Ep. 158: death row stories

[00:00:04] Speaker A: Now, you'll remember that some weeks back. What did I say? What were the parameters of the challenge I set myself? Corey, I was going to school you on an element of spooky American history. [00:00:20] Speaker B: Yes, that's right. [00:00:21] Speaker A: Or of American cultural significance that you just simply didn't know about it. [00:00:27] Speaker B: Exactly. Yes. I believe not. For the first time, I had told you a story about your own country that you had never heard before, and so you decided it was time to. [00:00:36] Speaker A: It just didn't feel right. It didn't feel right that I was learning so much about my native land from someone who's visited twice by now. Three times. [00:00:46] Speaker B: Four times. [00:00:47] Speaker A: Four times. Okay. Okay. But you know what I'm saying? It didn't feel right. [00:00:50] Speaker B: Yes. [00:00:50] Speaker A: I got it. It made me feel bad about myself. So I set out to do that this week yes. And got quite far along yes. Before realizing that Nova Scotia is, in fact, in Canada. Right. [00:01:08] Speaker B: It is not a part of these states. [00:01:11] Speaker A: To you I present this is what you're having this week. You're having some weirdest fuckery here in the Oak Island Money Pit. Does that ring any bells, those four words, oak Island Money Pit. [00:01:30] Speaker B: So there is not necessarily. There's a show on Discovery Channel called The Curse of Oak Island, I believe. [00:01:37] Speaker A: Yes, it is. There have been a few, in fact. [00:01:39] Speaker B: Yeah. And I always wonder what it's about, because it's one of those things that it's like it feels like I know they're trying to find something, but I've never known what. And it's like it's so far into the show that I'm like, a how can there be this many episodes of something where they're not finding the thing they're looking for, and now they're not explaining to me what it is? I don't I know the name Oak Island. I know nothing more about it than that. [00:02:03] Speaker A: Well, when they do find they find big and they find weird is what I'm saying. Right. [00:02:08] Speaker B: Okay. [00:02:09] Speaker A: I'll give you a little bit about the island first. It's just off the south shore of Nova Scotia in a very interesting so bad. Well, tell me about it. Talk to me about it. What's in your mind's eye? [00:02:22] Speaker B: It's a big vacation destination for people from my neck of the woods from Know. You go to Florida or you go to Nova. [00:02:29] Speaker A: Very interesting. [00:02:30] Speaker B: On holiday. [00:02:32] Speaker A: It's very interesting you'd say that. [00:02:34] Speaker B: Is it? Why is that? [00:02:35] Speaker A: It is. Well, the Jo Agadjason point was the first people known in that area in Nova Scotia are the Michael Mac, who are the dudes behind the dudes behind the dudes behind the pet cemetery. As any fool knows, this is true. [00:02:51] Speaker B: That's a really good point. [00:02:52] Speaker A: So, anyway, you and your Massachusetts crew, you turned up in 1761. We love that. Thank you. It was split between, let me see, 1234 families or so into 32, 34 parcels or lots or whatever. And weirdly it doesn't seem like since then Oak Island has been owned in any real sense except by I'll give you this for ten fucking acres of corn or whatever, or I'm a pirate. I'll give you pirate deeds to it. It's always had some because it's small, you see. It's fucking tiny. [00:03:31] Speaker B: Yeah. This island, it's not strategic in any way. No, because this is very rare. We'll take over anything, to be honest. All those European explorers and all that kind of stuff happily just take over whatever piece of land there is. So it has to be really useless for no one to have officially been like, yeah, we'll have that. [00:03:54] Speaker A: Outside of kind of prospectors or treasure hunters or adventure seekers or blah, blah, blah, blah. It's been largely left alone. Right. I mean, year round. It has two permanent homes that are populated on a seasonal basis, and it has two cottages that you could rent out part time. You could go there if you want. There's nothing stopping you going there. If you want, you write to them, you get a permit or something. Or by fax, I would think. [00:04:19] Speaker B: Sure. It seems like the kind of place. [00:04:21] Speaker A: You fax and they'll invite you over for a bit of a tour around and then off you fuck. You can do that should you wish. Okay, now let's see a little bit more. A little bit more now, because it's so tied up and has been traded soft and between know, pirates jack Sparrow, obviously, and others. [00:04:49] Speaker B: Jack Sparrow? [00:04:50] Speaker A: No, it is just nothing else came. Lachuk. There we go. [00:04:54] Speaker B: The dread pirate, obviously. [00:04:56] Speaker A: Dread Pirate Le chuck So it's had quite a lot of pirate activity, but all ever since down to that first sieving by the Massachusetts. Right. So you guys came in and fucked around. Yes. There was a TV show called Curse of Oak Island which ran for a fucking long time. It ran for a bunch of seasons. [00:05:19] Speaker B: Is it not on anymore? Because it's on all the time. [00:05:23] Speaker A: I think it had a finale. I think it had a season finale. It's probably running out. It's probably on now. You could find it million reruns, but even them, they found coins from centuries ago, an antique brooch, jewelry. They found a butt ton of things there themselves. [00:05:42] Speaker B: That still doesn't feel like enough to make a show about. You could make a show about people with metal detectors. [00:05:50] Speaker A: Oh, you could. And some of the bits that have been found have been just like twists of bronze or something fucking. But what grabs me is how none of the things that they're finding are coming from the same era. Right? Stuff is below other things in terms of physically underground, where because of how. [00:06:14] Speaker B: Old it is, the different layers, it. [00:06:16] Speaker A: Should be way above things. And the pit itself came to be, or came to start when it was something that had clearly been man made and a local child from the area started to kick at it and dig at it and dig away it and dig it away. And he got his friends involved. [00:06:33] Speaker B: Local child from one of the two houses on this place. [00:06:37] Speaker A: Yeah, I think it was a local child. [00:06:41] Speaker B: Okay. [00:06:42] Speaker A: I've got to say his name was Daniel McGinnis. And this started in 1795. The Massachusetts showed up in 1857. [00:06:53] Speaker B: What, 1761. [00:06:56] Speaker A: Oh, shit. They did, yeah. Can you see my screen? [00:06:59] Speaker B: No, you told me you just know that. [00:07:04] Speaker A: Hey, you remember. Good. [00:07:07] Speaker B: I'm very aware of my Massachusetts history. [00:07:09] Speaker A: Where did I get to? Where did I get to? Daniel McGinnis. So, yes, it was him. He was a local child, and obviously there are kind of conflicting legends about the pit. I prefer the one where it was started by a local child digging with his friends under the flagstone. He would find oakn kind of slats covering what he thought would be like some booty, so the pirates say, isn't it? [00:07:34] Speaker B: I think it is, yes. [00:07:36] Speaker A: He'd then kind of dig those paths, and they'd be sand for 10 meters or more. 10 meters. Dig down, dig down. Oh, hello. There's another layer here. Another almost like the wood. Yeah. Lots more wooden stakes, lots more protection. Let's get rid of those motherfuckers. By this size, you should see the size of this hole. Honestly. [00:07:59] Speaker B: Okay. [00:08:01] Speaker A: Honestly. Let's keep it in context. But you ought to see the size of this hole by now. It's vast. [00:08:05] Speaker B: Right, okay. Yeah. [00:08:08] Speaker A: You could sit on the edge and dangle your legs into it and just huge hole. Anyway, they kept digging. They kept digging. They kept finding stuff from the reign of one of the King Charles's. I forget which one. There are several at that point. [00:08:24] Speaker B: I mean, that would have to isn't oh, no, I was going to say, isn't that like the first King Charles at that point? [00:08:31] Speaker A: No, this one had more letters after his name. I'll come back to it, then I'll find the guy. But we're talking coins, military buttons, king Charles II. There you go. King Garland is the third 17th century. [00:08:43] Speaker B: Options. [00:08:44] Speaker A: Yes. So the question, I guess, that has never really I wouldn't even say sufficiently answered, it's never been particularly answered at all, is why is there a massive tube, a massive tunnel hole in the ground with such strangely placed artifacts and jewels? [00:09:06] Speaker B: So let me just recap here to make sure that I understand what happened. [00:09:11] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:09:11] Speaker B: So Massachusetts Bay colony spreads up into Nova Scotia in 1761. Parcels outland to various families, 1790s. Daniel MC, whatever his Guinness is. [00:09:25] Speaker A: Daniel McGinnis. [00:09:26] Speaker B: Daniel McGinnis. The streets will never forget a a child of the Massachusetts Bay Colony starts digging and for whatever reason, digs meters and meters and meters. But we don't know why he started digging. [00:09:42] Speaker A: Correct. No, he started digging because from what I've been able to gather, it looked as though it was the opening of something. [00:09:49] Speaker B: It was like something is here. [00:09:52] Speaker A: It was something kind of hello. Oh, that don't sound right. Gavner is how I would have voiced. [00:09:56] Speaker B: Him had he that's I mean, that's pretty much what I sound like as a member of could you do him then? Could you do him for mean, he probably would sound more like you than me, to be honest. Or probably like someone from Boston, I imagine, because that's what they say, right? Bostonian accents are closer to, hey, watch this fucking hole. [00:10:16] Speaker A: Don't daniel. [00:10:17] Speaker B: Yeah, that's that's the guy. That's the one. Okay. So he starts digging and finds like essentially an elaborate tunnel in this pit that was already dug and is full of it's. [00:10:31] Speaker A: Worth pointing out as well. The wood was layered also with coconut fiber, so the husks, the shells of coconut to make it even tougher. [00:10:41] Speaker B: And the relics that he finds in here are not from one particular era. They're from all over the place, but within the same layer of earth. [00:10:51] Speaker A: So that they're not add to this. Right, okay. Somewhere between 80 to 90ft down in the pit. Jesus. Just trying to visualize that. [00:11:03] Speaker B: Yeah. That's incredible. It's not just Daniel digging, obviously. [00:11:08] Speaker A: No, it is, but at this point I'm convinced that it is. [00:11:12] Speaker B: Okay. This is the theory you're subscribing to. [00:11:14] Speaker A: I sure am tired. Shut up, Daniel. But they are 80 to 90ft down at this point and a stone tablet is found. Right. [00:11:27] Speaker B: Okay. [00:11:28] Speaker A: And this stone tablet in itself is 90 foot long. Right. Huge. [00:11:32] Speaker B: What? [00:11:33] Speaker A: You heared me? Yeah. 90 foot long stoke tablet. [00:11:37] Speaker B: Tablet, yes. [00:11:38] Speaker A: Of stone. [00:11:41] Speaker B: How is that possible? One cut piece of stone that is 90 scribe feet. [00:11:50] Speaker A: 90 foot stone down around about the 80 to 90ft level mark in the pit, between two and 3ft long and twelve and 16ft wide. It's vast, this rectangle. It's an obelisk. [00:12:05] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:12:06] Speaker A: Right. Yep. It is transcribed. So some stonesmith has been to work on it, etching out a message. Cryptologists had a look, researchers had a look, and it was kind of translated roughly as 40ft below 2 million pounds are buried. [00:12:30] Speaker B: Wow. Okay. [00:12:31] Speaker A: How wild is that? [00:12:33] Speaker B: 40Ft below. [00:12:35] Speaker A: 40Ft below two. That's one line 40ft below two. But then million pounds buried. So is it 40ft? Is it 42ft below? Is it 40ft below? Is it 38ft? [00:12:44] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:12:45] Speaker A: Is it 2 million pounds? Is it one pounds? But even that in itself to have something as fucking fucked up as that in this place. [00:12:52] Speaker B: Yeah. And like 2 million pounds at some time before the 1790s or a million pounds or whatever before the 1790s, which. [00:13:05] Speaker A: Is not a person I wouldn't kill for 2 million pounds right now. There's not a single person you would. [00:13:11] Speaker B: Kill me right now for 2 million pounds. [00:13:13] Speaker A: What about PayPal? [00:13:17] Speaker B: Jesus Christ. Okay. This is quite a revelation. I wouldn't me stressing out over the idea of killing you if you turned into a zombie, you I would kill you right now for 2 million pounds. [00:13:33] Speaker A: Only joking. I was having a joke like that thing where I say things I don't mean. [00:13:40] Speaker B: Okay, what are your theories? Well, I have questions before we even get there. [00:13:46] Speaker A: I won't have answers, but feel free to do your work. [00:13:50] Speaker B: We research so differently, and this is a problem. Where are they now? Where is this tablet? Is it still in the hole? [00:14:00] Speaker A: Okay, right, great. So the tablet, if you excuse me. There have been no tracings that have survived, no rubbings that have survived. Okay. The original doesn't appear to exist any longer. Right. Although, and I quote, it was said to have been viewed by hundreds of people while in the home of while in the home of the Smith family, who I guess owned it last. [00:14:27] Speaker B: In their home. [00:14:28] Speaker A: Yes. [00:14:30] Speaker B: Mark, could you fit a 90 foot rock in your house? [00:14:34] Speaker A: Well, no, but I'm not Indiana fucking Jones, am I? [00:14:37] Speaker B: Neither is this is a child living in colonial Nova Scotia. Well, what kind of home do you think they lived in? [00:14:50] Speaker A: Well, the simple answer is, I have no clue. People have died on site. People have died whilst trying to excavate these colossal messages? [00:15:01] Speaker B: Of course. [00:15:02] Speaker A: Written by who? Exactly, we don't know. [00:15:06] Speaker B: It would be so difficult to get rid of that. And why would you do it? Yeah, why would you be like, I'm going to break down this 90 by 15 rock obelisk inscribed with things that could probably make me millions of money and in fact seems to point to millions of pounds. I'm just going to throw it off a cliff. This is impossible. There's literally no way this existed. [00:15:35] Speaker A: I believe several hundreds of people saw it. Hang on. Let me just check the name of that website I'm getting all of this information from. Oakislandmistry.com is where this is coming from, folks. Your number one reliable island mystery news. Right? That's Oakislandmistry.com. The good people overt. [00:15:53] Speaker B: This is some Joseph Smith shit right here. The angel Moroni showed me Christians. Yeah, right? Showed me some tablets, but they're gone now. You can't see them, but trust me, it totally said all of this stuff, they went too far. They should have said that. [00:16:11] Speaker A: It was a load of good shit there, though. [00:16:15] Speaker B: Well, it sure, but also, I mean. [00:16:18] Speaker A: Let me let me let me just wrap this up. Right. Go ahead. It's lost some people. Some people died. Some say it's a size 14. [00:16:27] Speaker B: Wait, hold on. So is the hole still there? [00:16:31] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:16:32] Speaker B: Okay. So the pit exists. [00:16:33] Speaker A: Yeah. The pit exists. The pit is a thing. 100% exists. Very occasionally, priceless fucking artifacts will be found there. Just quite recently, a 500 year gemstone was uncovered on the site. 500 years old. It dates from the 15 hundreds. What do they sell it for? Let me see. Probably a fuck ton. Do you get Antique Roadshow over there? [00:17:07] Speaker B: Oh, yeah. Love antiques roadshow. [00:17:09] Speaker A: I really enjoy Antique Roadshow too. [00:17:11] Speaker B: Everybody Loves Antiques Roadshow. [00:17:13] Speaker A: It's the most if it's on if it's on, I'm going to sit my ass right down. It's a four to 500 year old Rodolite Garnet by now. That pit is called the Curse of Oak Island. [00:17:26] Speaker B: So why do they? Because people died trying to excavate it, among other reasons. [00:17:33] Speaker A: Four lives were lost in one huge tragic accident. Something gnarly blew up in their face. Some mountaineering gear blew up in front of them. There was that of the tragedy that we know about earlier on that killed up to 14. [00:17:47] Speaker B: What tragedy? You didn't talk about that. [00:17:49] Speaker A: I didn't? Well, up to 14 people may have died in a tragedy. [00:17:55] Speaker B: May have? [00:17:56] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:17:57] Speaker B: We don't know. [00:17:58] Speaker A: Definitely six, but at least but maybe up to 14. Six totally counted. 14 pretty much speculated. [00:18:05] Speaker B: Why don't we know? [00:18:07] Speaker A: Because it was fucking it was in the 1770s. [00:18:12] Speaker B: Mark, I have so many questions. What were they doing, and why didn't people notice? Apparently eight people disappeared in the hole. [00:18:22] Speaker A: Well, they were digging for shit. The only thing anyone ever does around that spot is dig for shit. Right? Today, in 2023, it remains your face. You ain't buying this tail one bit. Look, fuck you, because I'm one fucking learn about the pit. People still arrive, right? People still come down there. People still try and find their gemstones, and sometimes they do. There was a blue gemstone found not a year or two ago, a gemstone of Oak Gold, it's called. There's that treasure that I just mentioned. There that artifact there's, the 90 foot tablet that you don't believe exists, absolutely does not exist. Just do me a favor, right? Just have a little look for Oak Island on the south coast of Nova Scotia. Read into your south corrigan before you make your infamously closed mind up, right? [00:19:25] Speaker B: Okay. [00:19:26] Speaker A: So I'll say that's all I'll say. I'll leave it in the hands of fate. [00:19:34] Speaker B: I mean, when you talk about all of this stuff, I believe people absolutely died in the pit. I don't know if you know about this. There was a guy who he buried treasure. He was a billionaire. Like real treasure. He's a billionaire. I want to say he buried it like 20 years ago or something like that. And then he created this book of clues, and he was like, you can look at this, and whoever solves all of these clues will be able to go and find my treasure. And it had all this priceless stuff in it, like just millions of dollars worth of things inside of it's, a real treasure that he put somewhere and over the years with people trying to find it, which it finally was found only a couple of years ago or whatever. And unfortunately the worst, because he didn't say what was in it. He wanted it to be a surprise for whoever found it. [00:20:34] Speaker A: Don't tell me it was just fuck all. [00:20:36] Speaker B: No, it definitely had stuff in it, but the person won't say, I think, because they don't want someone to come rob them or whatever, so they won't say who they are and they won't tell us what the treasure is. And people have been searching for decades for this treasure. [00:20:49] Speaker A: TikTok about it, mate. I'd be putting on fucking TikTok. [00:20:53] Speaker B: But yeah, so people like adventurers would almost full time try to find what do you think these fucking idiots in. [00:21:00] Speaker A: The submarine did a few months back? [00:21:02] Speaker B: What do you think they exactly. And so people absolutely died trying to find that treasure. [00:21:09] Speaker A: People sailed down the sides right to the length of just the sheer size of this hole. It's vast. It's vast. It exists on Planet Earth. Its mysteries have yet and may never be uncovered. [00:21:24] Speaker B: Well, and I think there's something interesting to the idea that there's stuff in it. Someone clearly put it there for whatever reason. [00:21:35] Speaker A: There are suggestions. Right, okay. Spanish galleons, for example. Ships being just blown off course. [00:21:42] Speaker B: Sure. [00:21:42] Speaker A: And barrels of riches and wealth from that part of the continent. The way that Panama City got fucking treated in 1671 by Captain you all drank M. Henry Morgan completely ruined the place. Looted, sacked, burned the lot. So hiding his I'll say it again, booty around the place might I knew you wanted to. Yeah, I thought did you notice a little pause when I decided, yeah, we're doing this. The Illuminati pop up a lot. No, sorry, not the illuminati. Not the illuminati. The Templars. The Templars. [00:22:23] Speaker B: Oh, yeah, okay. [00:22:23] Speaker A: The Assassins, they turn up in quite a few theories, but they get more unhinged from there, as I can imagine. You guessing. [00:22:33] Speaker B: Yeah. I think it'd be all I can hope find out. [00:22:37] Speaker A: All I can sincerely hope is that you enjoyed that tale more than Corey did. [00:22:46] Speaker B: That's impossible if you're at home, but Goonies is notably a movie and and not based on I think, you know, if they were going to make up this story, they should have gone with a smaller tablet. [00:23:05] Speaker A: Let me quote directly from my notes, if I may. [00:23:07] Speaker B: Yes, please do. [00:23:09] Speaker A: Fucking look at these nerds. Oh, miselsen. [00:23:12] Speaker B: I don't think anyone has ever said miselsen in such a horny way before. [00:23:16] Speaker A: The way I whispered the word sex cannibal received. [00:23:19] Speaker B: Worst comes to worst, Mark, I'm willing to guillotine you for science. [00:23:23] Speaker A: Thank you. That's really, really sweet. It's cold outside, but my pancreas is talking to me. I'm going to leg it. [00:23:29] Speaker B: You know how I feel about that, Mark. [00:23:31] Speaker A: I think you feel great about it. I'm going to welcome everyone in. Welcome. Welcome, folks. It's time for your weekly medicine. Yes. Wouldn't you say? [00:23:41] Speaker B: Time to take it. You got it. [00:23:43] Speaker A: Time to take your little time to take a shot. You'll just feel it'll hurt. Yep. Only for a moment. And then you'll get used to it. And then you love it. So it's come on in time to take your medicine. [00:23:54] Speaker B: Is that how shots work for you? It hurts for a little bit and then I love it. [00:24:00] Speaker A: No tattoos. Yes. There's such an arc with tattoos for me, at least. Obviously, everyone's different for me. This Rob Cop one is the longest I've ever sat, and obviously for the first hour, it sucks. [00:24:18] Speaker B: I find that the beginning is fine. Don't mind the beginning. It's always like, oh, is that it? Then it starts getting the middle is. [00:24:28] Speaker A: When it gets the zone where it's nice. That's the middle bit, where you kind of feel elevated. Then the last bit, and when they're putting the white in, they can fuck off. Yeah, I'm sick of them. What was I going to say there? What was I going to say? Just to greet everyone, really. [00:24:48] Speaker B: People for their taking their medicine. Apparently. I was, yes, hurts, but they love it. [00:24:53] Speaker A: Yes. Whatever ails you, we're here for it. Whatever pains you, we want to know about it. We are your weekly paper cut. We are that you know the little web in between the two fingers of your hand? We are that kind of we're that thick cardboard cut between those lovely two bits of skin there. And it doesn't close, obviously, because you move your hand a lot, so every time you look at it, you just see it's. Red lips parting and opening and closed at you like a what is happening? Like a lipless mouth just wants to. [00:25:36] Speaker B: This is what you think our show is like? [00:25:38] Speaker A: Suck you to death. [00:25:44] Speaker B: I think we've lost the plot here. [00:25:46] Speaker A: Not at all. Not at all. Welcome is what I'm look, what I'm saying, long story short, is welcome. Corey, how are you indeed? [00:25:53] Speaker B: Welcome. I'm doing all right. Little hectic in my world at the moment. I just got back. [00:25:59] Speaker A: Yeah, because you're not at home, are you? You are at home, but you've not been at home. [00:26:03] Speaker B: I am not at home. I am in the corner of my friend's kitchen, shoved into a small little picnic table type situation. I was in Oregon for the Dead and Lovely meetup, which is why we're a day late on recording this week, because I was in transit yesterday. Had a lovely time in Portland with the gang, just hanging out and playing video games and watching movies. Well, we went to an arcade, Ground Control. It's sort of a famous arcade in Portland. They have pinball, they have all the old games, got little tabletop ones, like all the stuff you loved, your galaxy. Did. [00:26:43] Speaker A: They happen to have what I think is my favorite arcade game of all time, which is the standy, the four stick standy of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles by Kanani. [00:26:53] Speaker B: They had to have I did not see it. I was very tired. So through most of the arcade time, I just sat wonderful stuff while everyone else went and did that, but yeah, I went and did that, and it was great. And now I am in Southern California where we are clearing out our storage unit. So it's been a little bit chaotic, but I am very glad to be back here on the Jog. Regardless. How about good? [00:27:16] Speaker A: What's going on? Yeah, I'm delighted by that. Same here. Life is good. You've just got to go at it at a million miles per hour per second, in fact, or just don't bother. [00:27:29] Speaker B: It's a really good good point. That feels like Vin Diesel would approve of that sentence. [00:27:34] Speaker A: As far as I'm concerned, there are two types of people, right? There are those who are in my way and those who are not. Right? [00:27:47] Speaker B: This feels like a really egocentric view of the world, Mark. [00:27:54] Speaker A: I'm literally saying the first thing that comes into my head. I know it's very you do this every week. [00:27:59] Speaker B: Mark introduced us today. [00:28:01] Speaker A: Sorry. [00:28:01] Speaker B: Well, yeah, that's why I have you introduce us. You're always like, oh, you do it. And I'm like, no, I'm here asking you to do it. Because I have no idea where it's going to end up every time. I'm just going to say, well, and. [00:28:11] Speaker A: I'll tell you something else as well. I've been watching an awful lot of Always Sunny recently, right? [00:28:15] Speaker B: Oh, boy. [00:28:17] Speaker A: Just a lot of it. And I don't think there's ever been another character as good as Dennis. He's the best. [00:28:23] Speaker B: I don't watch it, so I can't. [00:28:28] Speaker A: I've absorbed a lot of that, perhaps by osmosis. Maybe you'd like to talk for a little bit. Did you notice how seamless that was? [00:28:39] Speaker B: Are you okay? [00:28:41] Speaker A: Are you having aneurysm what's going I'm fine. I'm absolutely fine. [00:28:46] Speaker B: Great. Wonderful. Well, today, dear friends, we are back in your ear holes to obviously talk about mysteries and whatnot. But also this week, we're going to be delving into the American criminal justice system, which is always a good time to talk a bit about our death penalty and not the death penalty itself. Though, of course, that will be inherent in the conversation, but about some of the people who have received it and are waiting for their just desserts. According to our criminal justice system. So we're going to delve into some of that this week on the podcast. So that's where we're going to aim the trajectory of this thing. In the meantime, anything else that we have to. [00:29:37] Speaker A: Yeah, Dupa Club. [00:29:39] Speaker B: No, that's not true. Next Saturday? Forget it. It doesn't matter. What were you going to say? [00:29:43] Speaker A: I was going to say thanks to everyone who came to the watch along. Just simply fun. You know what I mean? The return of fun. The return of Camaraderie, the return of just talking guthwell semidecent films, play. It was nothing short of a delight. So huge thanks to everyone who attended. I love each of ye. [00:30:03] Speaker B: Here, here. I was like, didn't we talk about this last week? But no, because we recorded on Friday. [00:30:08] Speaker A: Yes, we did. [00:30:09] Speaker B: So, yes, it was wonderful. Such a blast to see everybody again after it had been a minute. And of course, we will fill you in with what the next watch along this month will be. Yes, you got the book club, you got the watch along, all that kind of stuff. We're living it. We're doing the Jo AG dream. Do you watch anything this week? Now that we're out of spooky season, I've like immediately dropped off. But what have you isn't it kind. [00:30:33] Speaker A: Of should there be a name for this period, do you think? Post Halloween, pre Christmas? But you've got Thanksgiving. [00:30:41] Speaker B: Yeah, I was about to say because for us, this is a season now. We just went to lunch right before I got here and they had all the turkeys on the wall and all that kind of stuff. Like it's Thanksgiving season now, so you guys are kind of like in a weird limbo. [00:30:57] Speaker A: Yeah, nothing really good happens now for like a month or a bit. We got my birthday week, which is always nice. I always kind of fuck about to make a song and dance of that. But then now we've got nothing going on, really. Just if I were to reach for the profanosaurus over there, it would be just a couple of weeks of fucking the dog. [00:31:19] Speaker B: It's nice, if vivid. So what have you watched since we have changed? [00:31:27] Speaker A: What did you do on the weekend, Mike? Nothing much, just fuck the dog. That's how you use that one, if you're curious. [00:31:32] Speaker B: What did I watch on the weekend? [00:31:35] Speaker A: Okay, so you've also seen Killers of the Flower Moon? [00:31:38] Speaker B: Yes, I have seen killers of the Flower Moon. Yes. [00:31:41] Speaker A: Right now I gave it a four. I've not looked at your rating. You gave it three and a half. Three and a half? [00:31:52] Speaker B: I gave it three and a half. I'm trying to remember if we talked about this because I know I talked about it on social media because that was the experience in which they played the Era's Tour, the Taylor Swift movie, on both sides of the theater. [00:32:06] Speaker A: They actually did that. And it was audible hugely. [00:32:11] Speaker B: You could hear every lyric of Taylor Swift Wild to me on both sides, different songs throughout the entire movie. It was so bad that at the end of it, I just kind of walked up to the manager and was like, hey. So I went to see Killers of the Flower Moon and she just handed me two free tickets because she knew exactly what the problem was. Yeah. [00:32:34] Speaker A: I think I had five people in theater. Please go on, please go. [00:32:39] Speaker B: My rating. So I've read Killers of the Flowerman twice. Very familiar with the story. So part of the thing about that is when you know everything that's going to happen, it's like you're just kind of like sitting there anticipating all the horrible. Things that are going to happen. And it does take something from the movie when you know what's going on, I think. And I think it was like, yeah, it's good. Like it's scorsese. Even when it's not the greatest scorsese, it's still going to be like, artful, interesting and things like that. [00:33:13] Speaker A: All of which it was. [00:33:15] Speaker B: Right. It just felt like I was a little underwhelmed by it, especially because I think it does get at how horrific it was, but almost doesn't. It somehow harps on so much on certain parts of this story that there are so many layers of horror that it doesn't even begin to touch on. [00:33:34] Speaker A: I wasn't left horrified. If it ought to have done that, then it didn't. [00:33:39] Speaker B: Yeah. After reading Killers of the Flower Moon, you just sit in despair with this. They annihilated an entire people, and Americans cheered it on, essentially because they were like, Indians shouldn't have money. And it's a horrifying story that has so many layers that just weren't touched in it. And so, yeah, that's why it's a 3.5 and not higher. But go on with your experience. [00:34:09] Speaker A: My four. Why do they have it a four? I don't know. As an experience, as a viewing, as a showing. It had a lot in common with Avatar the Way of Water, right. For you lot. In common with those two films, as far as I'm concerned. I saw them as very similar films. [00:34:31] Speaker B: Yeah. People are always saying that, if you. [00:34:33] Speaker A: Know what I'm saying. They're almost like two halves of one narrative, aren't they? Pretty much. Now, I know the following. I stayed awake the whole time. I stayed awake the entire fucking 4 hours. I did the lot, okay? About 15 minutes in and I checked, right, this is after the trailers, 15 minutes into the film because I had a sneaky look. Geezer next to me starts full on fucking Snoring, right? 15 minutes, mate. [00:35:05] Speaker B: That cost you came there for the nap. [00:35:08] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. He brought snacks. He had the lot. I nudged at one point. [00:35:13] Speaker B: Wow. Oh, he was like, directly next to you? [00:35:15] Speaker A: No, he was in the next seat. So I nudged him at one point. Then there were about five other people in theater. Okay. [00:35:23] Speaker B: There are five people in theater and someone sat directly next to you. [00:35:27] Speaker A: You buy your tickets online earlier, you've got to book your tickets on the app. [00:35:31] Speaker B: Yeah. Why did they pick a or people next to someone else? [00:35:34] Speaker A: I don't know. I don't know. [00:35:35] Speaker B: I hate, like, the biggest pet peeve of mine when I'm like if I'm in a bathroom stall, if I'm in a parking spot, if I'm at theater. [00:35:43] Speaker A: If you have space, let's all share it. [00:35:46] Speaker B: Don't be in mine. [00:35:47] Speaker A: Let's all share the space. [00:35:49] Speaker B: The lovely little I don't like this, man. [00:35:51] Speaker A: Where was I even going? Five people in theater. We got into a kind of a cough circle, which is a bit rough my nightmares. [00:36:04] Speaker B: This is worse than the Era's tutorial. [00:36:07] Speaker A: This is what I can tell you about Killers of the Flower Moon, right? I thought I'd try to evil ends tonight and go out and get a drink, thus quenching my thirst and not coughing anymore. Right? So I had a blue Tango ice blast. Fucking year most beautiful view cinema drink is a Tango Ice Blast, right? A Tango ice blast in blue. Beautiful. And it worked. And I was able to enjoy Killers of the FLone when unmolested. Don't ask me a single fucking question about that film because I don't remember any of it. [00:36:35] Speaker B: And yet you gave it a four. [00:36:37] Speaker A: Yeah, well, yeah, you got it, wouldn't you? Look at the talent. No, Leonardo DiCaprio was very good at that face he made. [00:36:44] Speaker B: He does. He does the face. I watched shudder. [00:36:47] Speaker A: Should we both do it? Should we both do it at the face? Let's both do the face. Three, two, one. Now. I like yours. I'd give you an oscar. [00:37:00] Speaker B: Yours was really good too. We'll try to put that one up on the Instagram, if I remember. [00:37:06] Speaker A: But anyways, can you not that's large duel. I saw you. Now let me think. Hang on. Yeah, let's talk death become too. Let's talk a really fun fucking Grand Guignol. Let's talk a Sterm UNT drang. Let's talk absolute fucking gothic. [00:37:26] Speaker B: I was really hoping for a third language there, but that's fine. [00:37:29] Speaker A: How many did I do? How many did I do? [00:37:30] Speaker B: Just two. [00:37:31] Speaker A: That's not bad. [00:37:32] Speaker B: This is good. I was just left wanting a little it was good. [00:37:36] Speaker A: But you wanted more. [00:37:37] Speaker B: It wanted more. [00:37:39] Speaker A: Fuck. Took my story of my life stars. Yeah, it wasn't bad, Mark. We just wanted a bit more. [00:37:50] Speaker B: Go on. Death becomes a hero. [00:37:52] Speaker A: What a great film. If you want to see Meryl Streep. Or is it Glenn Close? It's Meryl Streep and Goldie Horn mutilate each other and ask questions about the gift of eternal life. Like, is it a gift caveat empty know. Careful what you wish for, monkey's. Poor shit. It's a really fun hour and a half. I was blown away by the soundtrack. The soundtrack was fucking lovely, Sylvester. I think it was. Unless I made that up, who also did Back to the Future. It's got that same kind of huge loads of brass. Good shit. Had a really good time. We're really good people. So thank you all. [00:38:29] Speaker B: Absolutely. 100% agree. Is that all you watched? [00:38:34] Speaker A: Let me see. Death becomes her. [00:38:36] Speaker B: Yes. [00:38:38] Speaker A: Killers of the flower moon. Apparently. [00:38:40] Speaker B: Apparently so you've been told and that's it. I love that. Honestly more like the substance of your review was more of the slurpee that you had in the lobby than of. [00:38:51] Speaker A: The actual actual that Flower moon getting killed. [00:38:58] Speaker B: For me this week. Obviously finished out all of the Halloween stuff, so watch a little practical Magic, which I forget this every time I watch it, and it always blows me away that that movie is directed by Griffin Dunn of, you know, An American Werewolf in yes, like, that. It's directed by a man at all is insane to me. And it's directed by Griffin Dunn. And it is the most female, gazey, perfect woman movie that exists. And it's, like, honestly incredible to me that a dude made that movie. It just blows me, you know? Practical magic is always a good time. If you've never seen, know, a pair of sisters who, because of an ancestral curse, if they fall in love, the man will eventually die young and tragically. And so Sandra Bullock finally meets a man despite years of trying not to fall in love, and he dies. And meanwhile, her sister ends up in an abusive relationship and they accidentally kill him. And a dashing police officer comes to town to investigate the crime and shenanigans ensue. My husband described it as if David Lynch directed a rom.com, which is 100% true. [00:40:22] Speaker A: I'd love him to do that. [00:40:25] Speaker B: Practical magic. [00:40:28] Speaker A: Do you know of your recommendations? That's one I might actually seek out. I have a dream, right? [00:40:34] Speaker B: Okay. [00:40:36] Speaker A: That maybe a group of studios combine resources, right, and select a group of directors, maybe four or five directors, hands them a budget of, say, 80, 90, O, 120,000,000, something like that, but gives them the challenge that they have to make something out of their irv. They have to make something completely different to anything they've ever done. I want to see a lynch rom.com, you know what I mean? I want to see a fucking slasher by insert non slasher director here. You know what I'm saying? I'd love to see what a director I love would do a mirror version of that director would create. [00:41:22] Speaker B: Yeah, absolutely. [00:41:23] Speaker A: Just wanted to hear that. [00:41:25] Speaker B: I feel good about that. I would be interested in that as well, in that endeavor. So, yeah, watch that. I've watched Hocus Pocus, obviously, because Halloween, you gotta watch Goosebumps. That's another one I like to go to on Halloween. The movie, not the new. You know, I just find that movie absolutely delightful. [00:41:44] Speaker A: I'm not enjoying the show at all. Me and Pete did episode one, and we don't think we're going to go back. [00:41:48] Speaker B: Oh, yeah. I watched the first five episodes of it because they put them all out at same time. And then since then, they have released them one at a time. So I have not watched I do. [00:41:58] Speaker A: Like Justin Long, though. [00:41:59] Speaker B: Yeah, I love Justin Long, but I watched the movie, not the show. And I always have a fun time with that. We watched Poltergeist, which was great because Poltergeist absolute classic. And as you know, my mother watches horror movies. Twenty four, seven. There is just screaming coming from her room at all hours of the night from stuff that she's watching. She falls asleep to it. She's seen two Human Centipede movies. She's like, unfazed by anything. And I go and I'm like, oh, let's watch Poltergeist. She's like, oh, no, too scary. And that banger of the scene, that movie is it's full of them. [00:42:43] Speaker A: It's full of them. [00:42:44] Speaker B: It's full of them. And I'm like, oh, whatever. We watch it. And I ended up having nightmares that night. My husband was like, you were like, yelling in your sleep and all this stuff. I was like, my goodness. It is just such an effective it is excellent. [00:42:57] Speaker A: It is excellent. It almost fools you into thinking it's just going to be kind of spooky house. Not nasty, but it's got nasty bits in it. Like, good old Toby Hooper. I made the mistake once on X. No, sorry, Twitter, which was formerly you know what I'm saying? [00:43:12] Speaker B: Whatever. Yeah. The other place. [00:43:14] Speaker A: I dared to suggest that Steven Spielberg may have had a hand in that film's directorial journey. [00:43:22] Speaker B: Right? [00:43:22] Speaker A: I dared to suspect that the kids on bikes and the Steelberg stare and literally 19 of his other tropes might have led one to believe that he had a hand in directing that movie. And some guy, I swear to God, he gave me like an eight tweet thread of why I was wrong and should remember that one guy who told me I should never be on a film set. It was like that. [00:43:48] Speaker B: Well, here's the thing about that, though, is that I think this is almost an example of exactly what you were talking about. Like, have a director do a movie that isn't necessarily in their wheelhouse. And I think what Toby Hooper did with this that's so impressive is he made a Steven Spielberg movie. [00:44:03] Speaker A: Very nice. [00:44:03] Speaker B: Yeah, but he then all that nastiness you're talking about comes from a guy. [00:44:07] Speaker A: Pulling his face off, fucking my favorite that's my favorite thing in the world. [00:44:11] Speaker B: And that's the thing. As I was watching it, I was like, I see why people often think Spielberg basically directed Peter Nolan good night. [00:44:20] Speaker A: That would really fuck him up. [00:44:21] Speaker B: Absolutely. Yeah. You see why people think Spielberg actually did all the directing on it. But I think it's just that Toby Hooper decided to essentially make a Spielberg movie. He's got Spielberg funding it. And he's like, what would it be like if I made a movie? [00:44:37] Speaker A: It's a really good show. Very good. [00:44:39] Speaker B: And so you get kind of the best of both worlds with that movie, which is yeah, Poltergeist is just it's pretty perfect. [00:44:46] Speaker A: If Toby Hooper could make Poltergeist, could Steven Spielberg make Texas? [00:44:53] Speaker B: No, I don't think so. I really don't think so. I don't think that's his sensibility. [00:44:58] Speaker A: I think he tried duel is probably the closest he got. [00:45:01] Speaker B: I think that's his I do. I do quite enjoy duel. I enjoy duel a that is you're right. I think that's the closest that he kind of gets to that genre wise. But yeah. So watch that. Watched on the plane several movies. Because of the changing of seasons. I always watch Nightmare Before Christmas on the 1 November. [00:45:25] Speaker A: And then I watch your favorite song, Jeez Louise. [00:45:30] Speaker B: That is a very difficult question for me. [00:45:34] Speaker A: Okay. I don't know. [00:45:35] Speaker B: That stresses me out to think about. Yeah, we'll come back to it. If it comes to do you have a favorite one from Nightmare? [00:45:39] Speaker A: Yeah. Mine's jack's lament. [00:45:42] Speaker B: I sing that a lot. Like just around the house. [00:45:45] Speaker A: Yeah, I just adore it. I couldn't pick one. I disliked it. I'm a fucking Rabid fan, as you know. [00:45:51] Speaker B: Yeah, absolutely. And 100% agree with you on that. So I always watch that. December 1. I mean, November 1 is my changing seasons. Cocoa for the dios muertos on November 2. [00:46:06] Speaker A: If there are ever times in my life I wish to make myself cry. [00:46:12] Speaker B: Yes. [00:46:14] Speaker A: Via a film. A film is the only pulling your nose hairs is really effective. Right. That will make you cry. But if I want to watch a film that makes me upset to the point of tears, I will either watch Cocoa because I will cry at Cocoa. [00:46:27] Speaker B: Of course. [00:46:31] Speaker A: Ugly I'll fucking meme of Peter Parker cry. And if the other one is the last ten minutes of the episode of Doctor Who called Vincent and the doctor. [00:46:41] Speaker B: Oh, yeah, please don't even mention it. Because it's one of those ones if I think about I start getting what a gift. I went to the know. [00:46:49] Speaker A: I know. [00:46:50] Speaker B: And I was like, thinking about it. [00:46:52] Speaker A: Pete's coming up on it. He's coming up on it soon. He's ripping through on the rewatch. [00:46:56] Speaker B: Love it. Yeah. So watch Coco, like you said, I mean, just super emotional and moving. [00:47:02] Speaker A: I think at the time, we thought that the heel from Coco is like Disney's worst ever fucking heel. [00:47:07] Speaker B: When you think, yeah, because he literally murdered someone. [00:47:10] Speaker A: He's a plagiarist. He's a murderer. [00:47:11] Speaker B: Yeah. Right. Yeah. He's pretty bad people. He's bad people. That Ernesto de la Cruz I watched. [00:47:21] Speaker A: He could have worked for the cartel. [00:47:24] Speaker B: He would absolutely do that. Yeah. Rewatch Shutter Island, which I'm not going to give anything away about Shutter Island in case people have not seen Shutter Island, even though it's a nearly 20 year old movie. But one thing about Shutter Island, I love that movie. It's a fun time every time I watch it. The gist of it being that Leonardo DiCaprio plays a federal marshal who he and his partner Mark Ruffalo, come to this island insane asylum where they are trying to track down an inmate who went missing. [00:48:00] Speaker A: You know how I've got like, one big cinematic dream? One more. Elm Streets. I've got one big TV dream. Mark Ruffalo's colombo. [00:48:12] Speaker B: I know you've said this, and it's true, it would absolutely work. But yeah, the thing about this is, once you have seen this so if you have seen this movie, how it ends, the sort of twist of this film when you haven't seen it is like, whoa. When you have seen it, the whole movie kind of becomes a comedy afterwards and that you can't help but watch it and sort of laugh. [00:48:42] Speaker A: I'm going to go ahead and imagine you notice pretty much straight away. [00:48:45] Speaker B: Yeah, because I saw it literally when it came out, like, 18 years ago or whatever. So I don't remember whether I noticed it immediately what the twist was. You know what? I will say that with which I forgot to mention, I watched Five Nights at Freddy's. [00:48:59] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. [00:49:01] Speaker B: Which was fine. Perfectly serviceable kids, horror movie. [00:49:04] Speaker A: The kids had their cousin round to watch it together, so they had a night of it while it looked disinterested. [00:49:09] Speaker B: And this one, because you always find it funny how quickly I spot the twist in something. I looked at my watch during this one, and we were at 15 minutes and 47 seconds when I figured out what was in this. [00:49:26] Speaker A: That's your mutual power, and it's not very useful. How are you going to get rich off that? [00:49:30] Speaker B: Yeah, and I had an inkling, like, five minutes before that, but then it was, like, confirmed with one little moment, and I was like, okay. [00:49:37] Speaker A: Yeah, very good. [00:49:39] Speaker B: All right. But yeah. So Shutter Island is always a fun time. And I watched on the plane a documentary from bloody disgusting called Hollywood Dreams and Nightmares the Robert England Story. [00:49:53] Speaker A: England story. Yeah. Now, before you talk about that, if I may, I think that was made by a guy called Chris Smith. Right, okay. He's a Welsh lad. I think he's from Cardiff. [00:50:03] Speaker B: I've definitely seen him in another documentary of some sort. [00:50:07] Speaker A: When I tell you this motherfucker works. [00:50:10] Speaker B: It was the video nasties one. Sorry, but yes, he did the video nasties documentary he's done. Yeah. [00:50:14] Speaker A: Go on. Dreams and Hollywood hellscapes or whatever. The Robert England story. He's recently released robo Doc. The Story of RoboCop. [00:50:22] Speaker B: Oh, that's that one. [00:50:22] Speaker A: You're struggling with the same guy. And he was out there doing the rounds with Robo Doc when I was at a convention in 2017. He'd been fucking plugging away on that piece of work, and only by then he had a clip to show. By all accounts, the big holdout was who would have thought dr weller himself. He was proper fucking dragging his heels on whether he'd appear in it, whether he'd answer questions, blah, blah, blah. But it seemed to have landed in because it's out. I cannot fucking wait to see it. [00:50:53] Speaker B: Yeah, that's like I think it could have potentially gone deeper or whatever and things like that. This is not one of those ones where you're going to learn about his childhood tragedies or anything like that. But it's a great like it feels like sitting down and talking to someone who is just kind of reflecting on their career and things like that. And you hear other people's sort of takes and it kind of goes chronologically through his career. So you're starting with stuff that I'm writing down a list. Like, I've never seen that. I've never seen that. And the early kinds of interesting characters he played and the people who were like his contemporaries are just people you don't really think of. Like him knowing not Ben Drifus, richard Dreyfus and moving out to like Holly. [00:51:35] Speaker A: Mark Hamill I want to say I. [00:51:37] Speaker B: Think Mark Hamill comes up in it. What's Lance Henriksen? There's all these different people who are like, contemporaries of Robert Englin that you don't really think about. And so it's just like a cool career retrospective that's like it's like two and a half hours long of I. [00:51:57] Speaker A: Do five of that. Of what you just described. I don't think there's enough limit on how long I'd watch that for. [00:52:02] Speaker B: Yeah, it's supremely watchable and just very cool. He's just such a well loved person, everyone. He's so generous with his time and his advice to people. He's got, like, a really cute him and his wife are just, like, inseparable besties people are like, I don't think I've seen them without each other. [00:52:25] Speaker A: Well, my briefest of stories meeting him, right? My briefest of moments, queued for 20 minutes to meet the guy, get a photo signed, hopefully get a picture, got the photo signed. Was chatting away to him, was quite nervous. I didn't really know if the sharpie was going to work on the photo. So that was a bit of an awkward moment. And I was chatting away, not knowing if he was listening or not. But the entire time, he had been and he'd been fucking doing his little thing on the photo and just immediately picked up my conversation thread and we chatted for 30 seconds, took a picture. That was that good guy, good laugh. And yeah, to those jogg listeners who don't know, and you do know this, robert England was seen that night in Cardiff, queuing at the View Cinema, just across the road from the CIA Cardiff International Arena. He was queuing to see a movie, robert England night wearing Elm Street. [00:53:16] Speaker B: Well, and that's one of the things that they talk about in this documentary, too, is like, he is such a cinephile. Everything. He loves going to the movies. He's like, yeah, just huge into film has. Yeah. [00:53:29] Speaker A: I just have to really finish up that he was actually going to see Monsters University. How cool is that? [00:53:34] Speaker B: How fucking I love that. And I bet he loved it. [00:53:37] Speaker A: I'm sure he did. Well, how can he not? Other than it does change the timeline. But. [00:53:45] Speaker B: Yeah. And of course, with the dead and lovely folks, we decided to close out the meetup the other night by watching Jackass Forever together. Great joke, cry, laughing, great joy in Steve's living room. And it was beautiful. Colin's partner had never seen it before. We were like, oh, man, we gotta get into it. And just as good as the first couple times that I watched. [00:54:09] Speaker A: I'm so glad he's still around Knoxville, man, because he nearly fucking bought the farm on so many different occasions, including in Jackass Forever. [00:54:17] Speaker B: You're like, yeah, this guy's dead. [00:54:21] Speaker A: He gets up at one point, goes, well, that was almost it for old fucking old Johnny. [00:54:29] Speaker B: So yeah, that about sums that up. [00:54:33] Speaker A: Yeah, that was our film of Week. It's always dies off just after Spooky season, but kills us. Moon was, I'm no doubt, a four star classic. [00:54:42] Speaker B: Yeah. Oh, the other thing though, I just want to recommend this to people because this was also a good time. Have you ever heard of the Nickelodeon show Legends of the Hidden Temple? [00:54:53] Speaker A: I do not believe so. But go on. [00:54:55] Speaker B: Okay, so it was a game show. [00:54:56] Speaker A: I'm right here. [00:54:57] Speaker B: Yeah, a game show for kids in the early ninety s. I think it aired from like 93 to 96 or something like that. And the premise of this, which now, looking back, you're like, this is such racist cultural appropriate or whatever. But that was all these themed challenges based around some little god guy named Olmec, which is based on an actual pink and god or something like that, but with all these white people in tribal makeup and stuff like that who would come out and snatch the kids and all that. And they had to do all these obstacles and trivia and all this kind of stuff to try to get through this and win very 90s prizes like a walkman space camp things by regraft. Perhaps they weren't was. I say they're not that lame. But some of the early ones, if you get knocked out really early in the game, were like Nestle Quick and stuff like Game. We decided to watch some episodes last night and it is so much funnier in hindsight because it's clearly they recorded it live to tape. So everything is done in real time. And that means the host is sometimes helping to set up the obstacles. And the instructions are always way too long. So you can see kids zoning them out as they're being told what they're supposed to do. There's like all these and they're kids who often get stuck in frustrating situations. So you can see kids about to lose their shit as things are happening. And it's so funny. And sometimes the kids do stuff that they're like, this is not what you're supposed to do. And so the host, who is ostensibly narrating to us what's happening is basically trying to tell the kid what to do. They're running through this like an escape room these days. If you're fucking right, that's exactly what it is. Your ending thing is basically like a big escape room type thing. And one of them we watched last night, this girl just starts going backwards, like coming back because she can't find those doors. She should be looking for the open door that goes towards the dungeon on the other end. I'm not sure what her strategy is here. Trying to lead her back the other way. [00:57:10] Speaker A: Alongside Bring Back Freddy is bring Back Nightmare, which is a UK kids game show, which I'm certain I've told you about. It's caught up to the technology. It was always a decade or two ahead of its time. A decade or two. I'm 44. It was always way before its time. And I feel as though the tech has now caught up to Nightmare sufficiently for it to rock. Premise was you had a kid surrounded by a green screen in a Hornet helmet, had a leather satchel and three of his mates on a video link telling him, right, walk forward, walk forward, walk forward. Stop. Grab the pie. Grab the pie left. [00:57:48] Speaker B: We had one kind of like that. It was called Nick Arcade, but yeah. [00:57:52] Speaker A: And it was simply iconic. It was iconic. [00:57:54] Speaker B: Yeah. I don't know why they don't have stuff like that anymore. Probably legal reasons, but it so easily ruining everyone's. All of these things were like, god, these kids could get injured so easily. Yeah. But if you're looking for something to do and I can imagine it's even more fun if you're, like, inebriated in any way, but we were completely sober and just cry, laughing, watching Legends of the Hidden Temple last night. So it's on Paramount plus with all the other Nickelodeon stuff. If you have that, it's such a great time. [00:58:24] Speaker A: Good to know. [00:58:26] Speaker B: Well, Mark, take us into our final. [00:58:31] Speaker A: I'll do that with a question, if I may. What were growing up, your favorite, let's say, your favorite movie stars growing up, your favorite kind of icons. You had their poster on your wall. Perhaps you remember wearing their tapes thinned. Your favorite kind of who were the movies to you when you grew up? [00:58:50] Speaker B: I mean, Ethan Embry was my dude through and through. All the pictures all over my wall of Ethan Embry. Watched every single thing that he came out, went to the video store, rented it all, like you said, wore out those tapes that Ethan Embry was in. [00:59:04] Speaker A: That was the guy who took over after him. Because I assume Ethan I know Ethan Embry is still the guy as far as you're concerned, but he wasn't. Who was the next guy who came along? [00:59:14] Speaker B: Probably Carl Urban. Went through my Carl Urban james Badgedale, obviously, as the trajectory changed. Yeah. These were like, my guys over there. [00:59:27] Speaker A: What about now? [00:59:29] Speaker B: I mean, probably still James badge. Dale and Carl Urban. Realistically. Yeah, those are they'll get me into get my butt in the every time. [00:59:38] Speaker A: All right. Just I want to briefly do the same exercise with music, if I may, and this is leading somewhere. [00:59:44] Speaker B: All right. [00:59:45] Speaker A: The bands you grew up listening to who were on your tape deck all. [00:59:47] Speaker B: The time, who did you yeah. [00:59:50] Speaker A: Who's on your radio playlist that you made yeah. [00:59:53] Speaker B: New Kids on the Block green Day offspring smashing Pumpkins into my teen years. You got all the get up kids, your Amberlin, your Juliana theory, all that kind of stuff. [01:00:10] Speaker A: Yeah, college. [01:00:13] Speaker B: The killers were a big one. Now, it's a good question. Dury is my big one. Ghost is probably now the one that I listen to the absolute most. [01:00:29] Speaker A: There's a reason that I ask, okay? And come with me on this. I'm pulling you in on this thread. The reason is killers. The reason is killers, right? Death row inmates, serious killers. When you think of I can almost visualize my friend Shane from Treega having this conversation with him because he was a big serial killer fan himself. He's now in Sam Hain, I believe his name is, if you want to look at his art, he's done some superb serial killer art, which I'll link on our what is it? Blue sky. Is that what it's called? [01:01:00] Speaker B: Blue sky? Yep. [01:01:01] Speaker A: Yeah, right, okay. [01:01:02] Speaker B: In the skeets. [01:01:03] Speaker A: Anyway, I'm sure you'll agree there were what I guess you would call big hitters for a bit, your Bundies. [01:01:12] Speaker B: Yeah, as we discussed with our lead paint theory episode, like, all those big guys from, like the heavy hitters you. [01:01:21] Speaker A: Think of, you got your BTK, you. [01:01:23] Speaker B: Got your Nightcrawler night Stalker. [01:01:27] Speaker A: Night Stalker, you're big hitters of the time. I'm going to ask you a few questions first, if that's all right. What would you say? Or you may already know this, what is the state with the highest murder rate per 100,000 annually? [01:01:48] Speaker B: Is it Missouri? [01:01:50] Speaker A: That's number two. I apologize. That's number three. [01:01:55] Speaker B: Okay. Illinois. [01:01:57] Speaker A: No, one more crack. Illinois was, if you're interested, 24th. [01:02:05] Speaker B: Oh, wow. It goes against a lot of myths. That conservative. [01:02:10] Speaker A: Highest murder rate in the United States belongs to the District of Columbia. [01:02:16] Speaker B: Oh, that feels like cheating, because that's not a state, and I was trying to. [01:02:23] Speaker A: In which case, you win a bonus go. [01:02:25] Speaker B: Oh, I get a bonus go for what number? [01:02:28] Speaker A: Yes. [01:02:30] Speaker B: California. [01:02:31] Speaker A: Nah, Louisiana. You fucked it up. Okay, but my point is, a lot of these guys aren't going to last long. You know, Manson's on his way out. I wouldn't be surprised if at any time we had jeffrey Dahmer's, dead. John Bundy's, dead. Ted John what did I say? [01:02:54] Speaker B: John Bundy. [01:02:55] Speaker A: Who's John Bundy? Cut that bit out. [01:02:58] Speaker B: If you guy you went to school with, maybe. We're going for gacy. John Wayne Gacy. [01:03:03] Speaker A: Yeah. There we go. There we go. Both dead. Both dead. Both dead. Gacy's not, though. Is he's alive? [01:03:08] Speaker B: No, Gacy's dead. [01:03:10] Speaker A: Yes, he is. Cut that bit completely. What I'm saying is, who culturally, would you say are the next level up, who are now our legends, who are now our demons, are kind of our figures of cultural kind of consistent blaming and shaming them and victimizing, who are the current death row occupants, who you think have the power to make cultural impact. In the same way that Bundy did. In the same way? [01:03:50] Speaker B: That's a good question because I feel like again, there's plenty of theories as to why this is, and Lead was one of the ones we talked about, but these heavy hitters often were from a specific time period and that has absolutely cooled down. There are not as many of these. [01:04:05] Speaker A: People as there were that is true. [01:04:07] Speaker B: Before, and I think of someone like the Golden State Killer comes to mind, obviously. But if you're talking about people who are on their way out, we've only just found him. The man is a million years old. But yeah, I don't know why it is, whether it's just a matter of people not committing as many are people getting better serial killings? I don't think people are getting better. I think it's harder to be it's. [01:04:35] Speaker A: More difficult to be a serial killer. [01:04:37] Speaker B: Yeah, for sure. It's more difficult to get away with damn killing random people than it was back in the day. There's so much more surveillance, which I. [01:04:47] Speaker A: Think we talked about with Dr. Ben Defend Jones, isn't it? There's DNA profiling and how many times have we talked about cases that were never really closed, just only kept on ice. But DNA profiling caught up with the right. [01:04:59] Speaker B: Because that's what happened with the Golden State Killer. I just watched a dateline the other day that god, I can't remember what they called the killer, but it was like a pretty crazy name. But this was a serial killer who had gone cold since the early ninety s, and they found him the same way, like through a relative's DNA profile that's incredible. And traced it to him. Yeah, lots of problematic things about that, obviously. Of course, when I submit my DNA to 23 ANDME or whatever, I'm not doing it to be like and you can use this in your criminal shit. [01:05:34] Speaker A: What they're going to do is put you all underground when the meteorite comes. They've got copies of each of you, they've got your genetic information, they're going to be in fridges in the bunker when the meteor is on. [01:05:45] Speaker B: Yeah, I don't know. I don't think off the top of my head, aside from those more old school killers I could name for you someone on death row. Could you? [01:05:59] Speaker A: Yes. [01:05:59] Speaker B: Aside from the ones that we've talked like that you have researched tonight and are going to talk about, other than that, could you name people on death row? [01:06:11] Speaker A: The truth is in the States. No, I could not. [01:06:14] Speaker B: Right. [01:06:15] Speaker A: There's some horrific people, but I couldn't name anyone there. [01:06:18] Speaker B: Yeah, right. It's different now. [01:06:22] Speaker A: When I say terrific people, I don't mean terrific people, I mean terrifically, you know, people driven to do terrifically bad things. Yes. It's like the thing when sometimes I'll say something I don't mean for comedy effect. Right. For me. It's Anders Bravic. Right. [01:06:40] Speaker B: Oh, I do know who that is. [01:06:41] Speaker A: Yes. I've been very loose with America on this. I'm talking world war. [01:06:47] Speaker B: Well, and also, doesn't he not have the death penalty because they don't have it? [01:06:51] Speaker A: No, he doesn't. He's completely locked out. [01:06:53] Speaker B: I mean, like 28 years right. Is the limit. But anyway, go ahead, talk about who this is. [01:06:58] Speaker A: Well, this was a guy who in a homemade police uniform with homemade document papers. He killed eight people with a van bomb, just blew up his vehicle, killed eight people, and then went to an island where there was an exercise event with very huge attendance. This island was full of people, and using his credentials, his uniform, he got the ferry over and simply began firing. Just simply began shooting where? As soon as he got off the dock. [01:07:37] Speaker B: No. Where in the world did this happen? [01:07:41] Speaker A: This is in the county of Vicin in Norway. [01:07:45] Speaker B: That's what I thought. [01:07:46] Speaker A: Yeah. If you would care for some additional information, it's 10.6 is a unit of. [01:07:57] Speaker B: Measurement that tells me zero things. [01:07:59] Speaker A: Yeah, same. [01:08:01] Speaker B: That's one of those ones that it's like it comes up and stuff as if that's like a universal unit of measure, like, oh, yeah, sure. Who on earth knows what a hectare is? [01:08:11] Speaker A: I think he's the closest we've got to somebody with the cultural staying power. [01:08:17] Speaker B: How many people did he kill? Let's go on. [01:08:19] Speaker A: Oh, my word. You're joking. [01:08:23] Speaker B: I'm not joking. You're telling a story on a podcast. [01:08:26] Speaker A: After he did the van bomb and went to the island, he murdered 69 other people. [01:08:32] Speaker B: It's an incredible amount of people. [01:08:35] Speaker A: After the van bomb, there were a further 200 or so additional injuries injuried injured, and he murdered 69 more people in the island. With a gun. With many guns. [01:08:47] Speaker B: Right. [01:08:48] Speaker A: And cross posed him, let him leave, which is pretty nuts in a police uniform he'd made himself. Talk your way out of that one. [01:08:59] Speaker B: Wild. Talk your way out of it. [01:09:02] Speaker A: Just talk your way out of that one, son. You made the uniform. [01:09:08] Speaker B: I mean, that's an incredible story. And also, I'm not sure on this, but what are Norway's gun laws? Like, feel like you weren't supposed to have them there like you are. [01:09:20] Speaker A: I seem to remember reading something around, obviously leading to a huge change in. [01:09:25] Speaker B: Gun laws, which seems sensible, which happens everywhere but here. When this kind of thing happens, there's. [01:09:31] Speaker A: No other way to stop this. Says only nation where this regularly happens. [01:09:34] Speaker B: Exactly. Yeah. [01:09:36] Speaker A: No way. Gun laws. Gun collectors may not fire their firearms without explicit permission from the police. Rifle and shotgun licenses can be issued to persons 18 years or over with a clean criminal record. I don't know if his firearms were. [01:09:50] Speaker B: Legally owned legal or not. Yeah. Certainly he didn't ask the police if he could shoot all those people. [01:09:56] Speaker A: Yes, there's that. [01:09:57] Speaker B: But he's sentenced, like, 28 years. Right. I think it's something like that, because that's like the maximum prison sentence that you can get in. [01:10:07] Speaker A: He he's lucky he's in shit. [01:10:11] Speaker B: Right. [01:10:11] Speaker A: You know? [01:10:12] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:10:13] Speaker A: And he's very similar in age to me. I think he's only maybe three or four months younger than younger. Older than I am. [01:10:19] Speaker B: Yeah. I thought he was a fairly young dude when this happened. What year was this? [01:10:23] Speaker A: The incident itself took place in 2011, and after his arrest, his arraignment, he was given 21 years plus preventative detention, seems like. [01:10:43] Speaker B: Yeah. That's literally the maximum you can give to someone there, I think. No matter what the crime is, you're not allowed to imprison anyone for life. In Norway. [01:10:53] Speaker A: This was in 2011, though. [01:10:56] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:10:57] Speaker A: It's 2023 now. [01:11:00] Speaker B: Yeah. So he's already served more than half of that. [01:11:04] Speaker A: There was a very real probability that he will live to see quite a long time left of daylight. [01:11:11] Speaker B: Right, yeah. I'm imagining that preventative what did you call it? [01:11:16] Speaker A: Preventative preventative detention. [01:11:19] Speaker B: Preventative detention. Sounds like probably by some technicality, they're allowed to keep him somewhere away from people to their discretion, which is probably. [01:11:29] Speaker A: But what I'm saying is cultural cachet. I believe he has punched through the murderverse, you know what I mean? The podcast fucking listeners. The true crimers. And I think he's got a much like Chris Benoit. I think he enjoys a live and healthy public profile despite his atrocities. [01:11:46] Speaker B: Like, I knew exactly who he was when you said his name. So there's one. Who else you got? [01:11:52] Speaker A: Well, we've grown another recently in Lucy Letby. We've seen one blossom before our eyes. It was a 10% higher than expected murder rate between June 15 and June 16, which was what got her. She was a nutter and remains a nutter. And I'm not going to tell you who it is, right. I'm not going to name names here. Okay. But I have a very good friend who I believe is of the mind that what happened at that hospital can be put down to a statistical anomaly and thinks that she's innocent. [01:12:33] Speaker B: Well, that's kind of I mean, to be fair, even though that's absurd. That was the case in one of those things that we discussed during our hospital series, one of the doctors who was quite possibly wrongfully accused, although that's disputed, they claimed that it was like, oh, this number of people wouldn't have died from this thing happening to this particular event without having diabetes or whatever. And then it turns out now, 18 years later or whatever, they're like, no, that absolutely happens all the time. We just didn't realize that at this particular moment. So what looked like a statistical anomaly was actually very, very normal. [01:13:16] Speaker A: He's either really good at he's either sticking to the bit or this is his heartfelt belief. [01:13:22] Speaker B: Oh, your friend. [01:13:24] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:13:28] Speaker B: That's a tough one because I think there's quite a bit of evidence that that's not the case. [01:13:34] Speaker A: Writing I did it on a posted note in your house is yeah. I don't know man. What about yourself? What are your thoughts? [01:13:41] Speaker B: We've been talking a lot about this kind of stuff for a while and about like, incarceration and all of this. And so after one of our episodes. [01:13:53] Speaker A: I do want to talk about abolitionism with you. [01:13:56] Speaker B: Yeah. And we'll get there. As we've said, we'll do that as like an actual episode. [01:14:01] Speaker A: Yes, exactly. [01:14:03] Speaker B: But that made me think about as we've been talking about empathy and all that stuff, the idea of writing to prisoners. Right. Which is a thing that I think is theoretically a cool idea. I always refrain from signing up for any kind of pen bow program because I'm afraid I'll forget and then I'll feel guilty for the rest of my life. But I was looking into it. I was like, what websites exist for writing to a prisoner and specifically to a death row inmate? And so I ended up finding one and was like, looking at female prisoners. Like, I don't want any weird dudes who fall in love with their pen pals or anything like that writing to me. And so I found this one woman on there and her bio do that, couldn't you? [01:14:53] Speaker A: If you've got a guy who is do they tell them when their date is? [01:14:58] Speaker B: Yeah. Yes. [01:15:00] Speaker A: It's not a surprise that guy isn't going anywhere. You could give him the illusion of having fallen in love over letters. [01:15:06] Speaker B: People do it all the time. [01:15:08] Speaker A: Okay. I'm just saying to do oh, you. [01:15:11] Speaker B: Mean like have a fake relationship just to make them feel good until they. [01:15:14] Speaker A: Might be a nice it might give them a little something something. [01:15:18] Speaker B: Sure. Yeah, I suppose that could be a thing. There are like legit websites that I looked at that were basically match with prisoners, where all the pictures of the prisoners, they were trying to do sexy poses while in their prison jumpsuits and stuff like that. So that exists for sure that people get like, Charles Manson is married at least once, maybe more to prison pen pals. But yeah. So I was looking at women on death row, which there aren't that many of, and so this one woman's profile really stuck out to me know she said in it, she was like, it just feels as if the whole world has forgotten me and it would be really nice to hear my name at mail call. I was like, oh, man, Christ almighty, it's really sad. And so I was like, okay. And so I googled this woman because I was like, what is what you. [01:16:20] Speaker A: Can do you have the power to do that? [01:16:22] Speaker B: Yeah, it says her name on it. Looked up this woman whose name was Michelle Michaud or Michelle Michaod, I'm not sure how French she pronounces it, this woman. Let me just read to you from the article in SFGate.com, the San Francisco newspaper. A former couple were sentenced to death Wednesday for luring a pleasanton student into a specially rigged van where they sexually tortured and strangled her before dumping her body on a snowy embankment. James Anthony Deveggio, 42, and his then lover, Michelle lyn Michode, 43, were sentenced by Alameda superior court for killing 22 year old Vanessa Lee Samson on December 2, 1977. Goes on later on here. The pair kidnapped Samson from a pleasanton street, kept her inside their green Dodge Caravan rigged with hooks and ropes, and repeatedly tortured her as they drove to Southlake Tahoe. They forced her to wear a rubber ball gag and strangled her with nylon rope. Yeah. According to this, it says, prosecutors said Deveggio and Michaud had sexually assaulted at least six other young women, two of whom were relatives of the defendants. [01:17:38] Speaker A: But where's the cultural impact? [01:17:40] Speaker B: Corey, you didn't ask me for culture. That wasn't the question you asked me. However, I'm joking. I will say, when I looked this up, there is an episode of, like, a show, one investigation discovery about this couple. That's how bad this crime is, that they actually one of those shows where they do a reenactment and all that kind of stuff and talk about the most heinous couples that exist. They talked about this couple and what they did, and so it was like a real whoa moment of like and of course, these kinds of things with couples are always complicated. And you get your carla Homoka and Paul Bernardo are obviously like your gold standard of with. They sexually tortured multiple people and then killed her little sister. And it's always that thing like, well, was she influenced by him? Did she really want to do these things in that case? Absolutely she did, but she's out. She's living in Canada or whatever and living her life. And in this case, did she get. [01:18:57] Speaker A: A new name and a new name, Carla Hamulka? [01:19:00] Speaker B: Yeah, I think they did give her a new name, but everyone knew who she was. She's, like, so incredible. They made a movie about her with Laura Prepon and Misha Collins. She's way too famous. So there's a case, maybe of amongst some of them, although that was in the well, but, yeah, it was like, Sweet lord. I was like, oh, this poor woman who's been forgotten about on death row. And reading the crime, it was like. [01:19:32] Speaker A: I'm sure there are better ones. What's the cutoff point that you will not write to? What is that one crime that you are not going to put pen to paper? [01:19:43] Speaker B: I mean, that covers quite a bit right there. Rape and murder. What do you do beyond that? You've kind of covered the whole spectrum at that point. [01:19:53] Speaker A: I'd go down a bit, to be honest. I don't want to correspond with an armed thief. [01:19:58] Speaker B: Really? [01:19:59] Speaker A: Yeah. Not if they'd killed people indiscriminately. [01:20:03] Speaker B: My brother's an armed thief. [01:20:06] Speaker A: But no, people have died because of that. [01:20:08] Speaker B: No, sure, yeah. [01:20:09] Speaker A: If an armed thief had taken out 15 people and I would want to not talk to him. There are some, I guess some death row denizens I would quite like to talk to. [01:20:22] Speaker B: Yeah. See, this is kind of know when we talked about Taylor Shabism, how part of you felt like that was better than other serial killers who didn't enjoy it like she did. And I think yeah, it's kind of the way that you look at it as like, these you can interact with these people as a curiosity, but you don't want to have to empathize with them. You don't want to have exactly this, exactly feel anything for them. [01:20:50] Speaker A: And I've said this time and time again on the it must be said, getting rarer occasions that I do look at gore videos here and there, the repugnance response is still alive and well. I'm not just kind of watching I'm not getting a fucking chub on, if that's what right. [01:21:08] Speaker B: Exactly. But the curiosity does something for you intellectually or whatever, and yeah, I don't know that I necessarily would say even with all of this, I don't know if I'd say I would absolutely not write, like, her birthday is in two days, and I'm like, she's not going to get any mail. That bums me out because she's a person. And I think it's really hard for me to completely I know what you're saying, write that off. That people do heinous things, and yet I have a really hard time not thinking of someone and their feelings. [01:21:42] Speaker A: She is going to be killed for. [01:21:44] Speaker B: The thing she did and she's going to be killed. [01:21:48] Speaker A: Maybe a birthday card or a Christmas card isn't right. [01:21:51] Speaker B: At the end of the day, she is going to be murdered for this. So is it really can I not send her a birthday email? [01:22:01] Speaker A: Why don't we pick one each and we write a Christmas letter or card to an inmate. [01:22:07] Speaker B: Yes, I like that idea. I really do. I think we should do that. [01:22:11] Speaker A: Yeah. No, I mean, it good. [01:22:14] Speaker B: Okay. So that's an assignment we're giving ourselves. [01:22:17] Speaker A: The fact that I've told you about it now means you have to do it. [01:22:21] Speaker B: I will. You know I will. I'm the one who will sit here and have a sad over a murderer. It's much harder for you to get the wherewithal to do this than it is for me. Who. Yeah. I can get sad about anybody, really. If I think about hurt feelings, I get very sad. Yeah, I love this. Yeah. You're seeing me get, like, a little bit. But obviously neither of us are pro death penalty. We're talking about some real douchey people here. Although, listen, you introduced this and you told me you wanted to talk about bad people on death row, and you did. Two people who are not on death row. [01:23:02] Speaker A: Oh, listen, there are others. Do you want to, for instance, discuss Charles Edmund Cullen, who confirmed 29 kills with many, many hundreds more suspected during his career. Right. He's alive. He was born in the 1960s. He's still about he's on death row. He's fucking, I would consider to be a big hitter. Not as big for I would say, as Gary Leon ridgway. Yeah. He still draws breath. Because newspapers, being as brilliant as they are, he became known as the Green River Killer. And by the time of his arrest, I mean, he'd been busy since 82 to 80. 82 to 98. So he'd been at it for 16 years. [01:23:52] Speaker B: That sounds right. [01:23:54] Speaker A: Did I just get that right? [01:23:56] Speaker B: I mean, I think so, but don't rely on me for that. But that sounds right. [01:24:00] Speaker A: But listen, he was a frequent target a frequent targeter sorry. Of the homeless, of sex workers. And by the time they arrested his ass, he'd killed about 80 people. 88 too many people by far. [01:24:18] Speaker B: And he's still alive. [01:24:20] Speaker A: Yeah. But on death row. [01:24:23] Speaker B: Wild. Yeah. Write to Gary Ridge. I'm sure he's got plenty of people writing to him. I feel like it's got to be those forgotten folks. So you're going to actually because I feel like it's cheating if it's just like, oh, you're writing like fan mail almost to them, but find a dead almost like, who, you know, but nobody's thinking about posting actually will make them happy. [01:24:46] Speaker A: A famous director of the time who had nothing better to do than to reply to my quick message, which wouldn't have taken him a second. All you had to do was just go back to him and say, no, I think he sucks. Never going to happen. Or yes, I'm interested. Stay tuned. Talks might be happening, blah, blah, blah. He could have given me something. Apart from the fall of the House of Usher. [01:25:13] Speaker B: Anyways, on the other end of the spectrum, obviously, these people are shitty, and this is like a thing that we're constantly talking about is like, what do these people deserve and how do we deal with that kind of stuff and everything. We're a Brit and a more or less prison abolitionist over here. So obviously neither of us think that the death penalty is appropriate, regardless of whether you're Andrew Brevick or you're Lucy Ledby or whoever the case may be. And so I wanted to talk about a couple people on death row for heinous crimes who didn't do it. Because, you know, when it comes down to it, on the most basic level, this is an important reason why it. [01:25:59] Speaker A: Should it's why it can never exist, isn't it? [01:26:01] Speaker B: It can never exist because if anyone can be sentenced to a crime they didn't for a crime they didn't commit, then it's not safe to kill anyone. [01:26:13] Speaker A: It's one of a few reasons I can think of there shouldn't exist, but right. Yeah, it's up there. [01:26:18] Speaker B: There's plenty. But let's say you're not even, like, the humanitarian type or any of these kinds of moral reasons. I think we should all be able to agree that no one should be killed who didn't do what they were accused of. [01:26:30] Speaker A: No, sir. [01:26:30] Speaker B: And as long as that keeps happening, there is no ethical way to argue that the death penalty should exist, because it happens quite often while you're doing it. [01:26:37] Speaker A: Ask yourself the question, is killing wrong? [01:26:40] Speaker B: And that's a thing that people will go back and forth on from a moral standpoint, that's the thing a lot of people don't think it is. When I was going to Christian school, no, killing isn't wrong. Murder is, but killing isn't. And there's plenty of people you can kill, right? Someone who comes into your house and threatens to harm your family, you can absolutely kill them. You can kill an inmate on death row. They make that distinction. So morally, it's pretty much impossible to argue this, because there's going to be people you see that in your own country, where most people obviously have grown up without it, and don't think that it's a thing that there should be, but there's still plenty of people in the UK who are trying to argue that it should be brought back. [01:27:25] Speaker A: I don't know how seriously the poll was taken, but maybe two or three years back, a poll did the rounds of what percentage of Brits think that hanging should be reinstated. It was a high figure, but I don't know. I've got my doubts about the kind. [01:27:39] Speaker B: Of the methodology of that whole. Right. But so I just wanted to give a couple examples of heinous crimes that, taken at face value, we might think are worth killing someone for, but it turned out the people who went to jail for them didn't do it. So one of those was a guy called Clemente Aguirre Arquin. And in that case, in 2004, two women were found stabbed to death in their home and then the boyfriend of one of their roommates, who was not there, whose name was Samantha, came in and found their bodies later in that morning. So they'd been killed in the morning. He comes by because he's kind of come get some of Samantha's clothes and he finds the bodies of her two roommates, one of which had been stabbed to death 129 times and the other only twice. [01:28:32] Speaker A: Often, when I hear of a murder that has occurred with a stab count that high, I almost try acting it out. [01:28:40] Speaker B: Right? Yeah. How does fuck that's why they always call those, like, rage killings and stuff, of course, and we'll talk a bit about the junk science of all a lot of this stuff. But, yeah, it is stabbing someone 129 times when you're in your right mind incredible. You couldn't really do it. You kind of got to be in rage mode to do something like that, especially because the person's probably been dead for at least 120 of those. [01:29:08] Speaker A: Is that how it feels to chew for loco? Is that a joke? [01:29:11] Speaker B: Chew for loco? [01:29:13] Speaker A: It's not a chewing gum, is it? [01:29:15] Speaker B: No. [01:29:15] Speaker A: Okay, fine. Continue. [01:29:20] Speaker B: Was a caffeinated alcohol drink. Yeah. There's a reason you're not allowed to sell it. Anyways, a ten inch kitchen knife was found at the scene and Samantha said she had a terrible gut feeling that the murder had been committed by her neighbor, Clemente Aguirre. Harcane. And he worked in a nearby restaurant where a chef's knife had apparently gone missing. And he had knocked at the door that morning to see if they had any beer since he'd run out the night before. And when he got there, their door was unlocked and he saw the body or the bodies. So if you think later on, of course, there's evidence of Agiriakin's presence at the scene, he didn't deny that. He told them exactly what happened. The wounds were allegedly consistent with a chef's knife, like the one that had gone missing at his work. And a fingerprint expert said one of his prints was found on the knife. But according to Arquin, he had actually tried to revive. So, like, his footprints were everywhere, which if you were really trying not to show you murdered someone, you probably wouldn't leave bloody footprints all over the house. But he had gone in there and he had tried to do CPR. He picked up the knife because he was worried the killer was still there when he noticed that the house had been ransacked. So he was worried he had stumbled upon a murder in progress. But then he sort of cleaned off and he left because he was an undocumented immigrant and he knew that if he called the cops, that was going to be the end for him on multiple levels. At best, he gets deported and at worst, he's arrested for this murder, which he was. He was tried and he was sentenced to death for this. [01:31:03] Speaker A: How long did he spend? [01:31:05] Speaker B: I'm going to tell you that. [01:31:06] Speaker A: Thank you. [01:31:06] Speaker B: Good. But the wheel started to come off of this. The fingerprint expert was discredited because she had given a positive ID in a different case on a fingerprint. That other fingerprint experts were like, this is unreadable. There's literally no way you could recognize that this was somebody's fingerprint. DNA found at the scene excluded him, while Samantha's DNA was found all over the fucking place in areas consistent with her having done the crime. People also testified that Samantha admitted to the crime repeatedly and that she had been acting, frankly, shifty as fuck about the whole thing, including standing on her front lawn saying, I killed my mother and grandmother, or whatever. Red flag, red flag, big red flag. And they believed her when she was like, I have a bad feeling my neighbor did this. Like, are you kidding me? Right feeling? Yeah. She admitted to having a hot temper, but claimed, no, she didn't do this, even though she told many people she did. And finally, in 2018, after multiple appeals and finally being granted a retrial. The charges were dismissed abruptly by the prosecution and he was free. Twelve years on death row for a crime that was obviously Samantha's doing. Obviously. But it was easier to believe an immigrant with no motive did it. [01:32:33] Speaker A: Of course, we don't have the death penalty here. Right. But just within the last few months, a man has been released after 17 years jail, had his conviction of rape completely overturned because of DNA improvements, of course. And he did 17 motherfucking years in jail and not once did he fold or you know what I mean. I guess the only thing he had to hold on to was his innocence. [01:33:03] Speaker B: Right. I did not do this. [01:33:04] Speaker A: Right. Yeah. [01:33:05] Speaker B: Which speaks to probably one of the most famous cases of this, which was that of Cameron Todd Willingham. And to be fair, one of the reasons it's the most famous is because he's white. So obviously this drums up more sympathy when most people who are on death row are black and brown people. Hugely disproportionately. It is black and brown people who are on death row. But what he was accused of was heinous and being accused, convicted and killed for it when he most likely did not do it makes it all the worse. In December of 1991, the home he shared with his wife and three daughters in Corsicana, Texas, went up in flames. While he was able to get out of the home with his life, his children were not so lucky. His wife had been out shopping at the time and also escaped the blaze. Willingham claimed that he attempted to save the kids, but prosecutors didn't believe him. They said evidence pointed to his having set the fire himself, likely to cover up evidence of child abuse. And the case is basically a classic instance of TV justice, where the forensic methods were used as if they were totally solid. But they are what many have referred to as folklore. Just complete junk science. Yeah. Completely discredited. So they found pools in various places on the floor that they said showed a liquid accelerant was used, and in multiple places around the house, which would mean that it was intentionally set. Yes, of course. A forensic psychologist claimed that Willingham having a tattoo of a skull and serpent meant that he fit the profile of a sociopath. And two other medical experts confirmed that that was true. [01:34:50] Speaker A: Well, so do I. Yeah, exactly. [01:34:56] Speaker B: Similarly, Iron Maiden and Led Zeppelin posters in his possession were used as evidence that he had violent tendencies because of their imagery. This is the 90s, by the way. We're not talking about the peak satanic panic. A jailhouse informant claimed Willingham told him he set the fire to cover up an injury on one of the girls and that he was trying to make it look like the girls were playing with fire and accidentally burned the house down. Witnesses said he acted. Strangely moving his car away from the fire, refusing to go back inside to get the kids, and being surprisingly light hearted. Despite the situation, he had a criminal past, which did include at least one incident of domestic violence, and that contributed to the idea that he was a violent sociopath beyond rehabilitation. But while no one would argue he was a perfect guy, this was a lot of grasping at straws. They had claimed he clearly hadn't tried to help and had just fled before the fire because they found no smoke inhalation. But hair on his chest, head and eyelids were all singed. He had a two inch burn on his shoulders and his wrists and hands were blackened by smoke. There were no injuries to the bodies of any of the children, which should have disproved the jailhouse informant, who also admitted he was bipolar and probably misremembered. Later, he admitted that he'd lied and it was found that he'd been offered a deal for his testimony, even though the prosecutors had claimed in court that he had not been given a deal. I don't think I have to tell you, obviously, of all people, that snake and skull tattoos and heavy metal posters are not indicators of sociopathy. [01:36:35] Speaker A: I do not believe that they are. [01:36:37] Speaker B: I don't think that's true. Otherwise we're in trouble. Further, his former probation officer said that not only was he not sociopathic, he had been, quote, one of my favorite kids, calling him polite and caring and the pooling on the floor labeled poor Patterns that proved he set fire with a liquid accelerant, completely discredited by later forensic science. Those patterns are now known as flashover and are a very normal and natural thing that happens in a fire. As the Innocence Project spent years fighting his death sentences, which he received because he refused to plead guilty to murdering his children, texas Governor Rick Perry steadfastly refused to stop or delay the execution. And this was largely because he believed that Willingham had tried to beat his wife into an abortion. And Rick Perry is famously anti choice. So there really was nothing Willingham could have done to change the mind of a man who already thought like, well, this is the worst. He tried to force an abortion. Like, not only is abortion wrong, but he tried to beat his wife into having one, which didn't happen, by the way. That wasn't a thing he did. But that's what Rick Perry believed. So it really wasn't even about the crime. It was about the fact that Rick Perry was like, he's scum, so there's nothing he could do to change his mind. And Perry was shown evidence about the poor patterns before Willingham was executed and was unmoved by it denying him a pardon. So now it's pretty much accepted that Willingham had nothing to do with the deaths of his kids, but in February of 2004, they killed him for it anyway. Thoughts? [01:38:17] Speaker A: No, I don't really have any that I would have I would have difficulty articulating. [01:38:23] Speaker B: Yeah, just the look on your face said everything, but unfortunately not a visual medium. [01:38:31] Speaker A: That really does take the A out of one, doesn't it? [01:38:36] Speaker B: Right, exactly. I mean, it's such an egregious case. And of course there's always reasonable doubt. Maybe he did and all of these things are whatever this is all coincidence and he still did it, but everything we know points to the fact that he didn't and that we can't know that there's that much uncertainty about it means this just simply shouldn't exist on that. [01:39:04] Speaker A: We agree to do that. [01:39:05] Speaker B: Yeah, absolutely. Whatever else our nuanced ideas about all of this are, I think that's something that we can agree upon. And I think that's interesting. Like someone like him, we may not have a whole bunch of murderers that we all know their names of now, but people know his story at this point. [01:39:25] Speaker A: Now, do you know what I think we should do next week? [01:39:29] Speaker B: What do you think we should do? [01:39:31] Speaker A: You know, I've had this idea bubbling away where we do a negative episode of Jackable Graves. I'll leave that there. I'll let you think about it. And that's what I think we should do. [01:39:43] Speaker B: Yeah. We're not doing that, though, so we just move on. [01:39:48] Speaker A: We're just not doing it. [01:39:50] Speaker B: What? The silent episode of oh, no. I see what you mean when you say the nega episode. I got you the episode where we. [01:39:57] Speaker A: Talk about fun things where people don't die. [01:39:59] Speaker B: Right? Yes. Which is I mean, just last week. [01:40:07] Speaker A: I suggested after talking a lot about performance art lately, right. I suggested to Corey that we do and fuck off, because I still want to do it, we do a Jack of all graves where we where we say nothing. [01:40:29] Speaker B: Yeah, and I thought that was what you were referring to. Which we're not. At least for now, we're not doing. [01:40:34] Speaker A: Not can we do that as a snackable graveswombers? [01:40:37] Speaker B: Can we do we'll think on that or just leave? [01:40:40] Speaker A: I'll do it. Okay. Fucking do it. [01:40:43] Speaker B: Okay. So, yes, the idea of a happy Jackisode is great. And in fact, someone I wish I could remember who it was, but posted in our Facebook group last week, like you guys do, a lot of people who have come upon really bad luck. Here's a video of a bunch of people coming. [01:41:02] Speaker A: Exactly. [01:41:03] Speaker B: And it was great. [01:41:05] Speaker A: It was. It was fantastic. I think there's an episode in that the unusual, the uncanny, the strange, the weird, but. [01:41:13] Speaker B: You know, things went well like that. Listen, it's the Thanksgiving season. Why not? [01:41:18] Speaker A: Exactly. What better way? [01:41:21] Speaker B: Yeah. So next week, friends, let's talk about some good stuff. [01:41:24] Speaker A: Yeah. Until we do that, there's something people have to be doing for us, isn't it? [01:41:31] Speaker B: There is. And I believe they must stay spooky. Spooky.