
teeth brilliantly white, the bust perfectlyproportioned. Her entire being US's comedy and
joy, although Italian Renaissance historian MaryHollingsworth claims that she is neither. Her
reputation has fluctuated between being a frighteningfan fatale and a pond played by men.

(03:21:03):
Perhaps she was in the middle.Lucretia's narrative is one of a lady
who did what she had to doin a dangerous world. What do you
think of this case? Do youthink Lucrezia slept with her father and her
brother? Is she truly responsible forthe mysterious deaths of her husbands? Be

(03:21:26):
sure to let us know, becausefor now, for tonight, I think
we're going to have to add thecase of black widow Lucretia Borgia to our
never ending but are always growing talesfrom the Dark alone. This black widow

(03:23:20):
narrowly escaped the Soviet Union with herhusband and suffered immense trauma throughout the years.
After authorities cut her cousin throwing bagsof her dismembered husband into a river,
the ugly truth came out. Thisis the case a black Widow,

(03:23:41):
Rita Glusman. This is tales fromthe Dark. Rita Shapiro was born in

(03:24:24):
nineteen forty eight in the Soviet Union. She had a difficult childhood, living
in impoverished conditions. When Rita wasabout ten years old, she was sexually
assaulted by a police officer. Whenshe was eleven, Rita was left to
take care of her sister all byherself when her mother abandoned them for two
years. In nineteen seventy, Ritaleft the Soviet Union for Israel shortly after

(03:24:50):
marrying Yakov Klusman. However, herhusband wasn't allowed to travel to Israel at
the time. Rita then gave birthto their son and fought hard for Yakov
to be permitted to leave. Atone point, she even went to the

(03:25:11):
United Nations and held a hunger strikethat lasted more than two weeks. Eventually,
Yakov received permission and the Glusman familymoved to the United States in nineteen
seventy seven. Yakov became a wellknown molecular biologist in the years that followed,

(03:25:31):
and Rita ran an electronics company thatshe co founded with her husband.
But the marriage began to crumble overtime, and it was stated that Yakov
was physically abusive towards her and theirson. By nineteen ninety five, he
moved out of their home in NewJersey and into an apartment in Pearl River,

(03:25:54):
New York. Yakov had then begundating a woman from Israel and filed
divorce from Rita in December of thatyear. In the filing, he complained
of her excessive spending habits. Innineteen ninety six, Rita spoke to her
cousin Vladimir Zelenin about a plan tokill Yakov. At the time, Vladimir

(03:26:20):
was granted political asylum but was nota legal resident yet. She promised to
help him with immigration and got hima job at the electronics company in addition
to a car and a house.On April sixth, nineteen ninety six,
Rita and Vladimir traveled to Yakov's apartmentin New York and waited for him.

(03:26:45):
They attacked Yakov when he returned fromwork around eleven thirty PM, using axes
and other weapons. Both continued toattack him until he died. Then Rita
cleaned up the apartment to get ridof the evidence, while Vladimir dismembered Yakov's
body and to sixty five pieces usingthe axes, a knife, and a

(03:27:07):
hacksaw. Then Rita asked Vladimir todump the parts in the river close to
their office. On April seventh,nineteen ninety six, authorities stumbled upon Vladimir
dumping garbage bags into the river andnoticed the blood on his hands. After

(03:27:28):
he was arrested, Vladimir confessed tothe plan and implicated Rita. She was
found a few days later hiding outin a vacant cottage at the laboratory in
Long Island, New York, whereYakov previously worked. Rita had her passport
and international flight information, and phonerecords showed that she had contacted several airlines.

(03:27:54):
Vladimir quickly struck a deal in exchangedfor a lenient sentence, and agreed
to testify against Rita. Vladimir,then forty, testified that Rita bought the
murder weapons and the garbage bags ata local store before the murder, with
the security footage corroborating the statement.Vladimir planned guilty to the second degree murder

(03:28:20):
and interstate domestic violence resulting in death. In May nineteen ninety seven. He
was sentenced to twenty two and ahalf years in prison. Vladimir was released
in twenty fifteen, and from informationavailable, he has maintained a low profile
since then. His last known locationremains to be in New Jersey. Rita,

(03:28:48):
then forty seven, stood trial inJanuary nineteen ninety seven, and the
jury ultimately found her guilty. Shewas the first woman to be convicted under
the nineteen Federal Domestic Violence Act.In May nineteen ninety seven, Rita was
sentenced to life in prison, doctorYukov Glusman's parents, Chame and Sophia Glusman,

(03:29:11):
remained in Israel to attend a niecesbab Mitzvah, but their presence was
felt in a letter to the judgeread by a prosecutor Kathy Sibel in the
courtroom filled with friends and colleagues ofthe victim. For twenty five years,
she gradually demolished him emotionally, andin the twenty sixth year she dismembered him

(03:29:35):
physically. The letter said, byher evil act, Rita has ruined the
life of her son, whom sheleft fatherless and marked him with the stigma
of a mother convicted for murder.After we raised Yakov to be a good
man and a world renowned scientist whodevoted his life to research and to the

(03:29:56):
benefit of humanity, she suddenly tookhim away from us, the letter went
on. Rita Glusman sat tensely asthe letter was read. When she spoke
on her own behalf, she wasbrief, your honor, I did not
do any of that, and Iwill say it in front of the world.

(03:30:18):
But Judge Barrington had already pronounced sentenceand lectured missus Lesman. None of
us can ever know what transpired betweenyou and your husband, The judge said,
The only thing we know is nothingthat occurred can possibly justify what you
did to him. You are awoman of considerable courage, capacity and accomplishment.

(03:30:41):
For whatever reason, you allowed yourselfto disintegrate around the relationship and the
pain that grew out of it.Judge Parker recommended that she be sent to
a medium security women's prison in Danbury, Connecticut. Over the years, Rita
dealt with many health problems, includingstrokes the ensuing complications Anne Parkinson's disease.

(03:31:05):
According to court records, in twentytwenty, Glusman was granted compassionate release from
FMC Carswell. Court documents show thatGlusman was having trouble standing up and walking.
She relies on a walker or reelchair to move around. After her

(03:31:28):
release, Rita flew from DFW InternationalAirport to New Jersey to begin five years
of court ordered supervised release. Glusmanwas staying at the Sheraton Hotel in New
Jersey before moving to a home inHackensack, about twenty miles outside of New
York City. According to the conditionsof her supervised release, Glusman will be

(03:31:52):
confined to her home with few exceptionsincluding doctor's appointments, court appearances, religious
services, employment education, and othercourt approved activities. Rita also has to
wear a GPS monitoring device. Whileout on probation, Rita will be cared

(03:32:13):
for by her sister. Rita alsoserved nearly nineteen years of her life sentence
at FMC Carswell, what do youthink of this case? Do you think
Rita actually killed her husband? Doesshe kill him because of jealousy or his
wealth? Be sure to let usknow, because for now, for tonight,

(03:32:39):
I think we're going to have toadd the case of black Widow Rita
Glusman to our never ending but arealways growing Tales from the Dark Slim Described

(03:34:28):
as a giggling grandma, arsenic Annie, and Lady Bluebird, this black Widow
carried many titles, but one thingwas for certain. She was cunning,
smart, beautiful, and deadly,killing eleven people from nineteen twenty to nineteen
fifty four. This is one ofthe more lethal cases we will cover this

(03:34:50):
season, and one thing is forcertain. Those who doubted her did not
live long enough to regret it.This is the case of black Widow Nanny
dos This is Tales from the Dark. Nannie Doss was born on November fourth,

(03:35:48):
nineteen oh five, in Blue Mountain, Alabama. She was born under
the name Nancy Hazel to James andLow Hazel. Nannie was one of five
children. She had one brother andthree sisters. Both Nannie and her mother
hated James, who was a strictand often controlling father and husband. There

(03:36:16):
is evidence that Nannie was conceived illegitimatelyas James Elnoo married after nineteen o five,
since his records also show that innineteen o five, Nannie and her
mother were living on their own.Nannie had an unhappy childhood. She was
a poor student who never learned toread well. Her education was erratic because

(03:36:41):
her father forced his children to workon the family farm instead of attending school.
When she was around seven years old, the family was taking a train
to visit relatives in southern Alabama.When the train stopped suddenly. Nannie hit
her head on the metal bar inthe seat in front of her. For

(03:37:03):
years after, she suffered severe headaches, blackouts, and depression. She blamed
these and her mental instability on thataccident. During her childhood, her favorite
hobby was reading her mother's romance magazinesand dreaming of her own romantic future.

(03:37:24):
Later, her favorite part was theLonely Heart's column. The Hazel sisters teenage
years were restricted by their father.He forbade them to wear makeup and in
tract of clothing. He was alsotrying to prevent them from being molested by
men, which happened on several occasions. He also forbade them to go to

(03:37:46):
dances and other social events. Nannyfirst married at the age of sixteen to
Charlie Braggs. They had met atthe linen thread factory where they both worked,
and with her father's approval, theymarried after dating for just four months.
He was the only son of hisunmarried mother, who insisted on living

(03:38:09):
with both Nanny and her new husband. Nanny later wrote, I was married,
as my father wished, in nineteentwenty one, to a boy I
only knew for about four or fivemonths, who had no family, only
a mother who was unwed, andwho had taken over my life completely when

(03:38:30):
we were married. She never seenanything wrong with what he done, but
she would take spells. She wouldnot let my own mother stay all night.
Charlie's mother took up a lot ofhis attention, and she often prevented
Nanny from doing things she wanted todo. The marriage produced four daughters over
a four year period of nineteen twentythree to nineteen twenty seven. Under a

(03:38:56):
lot of stress, Nanny started drinkingand her casual smoking habit became a heavy
addiction. The marriage was an unhappyone, and both suspected each other correctly
of infidelity. Braggs often disappeared fordays on end. In early nineteen twenty

(03:39:16):
seven, they lost their two middledaughters to suspected food poisoning. However,
Charlie didn't believe in Charlie thought thatNanny had killed them both, so he
fled from her, taking their eldestdaughter, Melvina, with him and leaving
newborn Florine behind. His mother alsodied around this time. Nanny, in

(03:39:41):
the meantime, took a job ina cotton mill to support Florine and herself.
Braggs returned home in the summer ofnineteen twenty eight with him Anne.
Melvina was another woman a divorce withher own child. Nanny and Charlie soon
divorced, and she returned to hermother's home, taking her two daughters with

(03:40:05):
her. Charlie always said afterwards thathe left her because he was frightened of
her living and working in Aniston.Nannie soothed her loneliness by reading true romance
and other such reading matter. Shealso resumed pouring over Lonely Heart's column and

(03:40:26):
wrote to men advertising there. Aparticular ad that interested her was that of
Robert Harrelson, a twenty three yearold factory worker from Jacksonville. He sent
her romantic poetry, and she senthim a cake. They met and married
in nineteen twenty nine, when shewas twenty four, two years after her

(03:40:48):
divorce from Charlie. They lived togetherin Jacksonville with Nannie's two surviving daughters.
After a few months, she discoveredthat he was an alcoholic and had a
criminal record for assault. Despite this, the marriage lasted sixteen years. Melvina,

(03:41:09):
Nanny's oldest daughter, gave birth toRobert Lee Haines in nineteen forty three.
Nanny came to help, and aftera few painful hours, a baby
boy was born. Melvina, exhaustedand from labor and groggy from ether thought,
she saw Nanny stick a hat pininto the baby's head, and later

(03:41:31):
told Mosey and Florine. They toldher how Nanny had said the baby was
dead, and they noticed that shewas also holding a pen. However,
the doctors cannot come up with anexplanation for the death. After this,
Melvina and Mosey drifted apart, andMelvina began dating a soldier. Nanny disapproved

(03:41:52):
of him, and while Melvina wasvisiting her father, after a particularly nacy
fight with Nanny, Melvina's son diedmysteriously under Nannie's care on July seventh,
nineteen forty five. The cause ofdeath was diagnosed as aphyxia from unknown causes,
and two months later Nannie collected afive hundred dollar life insurance policy that

(03:42:16):
she had taken out on her grandchild. In nineteen forty five, Japan surrendered
to the Allied Powers at the endof World War Two, and Harolson,
Doss's second husband, was one ofthe many people who celebrated rather robustly.
After an evening of particularly heavy drinking, he sexually assaulted Nanny. The following

(03:42:41):
day, as she was tending toa rose garden, Doss discovered Harelson's corn
whiskey jar buried in the ground.Nanny took the jar and topped it off
with a rat poison. Harolson dieda painful death that evening. Nanny met
her third husband while traveling Lexington,North Carolina. His name was Arley Laning,

(03:43:03):
and she married him within three daysof meeting him through another Lonely Heart's
column. Arley in many ways waslike his predecessor, Haroldson. He was
an alcoholic and a womanizer. However, in this marriage it was Nanny who
often disappeared for months on end whenshe was home. However, she did

(03:43:26):
play a doting wife, and whenher husband died of what was said to
be heart failure, the whole townturned up to his funeral to support her.
Afterwards, the house the couple livedin burned to the ground. Edban
left a Laning's sister, and hadit survived, it would have gone to

(03:43:48):
her. As it happened, theinsurance money went to Nanny, and she
quickly banked it. She soon leftNorth Carolina, but only after Laning's elderly
mother had died in her sleep.She ended up at her sister, Dovey's
home. Dovey was bedridden, andsoon after Doss's arrival, she died.

(03:44:11):
Nannie had joined the Diamond Circle Clublooking for another husband. That's where she
met Richard L. Morton of Emporia, Kansas. Richard did not have the
same drinking problem as her other husbands, but he was a womanizer. Before

(03:44:33):
Nannie could poison him, she poisonedher mother Luisa on January nineteen fifty three
when she came to live with them. Morton met his death three months later.
Nanny then met and married Samuel Dossof Tulsa, Oklahoma, in June
nineteen fifty three. A clean cut, churchgoing man, he disapproved of the

(03:44:58):
romance novels and story is that Nannyadored. In September, sam was admitted
to the hospital with flu like symptoms. The hospital diagnosed a severe digestive tract
infection. He was treated and releasedon October fifth. Nanny killed him that
evening in her rush to collect thetwo life insurance policies that she had taken

(03:45:20):
out on him. This sudden deathalerted his doctor, who ordered an autopsy.
The autopsy revealed a huge amount ofarsenic in his system. Nanny was
then arrested. Nanny confessed to killingfour of her husbands, her mother,

(03:45:41):
her sister, Dovey, her grandsonRobert, and her mother in law,
Arlie Laning's mother. The state ofOklahoma centered its case only on Samuel Doss,
though the prosecution found her mentally fitfor trial. Nanny pleaded guilty on
May seventeenth, nineteen fifty five,and was sentenced to life in prison.

(03:46:05):
The state did not pursue the deathpenalty, though due to her gender,
Nannie was never charged with the otherdeaths. She died of leukemia in the
hospital ward of the Oklahoma State Penitentiaryin nineteen sixty five. What do you

(03:46:26):
think of this case? Was Nanniejust in it for the money or did
she have some other kind of vendetta? Be sure to let us know,
because for now, for tonight,I think we're going to have to add
the case of black widow Nannie Dossto our never ending but are always growing

(03:46:52):
tales from the dark want thelone.Known as the soap Maker of Correggio,

(03:48:33):
this black widow killed three women andturned their remains into soap and teacakes.
Why she believed human sacrifice would protecther son while he was enlisted in the
Italian Army for World War Two.This is the case of Black widow Leonarda

(03:48:56):
Chinchuli. This is tales from theDark and the sleepy community of Montela and

(03:49:37):
Southern Italy. Leonarda Chanculi was bornon April eighteenth, eighteen ninety four.
Amelia Chanculi, who simply detested thesight of her child, gave birth to
Leonarda. She made sure to tellinfant Leonarda that she was at fault for
everything that occurred to her, anddid it on a daily basis. Every

(03:50:01):
day Leonarda experienced verbal and physical assault. Amelia was sexually assaulted by Marianna Chenchuli,
who was in his forties when shewas just fifteen years old. He
was an alcoholic and unemployed. Whenher parents learned Amelia was pregnant, they

(03:50:22):
decided to get them married rather thanhave him prosecuted for sexual assault. Amelia
loathed Leonarda for this. Leonardo wasroughly five years old at the time.
Marianna left the house to go outdrinking and didn't return for days. Amelia
didn't care much in general, butgradually she started looking for him. He

(03:50:48):
was discovered unconscious, comatose, andsuffering from a high temperature at a friend's
home by Amelia. Under the guiseof taking care of him, she had
him transported back to her house.She conveniently forgot about him after that,
reasoning that if he woke up,things would resume as normal. However,

(03:51:09):
if he didn't, he would havedied by then, making her a widow
who might be able to marry.Sadly, Mariano did not get out of
bed. Leonarda, who was nowa teenager, didn't really remember her father
other than from the beatings he gaveher, but she did recall that her

(03:51:30):
mother spit on his grave after everyonehad left the burial and remarked good riddance.
Amelia first hung around with some guyswho were involved in Alica activity,
and she eventually wed one of them. Leonardo's mother and stepfather would take Amelia
out for extravagant dinners, so oftentimesLeonarda had a thinned for herself. She

(03:51:56):
was frequently left alone and forced toscramble to obtain food. El swear she
was continually being rebuked by Amelia abouthow obnoxious and hateful she was. Leonarda
attempted suicide when she was thirteen yearsold, but she was unsuccessful. When
she was fourteen, she made anotherattempt but also failed. From the beginning

(03:52:20):
of her existence, Leonarda Chin Juliehad a tragic life. Leonardo said her
mother cursed her since she didn't approveof the marriage when she led a registry
clerk Raphael Pensarti in nineteen seventeen.She starts her story around the turn of
the twentieth century. She became pregnantseventeen times while married. Three of those

(03:52:46):
seventeen pregnancies were lost due to miscarriages, and ten of the children died before
the age of eighteen. They couldnot have wished for a more protective mother
for her four living children. Chenchuliwas put in jail in nineteen twenty seven
for fraud. She and her familyrelocated to Lancedonia. After being released from

(03:53:16):
prison. In Potenza, not toofar from her childhood home, Leonarda and
her husband experienced a tragic accident.The Urpinia earthquake occurred on July twenty third,
nineteen thirty. Later, it wouldbe listed among the earthquakes that had
caused the most damage in Italian history. Thousands of people lost their houses in

(03:53:39):
the disaster, including Leonarda. However, Leonarda resorted to superstition and paranoia in
the nineteen thirties while residing in asmall region tucked away in the Matisse and
the Pensini Mountains in southern Italy.It turns out that some evidence exists to

(03:54:01):
support the idea that Chinculi's superstitious beliefswere a symptom of a more pervasive anxiety
and sadness. Many clinical psychologists todayhold the view that superstitions develop as a
result of damaged mind's attempt to makesense of the absurd. Of course,

(03:54:22):
it is hard to say whether theensuing events might have been avoided with current
medical technology. Giuseppe Pimsardi, Chinchuli'seldest son and beloved kid, decided in
nineteen thirty nine that he would enlistin the Italian Army. He wished to
contribute to the World War two effort. Like many other Italians at the time,

(03:54:46):
this declaration, coupled with her faithand superstitions, gave Leonarda Chinciuli the
impetus she needed to become one ofthe most notorious female serial killers of the
twentieth century. Leonardo Chinciuli came tothe realization that her life, to put

(03:55:07):
it frankly, was bad due toher attempts at suicide, her mother's purportic
curse, and her numerous miscarriages.As a result, she sought advice from
fortune teller. She had her worriesconfirmed by the wandering Romani fortune teller,
but nothing was done. She wastold by the fortune teller, in your

(03:55:31):
right hand, I see prison.A criminal asylum is on your left.
Leonardo Chinciuli developed severe's superstitions as aresult of the ruminating on her mother's purportic
curse and the romaining fortune teller prophecies. Leonardo turned to the one thing she

(03:55:52):
thought would keep her son Giuseppe safe, while he informed her in the late
nineteen thirty nine that he was playingon joining the Italian Army. Human sacrifice.
Her inspiration to sacrifice people in orderto prevent her son from perishing in
World War two is unknown. Humansacrifice was forbidden by the Roman Catholicism that

(03:56:18):
Cinculi encountered at the time, sinceit was viewed as an abomination by God.
Furthermore, there is no Romani superstitionor belief that accepts human sacrifice.
However, Leonardo Cinciuli would go onto kill three women before she was apprehended

(03:56:39):
regardless of where she obtained her inspiration. Faustini Seti, a local spinster,
served as Leonardo Chinchili's first victim.Setti was invited to Leonarda's house in nineteen
thirty nine under the pretense of introducingher to a husband, and Leonardo gave
her instruction to compose letters to herfamily and forming them that she would be

(03:57:03):
visiting the man abroad. But beforeshe used an act to murder Setti,
Chinchuli gave her a tainted drink.Seti was then divided into nine pieces and
her blood was collected in a basin. She outlined what she did next in
her formal statement, falling her rest, I tossed the pieces into a pot,

(03:57:28):
added seven kilograms of caustic soda,which I had purchased to manufacture soap,
and mixed the whole concoction until thefragments dissolved into a thick, dark
mush that had dumped into many bucketsand emptied into a nearby septic tank.
As for the blood in the basin, I waited until it coagulated, dried

(03:57:52):
it in the oven, powdered it, and mixed it with flour, sugar,
chocolate, milk and eggs, aswell as a little margarine, needing
all the components together, although Giuseppeand I also consumed them. I made
a lot of crunchy teacakes and presentedthem to the ladies who came to visit.

(03:58:16):
In addition, is also been claimedthat Leonarda sees Setti's life savings of
thirty thousand Italian liar, which isequal to seventeen ninety four now and three
hundred and thirty two dollars and twentytwenty after accounting for inflation. Setti had
paid Leonarda for her help in matchingSetti with a husband, and she had

(03:58:37):
gotten this money in exchange. FrancescaSiovi, a new victim, was discovered
by Chinchiuli in September fifth, nineteenforty. Similar to what she did with
Setti, Leonarda forced Siovi to writeletters to her friends documenting her travels while

(03:58:58):
falsely claiming to assert her a teachingposition abroad. In addition, much like
Seti, she gave her drugged wineto drink, axed her to death,
cooked her in tea cakes, andtook her money. A renowned soprano who
formerly performed at Milan's illustrious Las Galaopera venue was Virginia Kuchopo. On September

(03:59:24):
thirtieth, nineteen forty, Coachopo paidLeonarda a visit because she had promised her
a position in Florence. Working withan Impressario, Leonarda fed Kachopo tainted wine
and used an axe to murder her. As she had done with her previous

(03:59:46):
two victims. Leonarda used to merelybake her body into tea cakes and feed
them to her neighbors, but thistime she also melted her victim down and
made soap out of it. Leonardoreportedly received fifty thousand liar, a variety
of gems, public bonds, andvarious jewelry from Conchopo. She even marketed

(04:00:11):
the clothes and shoes worn by thevictim. Following her arrest, she detailed
what she did next in an officialstatement. Cachopo was thrown into the pot
along with the other two. Herflesh was white and fatty. Once it
had melted, I had added abottle of cologne. After a long time

(04:00:35):
on the boil, I managed toproduce some quite respectable creamy soap. I
gave my neighbors and friends bars.The cakes improved as well. That woman
was quite nice. Leonardochinchiuli could nothave been more mistaken in her judgment of
her crimes, even though she believedthey were flawless murders. In contrast to

(04:01:03):
Leonarda's first two victims, who hadfew worried family members, Kchopo had a
highly worried sister in law. Shedidn't take Kachopo's letters about her hasty departure
seriously because she had actually seen herenter Chinchuli's house the night before she supposedly
left. She contacted the Raggio Emiliapolice promptly after her sister vanished, and

(04:01:30):
they launched an investigation into Leonarda.Leonarda, to Julie, at first defended
herself. She didn't completely break downand disclose everything, that is, until
the cops placed the blame on heradored son, Giuseppe. Leonarda contended that

(04:01:50):
she was solely responsible for all threemurders and that her son had no part
in them. The book that leonardatwhere she listed all the murders, was
also discovered by the police during theirinvestigation of her home. The trial for
Cinciuli was over in a few days. She was found guilty of her crimes

(04:02:13):
and was given a thirty three yearsentence, which included thirty years in prison
and three years in a mental institution. This punishment eerily echoed the Romani's Woman's
prediction. It was later discovered thatGiuseppe, her oldest son, had assisted

(04:02:33):
her in committing all three killings whilestill residing in the asylum. Leonardo Chinciuli
died on October fifteenth, nineteen seventyfrom a cerebral hemorrhage. She was seventy
nine years old. Her remains weregiven back to her family for burial,

(04:02:54):
but her murderous tools, including thepot in which she boiled her victims,
were presented to the Rome Criminology Museum. Visitors can still examine her collection of
axes in the museum and have alook inside the vat where she once spoiled
people. What do you think ofthis case? What caused Leonardo to believe

(04:03:16):
human sacrifice was a solution to herproblems? Be sure to let us know,
because for now, for tonight,I think we're going to have to
add the case of black Widow LeonardoChinciuli to our never ending, but are
always growing. Tales from the Darkalone more. As we close the book

(04:05:16):
on our first season of Black Widows, I want to thank everyone for following
along and supporting Tales from the DarkTrue Crime. If you've enjoyed this journey
so far, please feel free toleave a five star review on whatever platform
you prefer, and be sure tojoin us again on October fifteenth for our

(04:05:37):
second season. In the meantime,we will have marathons and season recaps for
you to relive this first season.In our final episode of Black Widows,
we set eyes on what I believeis the worst one yet. This black
widow created an entire empire off luringwealthy women and men to her home into

(04:06:01):
their death. She killed everyone aroundher, and her fate is still uncertain
to this day. This is thecase of Black Widow Bell Gunnis. This

(04:06:52):
is Tales from the Dark. BelleGunnis was born on November eleventh, nineteen
fifty nine, but not by herBell name. Her original Christian name was
Brunhild Paul Statter sore Set before shechanged it later in life. Belle was
born to Paul store Set and BarrettUlstatter. Paul was a Stonemason, and

(04:07:16):
Belle was the youngest of eight children. The family lived in Norway in a
very small cotter's farm. There wererumors that Belle was pregnant in eighteen seventy
seven and attended a country dance.It was said that Belle was attacked by
a wealthy man who kicked her inher stomach, causing her to miscarry.

(04:07:41):
The man himself came from a wealthyfamily and was never prosecuted for his crimes.
People who reportedly knew Belle at thetime said that her entire personality changed
after that night. The man whoattacked Bell died shortly after, cited as
stomach answer. Bell would spend thenext few years working at a wealthy farm

(04:08:05):
to make a trip across the Atlantic. Like her sister, Nellie Larson had
earlier in her life, Bell madeher trip to America in eighteen eighty one,
and during this time took the nameBell Gunnis. While working as a
servant, Bell would marry Mad's AntonSorson in eighteen eighty four in Chicago,

(04:08:28):
Illinois. The couple would open aconfectionery store in eighteen eighty six, only
for it to mysteriously burn down ayear later, the couple did receive an
insurance payment which would pay for theirnext home. According to the United States
Census on June thirteenth, nineteen hundred, the couple had four children, Caroline,

(04:08:52):
Axel, Myrtle, and Lucy.Both Caroline and Axel were said to
dine emphasy from acute kidas, symptomswhich closely match those of many different types
of poisoning. The two children,according to an article on May seventh,
nineteen o eight, from New YorkTimes, would be buried in a plot

(04:09:13):
belonging to Mad's and Belle. MyrtleA and Lucy B would be the two
living children in Belle's home, alongwith an adopted ten year old girl by
the name of Morgan Couch, whowould later be known as Jinny Olson.
Mad's sourson, would die on Julythirtieth, nineteen hundred, reportedly on the

(04:09:37):
only day his two life insurance policiesoverlapped. The first doctor to examine Mad's
body believe that he had died fromstrict nine poisoning. However, the family
doctor had been treating Mad's for anenlarged heart and changed the cause of death
to heart failure. No autopsy wascompleted as death, as it was not

(04:10:01):
considered suspicious, even after Bell toldthe doctor that she had been giving her
late husband medicinal powders to help himfeel better. The day after her husband's
funeral, Bell applied for the lifeinsurance money. Mad's family, however,
insisted that Belle had poisoned him inorder to receive the money, and demanded

(04:10:26):
that an inquiry be held for thepolicy. It is unclear, however,
if Mad's body was ever exhumed orif the inquiry was seen through. Belle
received eighty five hundred dollars or threehundred thousand dollars today. Bell used the
money to buy a farm on theoutskirts of Laport, Indiana. Belle Gunnis

(04:10:52):
bought a plantation on McClung Road innineteen o one, but according to reports,
both the boat and the carriage houseburn down shortly after her new ownership.
While Belle was preparing for her movefrom Chicago, Belle grew close with
a former acquaintance and widower named PeterGunnis, who was also in Norwegian.

(04:11:13):
They married and Lapoor, Indiana onApril first, nineteen o two, just
one week after their ceremony Peter's infantdaughter died after being left alone in the
house with Belle. The cause ofdeath was undetermined. In December nineteen o
two, Peter himself suffered an untimelydeath. According to a recounting from Belle

(04:11:39):
herself, Peter was reaching for hisslippers next to the kitchen stove when he
was scalded with brine. Later on, she claimed that a portion of a
sausage grinder fell from high shelf andcaused a fatal head injury. One year
later, Peter's brother, gust tookPeter's older daughter, Swanhild, from Belle

(04:12:03):
and moved her to Wisconsin. Swanhildwas the only child to survive living with
Belle Gunnis. Belle made three thousanddollars from the life insurance of Peter Gunnis,
and today's dollar value that when equalone hundred and three thousand, three
hundred and fifteen dollars. Many localscould not believe the story that Belle had

(04:12:30):
spun. Peter himself ran a hogfarm on their property and was well known
as an excellent butcher. The coronerreviewed the evidence and announced that, with
no uncertainty, Peter Gunnis had beenmurdered. He gathered together a jury to
look into the matter. All thewhile, Jenny Olsen, Belle's foster daughter,

(04:12:52):
was overheard confessing to a classmate,my mamma killed my papa. She
him with a meat cleaver and hedied. Don't tell a soul. However,
when Jenny was brought in and questionsabout these allegations, she denied ever
saying those remarks. Belle eventually convincedthe borrower that she was innocent, and

(04:13:18):
on May nineteen oh three, Bellegave birth to a baby boy, Philip.
A few years went by, andin nineteen o six, Belle told
her neighbors that she had sent herfoster daughter, Jenny to Lutheran College in
Los Angeles, while some neighbors weretold it was a finishing school for young
ladies. Later on, in futureinvestigations, though, Jenny's body would be

(04:13:45):
found buried on Belle Gunnis's property.In nineteen o seven, Belle employed a
single farm hand by the name ofRay lamp Here, and around the same
time, Belle posted the fallowing advertisementin the matrimonial columns of all Chicago Daily
newspapers, along with other large Midwesterncities. Personal comely widow who owns a

(04:14:11):
large farm in one of the finestdistricts in Laport County, Indiana, desires
to make the acquaintance of a gentleman'sequally well provided with a few of joining
fortunes. No replies by letter consideredunless cinder is willing to follow answer with
personal visit. Traillers need not apply. Several middle aged men of memes responded

(04:14:41):
to Belle's ads. One of thosemen included John Moe from Elbow Lake,
Minnesota. John allegedly brought more thanone thousand dollars with him to pay for
Belle's mortgage from reports of neighbors,but Belle introduced him as her cousin.

(04:15:01):
John disappeared from Belle's farm only aweek after his arrival. Next, George
Anderson from Tarkio, Missouri, camefor Belle's hand. During dinner with George,
Belle brought their attention to her mortgage. George agreed to pay off for

(04:15:22):
farm if they decided to wed.Later that night, George awoke to see
Belle standing over him, holding aguttering candle in her hand, and she
wore a sinister expression on her facewithout saying a word. She ran from
the room when she noticed that Georgehad awoken. He quickly gathered his things

(04:15:46):
and fled from the home, takinga train to Missouri. That same night,
more suitors came to Belle's home,and none other than George Anderson ever
left. She began ordering large trunksto be delivered directly to her home,
and the delivery driver, Clyde Sturgis, recalled how Bell would lift the enormous

(04:16:07):
trunks with much ease, like abag of marshmallows. He was quoted.
Bell kept the shutters of her homeclosed day and night. It was often
seen at night digging within her pigpenby passing farmers. Old B. Budsburg,
an elderly widow from Iola, Wisconsin, came to Bell's home next Ole

(04:16:30):
was lasting alive at the Lawport SavingsBank on April sixth, nineteen oh seven.
There, Ole mortgaged his Wisconsin land, signed over the deed, and
withdrew several thousands dollars of cash.Old did not, however, communicate with
the sons about where he was going. After digging into it and not seeing

(04:16:56):
their father return, the sons foundout where he went and that he went
to visit Bell they decide to writeto her. She replied and told them
that she had never seen their father. Bell continued to develop relationships with wealthy
men, and all disappeared after visitingher. In December nineteen oh seven,

(04:17:22):
Bell wrote back and forth with AndrewHelgalina, a bachelor farmer from Alberdeen,
South Dakota. A letter dated Januarythirteenth, nineteen oh eight read, think
how nice we will enjoy each other? Can you conceive of anything nicer?
I think of you constantly when Ihear your name mentioned. And this is

(04:17:47):
when one of the dear children speaksof you, or I hear myself humming
it with the words of an oldlove song. It is beautiful music to
my ears. My heart beats inwild rapture for you, my Andrew.
I love you, come prepared tostay forever. Convinced of her love for

(04:18:08):
him, Andrew promptly went to herside in January nineteen o eight. He
brought with him a check for twentyeight hundred dollars and his belongings. A
few days after his arrival, Belleand Andrew were seen together at the Lawport
Savings Bank cashing out the twenty eighthundred dollars. Andrew disappeared a few days

(04:18:33):
later, but Belle was seen makingtwo deposits, one of five hundred dollars
and another for seven hundred. Atthis time, Belle began having troubles with
her farm hand Ray Lampiere. Raywas uncontrollably in love with Belle Gunness.
Ray worked day and night to impressBell and grew extremely jealous of all the

(04:18:57):
suitors coming to her farm. Raybegan making scenes in front of the men,
and on February third, nineteen oeight, Bell fired him. Shortly
after. She went to the localcourthouse and Bell claimed that Ray was not
in his right mind, that hewas a menace to the public. She

(04:19:18):
was able to convince the local authoritiesto hold a sanity hearing, where Ray
was declared same and then released.After the release, Bell went to her
local sheriff to claim that Ray hadcome back to her property and argued with
her. Bell claimed that he wasa threat to her family and had the

(04:19:40):
police arrest him for trespassing. Duringthis time, Andrew's brother Isle was worried
when Andrew did not return home andwrote to Bell to figure out where he
had gone. Bell wrote back andsaid she believed Andrew had gone to Norway
to vi a family. I'L didnot buy this. He believed that his

(04:20:04):
brother was still in Indiana and toldBell so. Belle's response to this was
that i'l was more than welcome tocome search for his brother, that she
would even help conduct the search,but it was a costly endeavor and he
would need to compensate her for hertime. At the same time, Is

(04:20:27):
believed that Belle was setting up acover story for her own arson. She
was meaning with a lawyer to setup her will and claimed that she was
worried that Ray Lampere would hurt herand her property. The lawyer oblige and
set her inheritances to go to herkids. Belle then went to the bank

(04:20:48):
and paid off her mortgage entirely.However, Bell never went to the police
with these concerns. On April twentyeighth, nineteen o eight, Belle's farmhand,
Joe Maxon, awoke to smoke fillingup his room on the second floor
of Belle's home. Joe attempted toopen his bedroom door, but the fire

(04:21:12):
made it impossible. Joe screamed outfor Belle and her children, but to
no avail I had to leap outof the second story window to save himself.
Joe scrambled to get help putting outthe fire, but the property was
in ash and shambles. Before thefire could be controlled, four bodies were

(04:21:34):
found in the home, three ofBelle's children, and a headless female that
some thought to be Belle in thebasement of the home. County Sheriff Smutzer
reported to the scene and recalled theinformation Belle had given the police about Ray
lamp fear. Belle's lawyer also cameforward and recounted that Belle feared for her

(04:21:57):
life because of Ray. Once Smutzerfound Ray, he could not get a
word out before Ray asked, didwidow Gunnis and the kids get out all
right? Smutser informed him of thefire, but Ray denied having anything to
do with it. Ray claimed thathe was nowhere near the property when the

(04:22:19):
fire happened. However, a youngman by the name of John saw him.
Came forward and claimed that he sawRay running away from Bell's property right
after the fire started. Ray toldthe boy, you wouldn't say that to
my face, to which John replied, yes, I will. You found

(04:22:41):
me hiding behind the bushes, andyou told me you'd kill me if I
didn't get out of there. Manypeople flocked to the Bell residence to search
for evidence and answers to what happened. There would be controversy over the headless
woman found, as many people didnot believe it was Belle. Belle was

(04:23:03):
a stockwoman, six feet tall andweighed between one hundred and eighty and two
hundred pounds according to the measurements ofthe local apparels. The body found was
a petite stature, less than onehundred and fifty pounds, and did not
have the same bone structor as whatwas perceived a Bell gunnis. Many neighbors

(04:23:26):
examined the remains and all stated thatthe body found was not Belle. Strangely
enough, Doctor J. Myers wassent the stomach contents of the body to
a pathologist, who found months laterthat the organs contain lethal doses of strynine.

(04:23:47):
Doctor Ira P. Norton, Belle'sdentist, came forward and said if
he could get any samples of theteeth or dental work, he would be
able to successfully identify the body asBelle. Louis Klondike Schultz, a former
miner was hired to sift through allthe debres in order to find more evidence.

(04:24:08):
As work progressed, more bodies wereuncovered from the property, but on
May nineteenth, nineteen o eight,a piece of bridge work was found made
of two canines, porcelain teeth andgold crown work. Doctor Norton identified the
dental work as something he had donefor Bell, and the body was named

(04:24:30):
as her. Around this time,Al arrived in Lawport and informed Sheri Smutzer
that he believed his brother died atthe hands of Bell. Her farm hand
Joe came forward and claimed that whenhe first started, Bell requested that he
even out a portion of her landthat she had supposedly buried trash. Sherif

(04:24:56):
Smutzer brought twelve men back to thefarm to investigate. On May third,
nineteen o eight, the men discoveredthe bodies of Jinny Olsen, two unidentified
small children, Andrew, and manyothers in Belle's hogpen. The list continues
as the following. OLB. Budsburgof Iowa, Wisconsin, Thomas Limbo,

(04:25:22):
Henry Gerholt of Scandinovia, Wisconsin,olof Spinherd from Chicago, Joe mo of
Elbow Lake. His watch was foundin Lancefier's possession Olaf Limbloom. Then reports
of other possible victims began to comein. William Mengee, a coachman of

(04:25:48):
New York City who had left thatcity on April first, nineteen o four,
Hermann Kolnitzer of Chicago who disappeared inJanuary nineteen o six. Charles Edmund
of New Carlisle, Indiana. GeorgeBarry of Tuscola, Illinois. Christie Hilcoven

(04:26:10):
of Dorvera, Barron County, Wisconsin, who sold his farm and came to
Laport in nineteen o six. ChairsNieburg, a twenty eight year old Scandinavian
immigrant who lived in Philadelphia, toldfriends that he was going to visit Gunness
in June nineteen o six and nevercame back. He had been working for

(04:26:30):
a saloon keeper and took five hundreddollars with him. John H. Mcjunkin
of Corpoulos, near Pittsburgh left hiswife in December nineteen o six after corresponding
with a Lawport woman. Olaf Jensen, a Norwegian immigrant of Carol, Indiana,
wrote his relatives in nineteen o sixthat he was going to marry a

(04:26:53):
wealthy widow at Lawport. Henry Biggof Lport, who disappeared in June nineteen
o six as hired man named EdwardKnary of Pink Lake also vanished. In
nineteen o six. Burt Chase ofIndiana sold his butcher's shop and told friends

(04:27:15):
of a wealthy widow and that hewas going to look her up. His
brother received a telegram supposedly from Alberdeen, South Dakota, claiming Bert had been
killed in a train wreck. Hisbrother investigated and found the telegram was fictitious.
Tonius Peterson of Rusford, Minnesota isalleged to have disappeared on April second,

(04:27:38):
nineteen o seven. A gold ringmarked s B. May twenty eighth,
nineteen oh seven was found in theruins. A hired man, George
Bradley of Tuscola, Illinois, isalleged to have gone on Laport to meet
a widow and three children in Octobernineteen oh seven. T J. Tefflin

(04:28:03):
of Minneapolis is alleged to have cometo see Gunnis in nineteen o seven.
Frank Rindinger, a farmer in Wisconsin, came to Indiana in nineteen o seven
to marry and never returned. EmilTell, a suede from Kansas City,
is alleged to have gone in nineteeno seven to Laport and never returned.

(04:28:29):
Lee Porter of Barringtonville, Oklahoma,separated from his wife and told his brother
he was going to marry a wealthywidow in laport John E. Hunter left
Pennsylvania on November twenty fifth, nineteeno seven, after telling his daughters he
was going to marry a wealthy widowin northern Indiana. The list continues,

(04:28:52):
and there are also unnamed victims.A daughter of missus H. Woodser of
Toledo, Ohio, who attended IndianaUniversity near Laporte in nineteen o two.
An unknown man and woman are allegedto have disappeared in September nineteen o six,
the same night Jinny Olsen went missing. Gunnis claimed they were a Los

(04:29:14):
Angeles professor and his wife who hadtaken Jinny to California, a brother,
Miss Jinny Graham of Wyouki, Wisconsin, who had left to marry a rich
widow in Laport but vanished. Ahired man from Ohio aged fifty name unknown,
is allegedo disappeared, and Gunnis becamethe heir to his horsome bucky.

(04:29:38):
An unnamed man from Montana told peopleat a resort he was going to sell
Gunness his horsome buggy, which werefound with several other horses and BUCkies at
the farm. Most bodies discovered werenot able to be identified, and because
of the nature of the recovery,an exact number of bodies could not be
determined. Puzz believed that approximately twelvevictims were found. Ray Lamphere was arrested

(04:30:06):
on May twenty second, nineteen oeight and tried for murder and arson.
Ray denied all charges and used anoffense that the headless body they had found
was not bolle. Ray's lawyer,wort Warden, worked closely with the local
jeweler to prove that the dental workfound by Klondike should have been partially melted

(04:30:29):
and imperfect. They provided evidence ofa similar dental procedure being put into a
blacksmith's forge, claiming that the resultsshowed that the canines, porcelain, teeth,
and gold had been placed post fire. Other witnesses claimed to see the
miner Klondike placed the evidence near thebody before claiming to find it on November

(04:30:55):
twenty sixth, nineteen o eight,Ray was found guilty of arson alone and
was sentenced to twenty years in thestate prison. Ray would dive tuberculosis on
December thirtieth, nineteen o nine.On January fourteenth, nineteen ten, Reverend
e a shell brought to light raysdying confession. Ray swore that Belle Gunness

(04:31:21):
was still alive. He recounted thatRay himself never murdered anyone, but helped
Bell bury her victims. When avictim arrived at Belle's home, she would
charm them, make them comfortable,then feed them on large meal. She
would then drug their coffee and waituntil they were deep asleep. Bell would

(04:31:44):
split their head with a meat cleaver. In other cases, she would wait
until her suitors fell asleep in bed. Then she would chloroform them and carry
them into the basement. To dissecther victims, Belle would place the remains
on her hogpen or in various placeson her property. When she was low

(04:32:06):
on time, she would poison theircoffee to kill them immediately. Belle also
dumped some corpses in the hog scoutingvat and covered them with quicklime. Or
if Belle was exhausted, she wouldchop up the remains and feed them to
her hogs in the dead of night. Ray claimed that the headless female body

(04:32:27):
found was that of a Chicago nativethat Belle had lured in under the pretense
of being a housekeeper. Belle druggedher, smashed her head in, and
decapitated the body. She then tiedweights to the head and threw it deep
into a nearby swamp. Belle thenchloroformed her children, strangled them, and

(04:32:52):
dragged their bodies into the basement.According to some accounts, Belle abandoned Ray
and ran across the nearby field intothe woods after the fire was started.
Others say Ray took bell to atown nine miles away to see her off
to Chicago. Ray said that Bellewas a rich woman who killed forty two

(04:33:15):
men by his count, and hadtaken money ranging from one thousand dollars to
thirty two thousand dollars. She hadallegedly made over two hundred and fifty thousand
dollars from her schemes, which isequal to almost eight million dollars today.
Local banks later admitted that Belle withdrewmost of her money just days before the

(04:33:40):
fire for many years, people claimedto see Belle in Chicago, Los Angeles,
New York, and many other cities. However, nothing was ever proven.
As late as nineteen thirty one,it was reported that Belle was living
in Mississippi, where she supposedly owneda very large property. Sheriff Smutzer said

(04:34:07):
that he received about two reports amonth of the alleged black widow's location for
more than twenty years. However,the female body from Belle's farm has never
been positively identified to this day.What do you think of this case?
Is this truly the one that gotaway? Or did Ray Lamphere murder Bell

(04:34:33):
and her children like she predicted?What do you think happened to Bell?
Be sure to let us know,because for now, for tonight, I
think we are going to have toadd the case of black Widow Bell Gunness
to our never ending but are alwaysgrowing tales from the dark alone